“I’ve got a question.”

“Ask.”

Lucimia opened her eyes, heavy as storm clouds over a sea. “If she has the Temporal Authority, why not return to the First Era and handle it herself? I remember the First Era began with her burning everything to seal the world’s Dark Deities. After that, she survived by parasitizing with her Soul Authority, and the world turned into a slow breach while she plotted a final expulsion.”

“Rewinding to the first stage isn’t really possible; even if she went back, it’d just be resealing,” she went on, voice like a blade through mist. “So let’s talk about the second picture. Why not Reversion to the past, take all her lessons, and reinvest them in her own descendants? Why obsess over me alone, like an arrow fixed on one target?”

“Simple,” Auril answered, his tone flat as winter ice. “They all died to Purification. Purified means erased, nothing left. Go back, and it’s a wasteland; time can’t grow flowers from ash. Time isn’t omnipotent—Olivya said that. And another thing, Lucimia—Olivya herself is dead; she clings to life by soul alone.”

“So you’re saying that if I use time to Revert, I still can’t bring Yuna back. And because I can’t bring her back, I’ll turn my blade on the Dark Deity?”

“I don’t know,” he said, like a wind that won’t change course. “I don’t understand the Temporal Authority.”

“…Hah.”

Silence fell around Lucimia like drifting snow.

It was too much and too cold; the tide of it numbed her skin. You’re telling her now that Yuna is false, that Rexi is false, that even feeling is a painted mask?

Elyssus once stood with Olivya’s camp. Nirael guided her hand. All of it to craft a being against the Dark Deity, like a forge hammering a single sword.

At least Desty was real…

But even Desty seemed beyond saving now, like a candle pinched out by night wind.

Grief hit first, a bruise under the ribs. Then anger, hot and red. Then helplessness, heavy as wet sand. Her head went light, the room tilting like a ship on black water.

For a breath, she couldn’t find the point of moving forward.

Is Yuna real?

She thought yes—and no. The original Yuna was gone; that was stone fact. But the Yuna she knew now was a new Yuna, like Rexi reborn in fresh dawn; that too was fact.

And together they had woven new memories, like threads catching sunlight.

“You’re all insane,” Lucimia said, voice cold as frost on iron. “More like Dark Deities than the Dark Deity.”

“Only a Dark Deity can defeat a Dark Deity… Lucimia,” Auril murmured, words falling like dusk.

Maybe it was the weight of what she’d seen, but Lucimia didn’t break. She drew two deep breaths, steady as tides, and changed the subject. “You said me learning Yuna’s parents would disrupt your plan. Now that I know your plan, I still don’t see why that fact matters. You’re her father. You sacrificed your daughter. I understand that. All I feel is absurdity, like a stage play in a storm. I can’t see why it changes anything.”

As her words dropped like stones into a still pond, the longsword sigil on the back of her hand flared like a cold moon. A stream of energy fell before her, and Auril’s figure surfaced from it like a man walking up out of fog.

The same austere face, chiseled by wind. Hair gone winter-white, with a few strands still holding cherry pink.

“Because I’m close to losing control,” he said, each syllable a nail into wood. “Once I tip over, even time won’t pull me back. You won’t save Yuna. You won’t save me. You won’t reunite Yuna’s family. The only thing left is for you to kill me and swallow my Authority Power.”

“But there’s another path,” he added, voice low as a grave. “Suicide. Olivya worries that once you know the truth, the weight will snap you. In this plan, if you willingly give up your life, the plan fails. Olivya’s soul state can’t last long. After you die, she could possess you, but the remaining energy won’t be enough to face the rest of the Dark Deities.”

Auril laid everything bare, like clearing snow off a stone stair. Lucimia knew why.

He’d judged she wasn’t the former one’s avenger. She was wary, a lantern that walks toward every shadow. Better to tell her all and show the whole terrain than hide it and let her dig.

Lucimia stood quiet a moment, breath steady as a held string. “I don’t believe it.”

“What?”

“I don’t believe the Temporal Authority can’t bring Yuna back,” she said, eyes like flint. “I think this is your rhetoric, bait to herd me into your plan. You don’t understand the Temporal Authority. What if Olivya lied to you, too?”

“…,” Auril fell silent, a pause like frost. Then he found words again. “If the Temporal Authority could save her, I don’t think Olivya would have come this far. She’d have kept trying, herself, again and again.”

“I’m not listening. I don’t believe it,” Lucimia said, shaking her head like a bough shedding rain. “If I don’t see it with my own eyes, I won’t believe any of it.”

“You—” Auril stared, thunderstruck. He realized Lucimia had let go of logic and chosen the softer lie of the heart, like turning into a warm current in winter.

It was simple as a straight road. If the Temporal Authority could save Yuna, Olivya didn’t need this labyrinth; she could simply act. She didn’t. The meaning was plain as daylight. Lucimia ignored that bright line.

“I’ve said all I can,” he finished, voice worn like old stone. “The choice is yours. I hope you finish the plan to expel the Dark Deity, so people in this world can live under clear skies.”

“…I don’t believe it,” Lucimia said again, steady as a drumbeat. “I’m going to a Duel. I need the Temporal Authority to see for myself.”

She stopped looking at Auril. In a blink, she cast Teleportation Magic, and the world folded like paper.

She appeared beside Rexi.

Rexi, engrossed in a grimoire, jolted like a cat splashed with water. She yelped, chair tipping backward, air rushing like a dropped stone.

Lucimia moved first, fast as a hawk, and caught her.

“Whoa, scared me to death,” Rexi gasped, hand to chest, breath fluttering like a sparrow. “Why’d you pop out of nowhere? Weren’t we not supposed to use magic? Won’t it attract trouble?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Lucimia said, voice clipped, wind through pines. “Let’s go find Anliena.”

“Huh? You finished the first task?”

“Finished.”

She gave three simple words, flat as slate, then strode for the library’s front desk.

Rexi heard the iron in her tone and felt the weather in her gait; something was wrong, storm-dark. She asked nothing, snapped her book shut, and hurried after her like a small shadow.

“Uh, h-hello, can I help you?” the receptionist stammered, watching Lucimia approach like a wave rolling through a doorway.

She’d seen the Teleportation Magic. That kind of spell was a comet across an empty sky. The black-haired girl before her had to be terrifyingly strong.

“Do you know Anliena?”

“Yes, she’s a professor at our academy…” the receptionist blurted, words tumbling like pebbles.

“Call her here, or take me to her.”

“Um…”

Lucimia’s brow creased, a line cut into stone. “Forget it. Rexi.”

“Ah?” Rexi reached the desk just as Lucimia called. “What’s up?”

Lucimia patted her shoulder, then glanced at the receptionist. “Help me find where Anliena is.”

“Got it!” Rexi caught the cue. She snapped her fingers, a spark in dry grass.

In a single heartbeat, she skimmed the receptionist’s memories like a swallow skimming a lake. Then she shared what she’d pulled with Lucimia, a clean handoff of light.

“Got it. Let’s go,” Lucimia said, already turning for the door.

“Okay. Are you planning to cooperate?” Rexi asked, trotting to keep up, breath chasing her heels.

“Let’s see first.”

“Eh?”

Lucimia took Rexi’s arm. The next moment, they shot skyward like arrows loosed from a bow.

“W-wahhh—” Rexi screamed, fear of heights knocking her voice into shards as the ground fell away like a dropped map.