The Darkness Sword rested in Lian’s palm, and a heavy storm of pressure blew out from the blade. Lian shot it a winter-cold glare; the unruly steel went quiet, like a hound cowed by its master.

She glanced at D. Since the draw, his face had curdled—the look you wear when the wild meets its natural predator.

"Why… does that sword make me feel crushed?" D’s gaze stuck to the blade, wary as a stag in torchlight. An ancestral dread rolled off it, a bloodline pressure. But a sword can’t be a vampire, right?

Lian wasn’t about to trade banter or plant a death flag; that’s what fools do when the wind screams change.

She raised the Darkness Sword, sighted the staircase that caged her, and chopped down like thunder splitting a tree.

She fed it no magic, yet the Darkness Sword threw a terrifying arc of slash-qi, black as moonless surf.

The arc met the stairs. What could withstand Lian’s sorcery a moment ago shattered now, collapsing like dry shale under a mountain flood.

"What! Impossible!" D stared, shock freezing him like frost on steel. His power, until now, had never failed.

Lian blinked, surprised too. She felt no monstrous gift in this blade, no runes or glow. Yet it broke what her spells could not. A quiet paradox, glinting like a hidden blade.

"Yare yare—looks like this sword’s not simple." Her voice rolled like a lazy wave, but her eyes watched like a hawk at dusk.

From past fights, maybe this blade counters D’s kind, a natural bane. But… how did Mr. Qin and his crew forge a thing like this, out of night and breath?

She shook off stray thoughts like ash from sleeves and let her focus settle, still as lake water before a storm.

"Hey, Mr. D—let’s keep playing. Perfect chance for me to learn this sword’s mood."

D clicked his tongue, annoyance sharp as grit. He struck a flamboyant JoJo pose, body cutting angles like statues in torchlight, then shouted:

"Stair Guardian!"

A gray figure slipped from behind D like smoke from a kiln. It stood two meters tall, dressed in stone clothes like a cliff wearing armor. Staircase earrings dangled from its lobes, tiny steps chiming like cold bells. Its left hand gripped a spiral stair, winding like a conch shell. Its right held a Möbius stair, a loop that returns you to the first breath. An X-shaped stair crossed its back like bound bridges. The whole thing was a man made of stairs, a labyrinth walking on two legs.

Only the god’s-eye view could see it. Lian wasn’t a Stand user; to her, D just struck a sexy pose and yelled, and the air stayed bare. But she knew JoJo; she knew he’d called his Stand from the shadow between heartbeats.

D raised his right hand, index and middle finger out like a finger-gun, pointed straight at Lian, the gesture taut as a drawn bow.

"Infinite Stairs!"

The words fell, and Lian felt the world blur, like ink bleeding in rain. In a few breaths, she stood inside a ringed stair. Walls pressed close on every side, a stone throat swallowing light. She couldn’t pin her location, couldn’t anchor a teleport—no sky, no map, just steps spiraling like a trapped wind.

No doubt about it. The only move now was to climb this stair with no horizon. Annoying as grit in a tooth, but that’s the road.

Tap… tap… tap.

Her footsteps drummed through the narrow shaft, echoing like a woodpecker on bone. She didn’t know how long she’d walked; time felt like fog. As for Aer and the others getting ambushed—please. Two little terrors with half a cheat sit there like twin storm fronts; it won’t be that easy. Hm? Why only half a cheat? Isn’t it obvious—Lian (Ling) is the only one running the full cheat.

"I’m done!" The boredom gnawed like mice in a granary. Repeating “climb the stair, climb the stair,” like a forum echo bot, rattled her restless bones. Motivation fell flat, and she slid down the wall and sat, a cat curling on cold stone.

She idly scratched the wall with the Darkness Sword. She carved childish curses like “Aer is a big dummy,” again and again. It felt like rain writing the same word on glass.

Tap…

After a dozen dummies, her ears finally caught a thread-fine sound, footfalls maybe, a ripple in the hush. That didn’t matter. What mattered was hope, flickering like a firefly in a sealed jar.

She sprang up, heart quick as drumbeats, and ran forward on big, eager strides.

Bang!

After only a few steps, the girl smacked into something invisible, a transparent wall, hard as cold air frozen solid.

She rubbed her reddened little nose, frustration sparking like flint, then slapped the unseen thing with her palm.

Smack!

Huh?

The feel was wrong. Not smooth like a space barrier—uneven, ridged, like bark under snow.

She traced it with her fingers, reading braille in the dark. By touch alone, she could make out a human leg… a human leg!

Deet deet deet.

Spider-sense—no, loli-sense—prickled with malice. A bad premonition surged like a black tide.

Lian hopped back. A huge pit tore open where she’d stood, the floor collapsing like sand under a wave. On the ceiling, D hung upside-down like a bat, eyes on Lian, a thin sneer cutting his mouth. A staircase bloomed on the ceiling from nowhere, and D, head-first, still walked it like a gentleman going down to hell.

Lian watched him leave and held her strike. She’d pieced it together: she’d crashed into D’s Stand. Judging by that one blow, its strength wasn’t small—more than enough to scuff her skin, to draw a whisper of red.

Since he dared to attack first, the real fight starts now. The drumbeat begins.

Her smile bloomed, bright as a blade. From the first bell, this fight was never fair; no matter what D tries, he can’t truly hurt her. But that flash of danger—that sweet, sharp edge—gave her joy. For battle, that’s enough. Joy is the wine.

The Darkness Sword whipped through empty air, casting a black arc that scratched the wall like a raven’s wing. A blood-red glint awakened in Lian’s eyes—the Yokai blood boiling like a kettle in winter.

"Come on—delight me to the fullest." Her voice rang like silver on stone, hungry for the dance.