Their goal was sharp as a drawn blade: purge the bugs. The snag now—where do they even start, with time sliding off like rain from eaves?

Hmph! I should’ve asked that guy where he hunts bugs. Now we’ll waste time, like sand bleeding through a cracked hourglass.

She kicked the wall, a little foot stamping a plum-blossom print on the chalky surface. The sting didn’t drain her mood; it swelled like storm tide.

Alicia didn’t stop the tantrum. Her palm settled on Ling’s head like a cool breeze over summer reeds, easing the twitching temper.

Look, complaining won’t fix a fallen leaf. It’s over. Even if you chase them now, you’ll find only wind. Save your strength and search slow.

Thud!

She kicked again, then yanked her small foot free from the dented plaster, pride flaring like a cat arching under moonlight. She quit the wall.

All right, all right. I know wasted time tastes bitter. This place isn’t big. If we fail, I’ll write my name backward forever, sky as witness.

Comfort somehow turned into a crooked bet. Still, Alicia’s worry clung like morning mist; that softness was kind of cute.

Since you put it like that, I’ll—

Drip…

Both went still, like herons freezing at ripples. Their Yokai ears pricked, catching the water-note through dark air.

Ling…

Mm. It’s over there. Let’s move, quiet as dusk.

No more talk. They held their breath like divers. Fingers laced, they flowed toward the sound and stopped before a shut door.

Drip…

Sis, the sound’s from here. Do we go in, or wait like stones?

Alicia’s lips curved like a crescent blade. Her hand rested on the cold door, frost-clear and calm.

This was our goal from the first step. Why hesitate when the river already runs downhill?

She pushed. The door yielded like wet bark, and darkness poured out, a room with no stars, no lamps, only thick night.

Ling, give me a flashlight.

Dummy sis, I’m not a flashlight!

She hmph’d like a sparrow flicking its tail. Between five fingers, tiny mana orbs danced like fireflies. She flicked them. They scattered, lighting the room.

The first sight snagged them like hooks: a giant bulk at center, veiled in heavy cloth. A long horn peaked beneath. Massive arms hung at a tilted angle.

While Ling measured the silhouette like a hunter sizing a stag, Alicia walked straight under the shrouded shape, trap-be-damned, and grabbed the curtain’s hem.

She tugged, but from that angle the cloth held like sailcloth in a stubborn gale. Alicia’s pull was only a breeze.

Ling, help!

Ugh… fine.

She sighed inside; her sister’s curiosity was a wildfire eating dry grass. Even so, she stepped forward, strength coiled like a spring.

Ling’s power wasn’t human. Alicia, still a fresh Yokai, couldn’t match that mountain-weight. Ling seized the cloth, fingers biting like iron.

The fabric tore from the horn’s tip, a rip that split like lightning. Inertia flung both halves aside, and the beast beneath stood revealed.

What is this, a ram-headed brute?

He fit the monster mold too well. Two goat horns crowned his skull; one was shattered, a jagged half-moon. His face was pure ram.

His frame was gargantuan, easily ten meters, a cliff of meat. The mismatch—his torso carried a ridiculous, literal 128-pack, stones stacked absurdly neat.

Four iron chains shackled his limbs, heavy as fallen anchors. A collar chained his neck, limiting motion like a post pins a ox.

No patch of skin was whole. Scars laced him like dry riverbeds, cracks and bruises bloomed like storm lilies. Through his chest, a black pipe speared.

Even so, the ram breathed, faint as wind through reeds. His chest rose, barely, like a quiet tide. Ling trusted her body’s reading.

Living through that level of hurt—pain must gnaw like winter wolves. Her heart pinched first; action followed like rain after thunder.

Well… since we met, I’ll lift that pain from you, like taking a thorn from a paw.

She wouldn’t end him to grant peace. Ling remembered who she was—a top-tier healer, milk-sweet and steel steady.

Healing Sigil: Perfect Restoration!

Natural mana gathered in her hands, two soft spheres swelling like springwater globes. These weren’t attack orbs; they were pure Perfect Restoration.

Once the orbs matched his scale, Ling tossed them. They kissed the ram’s hide and burst, droplets scattering like a warm rain.

A green film bloomed over his body, luminous as young leaves. Muscles knitted like weaving vines. Wounds closed like lips over secrets.

Missing flesh regrew with haste, shoots from stumps, life rushing back like a river breaking ice.