Uncertainty pressed like cold fog; Ling didn't know what to do.

Between them lay a still pond; Ling stood still, and Ban stood still.

Ban's stillness was a mirror; he was copying her, mind stuck at mimicry.

Ling froze for a reason, hunting a one-stroke answer, like cutting a knot with one blade.

Charging blind to bash the Skeleton would be foolish, like running into a storm without a coat.

Their standoff was frost on glass.

If Ban revived again, his wits would thaw; he wouldn't grant her this quiet.

So the best path was a strike that denied rebirth, like salting the earth.

But how do you land that strike? A question hung like a suspended blade.

Forget the brainless hammer; aim for a weak point, a chink in the bones that kills the cycle.

But this big thing was only a frame of bones—did it even have a weak point, a seam in the ivory?

Her gaze drifted over Ban like a lantern's sweep.

Ember-red pupils; a mouth sealed like a tomb; the crown of the skull.

She checked every place a secret might hide, yet nothing stood out.

He was plain as the other Skeletons, a pebble among pebbles.

She was about to abandon the hunt.

Her sea-green eyes pinned his ribcage.

There, a char-black something pulsed like a moth.

Humans track motion first; Ling, not human yet no different, felt her eyes snag like a fishhook.

The carcass was still as midnight.

In its chest, that tiny thing beat—black on black yet bright as a coal.

Ling's sight was sharp as a hawk.

The little object drifted up and down between ribs, a dark bead on a thread.

It was a flute, half charred, a flute Ban once clenched like a lifeline.

Her thoughts flashed like sparks; the flute tied to his berserk form had to be the weak point.

With a target marked like a painted bullseye, the how became simple.

She spread her arms into a cross, like a scarecrow in a windless field.

A second later, Ban crossed his arms the same.

Seeing him obediently mirror her, her smile lifted like a crescent moon.

Bow—like a bowstring drawing.

0.1 s.

Sprint—like an arrow loosed.

0.4 s.

Rise to the Skeleton's waist, hand out to catch the flute like a fish.

0.6 s.

Yank it free from the ribs, fall with chips of bone like snow.

0.7 s.

Snap back, return to position like a shadow recoiling.

1.0 s.

The whole maneuver flowed like cloud and water; one second and the trouble was cut clean.

Ban seemed not to notice the theft; he lunged at her, copying her like a wind-up puppet.

He had form but no marrow.

In practice, he couldn't match Ling, a reed chasing a hawk.

Why? Because of his build, brittle as kiln-dried straw.

A Skeleton's cheap frame can't rival Ling's tempered steel.

Look at him now—he's "sprinting," but his speed is a snail on stone.

Ling let the snail charge; her eyes dropped to the flute, weighing it like a pebble in her palm.

How to put this?

The flute looked ordinary—no, shabby.

It was a roadside trinket, chipped like bark.

Shoddy and uneven, the holes were poked like random pinpricks.

They weren't the clean circles they should be.

Its half-charred skin told of the Magic Cannon's heat, a scorch like wildfire.

Yet being only half burned meant Ban had shielded it.

Even while dying, he guarded the flute like a flame in cupped hands.

He was blackened head to toe like charcoal, while the flute was only half ash.

That contrast rang like a bell.

So its importance blazed; the guess that it was a key item felt solid as stone.

Sure, it could be some cherished trinket to a Skeleton, a token of meaning guarded to the grave.

But that's a thin reed; once you're bones, a "girlfriend gift" is grave-cold fantasy.

Off-topic—fine, let it drift like smoke.

Bottom line: this thing was likely a way to erase the big guy for good.

If an "accident" happens, she'll just solve it the violent way, like breaking ice with a hammer.

Her thoughts ran wild like nettles, and then a vast shadow fell, eclipsing her own.

No need to look up; a hulking figure loomed three meters away, a stormcloud at the doorstep.

Head still bowed, she gripped the flute's other end, hands like clamps on a twig.

Bye-bye.

She murmured, and her wrists turned like grinding mills—left counterclockwise, right clockwise.

Crack.

Bones are fragile; a child could snap them like twigs—so what about Ling?

The flute split in two, and the Skeleton before her shattered like glass.

The flute broke into halves.

The Skeleton broke completely, becoming white dust in a blink, a burst of frost.

Momentum sent the dust outward, fluff swirling to the sides instead of dusting her crown.

A little still fell on her head—ash descended like rain, a rain of bone.

In this bleak room, ghost-light caught each mote, shaping eerie beauty like fireflies in fog.

Beneath that ash-fall, the small figure kept staring at the snapped flute, thoughts drifting like leaves on water.