Looks like I did alright, like dust settling after a storm.

I let a portion of my soul sink into the Ocean of Darkness and go quiet, like a hollow left by a pulled tooth. The Demonfolk play souls like lutes; I left no snag for Stini to catch, so she should be drowning in guilt like a stone in deep water.

I feel a weary relief; since Stini recognized her death-wish was wrong today, maybe she won’t make me drag nets through her mess like this again.

I need to tell Stini her naive choices breed tragedy, like paper boats facing a flood. Tell her her salvation is a tower built on pride.

After this, she should sit still at the peace conference, like dust after rain.

Still, a favor owed is a fire to be banked; you sell kindness like warmth in winter.

Yesterday, Nivifar almost cut me in half with one stroke, like a guillotine on silk. My body hasn’t fully healed; a half-new heart can’t fuel full power, like a weak pump in a storm.

I’m calm; I won’t fight with flesh today. I check the flow of mana; it courses like rivers through canals. My circuits roar, like thunder under skin.

Most crucial, my mana’s topped off; in my tactical pocket sit three vials of HolyWater tuned for mana, like moonlight corked in glass. Enough to finish the job.

Probably. Maybe twenty minutes can end this fight, like a candle burning down.

It feels shaky, like a bridge in wind. This is Nivifar’s home turf.

I look up at the décor—twists no human would imagine in a hundred ages. Human candles, bone candelabras, hanging corpse-shapes, a broken beauty like wilted flowers in a crypt.

To ordinary eyes it’s absurd and terrifying, like a carnival in a graveyard. This wasn’t built by people; it’s the town center warped into a palace.

After Nivifar gained a slice of rank-authority domain, she kneaded reality like clay and raised this hall from nothing.

This doesn’t feel like Nivifar’s taste either. So...

“You’re still alive, Andor.”

From the warped palace doors, Nivifar steps in and speaks with plain surprise, like a girl noticing rain. No venom, no miasma—just simple astonishment.

I shouldn’t have lived. Princess Golia said when they found me, I was already in two pieces, like a felled tree. Thanks to the undying trait of the Endless Demon King Andreas, I clung to one last breath like a leaf in frost and got pulled back.

“Just like Stini said—you crawled up from the death domain to save her. It’s funny. It makes me jealous.”

Against my expectations, Nivifar sees the empty altar and me waiting, and only gives a light glance, like a cat at a quiet window. No rage, no lost composure. Her calm regret makes me pause like a hand over a pond.

She’s mellow, tranquil, faintly wistful, like dusk over water. If not for the black lacquered skin and the crown on her head—an artifact of the rank-authority domain, “Levy”—I’d mistake her for a woman as still as a lake.

It feels like what she did was routine—done well, no joy; done poorly, no care—like stamping papers in a cold office.

Odd.

“Strange. Yesterday when you fell into demonhood, you were feral—like a possessive lover who’d cut off a sweetheart’s head and kiss it.”

“Ha. Andor, your trash talk is as fun as always,” she laughs, bright as bells over a grave.

“Then come back,” I say, hope tightening like a bowstring. “Since it’s fun, come back. We can be like before.” I reach out a hand like a bridge over a ravine.

“That’s impossible.” Nivifar smiles and shakes her head, every word carrying a buried sadness like ash under snow. “No one returns to the past. That’s the doctrine of the god of time, Tim. What’s destroyed won’t come again. Even if we regret, even if it hurts, we can only walk forward and find new things.”

“What do you plan to do, then?”

“Join me,” she says, voice like silk over steel. “Not Stini—choose me. Whatever Stini promised—money, power, fame—I’ll give you better. Look at my body—better than Stini’s flat board, right? Or do you like her childlike frame?”

She runs a hand over her chest and lower belly, then leans into a sensual pose, like a blade curving to a smile. Black runes wrap her skin like living ink; aside from that, she wears nothing.

It’s not just the pose that boils blood; her form carries a strange spell, an eye-snaring charm, like a rare flower that stings.

It even looks like some parts are swollen—okay, joking; this isn’t heat-season. I keep my mind cool like night wind.

“Your figure’s too perfect; I can’t handle it. I’m afraid I’d be drained dry like a river in drought.”

“Is that so? What a shame...” she says, airy as mist.

She flicks a glance toward the Shadow where Stini hides, barely there, then shrugs and smiles, bright as knives catching light.

“What’s so good about Stini? Why does she always get approved?”

Her smile greets me, but a chill slides down my spine like ice water. Maybe these are our last words before steel speaks.

I feel the knot tighten; after I answer, we’ll have to fight. That’s the taste in the air, like iron.

“I really don’t get it. Where am I lacking?”

If the devils hadn’t sworn over and over they could persuade Nivifar back onto the path—and devils are famous for never lying—I wouldn’t dare try to win her with words, like throwing seeds into winter.

No help for it; language is scant, like thin cloth in rain. I rarely gamble the future on a mouth.

“Maybe it’s the pursuit itself,” I say, watching her like a hawk. “You chase and never catch. Stini just does what she believes is right. She doesn’t invite; we’re pulled in by her purity, like resonance between heroes... no, like moths to a flame.”

“Her? Pure?” Nivifar tilts her head, puzzled like a bird at glass.

“Yeah, pure.” I nod, steady as a drumbeat. “She invades men’s baths, trips like a creep, reads smut—like any girl with desires—but at her core she’s transcendently pure. You could call her a saint.”

“Don’t get it.”

“She’s a fool who instinctively holds to the righteous act, like a reed bending with the wind yet never breaking. Just that.”

“Sounds simple. If I pretend, I can do it—just fight for others, right?”

“But no one really carries that simple thing to the end, like walking to the horizon. You want a final answer, but I’ll say it plain: you’re different. In any field, you can’t beat Stini.”

“Is that so?”

“It is.”

“Anything else to say?”

“Yeah. Will you listen?”

“I want to... but I’m not in the mood,” she says, like a cloud refusing rain.

“Talk while we fight?”

“Mm, yes. Words only sink in when steel pierces flesh; we’re fools like that,” Nivifar says, and black breath leaks from her lips—dark as abyssal tides—the scent of the deepest Ocean of Darkness, the domain’s aura.

“And you?” I ask, heart steady as a drum. “Anything you want to say, Nivifar? I’ll wait.”

“Thank you for listening.” Her smile is tear-bright, and under her face something stirs, like yesterday’s prelude to madness.

“Not choosing me—too bad. For me, that’s what it is.”

“Anything else?”

“No.”

“Then we should start, right?”

“Only this left undone. Let’s begin.” Her voice is light, reluctant, sad, with a touch of lament, like a farewell at dusk. I wonder if she even wants this fight; but if I go soft, the board is fatal.

“Alright. Let’s clash. I’ll convince you to turn back before you kill me,” I say, as bold as a trumpet—also for Stini listening in the Shadow.

“Really?”

Her reaction is lukewarm, like tepid tea.

“Then your goal already failed.”

She’s holding a heart—fresh, wet, twitching stubbornly once or twice like a fish on a hook.

The left half looks more tender, like newly grown flesh, stark against the right half like dawn against dusk.

Nivifar licks the meat, then takes a light bite; blood splatters her face like red rain, sharpening her wicked charm.

Pain spears my chest; I grab at it, and on the left I find only a hollow, like a missing stone in a wall.

“Too bad. Even you didn’t choose me. Too bad for me; I gave so much and got nothing.”

Her voice carries a trace of sorrow, like a thin cloud over sun.

But just as she said—only “too bad,” and nothing more.