“Wait. You—hold it!”

Stini yanked Parrotti back, her shout cracking the air like a thrown brick through glass.

“Cassio just now—he really meant to kill Andor!”

A cold knot twisted in my chest, like frost on iron. “He did.”

“It’s fine, Stini. The two before him planned to kill me too—if I’d hesitated.”

I cut Parrotti off with a palm, a flat blade in the air. “Mouth shut. Lead.”

“What do you mean?”

“How many truth spells do you people have?”

“Plenty. The Aerian Gift of True Speech, the elves’ Words of Truth, the beastkin Judgment Guillotine… a whole armory. What’s that to them wanting you dead?”

“It means this: at the start, Parrotti already confirmed we truly came to save Raven. You saw Nagash fight. An Arcane Engineer can borrow other races’ magic with arcane components.”

I could feel it even now, like pricks of ice on the skin. Parrotti threw more than ten truth spells at me in that first talk.

“But he didn’t know if we’d hold that intent to the end.”

Heat rose, then steadied, like a coal cupped in both hands. “I don’t get it.”

“I said, ‘We stand for the Hero, and we can guarantee she lives.’ That wasn’t a lie. Its shadow is this: if we sell Raven out, she dies for sure.”

“How could we ever… You’re saying Parrotti doubts us?”

“Good will curdles fast, like milk in sun. Once we walk out, the Heretic Inquisition will grill us as heretics’ allies. One slip, one crack under torture—Raven dies.”

“Ah. So you killed them also…”

“To turn us into offerings to a Hero’s altar. Then the Inquisition must weigh public eyes before they pry. At the same time, Parrotti and the rest need to see our resolve to carry Raven out.”

To kill for her, like cutting through storm reeds.

To strike without a heartbeat’s hesitation, like lightning breaking night.

To shoulder the name of villain, like wearing a winter cloak of thorns.

To the Truth Seekers Assembly, Raven is a spark in dry tinder. Their future hangs on her. Caution is a lighthouse; they need it.

I understood. The thought sat heavy, like rain-swollen clouds that don’t burst.

Stini fell silent. The hush clung to her shoulders like mist; she had understood too.

“They’re little Raven’s—”

“—friends?”

The twins peered at us, eyes bright as twin lanterns. They skipped over, light as sparrows.

They wore outfits drenched in vivid yellow, petals too bright for daily streets. Stage clothes, like sunflowers stitched with stars.

“Yes. They’re here to take Raven away.”

Parrotti sighed and pinched their collars, hauling them aside like kittens by the scruff.

“I see, that’s great. Raven’s dear friends—”

“—crossed a thousand thorns to save her. Amazing.”

They kept grinning, lines dovetailing like a duet on a moonlit stage, one voice braided from two mouths.

“You two didn’t forget your job, did you?”

Parrotti flicked both foreheads, two neat snaps like pebbles on a drum.

“Hee-hee, we didn’t—”

“—it’s important, after all.”

They minced to a spot before us and struck an extravagant pose, like peacocks fanning gold.

The sister dropped into a lunge, hands raised in a guarding cross. Her spirit blazed like a festival fire.

“Eve Frida—”

The brother set one hand at his eye and curled the other like cradling a spell. He sighed, wind through reeds, at her silliness.

“—Opa Frida!”

They relaxed, then linked hands, and in one breath mimed a soaring glide, like swallows catching an updraft.

“We’re idols, and the gatekeepers here. Want through? Then beat us.”

Ah. So that’s their flavor—sugar and steel.

“Eve Frida, Opa Frida. Lunarfolk twins, earliest disciples of Nagash, and of his era. Skilled in arcane component operation. Recent public idols on the rise, known for lively air and childlike looks, darlings of children. The most active among Nagash’s disciples, veterans of many Demon King Army subjugation campaigns, famed heroes.”

I recited Abigail’s notes, each line like a brass plate on a wall.

They corrected me with bright claps:

“Wrong, wrong—”

“—we specialize in artillery.”

“The usual, the unusual, the handmade, the mass-issued—” Eve traced a huge circle, a sun hung low.

“—Arcane Cannons, spell-imbued cannons, composite focus cannons, all the guns,” Opa said, steady as a metronome, pointing at the drifting arcane components like planets on strings.

“Do you?”

“Yup, that’s right. Of Teacher’s disciples, only Opa and I are fighters—” Eve flashed a thumbs-up, lightning-fork bright.

“—can’t be helped. Eve and I aren’t good at research or bookwork. We’re good at war,” Opa shrugged, a leaf catching rain.

They folded together in a dancer’s grace, then leveled their palms at us like offering bowls turned to blades.

“We’re idols, so our requests can be a bit spoiled, Parrotti—”

“—we’re warriors, so our demands can be strict, friends of Raven. No problem, right?”

“Exactly. Guarding the gate is your duty. Turning slaughter into trial already earns my thanks.”

I matched their theater, knees bent deep like a court bow, then extended my hand to the stars they pretended to be.

Eve planted fists on hips and boomed like a herald. Opa stood behind, tending the words she left ragged, like a gardener trimming vines:

“Listen up. To us, to the Truth Seekers Assembly, Lili is a goddess—noble, proud, brilliant, top of Teacher’s students—”

“—she’s got talent and grind, so her achievements are a crown she earned. We only envy, admire. We don’t begrudge.”

“And Raven? She’s a princess fallen from the heavens, named successor by Teacher. We don’t understand why—”

“—to guard a princess by sacrificing a goddess, we can’t accept that. But if Teacher decided, and Lili agreed, we won’t kick dust.”

So Liki… Liqibela sits high in their hearts, like the North Star fixed in a black sea.

The diligent and gifted thrive wherever the scales are even. That truth lands like a hammer on an anvil.

“Lili’s a good girl. Even if you must kill her, please spare her pain—”

“—so draw as fast as you can. If we feel pain, we’ll strike back.”

As they spoke, their arcane components began to whirl, a storm of silver leaves.

An arcane component is a carved mana circuit, a borrowed organ that lets an Arcane Engineer cast what blood would deny. Keeping them spinning costs a river of power. Even Nagash doesn’t wear many: some lost under the hunter’s moon, some because his mana can only feed so many mouths.

Eve and Opa called more than the last few combined, enough to stack into a wall, a moving mountain of gears.

A wall flickering with spatial ripples, heat-haze over a desert road. Countless barrels pushed through like thorns through bark, hungry to fire.

Heavy artillery, railguns, focus cannons, particle cannons, energy cannons, antimatter cannons, Order-Collapse Cannons, and—

Raven’s finest work, the Void-Obliteration Arcane Cannon.

Heat and light bled from the muzzles like molten gold, while space buckled harder, a drumskin about to split.

I gripped the Holy Sword and lifted it to my eyes, a straight line of winter light.

“As you wish.”

“Right, so—”

“—come kill us.”

I let myself nearly fall, weight driven low like a sprinter biting the track, then ran a straight line. No extra shifts. No wasted breath. Faster. Then faster.

Power surged to ruin, enough to melt barrels like wax under sun—then tried to fire.

Before they could shatter the Hall of Truth, the space-warping components starved for mana. The muzzles sang a bitter whine, then retreated into the wall like turtles into shell.

The world slid back into calm, like a pond after a tossed stone.

Eve touched her throat, thrilled, then licked the blood from her hand like tasting rain.

Opa grimaced, drew a handkerchief, and wiped the red away, neat as folding paper.

I stood behind them, lowering my blade, a shake sending blood off in a thin arc. Yes—there was the feel of two heads severed, clean as slicing bamboo.

But the Lunarfolk heal too fast. As the Holy Sword cut the neck, flesh behind the edge had already knit. A ring of red ringed their throats, no wound to show the story.

“It still hurts—”

“—though it’s light.”

“Miss Liqibela is human. She’d be dead before she felt the pain.”

Eve scrunched her face at me, a playful mask on a hunter.

“Fine, you pass—”

“—let’s call it that. Mostly Sis’s idea. If she’s satisfied, I’m fine.”

Opa shot me a sideways look, then tugged his sister’s sleeve like a bellpull.

“Then now, welcome to the final show of Eve-chan and Opa—”

“Wait. You—you don’t have to die, do you?”

Eve had just opened her mouth when silent Stini cut in, a blade slipping between ribs.

“You’re idols. You’re big heroes. You don’t need to die, right?”