Since Stini, Raven, and Catherine’s trio has their path set, there’s not much left to say, like closing a map and watching the road blur in dusk light.

Catherine still had complaints tangled like thorns. She sobbed till she fell apart, then Stini and Raven wrapped her in a fierce hug. One line—“Welcome back, Catherine”—plugged every protest like a stopper on a storm bottle.

She looked all princessy fuss, silk gloves and frilled temper—fine, let it drift like perfume.

She still couldn’t let go of me, a splinter under the skin. She couldn’t name what felt wrong, so she simply refused to look my way, like a shutter slammed. Working happily with this new subordinate would need time, slow rain over dry fields.

When the girls moved to leave, the Savior Saint stepped aside, a half step of courtesy, and bowed slightly in apology, shadow skimming his collar like a thin cloud.

This guy came here for trouble, a cat to a birdcage.

“You were told at the start, told at the first page. I asked you not to meddle. I told you stories, weighed the good and bad. What I do is right, so why come and bar my road?”

I waited till the rebellious trio were far enough—at their speed, out of earshot, our words swallowed by wind—then asked.

It wasn’t doubt. It was the need to hear him say it, a nail set by his own hand.

It was a way to weaken the “Saint’s” edge, shave steel off his blade.

The Savior Saint gave his usual bitter smile, a cracked cup held steady. He knew what I meant, but he wouldn’t blindfold himself. He would think, then see what he was doing, lantern slowly lifted over his own tracks.

He is a “Saint,” high-minded, high-duty, a banner in clean wind.

That’s the part I can use, a gap in the armor.

“I… have a child. She said she wants a world without demons.”

“So you came to kill me?”

“The first one is you.”

“Even if you know my acts save the world, even if you know I’m right—still, you truly intend to kill me?”

“Yes. You’re right. But… it’s not the world children dream of.”

“So, measure against my rightness—Savior Saint, your stance is wrong.”

“No… not all wrong. The purest, most beautiful wishes aren’t wrong!”

“You sure? Children are innocent, and cruelty isn’t hidden. They want grasshopper wings, crown jewels, petals from mountains that cure all ills to play with. They want the moon—pure, lovely, and is that right?”

“At least… this time…”

“Are you sure it’s not just self-soothing? What do your deeds change? Why decide your aim is correct? You’re a Saint—why draw a line inside those you save? Why is it only children you won’t disappoint?”

The Savior Saint went silent, half his face buried in his high collar. Shadow swallowed his expression, like ash over snow.

“Can it hide? Can hiding trick yourself?”

In pure debate, someone who’s walked far and lived long won’t yield to a few lines. A stone path needs weather.

But the Savior Saint thinks while he seeks how to save, and he’s seen his own ugliness—he denies himself, yet cannot find a flawless right, a moon without scars.

That’s why he chose to “only save the world,” bare bones, bare hands.

As a “Saint,” as the “Savior Saint,” he is so strong, so stubborn—yet powerless, fragile, a sword with a hairline crack.

He closed his eyes, tilted his head, drew a deep breath, then let it leave him like fog.

“…Yes. I’m self-indulgent.”

Come on! Applaud till your palms sting! Cheer till your throat burns! Praise till the rafters shake!

As expected of my favorite actor under heaven!

You—finally admit your ugliness—admit you’re not a spotless great one!

Only then can you fulfill those children’s wishes, a lantern lit in a paper house.

For a hero who parachuted into my plan, I’ve no patience for gentle guiding, no sugar on the blade.

“So now you’re just a plain hero, walking for your own wish, not the flawless Saint carrying the crowd’s prayers like stars in a bowl.”

“Maybe not even a hero. I know and still—”

His voice sank like dusk. His gaze stayed straight and clean, a plumb line.

This Saint wasn’t leaving. His heels had roots.

“This is where I should ask, ‘Want to leave? Walk now and I’ll pretend nothing happened.’ But judging from your look, you won’t agree.”

“Ah, yes. Even if it’s self-indulgence, it’s mine. This not-beautiful belief is still my belief. I won’t betray the children’s wishes.”

“Then it’s my turn. I’ll say what’s mine to say. Like ‘three warnings, and no third mercy.’ And there’s another line—”

“—Great hero, step forward, then die.”

Begin. Before battle, build another world, a fresh page in the margin.

I stretched out my hand, exercised authority. While we spoke, we set a pact like seals pressed in wet clay.

“With a world in a pot—”

“With a fairyland in a painting—”

“With sun and moon in a mirror—”

“Motion.”

“Agreed. Amendment.”

“Agreed.”

We would keep our fight from breaking the real world, carve a temporary field where no blow touches truth.

Call it a battlefield, or a tomb field, wind over stone.

A small world unfolded from the void, a paper screen sliding open. We agreed on its basic rules. Start the fight, drumbeats in a hollow valley.

The Savior Saint planted his feet on fresh earth, drew in man-made air like cold wine, and charged me.

His raised fist brimmed with killing intent, a dark river surging.

Martial stance, “Joyous Walk of a Thousand Peaks.”

Before he became a Saint, he was a traveler who measured land with feet. This stance was the insight of long roads, dust and dawn.

It’s steadier, rounder, vaster than Nivifar’s signature stance “Step to Break a Thousand Mountains.” He’s lived longer than Nivifar’s handful of years—centuries, millennia, night counting stones.

Nivifar’s stance is a hard will, grinding mountains to gravel. She flattened dozens of kilometers of surface, and soil and stone below were punched through and ground to powder.

The Savior Saint’s stance is sediment of time. Every step, every forward lean, is a steady print carved into history. Faster, firmer—he flashed to my front, then aimed a punch at my mask, a comet to a glass lake.

“Not bad. But you think that works?”

The Long Halberd reached forward.

The tip pierced his chest dead center, exited his back, a spear of winter.

Blood flooded his lungs. Reflex seized him. He coughed hard, blood and spit spilling like a broken wineskin.

“You think you know who I am?”

I turned, stamped, and slung the Long Halberd back the other way—more precise, I flung the Savior Saint impaled upon it.

The backward edge bit his ribs like a wolf’s jaw and held the force I cast to distance.

Perfect feel. A craftsman’s satisfaction.

I set gravity, but it wasn’t needed. He flew like torn cloth. His chest and heart burst, blood heaved out in a bright arc, then he struck the mountainside. Dust plumed, a gray blossom.

“Bring something interesting. I was almost going to get serious—kidding. If you let me kill you neat, I’d thank heaven. I’d like to save mana if I can.”

Why seal a Saint’s power? Efficiency first, even with a side of dark humor.

Walking the world as a Saint, he was earlier an undertaker of the Time Management Bureau. They guard the “axle of the world.” Undertakers “bury things that shouldn’t exist among men, by violence, into the ruins of history.” Background over—their ability is the point.

They’re blessed directly by a Divine Being, god’s household. They bear half a god’s protection and duty. They hold a rank of ward just below a god’s—“a child of god is not harmed by the children of men,” and sometimes higher.

Their price is a heavy shackle. They can’t leave their name in history. They need permission to wield power in the world, paper chains on steel wrists.

It means few attacks can pierce their skin. A trench coat or plate armor feels the same, rain on an umbrella. If an enemy breaks that level of ward, mundane hardness is useless. At that point, an undertaker should consider a headquarters resurrection or call support, a bell rung in a storm.

“An undertaker’s foes are usually ‘humans.’ Challenging god-and-demon tiers—there’s no ‘your level is a bit short.’ It’s the road only fools choose.”

This body is built at physical limits, crafted for a fight with the Savior Saint, candle to furnace.

I drove force from my soles. I didn’t even bend a knee. I crossed like a blink, a visual teleport, flying to where he lay buried.

The second swing of the Long Halberd carried raw momentum. The wind pressure alone blew rubble away. The poor soul was still coughing blood. He read my overhead cut.

And what then? Can you dodge? Can you take it?

“My other name—Endless Demon King Andreas—the place where all hope, resistance, and prayer go to die.”

The Savior Saint stepped in correctly, arms raised to block on the bladeless haft. Then I hammered through, snapped both arms and one shoulder—him reacting fast saved worse.

The third stroke drew sideways. The side blade punched into his chest and belly, dragging out a wound that nearly severed his waist, a red door opening.

The fourth stroke—he tried to grab the haft. The price was all ten fingers fractured. They twisted like the tentacles of a roasted octopus, curled and blackened.

The fifth—

The sixth, seventh, eighth—

Why, under such crushing odds, hasn’t he given up? Why won’t he fall?

Because the despair I’ve given isn’t enough. He can’t yet tell himself, “I’ve used everything,” a runner refusing the tape.

Then let’s continue, Saint. Keep stepping.

Only one thing surprised me—

—do humans have that much blood?

I glanced at a half mountainside smeared red and thought, dawn bleeding into stone.