Thirty-Eight: Picking a Title Is Hard

Lilith raised the Shattered Ark sideways, like a shield of moonlit steel against a whipping tentacle.

The pink‑white blade flashed like frost on dawn stone. As its charge peaked, she cut for the heart’s gleam like a comet diving.

Her sword‑qi sheared several flailing tendrils, carving a narrow path through a forest of writhing limbs.

The Little White Dragon lowered her body, like a cat flattening for a sprint. To save her dwindling Star Energy, she skipped Luck Resonance and tapped a wind gem from Lillum.

Her speed dipped, a breeze where she needed a gale. As she threaded the severed tentacles, she was one beat slow. The heart sensed it and birthed a new limb that slapped at her like a falling tree.

The Little White Dragon didn’t dodge. She ran straight for the heart, eyes fixed like stars over still water.

A breath before the blow landed, a Black Knight ghosted to her side, blade in hand. One clean stroke split the tentacle like bamboo under an axe.

Lilith used the opening. She kicked off the tentacle’s flank and drove her blade into the heart’s skin before it could twitch.

The Shattered Ark, honed by the parry, bit like winter glass. Even the heart’s spiky hide couldn’t shrug off that cold thrust.

But in her hands, it was a Broken Sword shorter than she was, a half‑moon where she needed a full. It couldn’t pierce all the way through.

Lilith wasn’t satisfied with one wound. She gripped the hilt with both hands and drew a slanted cut, carving a pale scar across the heart like a crescent on wet clay.

Thick dark‑violet ichor sprayed, a night river bursting its bank. Under the Black Knight’s guard, she pushed off the slick floor and sprung back, opening space like a curtain.

“So did that kill it?” Lilith asked, watching the huge heart heave and jet violet ink.

“Not sure. Be ready,” the Black Swordsman said, his voice a cloud with no rain. Lilith pouted, a sparrow ruffling its feathers.

“Fine. Magic, then.”

She pulled the Astrolabe from her belt. After changing cloaks, the straps from her black one wouldn’t latch, so both weapons dangled at her hips like twin pendulums.

It worked for now, but worry pricked her like thorns. If the Shattered Ark gets restored and lengthens, how would she carry it?

Her thoughts fluttered like leaves, but her hands didn’t slow.

She raised the Astrolabe, murmuring a knot of old words, mist‑soft and thorn‑sharp. She could cast without chanting, same power, but the fight wasn’t urgent. Today she wanted a touch of show.

The floor around the heart was eaten by violet acid, a shore gnawed by tide. She doubted her body could stand that gnawing storm.

Safer to end it at range, a winter arrow from afar.

Her chant finished. A massive ice spike formed, a white spear of mountain glacier, and shot forth. It slammed into the heart like hail through silk.

Ice Spike was the simplest frost art, a stone one could lift with bare hands. Easy to cast, perfect for saving Star Energy.

The huge spike skewered the gray heart, a skewer through tough root. The heart convulsed, tendrils thrashing like eels in a bucket, then deflated like a punctured ball and sagged into a limp puddle.

“Dead?” Lilith blinked, lashes fluttering like moth wings.

“Probably. I’ll check.” The Black Knight sheathed his sword, barred the Little White Dragon with an arm like a gate, and walked forward like a shadow crossing snow.

“I could go. It’s fine.” She grumbled, a kettle hissing, but stayed put and waited.

“Dead for good. No threat.” He drove a blade‑long tool into the heart, burying it to the hilt like a stake into peat.

The gray meat didn’t twitch, a winter field under frost. Only after that did the Black Knight wave her closer to the giant heart.

Lilith stood by him and poked the thing, her pale finger like jade against chalk. The gray‑white hide didn’t even dent.

She drew back, disappointed, hugging her Astrolabe like a pillow, and looked up at the Black Knight.

“So why did you come out? I said I could handle it.”

“If I hadn’t, you’d be hammered into the floor,” he said, a cold breeze through reeds.

He glanced at her and sighed under his helm, a deep bell muted by felt.

“Impossible. Who do you think I am? When have I ever been hit by junk like that?”

The Little White Dragon huffed, puffing her boundless chest like a proud pufferfish.

“Want me to remind you how Miss Mona dragged someone out of the same tentacles two years ago? Or about the time the Taint swallowed you whole?”

The Black Swordsman pulled open her old scrolls without mercy. The Little White Dragon leapt up, clapped a hand over his mouth, and glared like lightning.

“Forget it! Or I’ll never let you out again!”

The Black Knight didn’t answer. Under the heavy helmet, his face was a quiet lake.

“Say something! Why won’t you talk!”

“Keep this up and I’ll really get mad!”

“Hey!”

He stayed silent, watching her bounce beside him with gentle eyes, like lanterns guarding a doorway.

After a little storm of fuss, Lilith felt the wind die. She stilled, lowered her head, and spoke soft as dusk.

“After we argued that day, I went back and thought it over.”

She started shyly, toes tracing circles like minnows. She didn’t dare meet his face, words trickling like spring water.

“I was too anxious that day. I do understand you want to protect me. This time, back in Morris, against the Demon King, and even earlier—I know.”

“I don’t want you gone. After I became a dragon, I made new friends, but I’ve spent the longest with you. I lost you once. I don’t want a second winter.”

“So my stance’s the same. I’ll find a way to control the Taint, and keep you with me forever. But if I can, I want to keep fighting beside you, and share the road’s stories like tea at dusk.”

“Can I?”

The Black Knight looked at the girl before him. He remembered the first time he saw her—smaller, face carved with panic, hiding behind an old king, nothing like a Saint.

But he hadn’t forgotten the light in her violet eyes back then, the same star now in these sky‑blue gems.

“You’ve grown up,” the Black Swordsman said at last, like a bell tolling once.

“Huh?”