Night Frost moved. Flames coiled her pale arms like serpents, carving a crude array. The array disk in her palm bled a camo glow, and her fire blazed whiter.
As expected, Senior Wang had caught the cube’s quirk. The nearer she came, the eerie pull weakened. She edged in, unaware Night Frost had waited like a hunter in mist.
A gale rose outside the Modification Center, racing the narrow corridor. Crimson Gold Flame streamed like banners, sparks swarming, wind-slapped against Senior Wang’s face. Night Frost stepped, her aura cresting like a tidal peak.
Flames on Night Frost’s fists met the emerald liquid in Senior Wang’s palm. In a breath, fire lanced from Night Frost’s knuckles, flash‑evaporating the green. Scalding steam rolled up, then wind shredded it thin.
Senior Wang’s Magic Tool couldn’t check Night Frost now. When the emerald was spent, her Magic Layer took the hit full on. It was frail. Under the fire’s gnawing, it hissed away with the last drops.
Night Frost had no time to argue at the door. She slipped the jade Key for the green liquid from Senior Wang’s belt, used the heartbeat of surprise, and dove deeper into the passage.
Senior Wang didn’t chase. Her arm throbbed, skin hot and stinging. She glanced at the deep red handprint seared there, then watched Night Frost’s retreat with a wary chill, like a fox smelling a trap.
That route crawled with cameras. A chase would strip her mask, nothing more.
And Night Frost was stronger than she’d guessed. With a Tool and her own skill, she’d planned to press the girl out. She hadn’t expected an eruption like a furnace uncaged.
Night Frost’s mana hadn’t grown denser. Yet every strike felt heavier on Senior Wang’s body. The weight came from the array disk and the patterns on her arm—an amplification akin to the Seekers of District Twenty One.
Night Frost had been mid-tier. Add those two and that strange suction, and for that instant she stood at the top of Cantata Two. A heartbeat only—but enough to kill the her from a breath ago.
She sprinted along the route. Senior Wang’s shared map said every three floors had an independent elevator. The third linked to a lakeside pavilion, but that lift was dead.
There was an exit on Six, true, but the lift there was never finished. A planning blunder had killed the project; the exit was never made. The place became a skeleton of intent.
The rest of the upper nine had no exits. Nine offered a lift to Three and a shaft down. Nothing else opened to daylight.
Still, Night Frost didn’t buy it. If there was only one exit on One, how did the Center’s managers come and go? One door for the anthill wasn’t real. Somewhere below Nine—between Eleven and Sixteen—there had to be hidden mouths. That would be her way out.
She studied the map for Eleven to Thirteen. By the three-floors pattern, Ten and Eleven likely had no elevators. Senior Wang had marked almost everything. Only Twelve and Thirteen were suspiciously thin.
She took a lift. No one in the Modification Center tried to stop her. They knew fighting up top would cost them more than it bought—like throwing jade to break a tile.
But they’d move sooner or later. They dealt with both Seekers and Order Keepers. Night Frost carried the Key they craved. Even if they snubbed the Order Keeper, they’d aid the Seeker—or skim it for themselves.
A woman scowled at her dark phone screen. Some idiot had blown the camera. The livestream was gone. She’d hoped to watch Night Frost die under an Order Keeper’s hand, a swan song cut short. Too bad.
Boredom settled like dust. Then her screen flared, washing the shadow from her cheeks.
A call. The cyborg man, steel from neck to heel.
“New orders from the boss. Grab the fire‑type Magic Maiden who ran. She’s got what the chief wants. She’s heading to Eleven now.”
They didn’t know what, exactly, the boss wanted from Night Frost. But if the boss wanted it, there was no room for drag or doubt.
They all felt it—the boss knew too much. He rarely showed his face, often vanished. Yet each return brought a shift in the wind: fresh tech, exquisite science, wonders wrapped in steel.
The woman had been itching for this. Hearing Night Frost still breathing, she exhaled, pleased—not for the girl’s sake, but for her own. She could paint the end herself, let Night Frost die with elegance, a scene to burn into memory.
She licked her lip, eyes slick with hunger and heat. She cut to the exit, slammed Eleven, and left everyone else behind like husks.
The fish‑monster manager pondered, then chose Thirteen. Night Frost was hunting an exit. Coincidence: a waterway there led outside. Someone had to keep that throat plugged.
Besides, that was his river. He’d be strongest there. And he had a gift prepared, tied with kelp and teeth, just for her.
Night Frost pushed on without pause. Her movements weren’t fast. The map helped, but it was her first time here, and pain tugged at each step. Not crippling, but it slowed her like wet cloth.
Fresh blood traced her arm. It was her first time completing the array engraving on her skin. Just as her so‑called master had warned, her body wasn’t sturdy enough. As an array base, it was barely passable.
She’d etched a near‑complete Array Pattern on her arm today, powered by mana. The force blew past her expectations, and so did the backlash. Still, it met her aim: strike fast, finish faster.
She swallowed a healing draught. She didn’t know if it touched backlash, but better to drink than regret. In Cantata Two, these meds were mediocre, yet a sip could still nudge the needle.
Ten and Eleven had no elevators. By the pattern, a hard fight was likely next. She downed the potion, found a quiet corner, and began restoring mana.
From Ten down, the Center wore a new face. Above Nine, staff swarmed and eyes watched. From Ten, that pressure thinned like fog in sun.
On Ten, she saw almost no workers, and cameras were scarce. It was a huge parts line, machines locked into programs, working like a metronome. Only two or three patrolled, bored shepherds among iron sheep.
The Center was an inverted cone, so Eleven was two rings smaller than Ten. Yet Eleven felt emptier. The walls were thick as cliffs, their mix different—laced with Obsidian Stone powder.
Scars of fire and cut slashed the walls. It looked like a place for testing gear and gifts. “Sparring arena” fit better than “workshop.”
Night Frost drew a fox carving from her Spatial Box. She’d polished it this morning. With materials Senior Wang had “lent” her, and with her skills cresting the threshold, she’d inscribed an animation formation.
She hadn’t completed it. Like dotting a dragon’s eye, she’d left the final fuse—the merge and activation step—undone. The formation had a nasty downside; at best it’d hold for a few seconds.
Before that, she’d branded it with a contract. A Contract Formation graced its brow, so the fox wouldn’t wake with white eyes and a traitor’s grin.
It had once tried to claw out her heart. You don’t wake a thing like that without a leash.
Good thing she’d asked her so‑called master last night. He’d given her a simple contract—revocable, basically worthless. What she used now was a replica of an ancient contract she’d scammed from him, and it actually worked.
The contract was carved on wood, so as long as she didn’t grant the carving awareness, that simple contract wouldn’t be rejected. Not that she could grant it a mind anyway.
A Magic Stone slot sat in the fox’s belly, copied from a black‑market piece. It would feed the fox the energy it needed to run.
Night Frost grinned. She was a genius. A real genius.
She set the carving by her side. If danger came, she’d fuse the materials and trigger the Formation. A few heartbeats would be enough.
She sank her mana. In the corner, she sat cross‑legged, crushed a Magic Stone, and drew in the power like breath. Mana and wounds knit by inches. Torn Magic Armor and a blood‑slick back mended under the current.
Silence held for moments only. A Blade of invisible mana split the air, cold as winter rain, stabbing for her heart. The foreign mana pricked her senses first; she slipped aside.
The blade hooked like a hawk mid‑flight, turning for her path.
Night Frost swept her hand. A Crimson Gold Spear flared into being before her chest. Spear and mana blade collided with a ringing crack. The razor edge bit deep, leaving a notch along the spear’s gleaming face.
