The Abyss was a swarm of Monsters, a black sea churning. An Earth Dragon couldn’t be the lone serpent.

Expedition tech was rising, like storm clouds gathering.

To study an Earth Dragon Heart, they’d wait for money and tech to ripen like fruit, then send a strong hunter.

The Rouge Rabbit boss paid a king’s ransom for that Earth Dragon Heart, a smoldering ember. Researchers hauled the corpse away like a cold mountain to dissect.

To keep that Heart alive, the Rouge Rabbit boss bled effort, luck that shouldn’t exist, and a river of money.

The heart should’ve died, yet through years of wind and frost it kept beating, like a drum under ice.

Eleven years ago, after Doctor Ling’s incident, District Six birthed research like a thunderclap.

The higher-ups pressed a lid over it. Only the elders of Cantata Two and Cantata Three felt its weight.

The Key to the Ultimate.

But the data was fractured, shards scattered. The true record fled with Doctor Ling to District Twenty One.

From then, Magic Maidens split like a river, new school against old.

Recently, that data circled back to headquarters, like a comet returning.

Doctor Ling proved a lone genius can beat a crowd; with foreign tech as sparks, the long-rumored method might finally forge true.

Yet it needed two seeds to sprout: the door to the Ultimate opened, and the matching Key in hand.

Ancient whispers claimed the twenty-four districts mirror the doors’ sites, like stars to constellations.

Each Key lay scattered across the world, irregular, wearing different faces.

Naturally, District Two held a Key of its own, like a seed under stone.

When expedition tech matured and the Magic Maiden government took root, the elite hunted Monsters like a storm net sweeping the sea.

They even brought back juvenile Earth Dragons.

After dissections, the Seekers and Order Keepers saw a pattern.

These hearts were nothing like that first Earth Dragon Heart.

The juveniles’ organs went inert fast, like embers dying, and later adults showed the same fate.

That first Earth Dragon was singular, a lone comet against dark sky.

District Two’s Magic Maidens cracked open dust-choked archives, tracing the Earth Dragon’s time, place, and path like threads on a map.

In trials, they found the door to the Ultimate, a black gate in stone.

It sat perfectly beneath the Earth Dragon’s appearance, deeper underground.

Truth was, the Abyssal Rift opened because of tremors below, like a heartbeat cracking earth.

Finding District Two’s gate stunned the top brass, a lightning strike at noon.

Of the two necessities for the Ultimate, District Two held one. The next was the Key.

For years, District Two scoured for the Key, sieving streets like sand.

Other districts found theirs nearby, but District Two flipped city and border like plowed fields and saw no trace.

Some districts weren’t content with their own; they eyed others’ Keys like vultures circling.

District Two’s higher-ups probed and pressed like a grinding stone, and no one stole District Two’s Key.

One Seeker stitched old reports and offered a hypothesis, sharp as ice.

Maybe that first Earth Dragon had accidentally fused with the Key, and that made it unlike the rest.

Among all the guesses, this one felt most solid, like bedrock.

Maybe fate leaned in. A few years back, Doctor Ling’s notebook was unraveled like silk.

Tech inside became partly real, sparks catching.

District Six had dissected a Key before; its core was Mana compressed like a star.

Ling’s crafted Key could resonate like a tuning fork, pointing toward the others.

The Seekers and Order Keepers lacked top-tier sigilcraft, but they cobbled together a flawed resonance device.

That’s the Key in Chu Qing’s hand, a firefly that still glows.

Ever since the Key entered the underground scene, it shed a constant, faint glow, like dawn under fog.

District Two’s upper Magic Maidens felt certain: the Key to the Ultimate treasure sat inside Rouge Rabbit.

It was likely that Heart.

So District Two branded Chu Qing a “traitor” and cast her out like a leaf on wind.

She used “accidents” and sharp talent to win the Rouge Rabbit boss’s trust, climbing like a serpent through cracks.

Someone would ask: why not cut down the boss, or unleash full force to take Rouge Rabbit?

Because District Two’s organization isn’t bigger than Rouge Rabbit, which has grown twenty, thirty years like an old oak.

Rouge Rabbit’s roots grip District Two. Order Keepers and Seekers are still outsiders, wind-blown.

Even a giant government can’t crush a local snake coiled round the mountain.

When Seekers set up the Order Keepers, Rouge Rabbit actually yielded a step, like tide receding.

If it resisted full force, Magic Maidens wouldn’t enter District Two easily. So, on the surface, no open war.

Striking the Rouge Rabbit boss is worse sense. Rouge Rabbit’s foundation is deep, an iron forest.

Full-body cyborgs aren’t few. Rumor says new armored warframes fit them like shells.

Chu Qing holds fresh, shadowed analysis on those warframes.

Besides Lin, Rouge Rabbit holds two hidden cards.

One is clear: a powerhouse in the shadows, guarding the boss like a moonlit blade.

Even up close, Chu Qing lacks the weight to cut him.

A chill ran in her gut. That card was likely Cantata Three, a storm behind silk.

Chu Qing is one step from the Key, but that one isn’t hers to beat.

So she built her own current inside Rouge Rabbit, like water seeping through stone.

She’d chip it from within, inching closer to that special Earth Dragon Heart.

Rumor says this Earth Dragon Heart will be grafted into a body, maybe the boss, maybe someone else.

However it lands, this Heart is a blazing prize.

Frustration pricked her like thorns. The Doctor’s arrival shuffled her board.

Research on compatibility got pushed up the calendar.

Soon the Heart would be inside someone, and then it would be locked behind bone.

Her choices narrowed like a canyon: drive the Doctor out, or wrest the Earth Dragon Heart back.

Annoyance tasted cold. Chu Qing planned to use Night Frost to force the Doctor to halt, then leverage the Doctor’s post to seize the Heart.

But Night Frost slipped the net like smoke. Her strength wasn’t simple.

The path ahead bristled with thorns. Night Frost had Lin’s shade over her; no clean strike.

The Doctor had strength of his own; Chu Qing’s odds were thin.

To take the Heart, two roads remained: hit someone close to Night Frost, or strike the Heart itself.

The second road was a wolf’s mouth; she’d likely never walk out of Rouge Rabbit.

Lin had said not to lay hands on Night Frost or anyone around her, but Chu Qing wouldn’t listen. She’d leave Night Frost herself alone—call it giving him face.

“This little girl is said to be close to Night Frost.”

Chu Qing finished the file and told the nearby researchers to send it to the District Two branch.

She pulled a vial of blood from her pocket, a crimson thread, and handed it over.

“I stole this blood from the lab,” she said, voice cool as rain.

“No idea what that girl Night Frost carries that makes this lot guard her like a fox guards its den.”

“Maybe we’ll find secrets inside her, smoke in a cave we haven’t walked.”

Chu Qing sent them back to their studies, then turned toward the underground district, a hawk folding its wings.

Her eyes swept the distance and caught residents trading with Rouge Rabbit members.

The nearby patch became her spur-of-the-moment target, like reeds in easy wind.

Tension tightened like a bowstring. Night Frost here meant Lin here.

She had one shot, one snowfall of a chance.

Yin Tianchen used the meeting to send orders like drumbeats.

Every member in the underground district mobilized.

Patrol teams formed and moved, explaining to residents like ants carrying grain.

Not far away, Night Frost stepped off the elevator and asked the patrol for details.

Because of her and Yin Chen Yue, patrols thickened like falling snow.

Yin Tiancheng seemed to have thrown every hand into the field.

For Night Frost, it felt wrong, a cold wind against the face.

Yin Chen Yue had woken early. Night Frost leaned close, concern like warm tea first.

With a candied pill in her mouth, Yin Chen Yue mumbled, “I’m fine.”

Her face was pale as a winter moon; Night Frost felt she was forcing it.

“If you feel unwell, you can rest.”

Yin Chen Yue nodded firmly, a sapling in wind, yet she didn’t seek rest.

“Did your father come last night?”

If you didn’t look closely, you’d miss the slight hairpin on her head, a dew drop.

It must be a gift from her father.

“Yes, sadly he couldn’t meet Sister Night Frost… Sister, how’s your body? Any better?”

Warmth washed Night Frost, like sunlight on frost. Yin Chen Yue truly cared.

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Night Frost laughed. “Your sis is sturdy. One punch, four or five down!”

She wasn’t bluffing. Right now she could drop four or five with one punch.

But it’d be just one punch; her Mana was a spark, not a storm.

Without a Magic Layer, enemy sigils still bit hard.

“Oh, right!”

Yin Chen Yue turned, remembering the little cookies tucked with today’s fruit.

She hadn’t eaten them all—sweet as snowflakes—but she’d saved some for Night Frost.

Chu Qing broke from the street’s edge, a shadow loosed.

Metal blades scattered like snow, then bit into patrol necks.

She sprinted for Yin Chen Yue’s position.

Residents were spattered by a red rain. For a heartbeat, the world went still.

Then the scream tore out, sharp as glass.

Shock hit Night Frost like ice water. The scream stretched, needle-sharp.

Mana surged into her palm, condensing like stormclouds.