The room sat in darkness, like ink pooled in a bowl.

The light wasn’t bright, but it sketched the layout, moonwash tracing edges.

You could see a half-ajar wooden door, cobwebs fraying in the corner, ivy slipping through the window, and an old phone ringing on the desk.

You also saw pill bottles and bandages, a small shore of medical supplies.

If you were there, the tableau would flood your eyes like a cold stream.

Maybe you’d miss the backed wooden chair in the center.

Someone sat there.

The shadows woven from gloom and daylight made that figure seem like a trick of angles.

To be sure, your gaze would sharpen.

You’d hold your breath and stare—

Not a mirage. Evelyn sat in the chair.

A chill of long-abandoned places drifted through the room, like dust remembering footsteps.

“Hello?” Evelyn lifted the receiver, voice thin as mist. “I’m working.”

“Melvina didn’t agree to cooperate.”

“Fits her nature.”

“Even with the Dark Realm Erosion data delivered, still no cooperation.”

“From the drawer, or the wardrobe?”

“Wardrobe,” the man said. “What’s the difference?”

“You can read it from her reaction, so don’t ask me.”

“How’s the capture going?”

“We’re measuring the stability inside the Dark Realm.” Evelyn paused, fingers tapping the desk like a metronome. “To pull Olivia Viola out, we need exact calculations. A hair off, and it repeats last time.”

“That was when—your condition worsened?”

Evelyn stared at her right hand, just freed from bandages.

On pallid skin, a strange tumor bulged, its surface an unhealthy dusk-red.

Under the thin skin, tiny worms writhed inside.

It looked like nature’s cruel joke and curse, carved in flesh.

“Doesn’t feel different,” she said.

“Good as it gets, but we can’t wait for you too long.”

“Once she’s captured, we’ll send her to you at once. The Institute can’t run anything too extreme.”

“Good. Stratford, we’ll help your entry into the royal court.”

Evelyn hung up and drew a slim lady’s cigarette from a silver case.

She set it to her lips and thumbed the lighter’s wheel—click.

She pulled smoke deep, then let out a ribbon of elegant gray.

An Investigator hurried in, cradling a thick stack of reports. “We’ve collected Dark Realm environmental parameters and spatial stability indices. We used models to predict trends and stability windows. The Dark Realm stabilizes between five and eight in the evening.”

“And?”

“Based on integrated data, we drafted four action plans. Each route avoids predicted unstable zones, to keep the task safe and feasible. They’re ready for your review, for deployment in the five-to-eight window.”

“Three hours until five.”

“Yes. Please review quickly.”

“What did I tell you?”

The Investigator blinked. “We’ve heard many things. Which one?”

“When you came with me to the Shattered City.”

“Ah! You said to put the Dark Realm’s core into dormancy, and asked for our full support.”

Evelyn’s eyes moved without a ripple, sheltering the tumor in shadow. “Do you have thoughts?”

“The Dark Realm in the Shattered City hasn’t shrunk after all this time. We should lull the core to sleep.”

“You’re volunteering, right?”

“Yes!”

“Good. Prepare.”

The Investigator straightened, offered a respectful salute, and slipped out.

Evelyn watched him leave, cigarette in hand, thoughts sinking like stones into deep water.

They didn’t know there were monsters inside, yet they handed me a hollow analysis.

It’s also on me—I didn’t tell them.

And I’m about to test Olivia’s aggression with their lives.

Evelyn tapped ash and eyed the report. “Olivia, don’t make me carry more deaths.”

She signed her name at the end of the analysis.

Time trickled.

Evelyn was on her third cigarette when the Investigator returned, saluted, and asked, “How does it look?”

“Is it almost five?”

“Two minutes.”

“The routes are broadly sound. No need to adjust.”

“Understood!”

Evelyn followed the Investigator out, toward the southern wall of the Shattered City.

Nineteen Investigators stood ready, lined like spears.

In their eyes burned steadiness against the unknown, like coals before a storm.

She stood before them and drew a long breath.

“You gather in the Shattered City—once quiet and prosperous, now a lifeless husk.

You might ask why it fell.

The root is the Dark Realm.

It eats our land, infects our bodies, threatens every resident, and bends our lives forever.

So we carry a task that matters: lull the core inside the Dark Realm.

Only then can we halt its spread and blunt its threat to the Empire.

It’s a brutal task. This is an A‑grade Dark Realm.

But I believe each of you has the courage and the wit to face it.

So hear me: whatever the obstacles ahead, whatever life or death we meet, remember—

We fight for the Empire’s tomorrow, and for everyone’s safety.”

“For the Empire’s prosperity, we give our humble strength!” the Investigators answered in one voice.

They saluted Evelyn, then stepped in order into the Dark Realm—into a domain of riddles and peril, like crossing a fogged threshold.