Lea woke with an uneven breath, the sheets tangled around her legs. The inn's walls were thin, the kind that let every floorboard groan travel through the wood, but tonight there was only silence. Her room was faintly lit by the silver glow of moonlight cutting through the shutters.

  She sat up, pressing a hand against her forehead. Sleep had given her no peace, only fragments of screams, pages tearing through the sky, and the half-truths of the Tome gnawing at her thoughts.

  So despite her tired expression, Lea did not sleep further. Every time she closed her eyes, the image of that accursed book appeared in her mind, trying to pull her in closer.

  It was quite a miracle that the Tome of Light didn't possess the domain over Corruption, else she'd have become a Horror.

  Her eyes wandered over to the parasol Lady Keter had given her, with the canopy carry spells that can be activated one time, more of an emergency attack than a solid weapon. But the main part, the sword hidden inside, was infused with Severence, Rift, and Rend. The name Lady Keter had given it was Hastur, not sure what that means.

  All of those paths are reted to the concept of cutting. Lea wonder why there are Paths that are so simir to each other, that is something she would ask Auger ter.

  Feeling sleepless, Lea took the parasol and headed out of her room.

  The inn was scarce of people, but a few goers were still in the bottom floor tavern, making noises but not rowdy enough to be a nuisance.

  With care, she moved along the edges of the tavern and got outside. While practicing her stealth in preparation to get Cloak.

  Outside, the town was quiet and unassuming, just like back when she was working in her old church. Everything was so peaceful, so mundane, every day was predictable.

  Lea wanted to go back to those times, but the fire of vengeance denied it, saying she must go forward, go destroy her true enemy... Akasha Monodrama.

  How to find a Veil-based organization is an absolute nightmare. They could be hiding anywhere and in pin sight.

  Taking in the chilly air of the night, Lea contemptes what to do next.

  She was heading to Ryteline, another country. The only fortunate thing was the shared nguage between Northern Renlou and Ryteline, so she could get by with no problem, though she would need to learn how to write again. She is pretty much stuck with Auger, her only guarantor in an unfamiliar country; she could get into contact with Bathory, but there isn't enough trust between them.

  Opening her parasol, she hides under the darkness it casts, her thoughts turn to the gloomy side...

  The parasol's canopy unfolded with a whisper, its shadow falling over her like a shroud. The moonlight bent around its bck fabric, as though unwilling to touch it, and Lea pressed closer under its veil.

  Her thoughts sank.

  What if she could never return to that life before? Not the cloistered quiet of her old church, not the rhythm of prayer and candle wax, but even the possibility of normalcy? Would she ever be anything more than a creature chasing gods through their own shadow games?

  If the Tome had taken her, would anyone have noticed? Would anyone have mourned? Perhaps Andre, for a time, but only because he was her senior. Even her vengeance… was it truly hers, or was it just another chain binding her to the path id by Akasha Monodrama?

  The parasol weighed heavily in her grip.

  Hastur.

  Lady Keter had named it without hesitation, as though the word carried meaning she wasn't allowed to know. A name unfamiliar yet dangerous, her instincts warned her not to know at all.

  Why had Keter chosen her for this? Why give her anything at all?

  Her mind pressed deeper. What was Lady Keter, truly? Guardian? Prisoner? Outsider? She cimed indifference, but pyed games with truths and lies as though the world itself was her board.

  And if— just if... Keter was the one holding the strings of this grand scheme; then what was Lea? A guest? A pawn? A sacrifice waiting to be tallied?

  Her breath quickened. The questions pressed harder, spiraling without end. Her parasol felt like a tether and a threat both, its hidden bde humming faintly with the promise of division.

  Then—

  The inn's door creaked.

  Lea stiffened, instinct pulling her into the parasol's shadow. From the corner of her eye, she saw Auger step out into the night. His cane tapped lightly on the cobblestones as he leaned against the railing, silver hair catching the moonlight, eyes raised toward the quiet sky.

  Noticing her, he tilted his head, faint amusement tugging at his lips, "Ah. Couldn't sleep either, hm?"

  Lea hesitated, then stepped out, parasol resting lightly against her shoulder, "No... not after… everything."

  "Understandable.", His gaze drifted skyward again, voice oddly calm, "Nights like these, silence carries too much memory."

  For a time, neither spoke. The town was still, only the distant wind shifting the tavern's sign.

  Finally, Lea broke the silence, "…Auger. Who do you think Lady Keter really is?"

  At that, he chuckled low in his throat, though without mockery.

  "Ah, the eternal question.", his cane tapped once against the railing, "She called herself a librarian when we first met, nothing more. But you've seen it too, haven't you? The weight she carries? No mere librarian commands the presence of gods."

  Lea's brow furrowed, thinking back to when the library was colored by the Tome of Light, "She… she looked different, for a moment. Not the pale shade in the monochrome world. Something more..."

  "Indeed.", his smile faded, eyes narrowing slightly as though remembering, "I knew her long before you. Even then, she stood outside everything— wars, kingdoms, even faith itself. She watches, she gathers, she remembers. But whether she cares?"

  He shook his head, "That remains the riddle."

  Lea gripped the parasol tighter, her voice soft, "…Do you trust her?"

  Auger's silence lingered long enough that Lea almost regretted asking. When he finally spoke, his voice carried an edge of gravity absent from his usual humor.

  "I do not trust her, but I respect her. And perhaps, that is the wiser choice."

  Lea looked at him, searching for reassurance, but found none. Only the weight of his words and the night pressing in.

  "Respect, but not trust...", she murmured, staring into the shadows beneath her parasol.

  Auger gnced her way, lips curving in faint amusement once more, "You learn quickly."

  For the first time that night, Lea allowed herself a small smile, though it faded almost as soon as it came.

  Lea lingered on his words, her lips pressing thin. The night felt heavier than it should have, the silence between them stretching too long. Finally, she asked, her voice quiet but piercing.

  "…Auger. Are you afraid of her?"

  He didn't answer at once. His gaze was still fixed on the moon, but something had drained from his face, like the light itself had turned cold upon him.

  His hand shifted over his cane, not in a gesture of comfort, but one of restraint, as though it was the only thing grounding him.

  "Yes.", he said at st. The word came out unguarded, almost bitter.

  Lea blinked. She had expected him to deny it, to give some half-dismissive remark, but instead… this, "Why?"

  He chuckled, low and humorless, the sound of someone ughing at the inevitability of drowning, "Because Lady Keter does not merely exist above men. She makes a mockery of us. To her, we are… moments. Nothing more. Do you understand how terrifying it is to be seen that way?"

  Lea shook her head faintly.

  "Most gods want something from us.", Auger continued, his voice sharper now, as if the act of remembering scraped him raw, "Worship, sacrifice, obedience. But her? She only takes time. And not in the way you think. It isn't just years. It's…"

  His words faltered, and he gripped the cane tighter, veins showing pale under the moonlight, "…it's how she warps it. How she toys with it."

  Lea leaned closer, "You mean the price?"

  He gave her a sidelong gnce, eyes haunted, "She told you, didn't she? A year of your life for a second of her presence."

  Lea nodded slowly.

  "The cruelest kind of truth.", Auger whispered, "Because that's exactly what it is. One second… but her second. Her domain is Time. And when she wishes, she can stretch that single tick into eternity. To her, sixty seconds is still sixty seconds, even if a day passes for everyone else."

  Lea's breath quickened, "…That really happened, didn't it?"

  "Yes.", he said ftly, and the way he said it chilled her more than any denial could have, "A comrade of ours once summoned her, eager to trade sixty years for a single minute of her power. Brave, foolish man. He thought he could bargain with eternity. But when she came…"

  Auger's voice cracked slightly, and he turned his eyes away from her, "…she stayed for a day. Twenty-four hours of her doing whatever she likes. And when she left, there was nothing left of him but a husk. Sixty years devoured in the blink of her eye."

  He fell silent then, jaw tight. Lea thought he had finished, until his next words dropped like a stone in her chest.

  "For all my years serving her… she never once looked at me.", his voice was raw, low, "Not once. I was a shadow, a tool, a clock to be wound and unwound. But then—"

  He inhaled sharply, shoulders stiff, "The day I reached the Fourth Step, when divinity burned itself into my flesh… she looked at me."

  Lea froze, feeling a chill going up her spine.

  "I still remember it.", Auger whispered, eyes gssy, "That was the first time Lady Keter's gaze rested on me. She recognized me, acknowledged me. And it terrified me more than all her silence ever had. Because if that is what it takes to be seen as a person in her eyes…"

  His hand trembled around the cane, knuckles white, "…then humanity means less to her than dust."

  The parasol on Lea's shoulder suddenly felt unbearably heavy. She swallowed, her throat dry, her mind conjuring the faintest image of Lady Keter's unseen gaze, weighing her as though she were a grain of sand.

  "…I see.", she whispered, though part of her wished she hadn't asked at all.

  And Auger, still staring at the moon, said nothing more.

  =0=0=

  The monochrome library y in its endless stillness, shelves stretching beyond sight, each groaning faintly as though they carried the weight of eternity itself. At the center of this muted expanse sat Lady Keter, legs crossed, a porcein pte banced neatly on her p.

  Upon it, a square of fruitcake, jeweled with candied peel. She cut into it delicately, savoring the sweetness against the barren sterility of her realm.

  "People are so noisy about me.", she murmured, voice carrying like a ripple through still water, "Fearful whispers, trembling admiration, frantic bargains… All of it born from their own limited comprehension."

  The light dimmed. The air thickened.

  A wrongness seeped into the library, sliding down between shelves like tar. Then it coaguted beside her, twisting into something that was neither form nor void.

  The weight of it was suffocating. The shelves themselves groaned louder, wood straining as if the concept of structure rebelled against the thing's presence. Every shadow deepened to an unnatural bck, stretching toward the creature only to wither away.

  The absence that should not exist leaned in, its edges writhing, folding like broken gss over water. It had no face, yet the entire library seemed forced to acknowledge it.

  Lady Keter did not so much as blink. She lifted her fork again, taking another bite of cake.

  "Auger Maxwell remembers well, quite insightful in fact.", she said, her tone airy, amused, "The moment I finally recognized him. How frightened he is of the truth… that my eyes only turned toward him when he stepped past mortality, it was quite fun teasing him."

  The formless thing twitched violently, reality around it cracking with faint screams. Dust fell from the ceiling as if even the architecture tried to flee.

  Keter merely dabbed her lips with a handkerchief, "Recognition must be earned. Until then, they are nothing but husks cking the fundamental pieces of creation, unworthy of names."

  The distortion lurched closer. The air pressed so heavily it could crush ribs, cold and sour, dragging with it the stench of something older than rot. No words came—

  Lady Keter smiled faintly, almost gentle, "And Lea. She listens too carefully. Every fear he spills, every caution I let slip. Fear tempers her but steel may break under the wrong hammer."

  The air screamed again, silence ripping open like torn parchment. "Miss Mashhith" trembled once, as though considering, then stilled, its very wrongness still suffocating the space.

  Lady Keter raised her teacup, her eyes glinting with pale crity.

  "I do enjoy fruitcake. The rest…", she let the pause hang, while the thing beside her distorted the world with its very presence, "…is inevitable."

  =0=0=

  The mist rolled in soft waves across Renlou's rooftops, the air sharp with night chill. Lea stood beneath her parasol's shadow, her gaze steady as Auger leaned against the balcony rail, ntern-light etching his face into harsh lines.

  "I've watched too many centuries slip by.", Auger said, his tone almost casual but carrying an iron weight beneath, "The gods py with lives like children tearing wings from flies. So I chose my path. I will become a god, and then I will sy them."

  His eyes flicked toward her, gleaming with conviction. “Lea, you walk with vengeance; I walk with war. Walk beside me until the end. Support me, as I tear down the divine."

  Lea's fingers tightened around the parasol's handle. For a heartbeat, she wondered if he was serious. But the gravity in his voice told her he was.

  Her response was immediate, unwavering, "No, my enemy is not the gods. My enemy is Akasha Monodrama. Nothing more."

  The answer cut the night like gss. Auger's lips parted, then curved into a grin.

  "Ha… as expected.", his chuckle was quiet but genuine, a ripple of warmth against the cold air, "Don't worry, I didn't expect you to start praying at my altar."

  He tapped his cane against the balcony rail, as if dismissing the thought entirely, "Still, it was worth a try."

  Lea exhaled slowly, a flicker of relief crossing her face, though she kept it hidden. His ugh, light as it was, stripped away the weight of the moment.

  "Dream your impossible dream if you must.", she said, tone ft, "Just don't drag me into it."

  "Perish the thought.", Auger replied with a smirk. Then, softer, almost wistful, "We'll see where our paths cross, Lea. Gods know, fate has a taste for irony."

  The night fell back into silence, but this time it felt less like a wound and more like a truce.