Yeon stood in the corridor, studying the two figures before him.
He sighed heavily.
"How did we even come to this?"
Zahir shrugged.
"We came to warn you all, but failed to consider how despicable your clan truly is. So this was plan B. Then again, we’re all aware of what killing machines you are, so I hope this isn’t quite a surprise."
Yeon studied the man and the black-haired, pale-skinned boy behind him. Then he shook his head.
"How pitiful... I didn’t mean for this."
He opened his palms, and two obsidian blades materialized in his grasp. He crossed them before his face and shifted into a combat stance.
"I know you’re a formidable opponent, Zahir al’Noor, so I won’t hold back."
He shifted his gaze to Ryan.
"Let’s eliminate the trash so we can savor this properly."
Zahir’s expression darkened. He shot his hand out, snatching Ryan’s collar and flipping him with a practiced roll while bringing his other hand up to block Yeon’s twin blades.
Parrying two swords with one was disadvantageous, but he was Zahir.
The ground cracked beneath him, yet he held firm. Instead, he channeled that force as momentum, twisting and drilling forward through the air with a steel rod in his grip.
Yeon blocked the strike and staggered back, but in that instant, the ground became treacherous—slick and frigid.
His eyes widened as he glanced down.
’Ice?’
He snapped his gaze to Ryan, who crouched on the corridor’s ledge, palm pressed against stone. Frost spread like wildfire, encasing the entire terrace and floor.
Yeon’s lips curved into a smirk.
"How delightful."
He glided across the ice like a seasoned skater, executed a graceful somersault, and landed balanced on his blade’s tip.
From his landing point, fractures spider-webbed through the ice, spreading rapidly until the surface shattered into crystalline fragments.
"That was your mistake, killer boy," Zahir said coldly as he surged forward, his robes billowing in the breeze.
The shattered ice fragments suspended in mid-air, then dissolved into mist that billowed outward, shrouding everything in dense white fog.
Yeon frowned as blindness engulfed him from all sides. He was trapped within walls of impenetrable whiteness.
He peered left and right—nothing. No sound, no presence. Complete void.
His eyes widened with realization.
’Have they... fled?’
He lunged through the fog, but it shifted states, becoming liquid. What had been walking became wading, then struggling as his legs grew heavy and his lungs fought for air.
Worse still, the water’s temperature spiked, scalding his skin and face, pouring into his mouth and searing his throat. He thrashed against the impossible circumstances stacked against him.
Then, in a single instant, everything froze solid. He was trapped within a crystalline prison that encased half the compound.
Zahir regarded him from beyond the ice.
"I’m sparing you because your death won’t quench my hatred—the one I seek is your father. But that reckoning isn’t today."
He raised his scarf to mask his face.
"Young Ryan, we depart."
Ryan nodded and fell into step behind him.
***
Zaire and Jynxa emerged from the tower onto the plain, where dark-armored knights stood at various posts. Some appeared to be conducting cleanup operations.
The moment they stepped outside, every knight turned, immediately spotting them.
Absolute silence stretched taut. Zaire appeared as shocked and bewildered as they were. Jynxa, however, remained utterly indifferent to everything—until certain triggers loosened her restraints.
No one truly understood what set the Blood Doll off. They only knew she shouldn’t be unleashed unless absolutely necessary.
Zaire swallowed hard and forced a smile.
"Please, continue your work. We’ll just head back inside."
As he turned, a harsh feminine voice cut through the air.
"Halt!"
They froze and slowly pivoted back. Zaire maintained his wide grin as a woman strode toward them.
She was tall and elegant, with cropped hair and sharp bangs. Her crimson eyes glowed like pinpricks of fire behind slits narrow as needle’s width.
Behind her followed another woman who had been overseeing the knights—shorter, clad in a black dress wholly inappropriate for battlefields, looking thoroughly irritated by everything.
The lead woman approached and stopped mere feet away. She never smiled—had never possessed one.
Her voice carried a razor’s edge with brutal directness.
"Aren’t you the visitors Yeon brought in?"
Zaire chuckled nervously, glancing around.
"I’m not sure who this Yeon is, ma’am."
The woman studied him with suspicion, her gaze like a dagger’s edge slowly catching light as it’s drawn.
Then she tilted her head suddenly, short hair cascading sideways.
"Doesn’t matter. You shouldn’t be here. I’ll just eliminate you both and report to Shin. My apologies."
She didn’t move—at least not toward them—but something else did. Too fast, too thin, blurring into motion.
Sparks spiraled around Zaire and Jynxa as he stepped forward, a compact hand axe materializing in his grip.
He used the weapon to snare what flew at him—a thin chain that wrapped around the blade. He drove it groundward and rolled aside as a gleaming silver sickle whistled over his head.
By shortening the chain’s length, he’d prevented decapitation as the sickle would have otherwise carved through his neck from behind.
But Zaire had no time to celebrate this small victory.
The woman barely moved, yet her chain and sickle whipped through the air, weaving vicious arcs across the entire space.
Zaire spun his axe between his palms, eyes tracking the primary blade. As it struck toward him, he swung to intercept. The sickle was lightning-quick, recoiling like a serpent’s strike before lashing out from another angle. Zaire matched its speed, spinning his weapon in fluid motions, deflecting the blade and sending it careening off course.
The woman’s gaze drifted to Jynxa, who remained utterly detached from the violent exchange.
Zaire’s eyes widened the moment he caught her shift in focus.
’Oh hell no.’
Electricity already crackled between his fingers as he pivoted toward Jynxa, desperate to intercept whatever strike the woman was preparing.
Then the lady’s lips twisted into a manic grin.
"Your flank is completely exposed, fool."
She jerked her hand, gripping the chain tight before whipping it downward and thrusting forward.
The sickle and its tether became a blur, changing trajectory with razor-sharp, imperceptible speed. Zaire couldn’t predict its path—it seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere simultaneously.
But then the Blood Doll shifted her head, and her eyes narrowed to deadly slits.