Immediately, the moment the giant lion ignited the sky, the battlefield fell into absolute silence. The clash of steel, the screams, the explosions, all of it vanished as if the world itself had been muted.

Every single person within the Holy Lands knew what that sight meant. It was the sign of the Emperor's presence, a divine summons that overrode all conflict. When it appeared, everyone was to gather, without exception.

This was no longer a fight for money, no longer a reckless hunt driven by greed or desperation. Anyone who ignored that call would be branded a traitor, and treason was punished far more brutally than killing a Holy Knight ever was. Death would be the least of it.

And yet, it was not the Emperor who had done this.

It was Hera.

The realization settled slowly, heavy and unsettling. Was this her plan all along? Not hunting them one by one in the chaos of the forest, but dragging every single Holy Knight into the same place, forcing a single, overwhelming confrontation. A massacre under the guise of a summons. The more I thought about it, the more absurd it became.

She's insane. Truly. There's something fundamentally wrong with her. What the hell is she thinking?

I cursed under my breath, but my steps never slowed. I moved forward without fear, following the path she had carved through madness and divine authority alike. Whatever was going to happen today would happen. I had already crossed too many lines to pretend otherwise.

As long as Elira was safe. As long as Beelzebub stayed with her. I felt, somehow, that things would not spiral completely out of control. Or maybe that was just another lie I told myself to keep moving.

Yes, I was walking straight into the stupidest decision I had ever made.

But if what she said was true, if she truly intended to hand me the Qillin bones and allow me to kill her afterward, then wouldn't that resolve everything except Lyssandra?

My uncertain steps carried me deeper into the darkness, the golden brilliance already fading behind us as if it had never existed at all. The forest felt different now, heavier, charged with something inevitable.

Hera stood ahead, unmoving, her face tilted toward the sky visible through the gaps between the branches. There was something unreadable in her gaze, something distant and almost solemn, as if she were watching a future only she could see.

"Are you prepared to kill?" she asked suddenly, without turning to look at me.

The question landed heavier than it should have.

"Sure," I replied after a brief pause, my voice steadier than my thoughts. "But after what you just did, it won't be only Holy Knights rushing here. Mercenaries will follow as well. Why draw them in too?"

I did not say the rest out loud, but it churned inside me all the same. The idea of them finding out who I truly was made my chest tighten. Had they suspected anything already? Had they noticed the cracks in the mask I wore so carefully? And if they came… did I really have to kill the people I had already bonded with?

The thought sickened me.

Northern Wolf alone would be a nightmare to face. His strength was no joke, not even for me. Hera could probably handle him without much trouble, but what about the others? The ones who laughed with me, drank with me, trusted me. Would I really raise my blade against them?

I wonder. How strong is she now?

My gaze settled on her back, sharpening as I focused fully on her. I reached out instinctively, trying to probe her presence, to see the color of her aura, to read something that might ground me in reality.

[This user is protected, skill denied]

My heart dropped.

For a brief moment, the forest seemed to tilt.

So it's true. She is like me. She is also from my world. She has a system as well...

"Surprised?" she asked.

Her eyes slid onto me, empty and cold, the kind of gaze that looked straight through flesh and bone and found nothing worth stopping for. There was no malice in it. No heat. She looked—exhausted.

"I was surprised too," she continued flatly. "When I learned there were worlds beyond the one where fantasy was only… fantasy." Her lips moved, but there was no emotion behind them. "At first, I thought it was a blessing. Coming here. Living inside a story instead of reading it."

She let out a slow breath, almost mechanical.

"You know. Here, I feel free," she said. "And still, I'm bound."

Her fingers curled slightly, then relaxed again, as if even anger required more effort than she had left. "Bound by this stupid task. Kill the main villain. Finish the book. Reach the ending." Her gaze hardened for a fraction of a second, then dulled again. "I don't want that ending. I don't want it, Beatrice."

The way she said my name made my spine tighten.

"You too," she went on, her voice steady, detached. "I knew something was off from the beginning. In the first few chapters, the raid should have already happened." She paused. "But the day I appeared in this world, everything shifted."

She finally turned fully toward me.

"I was given a quest the moment I arrived," she said. "A simple one. Complete the raid. Kill the hidden anomaly. Kill you."

The words landed without force, spoken like facts carved into stone.

"You were supposed to die there," she added. "But you hid yourself in the treasury. The moment your blade nearly sliced my throat open, I understood that this was not a game at all, no matter what the system kept insisting otherwise." Her eyes narrowed slightly, not in anger, but in recollection. "I failed because of you. I failed my quest."

For the first time, something faint flickered behind her gaze. Not rage. Not resentment. Regret.

"I lost a massive reward," she said quietly. "Something that would have made everything easier." Then, almost dismissively, "But I don't hold it against you anymore."

That surprised me more than anything else she had said.

"After all," she continued, her tone flattening again, "we're the same."

The forest felt unnaturally still around us.

"We're both cursed by this fate," she said. "Dropped into a story that refuses to let us live freely. Given systems, quests, paths, endings." Her eyes lifted briefly toward the sky, empty and distant. "No matter how strong we become, no matter how much we change, we're still trapped inside someone else's narrative."

She looked back at me.

"Unable to be free."

I stood there, unmoving.

For once, there was nothing sharp to say. As we waited for what was shaping up to be a suicidal confrontation, she had dropped something far more devastating than a threat.

The truth.

And it left me standing in silence, realizing that the enemy in front of me was not driven by hatred, ambition, or even madness.

She was driven by exhaustion.

"Where were you from?" I asked. The question slipped out before I could stop it. I did not even know why I asked. Maybe because everything else had already stopped making sense.

She glanced at me, her gaze briefly puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"Our world," I clarified quietly. "Where did you live?"

For the first time since this conversation began, something shifted. Her face lit up with genuine surprise. Then she laughed. Innocent laughter echoing softly through the trees.

"Did you seriously just ask me that?" she said between laughs. "Now? After I just told you we're both aliens to this world?" She shook her head, still smiling. "Beatrice, you're really something else."

Heat rushed to my face before I could stop it. Embarrassment burned across my cheeks, sharp and humiliating, completely out of place in a clearing moments away from turning into a slaughterhouse.

"The States," she added at last, tilting her head. "I came from the States. And you?"

"Same," I replied, turning my head away instinctively. I felt ridiculous. Out of everything happening here, this was the thing that made my composure crack.

For just a second, it almost felt normal.

"Hera?!"

A sharp, manly voice cut through the moment from the darkness beyond the trees. "What happened? Where is the Emperor?!"

The forest responded immediately.

Footsteps surged in from every direction. Figures poured into the clearing, one after another, their advance slowing the instant they saw us.

Hera and I... Standing together.

The lion-shaped statue glinted faintly in her hand. I saw recognition bloom across their faces, shock giving way to confusion, then fear. Holy Knights froze mid-step. Mercenaries stiffened, hands tightening around hilts they no longer seemed sure they should raise.

Northern Wolf was among them. Others too. People I had traveled with. Fought beside. Trusted.

Every gaze locked onto us.

The air thickened, tension coiling tight enough to snap.

This was it.

No matter how today ended, there would be no walking away untouched. I could feel it settling into my bones. I had to survive this. She had to survive this too. Not because of destiny or deals or cursed relics, but because I needed answers.

I needed to know everything she knew about this world, about the system, about the path she had chosen. About what came next.

Even if, at the end of it all, she still asked me to put a blade through her chest.

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