Frank's heart pounded as he watched Ian's face transform from menacing confidence to abject terror. The Jiuling member spun around, his eyes widening as they landed on Mai.

"Mel?" Ian's voice cracked, barely above a whisper.

Frank's brow furrowed in confusion. Mai? Mel? His mind raced, trying to make sense of the sudden shift in Ian's demeanor. The little girl he'd been protecting stood there, but something was off. Her usual childlike innocence had vanished, replaced by an eerie, emotionless mask.

Mai—or was it Mel?—strode forward with unnatural grace. Her small feet barely seemed to touch the ground as she approached a severed Jiangshi head. Without hesitation, she drew back her leg and kicked. The head soared across the warehouse, smashing against the far wall with a sickening crunch.

Frank's stomach lurched. This wasn't the Mai he knew. This was something else entirely.

"Was I also just one of your pawns?" Mel's voice was cold, devoid of any childlike qualities. Her eyes, once warm and innocent, now bore into Ian with an intensity that made Frank shiver.

Ian stumbled backward, his earlier bravado evaporating like mist in sunlight. "Mel, I... it's just a misunderstanding. I swear, I didn't-"

"Silence." The word cut through the air like a knife, and Ian's mouth snapped shut.

Mel turned her gaze to Frank, and he felt a chill run down his spine. Those eyes... they weren't the eyes of a child. They were ancient, filled with a knowledge and power that made his skin crawl.

"Detective," she said, her voice unnaturally calm. "Thank you for the chocolate bars."

Frank swallowed hard, his throat suddenly dry. "Who... what are you?"

A smile played at the corners of Mel's lips, but it didn't reach her eyes. "I am many things, Frank. A guardian, a destroyer, a banished… Dainv. But to Ian..." Her gaze flicked back to the trembling Jiuling member. "To Ian, I was hope. Misplaced hope. And in him, I also had hope. He told me he could find the boy."

Ian fell to his knees, the stolen ether pulsing erratically around him. "Mel, please. I did it all for you. For us. I thought... I thought if I could harness enough power. After I get enough, I swear I could find him."

Mel's eyes narrowed. "And how many lives did you destroy in pursuit of that, Ian? How many innocents suffered because of that? Yet you dare trick me for your own goals."

Frank's hand tightened on his gun, though he knew it would be useless against either of them.

"I... I didn't mean for it to go this far," Ian pleaded. "The power, it... it consumed me. I couldn't stop. I just wanted to see her again. To hold her one more time."

Mel's expression softened for a moment, a flicker of something almost human crossing her face. But it vanished as quickly as it appeared, replaced by that same cold mask.

"Your actions have consequences, Ian," she said. "You told me you would find him. So who's working for who?"

Her body glowed, and the air around her began to shimmer, the red silhouette began to form. Frank felt a pressure building in his ears, and a headache setting itself on the familiar place on his head.

"Wait! Mai!" he shouted, surprising himself. Both Mel and Ian turned to look at him. "You don't have to do this. Ian's done terrible things, yes, but shouldn't he face justice first? Human justice?"

Mel tilted her head, regarding Frank with curiosity. "And what would your human justice accomplish? Can that justice help me find the boy I long for?"

Frank's mind raced. He was out of his depth, way out of his depth, but he couldn't just stand by and watch... whatever this was about to happen.

"Maybe not," he admitted. "But killing him won't help find the one you're looking for."

Ian looked at Frank with a mixture of surprise and desperate hope. Mel, however, remained impassive.

"You speak of things you don't understand, Detective," she said. "It's not about justice at all or anything you are thinking of. I simply want to kill him"

As if to emphasize her point, the air behind her shimmered, and the familiar red silhouette engulfed her very being. Frank resisted the urge to look away from Mel.

"Please," Ian begged, reaching out towards Mel. "I'll do anything. Anything to make this right."

Mel's gaze softened again, and for a moment, Frank saw a flicker of the little girl he thought he knew. "Oh, Ian," she said, her voice tinged with sadness. "You already have by letting me eat you."

Frank's heart pounded as Mel's red silhouette materialized in front of Ian. The air crackled with energy, and Frank's skin prickled with goosebumps. He watched, paralyzed, as Ian raised his hands in a futile attempt to defend himself. Hundreds of knives launched themselves in a carpet towards Mel.

In a blur of motion too fast for Frank's eyes to follow, Mel grabbed Ian's head. The sickening crunch of bone and tearing of flesh filled the warehouse. Frank's stomach lurched.

"Stop!" he shouted, his voice hoarse and desperate. But it was already too late.

Ian's headless body crumpled to the floor, blood pooling around it. The red mist surrounding Mel dissipated, revealing not the little girl Frank had known, but a full-grown woman. Her eyes, cold and ancient, locked onto Ian's severed head in her grasp.

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Frank's mind reeled. This couldn't be happening. It had to be a nightmare, some twisted hallucination brought on by stress and lack of sleep. But the metallic stench of blood in the air was all too real.

Mel's lips curled into a smile that sent chills down Frank's spine. Her voice, no longer that of a child, resonated through the warehouse. "I've lived for centuries and centuries with nothing to live for. Only in recent times I found something to look forward to every day. But he was gone in a blink of an eye. Maybe you took him!? Did you take him!? Answer me!"

Her haunting laughter echoed off the warehouse walls, sending shivers down Frank's spine. Though barely audible, the woman's chuckle seemed to envelop him completely.

"Answer me! Answer me! Answer me!" she shrieked, her desperate pleas growing more insistent with each passing moment.

She held Ian's head up, staring directly into its eyes. "So I ask you this…" She paused, her smile growing more deranged. "Oh right, you're dead. But I'll tell you. Let me tell you. I'll do anything, even if the whole universe turns against me. But you got tempted by such shallow goals! By those pests... Why! Why! Why!"

Frank watched in horror as Mel's mouth stretched impossibly wide. In one swift motion, she devoured Ian's head whole.

Suddenly, the space around them distorted. Frank felt a wave of dizziness wash over him, and he saw Mel and the dead bodies on the floor disappear. But he remained conscious, his mind buzzing with a strange, manic energy. Then he felt something crack within him. The headache dulled and the dizziness subsided.

A laugh bubbled up from deep within him, starting as a chuckle and growing into a full-blown cackle.

"So it was you," he gasped between fits of laughter. "I got it! I finally got it!"

Frank's laughter echoed through the chamber, then slowly turned into a giggle.

The realization hit him like a freight train. All the pieces of the puzzle he'd been trying to solve for years suddenly fell into place. The Red Death incident, the disappearances, the supernatural occurrences—it all led back to this being, this... Dainv.

The word echoed in his mind, a broken record playing on repeat. Dainv. Dainv. Dainv. What did it mean? What was she? The questions swirled in his mind, but he knew he was powerless to find answers. How could he, a mere human, hope to understand or confront something so beyond his comprehension?

Frank heard footsteps approaching. Alan's familiar gait. His partner's voice cut through the chaos in his mind.

"It's time to go," Alan said, his tone surprisingly calm given the carnage surrounding them.

Frank felt Alan's strong hands grip his shoulders, pulling him to his feet. His legs felt weak, unsteady. He leaned heavily on his partner, his mind still reeling from everything he'd witnessed.

As Alan guided him towards the exit, Frank heard him speak again.

"Mel," Alan said, his voice casual as if addressing a child, "You're welcome at my house anytime."

Frank's head snapped up, his eyes wide with disbelief. He stared at his partner, searching for any sign that this was some kind of sick joke.

As they stepped out of the warehouse into the cool night air, Frank's world tilted on its axis. Everything he thought he knew, every truth he'd held onto, suddenly seemed like a lie.

The sound of sirens pierced the night, growing louder with each passing second. Frank knew they should leave, that staying here would lead to questions he couldn't possibly answer. But his feet felt rooted to the spot, his body unwilling to move.

"We need to go," Alan urged, tugging on Frank's arm. "Now."

Alan picked him up, put him in the passenger seat, and drove off.

***

Frank's hand trembled as he raised the glass to his lips, amber liquid sloshing over the rim. The bar's dim lights swam before his eyes, a hazy blur of neon and shadow. It felt only yesterday that he'd been sitting beside Carl in this bar.

The whiskey burned its way down his throat, a familiar warmth that did nothing to ease the chill in his soul. How could he possibly hope to fight something like that? That... thing that wore Mai's face? It was beyond human comprehension, beyond anything he'd ever encountered.

A chuckle bubbled up from his chest, startling him. His face contorted into a grin, muscles moving of their own accord. It should have felt wrong, but somehow, it didn't. Nothing felt real anymore.

Frank pushed himself to his feet, the world tilting dangerously. He stumbled towards the exit, bumping into tables and chairs as he went. The bartender called out something, but the words were lost in the fog of alcohol clouding Frank's mind.

The cool mid-day air hit him like a slap to the face as he stumbled out of the bar. Frank tripped over his own feet, the ground rushing up to meet him. He landed hard on the sidewalk, the rough concrete scraping his palms.

Groaning, Frank rolled onto his back beside the bar's door. The world spun above him and then he saw it.

A massive tear in the fabric of reality itself, a rift stretching across the night sky. It's size could cover all of Toronto all the way to the borders of New York state. The rift pulsed with an otherworldly light, its edges jagged and raw. Frank blinked hard, certain it must be a hallucination. But when he opened his eyes again, it was still there.

A warm wetness spread across his lap, and the acrid smell of urine filled his nostrils. Frank knew he should care, should be mortified, but he couldn't summon the energy. What did it matter now? Nothing mattered in the face of that impossible rift hanging over the city.

A man stepped out of the bar, looked at him displeased. "Lazy drunk." said the man as he walked by. Moments passed by and more patrons exited the bar.

"Frank, it's time to go home."

Alan's voice cut through the haze of alcohol and despair. Frank turned his head, struggling to focus on his partner's familiar face. Alan wasn't alone. He held the hand of a small, blurry figure—a little girl.

Even through his drunken stupor, Frank felt a chill run down his spine. The girl's face was indistinct, but her smile... That smile was crystal clear. Wide and unnatural, it split her face like a wound.

Frank tried to speak, to warn Alan, but his tongue felt thick and useless in his mouth. He could only watch as his partner helped him to his feet, steadying him with a firm grip.

"Come on, buddy," Alan said, his voice oddly gentle. "Let's get you cleaned up."

As they walked towards Alan's car, Frank's gaze kept drifting back to the little girl. Her hand in Alan's, her eerie smile never wavering. How could Alan not see it? How could he act so normal?

The world tilted again, and Frank found himself in the backseat of Alan's car. The leather upholstery stuck to his damp clothes, but he barely noticed. His eyes were fixed on the rearview mirror, where he could see the little girl's reflection.

She turned to look at him, her smile growing impossibly wider. Frank's heart pounded in his chest, a scream building in his throat. But before he could make a sound, the girl's face... changed.

For a split second, her features melted away, revealing something ancient and terrible beneath. Frank's mind recoiled from the sight, unable to process what he was seeing. And then, just as quickly, she was a little girl again.

Alan's voice drifted back from the driver's seat, casual and relaxed. "So, Mel, how are you enjoying your stay?"

The rift in the sky loomed larger with each passing moment, a constant reminder of the world-shattering events unfolding around them. Frank felt like he was teetering on the edge of an abyss, about to fall into a reality he couldn't begin to comprehend.

Mel's voice, childlike yet ancient, cut through his thoughts. "I'm having a great time. Thank you for asking."

Her words were innocent, but there was an undercurrent of something else. Something hungry.