Whatever method she used to force her way through the barrier, Arte recognized the girl as the one he had, on numerous occasions, seen striding alongside Ramia, the red princess.

At the academy, Arte had heard rumors about the girl, as rumors were something her appearance and presence easily sparked. Not much was known about her. It was said that she came from a low-ranking noble family in the Duchy of Félicity and suddenly appeared at the academy. In just a few days, she made a name for herself by joining the ascending nobility's faction and becoming their protégé and sort of mascot.

"Hi Mael."

"Hi... Reina."

"You’re okay?" she casually asked, with a tone unfit for her grand entrance.

"I… I am."

Whatever that girl was there for, Arte could see that even those who supposedly knew her best, like Arte, seemed visibly surprised, if not straight-up taken aback, by her presence.

Her blue eyes then shifted from Mael to Arte, and though she spoke no words, Arte could somehow hear her, in her strange accent, asking him the same question she had asked Mael.

"I see," she sighed, seemingly relieved, "at least I wasn't too late this time around."

After finally taking her gaze off of Arte and Mael, she turned her attention to the archbishop and began to stride towards him.

"Who are you!?"

"Stand down!"

"Surrender!"

"Halt," the Archbishop's close guard yelled at her, standing between her and their master, their weapons and magic aimed at her.

The girl came to a halt in her stride, not in response to the archbishop's men but to summon something neither Arte nor Mael understood.

"Stand aside."

Blue light erupted from her and engulfed everything in its path. At first, it did not seem to have harmed anyone, nor did it appear to have any repercussions. This impression was short-lived, as it didn't take long for Arte and the others to understand and feel what she had actually done.

Like nothing, the red barrier summoned by the archbishop shattered.

Though Arte had never experienced it before, he immediately recognized the similarities between what he was feeling now and how those wielding water magic felt when facing the water calamity, namely, helplessness.

Mael, who had been there that day, instantly recognized and picked up on that presence. It was one that screamed his own insignificance, but unlike that day, this feeling was induced on him not by a mountain-sized beast but by a girl—or possibly worse, something that resembled one.

The girl walked right past the guards, who, in the face of the tetanizing feeling they went through, remained frozen in place.

"You... you're the one... the one accompanying the faceless one," the Archbishop managed to say as the girl reached him.

To everyone's surprise, she walked past the archbishop, completely ignoring his presence, to go to what seemed to be what truly interested her: the massive crystal, within which Sora, the Daughter of Mountain, remained frozen in time.

There she remained still for a long moment before gently reaching onto the crystal surface and murmuring, "Sorry for having you wait so long, aunt. Your niece has finally returned; let me return you to your rightful place," she said before encasing the massive crystal mass inside a blue orb, which could have been stored or teleported away. One could hardly say for sure.

"No, you can’t!" The archbishop barked, firing magic, which he seemed to still be in possession of, at the girl. "That is not for you to take."

But before it could reach her, it vanished into nothingness as it collided with a barrier she had erected around herself.

"You… who are you?!" The archbishop mumbled, backing away in fear from her.

"It was you... You're the one who did those things to all these girls, to these people, and to Aunt?" She approached the archbishop, threateningly asking him as her eyes gleamed with a murderous blue.

"Stay away from me!" the archbishop screamed at the girl backing away from her. With a glance cast at his guards, he ordered, "You all, do something!"

Finally gathering themselves up from whatever the girl did to them, the Archbishop guard finally made their move and went to stand between their master and the girl.

This time, the girl wasted no time issuing warnings. With disconcerting ease, she trapped the nine paladins within a bubble-like prison and lifted them off the ground, allowing her to approach the archbishop unimpeded.

"Stay away! Stay away from me!" screamed the archbishop, collapsing arse-first on the ground.

"You may crawl, squeal, and beg as much as you like." The girl reached around the archbishop's neck and lifted him off, to have him on his knees. "There will be no escape for you today."

"Please... I must not die here. Please," the Archbishop begged. "I can help you, I can help the faceless one. I can be of use!"

Unfortunately for him, the Archbishop's pleading words did not even manage to shake the girl's murdering intent; instead, she went so far as to ask, "So that I get to kill you of my own accord, give me a reason. What’s all of this for? What pitiful excuse do you have for all you have done to all these pitiful girls?"

Though he knew that there was no surviving outcome for him, the archbishop nonetheless answered, "To protect humanity. Humanity needs nobles to survive. I wanted to find a way to ensure the perenniality of nobility and thus the survival of humanity."

Perhaps the archbishop’s words had a calming effect on the girl, or perhaps it was the inverse, but facts remained that the girl gave the archbishop a pause before asking, "To protect humanity, you said,... from what exactly?"

"They," the archbishop said, "who see us as nothing and who look down on us," had no choice but to respond. "They," the Archbishops replied, "who I know will doom us all: the gods and, of course, the dragons."

Though she had asked, she didn’t look particularly surprised by the arrogance of the archbishop’s aspiration; disappointment and anger, on the other hand, were laid bare on her face.

"She was right. She was right about you all along. You were made aware of the truth, yet went to reach out for the worst imaginable outcome."

With these words, the archbishop's entire reality suddenly changed; he was no longer on his knees, and the girl to whom he was prostrating and begging was no longer there.

He was alone, in a completely different environment. Instead of being inside the facility as he was a few breaths prior, he now stood in the middle of a strange place.

Around him was a tundra-like place, but it had to be that. It was tundra-like, nothing more, nothing less, as there was something about this place that made it less than simply real or even believeable to the Archbishop’s eyes.

It took him some time to identify it, but the Archbishop eventually managed to put a finger on what it was that he felt was wrong about that place.

The world, as surreal as it was, had something that made it subreal; that was how the tundra was made. It was attempted to mimic a tundra, but in the end it remained a mimic.

"You were correct," he heard a voice he recognized as the girl's say.

While attempting to locate the source of the voice, the scene changed; it was no longer as seamless as it had been the first time it occurred.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

At a skin-threatening speed, the temperature rose.

"What is th—Aaaaaaaargh!"

The tundra had been replaced by a fiery landscape that was almost too surreal to be an illusion.The ground first embered, then caught fire, and soon lava was spewing from its depths.

Facing the searing heat that he could not protect himself from with magic he didn't seem to have access to, the Archbishop was burned but miraculously was not reduced to ash. Amidst the agonizing but non-lethal pain, he somehow managed to survive. He survived to see the world around him boil in lava, with lightning dancing furiously in the millions, if not billions, around him.

The Archbishop clearly heard a voice speaking to him among the deafening sound of the worlds being devoured around him and the sound of his own agonizing screech: "You were right; dragons and gods will indeed cause the end to you all, just as they had almost done in the past."

When the Archbishop turned around in the direction of the voice, he was greeted by an otherworldly sight: amidst the sea of fire, stood a gigantic winged shadow, her eyes gleaming beyond the faraway ashy and fiery fog, and the Archbishop recognized the merciless blue eyes that stared down at him.

"You might be right. Aina's children, Mana, and my sister will awaken, for it is their right to do so. There is nothing you can do against it. The gods and dragons will awaken, and there is nothing you can do to stop it."

"You believe you are worthy of standing in their way?" A giant clawed arm descended from the sky, crushing the archbishop like an ant beneath its claws. "Allow me, Nia, voice of the primordial thunder and dragon of the eight elements, to show you how wrong you are," the voice boomed before obliterating the archbishop with a single, anticlimactic blow.

Arte and Mael stood there, speechless, contesting what they had just, with their very eyes, witnessed.

Whatever exactly she did there, the Archbishop, along with his guards imprisoned inside the girl’s bubbles, vanished into complete non-existence. Nothing was left of them—not blood, not bones, not ashes. They simply vanished in a flurry of volatile, fiery twinkles.

The archbishop gone, the girl’s attention went back to the only two people left in the room: Mael and Arte.

"I will raze this place," she simply announced, before suggesting, "you two should take your leave."

The way she so casually announced it was such that it induced no immediate reaction from both Arte and Mael except one of confusion, one that required the girl to ask, "Mael?" to snap them out of.

Snapping out, "We will, but—" Mael ventured, only to be interrupted by Arte’s mumbling.

"You... you just started at the academy three months ago."

Three months ago, not so long after Arte’s master's alleged death, which he heard rumors of being at the hands of someone calling himself the "Faceless One,"

"The archbishop earlier said that you were the one accompanying the faceless one... Is that true?" Arte asked, striding toward her, but only to freeze in what he understood was fear—a feral instinct—a couple of steps taken.

"It could be. What of it?"

Arte had heard countless rumors about members of the Fourteen allegedly being killed by the "faceless one" all across the continent over the past three months. However, he struggled to believe them, as his master was one of the Fourteen and was incredibly strong. Arte couldn't imagine his master being defeated by anyone, let alone the faceless one, as rumors claimed. If he were to believe something, it would be that his master was most likely surrounded and ambushed by members of the aristocracy, who then used the alias "faceless one" to vindicate a Fourteen's defeat.

However, as he watched the girl effortlessly defeat the archbishop, Arte couldn't help but wonder if the rumors might actually be true. Could it be that the "faceless one" was actually this seemingly ordinary girl standing in front of him or someone similar to her? If so, then perhaps his master's alleged death had not been due to an ambush but rather to an overwhelming strength similar to the one that this mysterious girl displayed. Arte couldn't be sure, but he knew that he needed to find out the truth.

"Master, the Holy Paladin Gunther Freshet... is he alive?" Arte inquired, since while his master had been rumored to be dead and had been declared so by the aristocracy, there was no corpse to back up that claim; only the testimony of those who had been in the vicinity claimed evidence of his death. But even they did not see his master in his very last moments.

She seemed rather disinclined to answer, but nonetheless nodded.

"He is. I was there."

"Was it you or that faceless one?"

"I want no conflict with you, yet I doubt that there is even a way to answer that question without having you take it badly."

"Just answer me!" Arte barked. " Was it you or that faceless one that ki-guh?!?" Arte suddenly stopped at the sight and the sensation of something red and blade-like stabbing from his back and piercing through his chest. Turning around, his eyes met those of the person who stabbed him from behind. "Mael!... why?"

"You’ll forgive me, cousin, I have come to learn that being reasonable was never something you were particularly good at. As such, I understand, and I expect you to do so as well, that if this is what needs to be done to get you out of harm’s way because of your own intemperance, then so be it."

To protect himself, Arte swung his spear at Mael, but by then he had already withdrawn, his hands empty, and whatever he impaled Arte with was still piercing through his chest.

Soon the red, blade-like thing impaling Arte started to melt into what it truly was: blood. It did not melt in a way to drop on the ground; instead, it melted in a way to crawl its way into the wound Mael had inflicted on him. Following that, Arte stumbled on his knees, then on his fours, his limbs limping and his vision blurry.

"What... what have you done to me?"

Arte didn't last long enough against whatever was happening to him to hear the response he wanted from Mael.

"I was not expecting that," the girl, who had remained silent and still for the whole thing, ventured, "Is he...?"

"Merely unconscious, he’ll wake up sore-backed, but he will be fine."

"You know, Mael, it would've been fine even if you hadn't done that; it's not like I would've harmed you or him."

"Still, my heart feels more at ease knowing that I did not take the risk, little as it may have been."

To that remark, she merely smiled. "Anyway, Mael, I think it should really be time for you and your cousin to take your leave."

"I can’t yet. The girls. There should be here four gir—"

"You don’t have to worry about them. They’ve already been rescued and evacuated. As of now, there remain in this place only the three of us."

"I see… and the witnesses?"

"Don't worry, this place has already been captured by the Aristocracy. There are no witnesses left here to attest to your and your cousin's presence and involvement in this matter. I personally made sure of that before coming here, and I will further ensure it by razing this place."

"I see."

"Any other concerns?"

"There is still one; this place is underground, beneath the Holy City; if you raze it up, like I heard you razed that duchy, you’ll destroy the whole city."

"Ah, you’ve already heard about it," she gaudily lamented, as though she wasn’t referring to half a duchy being turned into ashes. "Don't worry, maybe raze was the wrong verb to describe it; let's call it flood then. Flood is definitely better, I think."

"If you say so." Mael went to his cousin and picked him up, adding, "So long as you do not destroy the city above."

With those words, Mael, carrying his cousin, made his way to the exit, only to pause and ask, curious as was his cousin, "You, Rena,... I’m not even sure that’s your real name; you came to us three months ago claiming to be the true faceless one sent by the aristocracy, and though neither Ramia nor I ever believed, even for one second, that it was ever true, we nonetheless accepted it as it was. But today I would like to ask, "Is the Faceless One—the true Faceless One—the one I think he is?"

The girl was on the verge of speaking when Mael precised, "No lies, please. Perhaps you’ve never been told this, but you're a very unconvincing liar."

At Mael’s remark, she once again smiled and said, "I have. Often, I would even say. But Mael, I don’t think that question of yours is for me to answer."

"Is there really no way?"

"There is none."

"I see," Mael sighed, giving up on insisting on that question.

"However, since it is in many ways my fault that you became involved in this particular matter you wanted to avoid, I'll let you know that things in the aristocracy's end are moving along rather smoothly."

"Perhaps Maa—Madam Mathilda didn't tell you, but despite working with the aristocracy toward a specific goal, neither I nor Ramia, and even less the ascending nobility, are working with the aristocracy, so the less I know about you people, the better," Mael explained.

"I know. which is why I take advantage of this opportunity to let you know that Maa is no longer the one in charge."

"What happened?"

"Nothing. She simply has more important things to do, such as catch up with your uncle Damian, her son.

"I see. So the one in charge is the one you call "the Mother""

"Yes, she is. Today, the last component to moving forward with her plan has been seized, so we might soon enter a new step, one where the aristocracy’s goal and yours perfectly align."

"You mean… them."

"Soon, the trumpet announcing their falls will be blown, so we’ll be expecting you to be ready when the time for the dance comes."

"I will. We will be ready."

"Good."

With these words, Mael prepares himself to once again take his leave and once again turn toward the girl.

"Anything else?"

"Your name?"

"My name?"

"You have yet to tell me your name. I think that at least that should be for you to answer, right?"

"Indeed, that I can do. It’s Nia. You may still call me Rena, without the "i" after all, that name is as much my name as Nia is."

"I see… See you then, Rena."

"See you, Mael. I can’t wait for the day the three of us, Ramia, you, and I, work together again. Though, at the time, four would have been a more accurate term."

With these words, Mael, carrying his cousin, walked away.

On his way toward the exit, Mael came to witness with his two eyes what the girl meant by "there are no witnesses" and why she was so keen on "flooding" this place.

Mael tried not to think about it, reasoning that their deaths must have been painless and spontaneous based on how they'd frozen in place.

It was then, amidst the frozen carnage left by the girl, Nia, that Mael remembered someone he did not see among her victims: the teleporter boy and the man, whom he had failed to have dead..