Night had fallen. The full moon hung high over the remote outskirts of Igwynt. Deep in a dense forest, Anna stood amid a raging gale, transformed into a valiant young knight. Wearing a fitted skirted armor, wielding a long spear with a banner, and crowned with a winged helm, she gazed solemnly ahead. Before her stood another young woman—Artcheli of the Church’s Court of Secrets—watching with a strangely focused look. “These… weapons and armor? And they’re of an ancient design. Is this some sort of inheritance passed down by the Field family? But from what I know of history, ever since the first head of House Field, their Beyonder heritage was severed long ago… It seems you’ve uncovered something new.” Artcheli observed seriously, seeming to believe that Anna and her organization had unearthed a hidden mystical legacy of the Field family. “You mean to say… Yarlin Field left behind some mystical relic?” “Anna” replied calmly. “That’s unfortunate. If he had truly left behind anything of power, his descendants wouldn’t be suffering as they are now.” She glanced down at the spear in her hands and continued. “My power doesn’t come from any inheritance—and it has nothing to do with the Afterbirth Cult. This power comes from history itself. We are not the people you’re looking for. There’s no need for us to fight. Let’s end this here, Secrets Cardinal…” “Power from history… Interesting. So the Rose Cross Order has even deeper roots than I thought—makes you all the more worth investigating. Besides, whether or not you’re related to the Afterbirth Cult isn’t for you to say. I’ll decide after I drag you back and conduct a thorough interrogation. Even if you have no connection, someone with this many secrets doesn’t get to just walk away. Don’t try to bargain with me.” Artcheli’s voice remained cold and emotionless. In the distance, Dorothy frowned slightly as she listened through the information channel. “The Church is too domineering… Is this the arrogance built up over a thousand years?” she thought to herself. She had already subtly hinted that the Rose Cross Order was connected to Revelation and to Heaven’s Arbiter—but even so, Artcheli remained unyielding and refused to let them go. This made things troublesome. As the dominant mystical force for centuries, the Church had never had to treat any other organization as an equal. Their powerhouses had grown incredibly arrogant. They weren’t used to negotiating on equal footing—any “negotiation” usually took place only after they had full control. The cardinals, although aware of the massive crisis posed by Unina’s return, had never personally experienced her might. Most of them had never fought in the Great Holy War four centuries ago, and had no direct understanding of the threat posed by the alliance of the Afterbirth Cult. As such, they hadn’t yet grasped the need to unite with other forces. Artcheli, being among the younger cardinals—unlike Amanda, who had lived through the last Holy War—was still deeply confident in the Church’s strength. She believed that their state of full-scale holy war readiness was sufficient, and that there was no need for further measures. This arrogance was common among the Church leadership. Artcheli wasn’t the worst of them, but it still made her inflexible and domineering in action. “Lady Secrets, is there really no way we can talk this out?” Anna asked. Artcheli raised her sword and replied coldly. “If you want to talk, come back with me and talk there.” As she murmured, Artcheli suddenly lunged with explosive speed, wielding both sword and gun—moving faster than the eye could track. Anna quickly raised her guard, swinging her spear with an upward slash. From the path of Anna’s strike, a massive, razor-sharp wind blade erupted and flew toward Artcheli. Artcheli’s expression remained composed as she sidestepped the attack, dodging effortlessly. The wind blade scraped past her and carved a deep gouge into the ground. This storm power was drawn by Dorothy from the Field family’s historical and legal legacy and bestowed upon Anna. Even without Viagetta’s buff, Dorothy could still tap into a limited portion of the divine power of Heaven’s Arbiter. She could use that power to enhance her own abilities. If quantified, Dorothy currently had around three units of recoverable divinity—using it to cast divine enchantments that could elevate her abilities. At the moment, her divine enchantment empowered her “Annecdotal Body,” a power from the Bewitching Dreams Path. Originally fueled by horror legends, this ability had now expanded to draw on history and jurisprudence. So long as Dorothy found a strong historical or legal anchor point, she could manifest that narrative as power. The form this took varied. In this case, Dorothy had armored Anna with that power directly—an approach she called Heroic Spirit Armament. Now, using Anna as the node, Dorothy had manifested the Field family’s legacy. While the family was only a few centuries old and their influence not particularly vast, Dorothy used divine power to further amplify it—extending the narrative via Yarlin Field to partially include the national history of the Kingdom of Pritt. Fortunately, Yarlin had a storied legacy—he declined the title of duke, played a major role in the Wind King’s Rebellion, was a founding contributor to the Hyacinth Dynasty, and had close ties to King Baldric. Using him as a conduit, Dorothy could easily incorporate elements of Pritt’s national legal legacy. Much of Anna’s power now stemmed from that history. Back to the battle—after missing her first strike, Anna continued swinging her spear, unleashing more massive wind blades. She also thrust it forward, firing compressed air blasts. Artcheli danced between the attacks with graceful agility, weaving through the formless assaults and dodging them all. “Such an incredible manifestation of Shadow power… This might be the strongest Shadow I’ve ever seen. Even compared to Gossmore back then, her speed and agility are superior. And to think such a powerful Shadow serves as a Saint in the Church of Lantern… What other secrets are they hiding?” Dorothy pondered as she observed Artcheli's performance. Back on the battlefield, realizing her standard attacks were ineffective, Anna’s expression turned serious. She lifted her spear skyward and unleashed a powerful updraft. The surrounding air surged toward her, forming a violent vertical current that howled into the night sky. “Prison of the Upper Wind!” Caught in the powerful updraft, Artcheli—slight as she was—was hurled into the sky, rapidly rising far above the ground. In that swirling wind, even Artcheli’s mystical mobility was suppressed. Seeing her moment of vulnerability, Anna fired several wind blades toward the airborne Artcheli. With no way to dodge, Artcheli raised her gun and fired. A dazzling orb of light erupted from the barrel and hung in midair. Its radiance lit the entire forest, casting sharp shadows on every surface—trees, rocks, even Anna. The moment those shadows appeared, Artcheli’s silhouette connected with the shadow of a tree on the ground—then her entire body dissolved into a mirage and vanished, melting into the connected shadow as if she had never been there. As Artcheli vanished, Anna paused. Guided by real-time input from Dorothy, she quickly spun around and thrust her spear into her own shadow. From that very shadow, Artcheli had been about to emerge. Because she had anticipated it, Anna’s wind-infused spear pierced Artcheli straight through the chest. But the impaled Artcheli showed no pain—her face remained emotionless. A moment later, her body vanished into thin air. “Not the real body!” Dorothy’s heart jolted. She immediately had Anna scan the surroundings—but what she saw next was completely unexpected. In the brightly lit forest, beneath the tall trees, deep shadows stretched out beneath every trunk. And in each of those shadows… A small girl’s figure was slowly rising. Each one was Artcheli. Artcheli’s figure emerged from the shadow of every tree beneath the bright light, each gazing coldly toward Anna at the center. Their numbers totaled in the hundreds—perhaps thousands—an eerie and spectacular sight at a glance. “This is… a shadow clone technique?!” All the Artchelis rising from the shadows raised their pistols and aimed at Anna. In an instant, she found herself surrounded from all directions by nearly a thousand dark muzzles. Her expression tightened slightly as she furrowed her brow and gripped her spear tightly. Without a word, all the Artchelis pulled their triggers simultaneously. A barrage of gunfire erupted as nearly a thousand golden beams shot forth in unison. The countless rays converged from all sides into a woven net of light, aiming to pierce and entrap Anna entirely. But Anna had been prepared. From the moment the multiple Artchelis began to appear, Dorothy had already warned her through the information channel. Raising her banner-spear high overhead, Anna crossed her hands and began spinning the spear rapidly—faster and faster. The rotating spear above her head whipped up a spiraling wind. Guided by the spear’s motion, the vortex gathered dust and sand and condensed around Anna, forming a swirling storm shield. This storm sphere spun faster and faster, gradually compressing into a spherical barrier. It was a violent cyclone infused with razor-sharp wind and the spirituality of Shadow. The high-speed spinning wind shield fully enveloped Anna just as the beams of light struck from every direction. The storm barrier deflected all incoming beams. The swirling spiritual wind and flying sand scattered and refracted the light, leaving Anna—protected within—completely unharmed. “Circle Slash!” After successfully blocking the dense barrage of beams, Anna gripped her spear tightly within the storm shield and spun her body once in a full turn, slashing outward and releasing a portion of the energy stored within the cyclone. From the perimeter of the storm sphere, a circular blade of wind erupted outward, expanding rapidly in 360 degrees across a flat plane, slicing at everything in its path. In the wake of the expanding wind ring, trees were sliced clean in half. As it spread, entire sections of the forest fell like dominoes—trees toppling with creaking groans. What had once been a dense forest was now reduced to a field of cleanly cut stumps. The view cleared instantly, revealing rows upon rows of smooth cross-sections across the landscape. Along with the trees, many of the Artcheli clones that failed to dodge in time were also struck down. About two to three hundred were destroyed in a single blow. However, most managed to evade using rapid reflexes—leaping, crouching, or otherwise escaping the arc of the devastating slash. Despite its force, the Circle Slash was limited in lethality against a high-agility opponent like Artcheli. It became clear: for swift, high-sensitivity enemies, power wasn’t everything—frequency and coverage were key. With this in mind, Anna changed tactics. As the remaining Artcheli clones regrouped and charged with blades drawn at blinding speed, Anna remained within her storm shield, gripping her spear to further rotate and accelerate the surrounding cyclone. This time, she released the storm shield’s built-up energy directly outward. The compact vortex exploded into a diffused hurricane, drawing in surrounding air. A massive air current began swirling around Anna, pulling more and more atmosphere into a giant rotating mass. Even the clouds overhead twisted into a spiraling formation. “Wind Swell…” At last, with a thunderous roar, Anna’s summoned storm became a massive tornado reaching into the sky. It howled with sand, debris, and countless wind blades—growing wider and thicker, from a dozen meters to hundreds. What began as a slender black column became a towering wall of black wind, pressing outward in all directions with immense force. Unlike natural tornadoes, this one was filled with spiraling blades of wind, turning it into a gigantic grinder. It pulverized rock and tree alike, swallowing all the Artcheli clones in its path. Even the orb of light Artcheli had launched into the sky was shredded and dissipated by the storm. Faced with the devastating tornado and seeing her shadow clones wiped out en masse, Artcheli’s expression turned grave. She now understood she had to draw upon greater power to respond. “May the Saintess bless me—release the name of Artcheli…” Facing the wall of destructive wind rushing toward her, Artcheli gripped the pendant on her gun-sword and, with a low prayer, melted into a pool of shadow that sank into the earth. At that very moment, far off on a mountaintop in another part of Igwynt, Dorothy suddenly jolted as if sensing something. She withdrew her gaze from the tornado and looked at her hand. On her finger, the inherited Shadow ring was glowing faintly with silvery light. Dorothy could feel it—something she had been especially concerned about had just grown stronger in presence… “This… could it be…?” she murmured in disbelief, staring at the ring. A strange thought took shape in her mind. Back on the battlefield, the roar of the storm echoed through all of Igwynt. The storm’s aftershock created gales that swept through the city, awakening countless citizens from their sleep. Many rushed to their windows, but the howling winds made it nearly impossible to open doors or shutters. Only a handful of Beyonders were able to resist the wind and step outside to investigate. “What the hell is going on?! Why did a storm just suddenly erupt like this?! What is that thing over there?!” On the rooftop of the Cypress Fir Tower, Turner, captain of the Serenity Bureau’s team in Igwynt, shouted into the wind as he stared at the terrifying black tornado in the distance. It was the most shocking sight of his life—he stood dumbfounded. As an Apprentice-rank Beyonder, he couldn’t begin to fathom what power could produce such devastation. “Director James… what the hell is this? This can’t be natural, right? Was this caused by some mystical power? Is it really possible for a Beyonder to create something this terrifying?” shouted Elena, a member of the Hunter Squad, struggling against the wind. As a Lantern Apprentice, she was more certain this was a mystical event—but she still couldn’t believe it. Never had she imagined any power in the world could be this apocalyptic. The scale exceeded her understanding of the mystical world. “This is… storm power… At this level, someone at least Crimson-rank—maybe even Gold—is involved. Why would such a powerhouse appear here of all places?!” muttered Director James of the Serenity Bureau, also standing on the rooftop. Using his powers to resist the wind’s impact, he stared in stunned silence at the distant tornado. He recognized the destructive force as belonging to the Storm Path, same as himself—but this was beyond anything he could possibly match. Faced with such overwhelming might, James and the others felt both awe and fear. Who was it that wielded such power—and who were they fighting? Why had such forces come to small, quiet Igwynt? Could it be royalty? In the presence of this colossal storm, even the local Beyonders of the Serenity Bureau were no different from ordinary people—small and powerless. The tornado raged for a long while. When it finally began to subside, the spiral black clouds in the sky gradually dispersed. Moonlight returned to the land, revealing a devastated and barren wasteland. Everything the tornado had touched—forest, stone, soil—had been obliterated. All that remained was a flat field of fine sand. The surface of the land had been stripped and ground into a desert. Under the moonlight, glittering specks of dust shimmered across the wasteland. At its center stood Anna, holding her spear, surveying the scene. She saw no trace of Artcheli—but remained on guard. Dorothy knew well that even such a storm, far beyond what most Crimsons could produce, was not enough to destroy a Saint of Holy Mount. She had only hoped to drive Artcheli back—to make her consider retreating or delaying the pursuit long enough for Anna to escape. Seeing no sign of Artcheli, Dorothy assumed she had withdrawn. She immediately directed Anna to retreat. But just as Anna began to move— —everything changed. From the shadows—countless shadows cast by the moonlight on the sand dunes—countless wraithlike figures suddenly sprang forth. Shadowy phantoms. Without substance. And there were many of them. Ordinarily, shadows exist only in relation to a physical object. But the shadowy forms emerging from the dunes’ projections were merely pure phantoms—they had no corresponding physical entities. These phantoms moved like sleek black fish, swimming at high speed across the desert sand. After surrounding Anna in the center of the desert, they surged in from every direction. Facing the incoming swarm of shadow-creatures, Anna immediately responded. She swung her spear, unleashing numerous wind blades toward the darting phantoms. But even when these spiritually-charged wind blades struck the ground where the shadows moved, they had no effect whatsoever. The blades only gouged deep trenches into the sand—without so much as scratching the phantoms. It was as if she were attacking actual shadows: completely ineffective. Seeing this, Dorothy’s eyes widened in disbelief. After all, illusory spiritual forms and elemental bodies of Crimson-rank Elementalists were generally immune to physical attacks—but even they were vulnerable to spiritual attacks. Yet these shadow forms that Artcheli had become were immune even to spiritual damage. They were like real shadows—impossible to harm. Faced with this, Dorothy’s mind raced to determine the principle behind such immunity. But Artcheli wasn’t about to wait for her to figure it out. The countless shadow-fish on the desert sands surged toward Anna’s location. Surrounded from all sides by these unstoppable shadows, Anna soared into the air to escape. Though these strange entities lacked physical bodies, they could still only move across material surfaces—bound to the ground. Lacking a medium, they couldn’t pursue her into the sky. By ascending quickly, Anna escaped their encirclement. But the shadows didn’t stop. Instead, they shifted targets— This time, they weren't chasing Anna’s physical body in the sky, but rather… her shadow cast on the ground by the moonlight! Even though Anna had taken flight, her shadow remained on the ground—it couldn’t follow her into the air. And with increasing distance between her body and the surface, it became harder for her to monitor her own shadow. As the shadow-fish approached Anna’s ground-bound silhouette, they gathered and merged—forming three humanoid shadow figures, shaped in Artcheli’s outline! In full shadow form, the three Artchelis charged at Anna’s shadow, swinging shadowy blades. Sensing danger, Anna altered her flight path midair, adjusting her position to shift her shadow’s location on the ground—managing to avoid most of the attacks. But one slash still struck her shadow’s waist. Instantly, Anna’s armored waist split open, blood spurting from the wound. She winced in pain. Artcheli’s shadow avatars could attack a target’s shadow—and thus wound the target itself! After the successful strike, the Artcheli shadows regrouped and slashed at Anna’s shadow again. With no clear way to defend against this, Anna steadied her breath. Under Dorothy’s guidance, she raised her spear high in the air. With a sweeping motion, Anna summoned another fierce wind that stirred up all the fine sand around her. A great sandstorm erupted, enveloping the battlefield—shrouding even Anna herself in thick, blinding dust. The environment turned to a murky chaos. The sandstorm blocked the moonlight. Without direct illumination, Anna’s shadow vanished completely. So long as no clear light was cast, no shadow would form. By obscuring the moon with sand, Anna erased her own shadow. With her projection gone, Anna now faced a battlefield filled with swirling dust. And at that moment, she suddenly sensed movement in the sand to her left. She spun and raised her spear toward the disturbance. Clang! A crisp clash of steel rang out. Artcheli’s real body appeared before Anna, her longsword clashing against Anna’s spear. In her cold eyes, a faint orange radiance shimmered. At this moment, Artcheli had shifted from shadow form back to physical form. Using the advanced Lantern vision, she pierced the dust cloud and located Anna to launch a direct assault. Though Anna’s Shadow abilities could obscure her from mystical detection, they couldn’t make her invisible in close quarters—especially when directly seen. Now engaged in close combat, Artcheli lifted her other hand and aimed her pistol point-blank at Anna. A brilliant beam shot forth from the barrel. But forewarned by Dorothy, Anna twisted her head away just in time to avoid the beam. Even though the beam missed, the blinding light from the pistol’s muzzle didn’t dissipate. At such close range, its intense illumination pierced the sandstorm and cast a massive shadow of Anna onto the dust behind her! When a light source is strong and near enough, even the densest dust can't block it. With the moonlight cut off by sand, Artcheli had chosen to physically manifest and bring a strong light source right to Anna’s face—forcing her shadow to reappear! At the exact moment her shadow was remade, two more of Artcheli’s shadow avatars re-emerged, manifesting from the swirling dust behind Anna. Shadow-blades in hand, they charged at her projection—while Anna herself was still locked in combat with Artcheli’s true form and couldn’t defend her shadow. At this critical moment, Anna quickly issued a Declaration: “In the name of Field… I banish all extraneous intrusions from my domain!” The moment her words rang out, Artcheli’s shadow avatars within the duststorm vanished instantly! Seeing this, Artcheli’s eyes widened in shock. Dorothy had been analyzing the essence of these shadow forms ever since Artcheli first used them. In this world, there were many spiritual or elemental entities immune to physical attacks—but shadow forms immune to spiritual attacks were something Dorothy had never encountered. And so, throughout the battle, she had been working to unravel the truth behind Artcheli’s shadow-form ability. Eventually, Dorothy found inspiration from the pseudo-moth entity that could shift between the real world and the dream realm, evading attacks through dimensional traversal. She hypothesized that Artcheli’s shadow avatars might be a form of inner realm interference—that somewhere on the hidden side of reality, there existed a shadow-related realm. Once one slipped into it, they could avoid all attacks from the physical world. Just like the pseudo-moth, the shadows were merely a manifestation of that hidden realm’s presence within the visible world. In this kind of “Shadow Realm,” Artcheli could also use shadow-on-shadow attacks to harm physical targets—much like how damaging a dream cocoon in the dream realm can affect the person in the waking world. Upon forming this hypothesis, Dorothy had Anna activate another function of her Heroic Spirit Armament: Jurisdictional Domain Authority. As Viscountess Field, Anna’s title gave her legitimate feudal authority over Igwynt—her family’s ancestral domain. Legally speaking, the entire region of Igwynt was Anna’s jurisdiction. When fighting within her own legal domain, Anna not only gained combat bonuses, but—supported by the divine power of Heaven’s Arbiter—she could act as a liege lord and invoke commands derived from feudal law. For example: banishment. A banishment decree is a noble’s order to expel unwelcome individuals. While such an order might be ineffective against a Saint like Artcheli’s real body, it had immediate impact on her shadow avatars, which didn’t belong to either the Field domain or the material world itself. Dual-layered legal authority stacked together, enabling their forced expulsion. After successfully banishing the shadows, Anna’s expression turned solemn. Spear in hand, she gave a firm push and shoved Artcheli back. Then, she charged forward. Artcheli met her advance with gun-sword in hand, ready to counter. Amidst the thick sandstorm, Anna and Artcheli began a fierce melee. At blistering speeds that defied the eye, afterimages flashed and steel rang out in a rapid storm of clashes. “They… they can even cut off inner realm interference. Looks like I’ll need to go all out if I want to subdue them…” In the midst of the high-speed clash, Artcheli thought grimly to herself. To deal with such troublesome foes, she decided to draw upon even more power. “May the Saintess bless me…” With another whispered prayer, Artcheli prepared to further release her strength—and at that moment, far in the distance, Dorothy suddenly brightened with excitement. “She’s coming…” From the mountaintop, Dorothy turned to her side. Floating beside her was a silver-white, ethereal woman—expression blank, gazing into the distance. This was the Fairy of the Lake, the Anecdotal Body Dorothy had summoned earlier. Dorothy had sensed something strange when Artcheli first began unlocking her power. Through her ring, she had detected a peculiar phenomenon: the connection to the Mirror Moon Goddess in this region had grown stronger. Though she didn’t fully understand the mechanism, Dorothy was certain—Artcheli’s power was somehow intimately linked to the Mirror Moon Goddess. Every time Artcheli released more power, the Mirror Moon’s influence here intensified. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Realizing this, Dorothy had summoned the Fairy of the Lake’s Anecdotal Body and began reinforcing the Mirror Moon Goddess’s connection from her side as well. She fought while waiting—waiting to see whether Artcheli would deepen her link to the Mirror Moon Goddess further. If that connection grew strong enough… perhaps the Mirror Moon Goddess’s will could once again be summoned into this world. Perhaps it could resolve the current conflict. Or—perhaps—they could even speak. And Dorothy’s patience was not in vain. On the battlefield, Artcheli was now indeed deepening her release of power. The Mirror Moon’s influence surged. Dorothy turned her full attention to the Fairy of the Lake’s reaction. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞 Sure enough—the Fairy of the Lake began to change. But not in the way Dorothy had seen before. Unlike in the Mirror Moon Cathedral, where the Fairy of the Lake’s form would become luminous and vibrant under divine possession, this time her figure became unstable—flickering, blurry, like a broken TV screen. “What… is happening?” Dorothy furrowed her brows in confusion. And then—it twisted. After a bout of high-frequency flickering, the Fairy of the Lake’s serene head vanished. In its place emerged a horrific spider-like visage, eight terrifying eyes staring silently at Dorothy.