In the dead of night, within a ruined fortress in Falano—long abandoned and desolate for many years—there was suddenly a stir. Under the moonlight, a low rumble echoed from beneath the fortress ruins. With that sound, the ground—once relatively even—began to bulge unnaturally. After a brief rise, it rapidly collapsed back in, caving in part of the floor. The already unstable fortress crumbled even further from the tremor. Clearly, a powerful explosion had just occurred beneath the fortress, destroying the vast underground space and causing the surface to cave in. After the tremor faded, the area fell into silence once more, lasting for nearly half a minute—until three figures slowly emerged from beneath the ground. These three figures were the three Gargoyles of the Dark Gold Society: Angley, Roke, and Craven. Using their ability to pass through earth and stone, they had returned to the surface. Their bodies were still covered in their signature gray-black hardened skin, though now lined with hairline cracks. After resurfacing, they examined the collapsed pit left behind. Roke and Craven then turned their eyes toward Angley. Roke asked bluntly. “Looks like the whole place caved in. So—did you find the item?” “Of course I did. Don’t underestimate me,” Angley replied, reaching into his coat. He pulled out an object and held it up—an irregularly shaped chunk of gold. It was unmistakably the golden pedestal they had been searching for all along. “You really found it… And it’s completely intact. Not even that powerful explosion damaged it.” Craven muttered, eyeing the base. Roke nodded and added. “Yes. That matches what our research on the crystals indicated. This series of artifacts may not give off any mystical reactions, but their durability is extraordinary—far exceeding many actual mystical items. Even with the scale of the explosion we triggered, we couldn't damage it.” Roke then looked again toward the collapsed ruins and continued. “The item’s fine—but that thief? Not so much… For a non-Stone Beyonder, no one could survive that kind of explosion. And even if they barely escaped it, the collapse afterward would have buried them. Fighting us in an underground space like that? They just got unlucky.” Their strategy in the underground encounter had been brutal but effective. When they realized they couldn’t capture Thief K quickly, the three immediately switched to an extreme tactic: scattering explosive fire sigils throughout the space, then igniting them using stored elemental fireballs. The resulting chain explosion, combined with a collapsing structure, completely annihilated the underground chamber. The firestorm and shockwaves had engulfed every inch of the space. Only the three Gargoyles, protected by their third-stage Stone skin, could survive. Once the structural supports failed, everything inside was buried. Only beings like them, who could phase through stone, could escape. Everyone else—Beyonder or not—would be buried alive. “I had to search through the rubble for quite a while to find this thing,” Angley said, holding the base. “Aside from this, all I found were some scraps of clothing. That explosion was more than enough to obliterate any non-Chalice, non-Stone Beyonder. According to Lord Frederico’s plan, we were supposed to capture them alive, but… well.” He looked out toward the pit. They had intended to take Thief K alive, hoping to extract useful information from them. But given the circumstances, that clearly wasn’t going to happen. “That thief’s ability was bizarre—completely unheard of. Catching them was always going to be difficult. But even though they’re gone, we’ve achieved our main objective. Time to report back.” Roke’s voice was steady. Hearing his words, Angley and Craven nodded in agreement. The three of them once again spread their stone wings and, channeling the elemental power stored within, rose into the sky, carrying the golden pedestal with them as they flew off into the distance. After the trio departed, the ruined fortress fell silent once again. But on the outskirts of the ruins, beneath the shadows of a tree, another figure quietly stepped forward into the moonlight. A wide black cloak lined in red. A tall black top hat. A masquerade-style formal suit. White gloves. A carved half-mask. It was the strange gentleman—the thief who had stolen Maria’s Light before the eyes of the public and battled the three from the Dark Gold Society. Thief K. They had not been reduced to ash nor buried beneath rubble. Instead, they emerged completely unscathed and stepped calmly into the spot where the Gargoyles had stood minutes before. Lifting their head, they gazed into the night sky, watching the direction in which they had disappeared. “So they’ve finally left…” they murmured to themself. Then, reaching up, they removed their half-mask. Beneath it was a strikingly beautiful and androgynous face—delicate and refined. Then, a change began. Under the influence of some mysterious power, their chest gradually swelled, their waist narrowed, their facial features softened further, becoming distinctly feminine. Their once-fair skin darkened. Before long, the thief’s form had transformed into a voluptuous, dark-skinned beauty. It was Nephthys. “Phew… What an incredible experience. I never imagined… a soul like that could be used for possession. It felt completely different from anything before…” she murmured, checking over her own body in awe. At that moment, Dorothy’s voice echoed in her mind. “That’s because what you possessed wasn’t just any soul—it was an Anecdotal Body I created. Though I added soul-like properties to it, it’s still quite different from a normal spirit.” “Is that so… An Anecdotal Body, huh? A new power you gained after becoming Crimson-rank, Miss Dorothy? I never thought it could be used like that… Amazing.” Nephthys continued to marvel, and Dorothy replied. “Of course the experience was amazing—because that’s what the world imagines Thief K should be. So, how did it feel? Becoming the ‘you’ of legend?” With a smile in her voice, Dorothy asked. Nephthys scratched her head sheepishly and answered. “How did it feel…? Hmm… honestly, I felt strong. If I had to fight the legend-version of myself, I think I’d lose…” “Heh… well, not quite. While Thief K’s Anecdotal Body is strong, in truth it wouldn’t have been able to pull off that whole performance against three White Ash-rank opponents without you as the vessel. “After all, this wasn’t just an Anecdotal Body—it was an Anecdotal Possession.” Dorothy clarified. The figure that had appeared as Thief K wasn’t a simple Anecdotal Body created by Dorothy. It was the result of a recent development in her abilities as a Bizarre Author—an advanced form she called the Anecdotal Possession. When Dorothy created her own Anecdotal Bodies, aside from the base cost in Revelation and Shadow spirituality, she also had to spend additional spirituality depending on the powers the Anecdotal Body was meant to possess. Beyond these essential spiritualities, Dorothy also needed to provide a small amount of Chalice and a nearly negligible trace of Stone—these were used to form a physical body and skeleton for the entity, a vessel capable of carrying and expressing its powers. No matter how powerful or seemingly unrelated to Chalice, every Anecdotal Body required some Chalice and Stone to manifest materially. Mystical abilities created through anecdote could not exist in a void—they required a host. And hosts, being physical in nature, demanded the material-linked spiritualities: Chalice and Stone. However, Dorothy once wondered—could her Anecdotal Body exist without material form? She conducted experiments by replacing or modifying the usual Chalice and Stone inputs with other spiritualities during creation. The results were mostly catastrophic. Using Lantern caused a brilliant flash, followed by immediate disintegration of the entity. Shadow manifested as a distorted silhouette on the floor that twisted and vanished. Revelation failed to create anything at all. Using only Stone produced a statue that immediately shattered. Using only Chalice generated a pile of dead, rotting flesh. The only stable result came from using Silence. In Dorothy’s experiments, Silence could create a spiritual version of the Anecdotal Body—a ghost-like form. Unlike other failed combinations, this spirit-form remained stable. It existed in a translucent state, able to pass through matter like other spirits, and even possess the living. However, these ghostly Anecdotal Bodies were unable to use their own inherent powers—unless the original anecdote they were based on was itself about a ghost. In other words, a ghostly state could only naturally express a ghostly tale. Spirit-form Anecdotal Bodies lacked the ability to channel their powers in the absence of a physical vessel. But Dorothy didn’t stop there. She remembered that there was another Beyonder Path capable of channeling the powers of the soul into reality—the Body Possession Path. And Nephthys just happened to be a Beyonder of that path. So, Dorothy involved Nephthys in the experiment, having her try to possess a spirit-form Anecdotal Body. Sure enough, once possessed, Nephthys was able to channel its abilities and manifest its power through her own body. However, the strength of the abilities Nephthys could express wasn’t significantly greater than a normal Anecdotal Body. The strength of such entities primarily came from the breadth and depth of the anecdote, the amount of spirituality invested, and their cultural rootedness. While a Soul Contractor could slightly boost low-dissemination anecdotes, they made little difference for already powerful ones. In practice, Nephthys’s possessed versions weren’t much stronger than Dorothy’s direct creations. There was, however, one exception—Thief K’s Anecdotal Spirit. Perhaps it was because Nephthys herself was the original model and source of the Thief K anecdote. When she possessed its spiritual body, a strange resonance occurred—the strength of Thief K’s Anecdotal Body surged dramatically in her hands. To illustrate: Dorothy’s Night Demon Anecdotal Body—based on a widely known and deeply ingrained local summoning tale in Tivian—could barely reach Crimson-rank when empowered by fear and ambient belief. The Thief K anecdote, while fairly well known, had nowhere near that same deep-seated cultural penetration. Lacking fear-related amplification, Dorothy’s standalone Thief K entity only barely approached White Ash-rank. But once Nephthys possessed it, that changed. The fusion of legend and original person caused a sharp leap in power. The new Thief K form, in Nephthys’s hands, even exceeded the Night Demon in Tivian in certain respects—well beyond typical White Ash. With a bit more spiritual investment, it could even come very close to a typical Crimson-rank! This Thief K was as fast and agile as the Night Demon, nearly reaching fourth-stage Shadow in speed. And beyond raw agility, it had many strange abilities—thanks to Dorothy’s intentional cultivation of the anecdote’s public image. Over the past few months, Dorothy, acting as a writer, had spread Thief K’s tale widely. She engaged in numerous literary circles and helped seed fanfiction and derivative works of Thief K, subtly shaping the persona to resemble the “phantom thief” archetype from detective comics of her previous life. During the earlier thefts in Falano, she had Nephthys deliberately act out that image. Since the phantom thief archetype was extremely popular, the public quickly accepted and internalized it—greatly amplifying the anecdotal power and granting Thief K multiple new abilities. One such ability was Thousand Faces: Thief K could shapeshift like a Shadow-Facade, transforming into people of any age or gender—but even more thoroughly. They could alter their voice, posture, and even clothing instantly—completely switching identities in moments. Another ability derived from the magician-thief persona: Stage Illusions. Thanks to the magician’s archetype, Thief K could use powers resembling sleight-of-hand—recreating stage magic effects on command. For example, Transformation: they could convert dangerous elements like flames or blades into roses, doves, or other harmless symbols—nullifying attacks with flair. Then there was Escape: an ability drawn from classic magician escape acts and Thief K’s reputation for always evading police. When trapped or facing fatal danger, Thief K could instantly escape and vanish, reappearing somewhere out of every observer’s line of sight. It was a semi-passive teleportation ability usable three times per hour, with a maximum range of 50 meters. Nephthys had just used it to escape the explosion in the underground chamber and teleport safely to the surface. These were only some of Thief K’s abilities. The combination of original model and anecdote granted Nephthys a suite of powers far beyond most typical Anecdotal Bodies. Yet, during the confrontation with the Dark Gold Society trio, Nephthys had not revealed the full extent of her abilities. Her goal hadn’t been to defeat them—instead, it was to resist just enough to make them think they had won, allowing them to take what they believed was the "trophy" and leave without suspicion. To lure the snake from its den safely, the Dark Gold Society had created a fake Maria’s Light for Thief K to steal, hoping to use it to trace them back to their lair and reclaim the golden pedestal. That was their plan. But Dorothy’s plan… wasn’t so different. The Dark Gold Society wanted to bait Thief K. Dorothy wanted to bait them. They knew Thief K wouldn’t bring the golden pedestal to steal a necklace. Dorothy knew that if they were setting a trap, they certainly wouldn’t use the real Maria’s Light—they’d present a convincing fake with a locator mark inside. If they could forge Maria’s Light, Dorothy could forge the golden pedestal. She directly contacted the White Craftsmen’s Guild. With Beverly’s help, they produced a high-fidelity replica of the golden pedestal—no worse than the Society’s fake necklace. In fact, it was even better, given that Beverly was a master artisan. So what the Dark Gold Society trio took away just now was a Beverly-crafted ultra-high-quality replica—with a hidden locator inside, just like their fake Maria’s Light. Now, Dorothy could follow the signal. She would trace it back to the Dark Gold Society’s base—and to the real Maria’s Light.