It took an entire grueling week for the Swabian merchant caravan to crawl its way from the outskirts of Paris, across the fractured borders of the Rhineland, and finally into the heart of Bavaria. For Faust, every mile was a monument to agony. Seven days without sleep, seven days of hyper-vigilance, and seven days of waging a silent, exhausting war against the parasitic malice clawing at his mind.
By the time he slipped away from the merchants under the cover of a pitch-black Bavarian night, he was running on nothing but raw, supernatural stamina. He navigated the cobblestone streets of München until the urban sprawl gave way to an isolated, sprawling estate.
Before him rose the grand mansion of the Frost family.
The estate was a masterpiece of imposing Gothic architecture, its sharp spires and arched windows cutting a jagged silhouette against the night sky. But as Faust stepped onto the grounds, an icy dread settled deep into his bones.
It was only the middle of autumn, yet a dense, unnatural mist clung to the earth, pooling around his boots. The air was violently, freezing cold. A biting, miserable rain began to fall, slicking the dark stone walls and iron fences.
"This is absurd," Faust muttered to himself, pulling his wet collar tight against his neck. "It feels less like the home of Roman-Germanic aristocrats and more like a desolate graveyard."
Every light in the mansion was dead. The only illumination came from the pale, fractured light of the moon cutting through the heavy clouds. Faust's analytical mind immediately began to piece together a new hypothesis. A legendary family of swordsmen, an estate locked in a perpetual, localized winter... Weyer's journal echoed in his thoughts. The Frost family might have a connection with the supernatural.
He approached the massive, iron-reinforced oak double doors. But just as his hand lifted to strike the heavy brass knocker, a sharp, metallic thud resonated directly behind his back.
Faust spun around on his heel.
Emerging from the swirling mist was a young man, seemingly in his mid-twenties, his expression carved from ice. In his hand, pointed directly at Faust's chest, was a colossal, terrifyingly elegant sword. Faust's eyes widened in instant recognition. The weapon was an unmistakable ancestral relic, a heavy, specialized blade shaped precisely like the magnificent sword from knight tales.
It had a long, narrow, double-edged blade with a polished silver-steel finish. Running down the center there was a glowing turquoise-blue fuller, giving the impression that magical energy is flowing through the weapon. The crossguard was ornate and wing-like, extending outward in graceful curves.
What staggered the doctor most, however, was the sheer physical strength required to wield such a monstrous piece of iron—yet this youth held it flawlessly with a single hand, his grip completely unyielding.
Instantly, a violent, scorching heat erupted within Faust's chest. The malicious, foreign voice inside his head slammed against his consciousness like a battering ram, blinding his vision with a sudden surge of pure, murderous intent.
"Draw the Bohemian iron. Paint the ground red with his brains. Kill him. KILL HIM."
Faust bit his lip until it bled, violently suppressing the dark urge, forcing his fingers away from the revolver at his waist. He raised his hands in a gesture of peace, keeping his voice as calm and aristocratic as possible.
"I apologize deeply for encroaching upon your estate at such an ungodly hour," Faust said, his gravelly voice muffled by the rain. "But the matter is of extreme urgency. Please, could you lead me to the Patriarch? I am the son of Herzog Johann—"
"Stop lying," the young man cut him off mid-phrase, his voice a low, freezing growl. "I don't believe a single syllable, you foul, evil creature."
Without another word, the youth swung the colossal blade in a horizontal arc designed to take Faust's head clean off his shoulders.
Faust's circus reflexes took over before his conscious mind could even process the danger. Drawing on the uncanny agility he had honed as Mephisto, he threw his body backward into a desperate, blinding backflip. To his absolute shock, the kinetic force of his altered physiology launched him skyward—propelling him more than three meters into the air, straight toward the stone ledges of the second-floor windows.
'What the hell..?'
He didn't even have time to ponder the terrifying height of his own jump. The young man, with an explosive burst of speed, leaped into the air right alongside him, matching his trajectory effortlessly. As the swordsman rose, a thick, sparkling layer of hoarfrost rapidly materialized across his hands and crept up the strands of his dark hair.
'Good God... young people these days are absolutely insane,' Faust thought frantically.
In the weightless suspension of the leap, Faust discovered a terrifying new aspect of his evolving body: he could maneuver, rather limitedly, while completely airborne. He violently shifted his weight to the left, the frost-rimed edge of the massive sword missing his throat by mere inches.
Reaching into the wide sleeves of his traveling coat, Faust grabbed a handful of the stage pyrotechnics he had stolen from Wunder's wagon.
"SLIT HIS THROAT! TEAR THE FLESH FROM HIS BONES!" the voice screamed, deafening his thoughts.
Ignoring the mental demonic roar, Faust ignited the colorful smoke bombs, casting them downward. The volatile powder detonated in mid-air, unleashing a thick, blinding screen of crimson and azure smoke that instantly collided with the heavy natural mist of the courtyard.
For any ordinary human, visibility was now absolutely zero. But to Faust, whose enhanced vision was now even better, the world remained perfectly, transparently clear. He saw every swirling particle of ash, every drop of rain, and the exact silhouette of the young swordsman falling back toward the earth.
Faust moved to strike, twisting his body to slip past the boy's blind spot as they descended through the smoke screen.
But the universe refused to obey his calculations.
Through the impenetrable shroud of color and fog, the frost-covered blade sliced through the air with mechanical, flawless precision. The young man didn't need to see; he was tracking Faust through the cold itself.
Before Faust could twist his joints or pull his weapon, the freezing, heavy edge of the ancestral sword tore through the smoke.
The blade was now milimeters away from his jugular.