In a wavering haze, everything that had ever been began to flow backward.
Céliu knew this state. In some translated volume from the distant land of Jiuxia, it had been named—the death lantern, a final procession in which a life is replayed in full before its end, the good and the wretched alike, each lived through once more.
Like a rising tide, it came for her.
Bit by bit, it swallowed Céliu whole, and all that had been buried in forgetfulness was cast back upon the shore.
From the day of her birth, the world had been a dim and colorless gray—until that moment when she clenched a stone in her hand.
She had smashed it against that man, as though she were striking at her own fate. And with that blow, she shattered a door. A madman stepped through into her gray world, glanced around as if it bored him, and casually suggested she grow some plants… perhaps keep a few fish.
"Reality's miserable enough," he had said back then. "You've got to make the inner world a little richer, don't you think?"
That was how he spoke.
And so, the weed called Lloyd Holmes spread wildly across her gray world, choking out everything—so that the flowers never even had the chance to bloom before they withered away…
Ah. Why, even at the brink of death, had her thoughts become just as deranged?
Céliu forced a crooked smile. That damned thing had influenced her more than she'd realized. Or perhaps… this was simply who she had always been, now laid bare?
But it didn't matter.
No one would ever notice now.
And so, all fell silent—until, seconds later, her hearing crawled back to her. The delayed sounds surged in all at once, crashing into her ears, overlapping, tearing at her mind as if to rip it apart.
The death she had expected did not come.
Or perhaps it had come—yet chosen not to claim her.
"…Lloyd…"
Céliu did not dare to look.
Blazing fire roared. Lloyd had had the chance to kill her, to shatter Lawrence's design entirely. And yet, at the final moment, that blade had turned elsewhere.
"I thought you'd stay cautious a little longer."
Lloyd braced his sword with all his strength, though it was clear he could not hold it for long.
"You really are cunning,"
Lawrence said, his voice laced with both fury and admiration.
At the final instant, he came like a storm, his blade tearing through the carriage door in a flash of cold light.
Lloyd blocked one nail-sword—but the second struck from an angle impossible to guard. It drove straight into the wound at his waist, tearing it open once more.
"Then tell me," Lloyd replied with a faint laugh, "do you think there might still be a pile of incendiaries here—enough to burn you alive?"
He looked calmer than ever before.
But it was only the haze of blood loss. The side effects of an overdose of Florend had begun to take hold. Even that iron will of his was on the verge of collapse.
"I won't give you another chance!"
"Don't be so sure. Like you said… I'm a cunning bastard."
With a violent surge, Lloyd knocked the nail-sword aside. His exhausted body burned once more.
This time, there would be no retreat.
There wouldn't even be a chance to stall. Céliu was behind him. If Lawrence broke through—everything would be lost.
"Honestly," Lawrence roared as he swung his blade, "I'm starting to wonder—what kind of mindset made you challenge me? Revenge?"
Face-to-face, Lloyd stood no chance.
And yet this madman had orchestrated everything, had nearly dragged Lawrence into death with him. By all rights, he should have given up now—should have killed Céliu and fled.
But instead, as if he had changed his mind at the last moment, he stood his ground.
"Probably something like… if I'm miserable staying alive, then you don't get to be comfortable either."
His mind was too fragile now to form anything resembling a proper threat. The madness surfaced, and what came out was little more than nonsense.
A blinding flash of steel erupted. Instinct drove him to swing—but his defense was riddled with openings.
"So you dragged your friend along to die with you?"
Lawrence mocked.
He had expected Lloyd to hide Céliu within that iron fortress. Instead, Lloyd had brought her here—into this deserted dead end.
He had done everything right. He had calculated everything.
He had been so close.
But Lloyd had not accounted for the Grail's overwhelming vitality… that sleeping face was about to awaken.
"Well, we swore brotherhood, didn't we?" Lloyd said, glancing back at Céliu. "Not born on the same day, maybe—but dying on the same day? That's the idea."
Judging by her expression, the girl did not seem particularly eager to acknowledge that bond.
The nail-sword fell one final time.
At last, it could no longer endure the strain of such relentless combat—it shattered.
Through the broken blade, Lawrence's sword pierced straight through Lloyd's arm, pinning him against the carriage wall.
The witch hunter's expression turned feral.
Without pause, Lloyd tore at his own arm, forcing the blade to rip through flesh and bone. He wrenched it free—and struck again.
Within the narrow carriage, a storm of blades erupted once more. Steel sang in shrill, relentless crescendos, the high-pitched scream of clashing edges like thunder rolling through a confined sky.
Those wounds would have killed an ordinary man countless times over.
But for witch hunters, there was still continuation.
The sinful blood—secret blood—mended the shattered body again and again, stripping away what was human, replacing it with something monstrous.
A forbidden exchange.
But Lloyd had always known.
Like the principle of equivalent exchange in alchemy—power demanded a price.
"It's over, Lloyd."
Lawrence's voice was cold, as though pronouncing a sentence.
His form blurred into motion. The nail-sword in his hand became an executioner's spike, driving through Lloyd's joints. In the next instant, he reached to his waist, drew another, and struck again.
Again.
And again.
At first, Lloyd could still resist.
But soon, he could no longer keep pace with the unending assault. One by one, the nail-swords pierced him through, crossing over his body, sealing him in place like a condemned martyr.
It became a cage of blades.
He could not even struggle—doing so would only slice himself into pieces.
"Don't worry," Lawrence said, gripping the final nail-sword. "You'll live."
He looked down at the battered witch hunter, declaring his victory.
He would not kill Lloyd.
There were too many secrets within him—his identity, and that strange power lurking in his mind. All of it fascinated Lawrence.
Not to mention… once this body was ruined, Lloyd's would make a perfect vessel.
Lloyd's head hung low, as though lifeless.
The consecrated silver in the blades burned with excruciating pain. Blood flowed endlessly along their edges, as if it would never run dry.
Slowly, Lawrence turned away.
His gaze settled upon the girl.
Step by step, Céliu retreated—until her back struck the carriage wall.
There was nowhere left to go.
The old man, monstrous as a demon, approached without expression. The flesh upon his chest writhed slowly—whether illusion or not, Céliu thought she saw an eye within that mass open for the briefest instant.
"I never thought things would become this complicated," he muttered, irritation lacing his tone. "It should have been simple."
Then his hand shot out, seizing Céliu by the hair, hauling her upward.
She could not even scream.
The moment he touched her, that horrific corruption flooded into her mind, gnawing at her consciousness.
"You… you were always there…"
Céliu struggled to speak through the pain.
Grotesque, shifting visions flooded her sight. A strange connection formed—binding her to Lawrence.
"Yes," he said. "The beacon was always there."
From the very first attack, Lawrence had already planted it.
Céliu had been the light—clear and unmistakable, even in the deepest dark.
Lawrence slowly closed his eyes. What he had to do now was simple in design, yet monstrous in consequence—use Selu as the conduit, and let the corrosion spread. With the Grail's blessing coursing through him, he could, in a single instant, plant the beacon within every soul sworn to the House of Stuart. And once it was done… if he so desired, half of Old Dunling could be paralyzed in the blink of an eye.
This was no ordinary contamination, but a memetic blight—an abstraction beyond the grasp of common minds. It could propagate through any medium that bore even the faintest connection. One might even understand it as… an idea that spreads.
At times, Lawrence suspected that the very notion of "demon hunter" was itself such a contagion—infecting the desperate and the damned alike, driving them to slaughter monsters with a zeal not entirely their own.
"The revelry… begins."
He stepped closer to his grand design, and the pitch-black sky seemed poised to ignite at his command.
With Selu as the nexus, the corrosive force began to spread like a virus, leaping ceaselessly between unseen "intervals." At first, its reach was slow, almost hesitant—but given time, it would grow exponentially. He could already envision the day when all would teeter on the brink of collapse.
Driven by that power, the fleshy tumor upon his chest stirred awake. It bore human features—a face, as though a second head had grown from his body. And now, it opened its eyes: vacant, hollow, devoid of soul.
Like an infant startled from sleep, it let out a hoarse, piercing scream. In that instant, the corrosion surged with renewed ferocity, an eerie pressure seeping into every living thing within its reach.
His body shriveled in moments, vitality boiling away into nothing. Lawrence seemed to age decades in seconds, his life force siphoned relentlessly into that grotesque visage upon his chest. It fed on him like a parasite, devouring its host from within.
Such was the price of power. The more he embraced the Grail's gift, the faster he melted into that aberrant flesh. He was losing himself.
And yet—something was wrong.
Lawrence felt it clearly. The spread… had been halted. Or rather, it had reached its limit. But instead of devouring hundreds, thousands as he had foreseen—it had touched only a handful.
"…What?"
He opened his eyes, seeking the cause. A thin wound suddenly split across his arm.
Through the pain, the girl glared at him.
Selu tightened her grip on her "stone," and with the other hand, she drew the dagger she had long hidden beneath her pillow.
No blessed silver. No sanctified alloy of the Cleansing Order. Just an ordinary blade, forged from common iron.
And yet—it wounded him again.
For a fleeting moment, Lawrence failed to comprehend. Then came the fury—raw, humiliated, explosive.
He slammed Selu violently to the ground. He could not discern where his design had faltered—but before thought could catch up, another gunshot shattered the air. A wound the size of a fist erupted in his chest.
His thoughts nearly froze.
He turned, roaring in rage—
"Lloyd!"
There stood the demon hunter, battered beyond recognition, standing in a pool of his own blood. Several of the nail-swords pinning him had been torn free. No more blood flowed—it was as if he had already bled dry. His face was deathly pale.
It was almost inconceivable that he remained conscious, let alone alive. Lawrence could not fathom how he still had the strength to strike back.
"As expected… when you traverse the 'intervals,' your consciousness isn't within your body. Which means—you can't perceive what's around you."
Lloyd spoke in a low voice. This was a conclusion he had drawn during their first battle within those unseen gaps. His gaze was cold—unyielding, even in the face of certain death.
"I know a rather skilled doctor," he added faintly. "Even severed limbs can be reattached."
Such wounds would not yet kill Lawrence. Tightening his grip on the nail-sword, he advanced toward Lloyd.
Lloyd barely lifted his head, a faint mockery in his expression. Then agony surged anew from the gunshot wound in his chest—countless tendrils writhed from the torn flesh, attempting to mend, yet suppressed by some unseen force. They could not heal. Blood poured freely.
"That was one of my last silver rounds… and I still missed."
Watching Lawrence falter under the pain, Lloyd lowered his Winchester. The oppressive force of the corrosion made it nearly impossible to aim.
He had used his remaining silver to forge just two bullets—meant solely for Lawrence. One for the head. One for the heart. And one had already gone astray.
Clutching his wound, Lawrence felt the searing agony of silver still embedded within him… once again, he had come within a breath of death at Lloyd's hands.
Raising the nail-sword, he resolved to grant no further chances. For the first time, fear crept into his heart—fear of this unknown demon hunter.
It was time to end this.
"…Little Nightingale?"
Lloyd's voice cut through the moment.
In the darkness, Selu lifted her head. She could not see him clearly—he looked like a broken scarecrow, propped upright by iron blades.
"Little Nightingale… that Red Rose nonsense is actually pretty damn stupid."
Lloyd spoke with strained restraint.
He stared into the shadows. He knew she was there.
"The great tree… has arrived."
His voice weakened—but in the next instant, a man on the brink of death unleashed a force beyond reason. His body tore free from the restraint of the nail-swords. He kicked against the wall, using the force to hurl himself at Lawrence.
Like a beast—wild, untrained, utterly unhinged.
And for a fleeting moment, it worked.
White light flared as flesh met flesh. Yet soon, Lawrence regained control. Two nail-swords came crashing down upon Lloyd's shoulders—another inch, and they might have snapped him in two.
Lloyd no longer seemed to feel pain. He muttered to himself—
"Time's up."
A pocket watch slipped from his grasp, shattering against the cold floor.
Madness flooded his eyes.
The shriek of a whistle tore through the blizzard. Burning embers burst from the furnace, scattering like crimson snow.
The train surged forward, accelerating violently. Amid the violent shaking, Lloyd braced himself against Lawrence—and with all his remaining strength, forced him upward.
Even now, the madman roared—
"So fly, Little Nightingale… fly high."
Those were his final words.
In the darkness, Selu saw it—Lloyd hurling Lawrence out of the carriage. From some unknown well of strength, he swung the nail-sword in a frenzy, bringing it down with brutal force, severing the connection between the cars.
It all happened in an instant.
Perhaps it was the corrosion clouding her mind—Selu could not fully grasp what had occurred. Only when the carriage began to slow, when Lloyd vanished entirely into the raging snowstorm, did she slowly rise.
Her numb expression began to crack—melting into terror.
Trembling uncontrollably, she stumbled forward, staring into the void where he had disappeared. The blizzard was fierce; within moments, even the train's passage was erased.
And then—she saw it.
A light ignited within the storm.
It fell from the heavens, setting the entire night ablaze—
A burning, suffocating crimson.