Rosalith’s POV:

The false entity hung in the air, the flame lady upright, the ashen judgment scale in hand. Rosay’s head turned in all directions, nerves getting the better of her.

Which Sovereign had summoned the false entity, she couldn’t be sure, but she chose to put it down to the Jester of the End. She doubted the Sovereign of Black Arms would be stupid enough to wreck his own hideout.

Ordinary humans couldn’t see the false entity, nor could Magicians, but the heat could reach them all the same. And that was what bothered her. If the Secret Detectives caught them, they’d be held accountable for every bit of blood they’d shed.

She had to stop this.

"We should all go in now."

The cadets exchanged hesitant glances, but Rosay frowned almost at once. She wasn’t in the mood for faint hearts.

"That’s an order!!"

Without another word, they fell into step toward the factory. Calamities included, not one of them spoke.

With a gesture to her guard, Rosay fell in behind the rest. At the entrance, a few Black Arms were trying to scarper, but one looked at how outnumbered they were, and they gave themselves up without a fight.

Rosay, though, couldn’t be bothered with any of that. She made straight for wherever the unholy presence was coming from, where the heat was at its worst.

"Why did you attack the cadets?!"

As she drew closer, a daunting voice reached her, and she knew at once she had to hurry. She got to the room, forced the door open, and blurted—

"Stop right there!"

Then her expression darkened. The Jester of the End had the Sovereign of Black Arms shaking in his seat, his right-hand man at his side, a dozen corpses strewn around them both.

"I think it would be best if we question him properly, Jester of the End."

The moment she spoke, the Jester of the End snapped his fingers, and the false entity vanished. Without a word spared, he vaulted through the broken ceiling above and trained his revolver on the Sovereign.

Rosay gulped bile. She hoped the Jester wouldn’t do him in, and with precise, unhurried aim, he fired two shots, each one punching clean through the Sovereign’s shoulders. The man screamed out in agony.

After that, Jester of the End simply vanished.

’It was almost as if he didn’t want me near him. Hm. It doesn’t matter. I disbanded the Black Arms and secured their Sovereign.’

She turned her attention to the Sovereign, the man still deep in his agony.

’I just need to get the answers I need before turning him in to the academy.’

As she moved to step forward, Herald of the End broke away from the Jester’s side and approached her:

"We hope justice is served. However, you must be careful. Broken shoulders are insignificant to an Archmage. It would be better to restrain him."

He leaped through the ceiling after those words and vanished just the same. Rosay’s expression stayed blank as she turned to the guard behind her, expecting him to follow suit; he was a member of the Laughing End, after all.

When it finally clicked, she exhaled slowly, disbelief getting the better of her.

"Leomaris isn’t back yet... so you can’t leave?"

The guard nodded positively.

’What a strange situation... Leomaris still hadn’t returned. I take it he will return soon now that the Jester of the End has vanished.’

The thought never had a chance to settle. Her eyes found the Sovereign again, and her expression darkened. Herald of the End’s words came back to her at once, something was wrong.

’Why is he being so cooperative...?’

—-

Leomaris’s POV:

"Jeez, that was scary."

Leomaris had ditched his disguise once he was a safe distance from Black Arms headquarters, handed everything off to Hazel, and headed back to the factory to find his sister, Rosalith.

Hazel melted into the darkness completely, her blue eyes the only thing that never left Leomaris.

"Don’t you think something is wrong, young master? If the Sovereign is an Archmage... why is he being so cooperative?"

His eyes found Hazel. Leomaris gulped bile as his thoughts moved restlessly from one thing to the next. He’d shot the man alright, but for an Archmage, something like that shouldn’t have put a dent in him.

’No amount of bullets can threaten an Archmage.’

The simplest conclusion came first. Maybe the Sovereign was nothing more than a Sorcerer pretending to be an Archmage. That sort of thing wasn’t hard to blag.

"But if that isn’t it, then..."

His eyes widened the instant it dawned on him. His head whipped toward Hazel first, but his legs had already made the decision for him.

"Do what I asked of you... then return to the academy."

He didn’t wait for a response. He was already off, dashing toward the factory. He wasn’t the kind to lose sleep over his sister, but she was blood all the same. He couldn’t leave her in that building.

Street to street he moved, and when he’d put enough distance between himself and the ground, he vaulted onto a building and changed his pattern completely, roof to roof from there.

The moment he caught sight of the faction, he picked up the pace. His palm had gone, slick and his body had stiffened, all of it despite the speed he was pushing.

"She’s too weak to survive this."

Had Rosay not been so close to the end of her hibernation, Leomaris wouldn’t have worried much. But with only a few days left in it, she could turn her ankle from a simple walk. That was the trouble.

As he drew close to the faction, something cold moved through him. Even from that distance, he could feel gunpowder all around the building.

Another step was all he managed, and then it happened, just as he’d feared. The ground split, the air thickened, and a massive explosion ripped through the building. The force sent Leomaris crashing into a wall. The whole place was swallowed in smoke and blazing flames.

A deafening ring tore through his skull, and shards of wood pierced his body, but he gave it no mind whatsoever.

He forced himself upright despite the thumping in his head, eyes sweeping through the distance for his sister and his sister alone.

Neighbours started emerging from their homes, drifting toward the burning building with the look of people who couldn’t quite make sense of what they were seeing.

He couldn’t afford to be seen, and yet he didn’t move. His mind pulled in two directions: walk into the flames and search for Rosay, or cut his losses and run.

"You can’t die like this, Rosay..." he muttered, his throat tightening.