"Will you take it?" asked the cat, its silver fur glistening like water beneath the pale light of the blue, cold sun. Its slitted, frost-tinted eyes held an uncharacteristic seriousness as they stared deep into Meris's silver ones.

Meris couldn't answer immediately. Her mind was still struggling to make sense of the situation.

Absentmindedly, she looked around her, taking in the wide expanse of frost stretching as far as her eyes could perceive, with jagged ice houses erupting from the ground like a frozen forest, forming a strange beauty, a nest built for cats.

She was kneeling on the cold floor, in the middle of the city, she assumed, for on her right stood a colossal statue of a cat, ice pouring down from its stretched canine mouth before melting into water mere inches above the small silver-blue lake beneath it.

It was the same one she had seen back in the Glacier of the Moon's forbidden zone.

Numerous cats, their fur shades of purple, silver, and blue, were watching her from every corner of this icy city. Some with curiosity, others with wariness, and others still with what seemed like disdain, or perhaps distaste.

Meris wasn't sure.

After taking everything in, she finally let her gaze return to the great silver cat, its eyes holding a strange patience and an unsettling understanding.

Meris sighed under her breath, forcing her emotions back under control. Then her expression shifted, her eyes brightened like those of a child before a new toy. Her voice echoed through the strange stillness, magnetic and melodious.

"Wouldn't I be a fool if I declined such an interesting offer?" She laughed. "Where else would I find a city full of so many cute cats?" she asked, her gaze flicking quickly around before her smile widened.

"A city of cats made of ice and water. Oh, even snow? Aye aye aye," she muttered with a smirk. "Maybe I've glimpsed heaven."

The silver cat smiled, revealing sharp teeth at Meris's reaction. "Interesting," she slurred, "it's my first time seeing the descendant of an Elamin like you."

"Like me? Of course you won't, cat lady. But…" she tilted her head, "…do you know us?"

"More than you think," the silver cat answered.

Meris parted her lips to speak again, but the silver cat beat her to it.

"You have inherited the affinities of one of your greatest ancestors, and yet, little kitten, you are so far behind her in every aspect."

Meris frowned at the sudden words.

"But no blame shall befall you," the silver cat continued, "for you have been denied a proper opportunity to exercise your power."

Then, in a burst of ice, she appeared atop Meris's head, her cold paws gripping tightly at Meris's purple hair, making her shiver instinctively.

Meris's eyes widened. Without knowing why, she felt an intense urge to break eye contact with the cat. She tried to move, but she couldn't, not even a finger obeyed her will. Hell, even her eyes refused to blink, as if she had been frozen solid. And yet she wasn't, or rather, not in the physical sense of the word.

A chilling dread seeped into her heart, forcing her to feel something she couldn't remember ever feeling before.

For the first time since she was born, Meris felt cold.

The silver cat perched on her head smiled like the mischievous creature she was, watching Meris's frozen state with quiet amusement.

"You will be tested," she said, her paw glowing with an intense silver light. "And perhaps you didn't pay attention to this detail, but this city is called the City of Cats. So…"

Instantly, every cat around them smirked in unison.

Her heart began to pound louder than ever, almost matching the wild rhythm it took whenever Kaden was near.

"You need to be a cat to stay here. But not only to stay here, little kitten. You will show us what you are capable of. Create your own house with your cat body, and live as any cat would live."

The chill of realization pierced into Meris's soul, trapping it in a frost of horror.

"Do it correctly, and you will earn our approval," the silver cat finished, and a brilliant light enveloped Meris's entire body in a cocooning embrace.

Inside the light, Meris felt her body begin to twist. Her muscles shrank, becoming smaller yet more flexible, her eyes and ears warped into something sharper and alien, her skin shifted and behind her, something began to sprout.

Throughout it all, she wanted to scream, to cry, to resist, but everything inside her was frozen, leaving her unable to do anything.

Soon, the silvery light began to fade.

When it vanished, a small purple cat with blue tattoos swirling across her fur like flowing waves, and silver slitted eyes gleaming like glass, was left standing.

Well, not for long. The cat immediately collapsed onto the frozen ground.

Meris was still reeling from the transformation, her mind spinning as she tried to grasp the overwhelming strangeness of her new body. Everything felt unfamiliar…how to stand, how to walk, even how to sense the world around her.

Besides, she had just noticed how slippery and cold the floor was, she needed to use her affinities simply to walk without slipping.

And on top of that, she had to construct her own house, hunt her own food, and live like them and with them…?

At that realization, unconsciously, a mad and lifeless smile crept onto her kitten lips. She strained to raise her head, staring straight at the silver cat before her.

"Are you willing?" the silver cat asked again.

Meris's smile widened.

"Ah. Aye aye aye. I am going to enjoy this," she said, her voice colder than the ice surrounding her. Then, just as swiftly, her tone shifted and became bright and lively, like an excited cat.

"Watch me become the best cat!" She meowed.

The town's cats looked at her with suspicious expressions, each face reflecting the same thought:

Is she crazy?

"How interesting," the silver cat murmured at last, noticing something in Meris that none of the others did.

"How utterly interesting."

…

Fokay — City of Sorrow, Church of Sorrow

'How woefully tiring,' Rea mused internally as she walked slowly through the grey walls of the Church of Sorrow. Her feet brushed softly against the cold stone floor, her body veiled by the weeping acolyte's grey robe, marked on the left shoulder by a black symbol shaped like a tear, signifying her rank.

Her mind was consumed by countless thoughts echoing sharply inside her head, filling her with the urge to sigh, to sit down, to close her eyes for just a moment.

But she couldn't.

All around her, people watched. Their gazes weighed heavier than anything Rea had ever endured.

They were judging her, trying to see if she was worthy of the distinction others had given her, or searching for the slightest weakness to exploit, to bring her down.

She was like a grey sheep amid a flock of white ones. And the wolves' eyes, no doubt, would certainly fall on her, eager to see and to taste, what made her different.

She was exhausted.

It had been months, or was it really? Rea wasn't even sure, as everything she had seen was grey halls, grey walls, grey floors, grey grey grey… just fucking grey.

And yet, it would be a lie to say she had gotten used to it.

Still, she had learned enough to mask her exhaustion beneath the expression of woeful pain befitting the Church.

So she hid it.

So she smiled sorrowfully.

And so she walked.

After walking for more than five minutes, turning left and right through countless intersections, Rea finally arrived before a wide, grey door.

There was no one guarding it, yet Rea approached slowly and calmly, and the door yawned open on its own.

Inside, the space was bloated with a darkness so thick one could touch it and drown in it. Once she stepped inside, the door closed behind her with a loud bang, making the darkness ripple, sealing her in a place where no light would ever reach.

Rea stood there calmly, like a being carved from stone. Her body did not move an inch, her eyes did not blink, staring into the abyss with harrowing intensity and razor focus.

In truth, she wasn't even breathing.

That was the state she needed to maintain, the state she had to be in, if she didn't wish to lose everything she knew or everything she was inside this place.

After all, she stood in the presence of the Disciple of Loss…

Her master.

"You never fail to amaze me, my beautiful Rea," a deep, melodious feminine voice rumbled through the suffocating darkness, making it churn like a restless sea.

Rea remained stone.

The woman — the Disciple of Loss — chuckled softly, and then a clicking sound echoed, booming through the silence. The darkness rippled and dispersed as a dim grey light bloomed in the center of the chamber, floating like a phantom jellyfish.

"Hah… hah… hah…" Rea finally allowed herself to move and breathe, her chest rising and falling in a sporadic rhythm. She lifted her gaze and looked upward, toward the elevated platform forged from her master's Intent.

There, floating ominously, was a single grey eyeball adorned with impossibly long, graceful lashes.

It blinked.

Rea did her best to lower her head without shaking before speaking. "I have met the Disciple of Loss," she said respectfully.

"You are interesting, my beautiful Rea," the eyeball's voice projected, smooth and echoing. "I love you. I truly do. But an Intermediate rank will hardly be of use to me. You cannot even look at me without trembling, my beautiful Rea."

Rea suppressed a shudder at the weight of her master's voice. It was deep, melodic, and heavy with feeling.

"So you must become more. You must become a Master," she said, then added wickedly, "I have an evolution stone… but you must earn it."

She paused, the silence stretching like a blade, before continuing slowly,

"Tell me, my beautiful Rea, what are you willing to lose to obtain it? What part of your being can you give me?"

Rea bit her lip.

"What rank of evolution stone, might I ask, Master?"

"That," the Disciple replied softly, "depends on what you are willing to lose."

Rea hesitated.

This was the power of her master, she could forge a contract where you would give her something you were willing to lose, and in return, she would grant you what you desired.

A dangerous thing to do.

But Rea knew well that being an Intermediate was not enough. She had known it even more clearly the moment she set foot inside the Church.

Yet she had no freedom to seek an evolution stone elsewhere, no liberty to act in any way beyond what her master allowed. Every movement, every breath of hers was controlled by the Disciple of Loss, the one who seemed to hold her in particularly high regard.

Too high, for Rea's taste.

Sometimes she wondered if she had chosen the wrong path. But it was far too late for such thoughts now.

Now, she could only take the hand of the devil, for the devil had made it the only hand left to take.

She smiled woefully, then slowly parted her lips.

"I am willing to lose a part of my dreams, Master."

She paused, and with deliberate slowness, whispered,

"Will you take it?"

—End of Chapter 311—

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