It was Seamus who struck first with his blade of bone and drove straight through Elle's heart. The illusion shattered like glass, fragments of light raining down around them.

But the Crow only tilted her head slowly, unnaturally, until it turned a full one-hundred-eighty degrees like an owl, grotesque, wrong.

"Oh! You finally came!" Her mouth stretched from ear to ear in a nightmare grin. "My mother's been waiting for you."

Seamus froze, stunned, just as Elle's body burst into a spray of glittering fireworks before dissolving. He whipped his head toward Maria, who alone could still see where she was hiding, but even she struggled to pinpoint Elle's real body.

Her eyes went wide. "Seamus! On your left!"

He turned, but too late. A blade made of bone flashed right before his eyes, angling to gouge them out.

Yet Elle was suddenly hurled backward instead, smashing into a wall hard enough to shatter it, her body flung clear out the window.

"Tch. That bastard Crow." Diane hissed, readying herself. "And you,

focus. Don't rely so much on the glasses girl."

Maria's brow furrowed. "This glasses girl has a name. It's Maria."

Diane just rolled her eyes. "Not exactly the right time to complain."

"What?!"

"Shut up, both of you!" Seamus snapped, his patience gone.

They kept bickering even on the way here. Especially what to do with Lucien's body as Diane wanted to kill him while Maria wanted to keep him alive for interrogating. Of course Maria won and they ended up putting his body somewhere safe and tied him tight.

Seamus' eyes widened, he could feel that the Crow was nearby, but his eyes couldn't see her. He could still feel her power humming in the air, crawling under his skin.

Worse, David was bleeding out and his father, what in the hell was his father even doing here?

"Seamus, get out of here. Elle wants you."

Andrew's voice cut through the chaos as he strode over, David slung across his shoulder, Dylan hovering close by with a lost, stricken look. David could barely stay conscious, mumbling incoherently.

"Elle?"

Seamus repeated, so the crow was really David's long lost daughter.

Andrew ignored the question. "And you, take David somewhere safe," he ordered, pointing at Lulu, who had been hiding behind the door.

Color returned to Lulu's pale face as her eyes lit up.

"Y-Yes! I will!"

She rushed forward, taking David's weight from Andrew, then grabbed Dylan's arm before he could protest. In a blink, they were gone.

"You should go too—"

Before Seamus could finish, a surge of energy built so fast it made the air vibrate. His head snapped toward the source just as a massive sphere of fire—like a descending meteor—shot straight through the building.

He didn't waste time speaking. He grabbed Maria and bolted, the others sprinting alongside him as the hallway convulsed with heat.

They crashed through the nearest windows, landing hard below just as the explosion roared behind them. The sound rolled like thunder as debris rained down, the building collapsing into a storm of rubble and fire.

"Damn…" Seamus muttered under his breath, the curse lost in the echo.

He barely noticed his father keeping pace with them. His eyes were fixed on the figure hovering high above, wings spread against the smoke and flames.

It was the Lady Crow.

Her wings were grotesque, formed from her own ribs and muscle, stretched thin with skin like veined parchment. Long strands of golden hair whipped in the wind as her dark dress fluttered around her childlike frame.

Only her eyes betrayed her: two red points of sharp orbs fixed on Seamus. She looked frozen in time, a child's body housing a mind that had long since outgrown innocence.

Seamus felt it, the same overwhelming pressure Lucien had radiated, but heavier, stranger. This was the power born of the "perfect experiment."

"Seamus… she's using her real body," Maria whispered beside him, voice tight.

His eyes widened. If that was true, then he had an opening.

Elle moved first, darting toward him with impossible speed. Seamus was ready. His bleeding hand lifted, scattering a haze of dream spores into the air.

But his Predator Oracle flared a warning. In that frozen instant of heightened vision he saw it clearly: her blood itself splitting into thin, razor-sharp needles that couldn't be seen at normal speed.

So this was how she'd slaughtered the scavengers without lifting a finger.

He twisted out of the way, the needles slicing past where he'd been a heartbeat earlier. Elle, though, had no chance to evade the spores. Darkness swallowed the world.

The ground turned to liquid black, rippling beneath their feet, and above them stretched a starless sky where only a swollen bloody moon burned.

Inside his dream realm it was just him, Diane, Maria, and Elle. He'd locked his father out; Andrew would only be a liability here.

"Oh," Elle's voice echoed, oddly delighted, her smile stretching wide in the gloom.

"So you can use a Psyche blood style? My mother was right. You really are just like me

Seamus didn't answer. He simply stepped forward, his bleeding hand curling as his will pressed down on the world around them.

The black liquid ground rippled outward like a heartbeat; jagged monoliths of obsidian erupted around them, cutting off Elle's sightline.

Diane and Maria vanished into the darkness with a soundless sweep of his power, their presence folded deep into the cracks of his realm.

This was his space. His rules.

However, even though there was a limit he couldn't break through, it was the fact that the Crow's Sagacitas was far higher than his, making every attempt to shatter her mind useless.

Tch… even if my attributes can be doubled by the other harem members, I still can't raise Sagacitas properly.

Elle tilted her head, the motion almost playful. "Hiding them from me?" she sang. "No one can hide."

She lunged toward the others, but the black liquid gripped her tight, dragging her down as her body slowly succumbed.

"I know your trick! I can't die here!" she spat, now nothing but her head above the mire.

"I know," Seamus smirked, raising his blade. "But I can still kill you here—over and over again."

He swung, and her head rolled free, blood splattering across the black floor.

When Elle opened her eyes again, her hands and feet were strapped to an operation table. She blinked at the cold metal under her skin, feeling every sensation with painful clarity.

But she only laughed. "This trick won't work on me! I've died countless times. Do you think I feel no pain when my clones are killed?"

With sheer force she snapped the restraints, metal screeching as she stood, defiant and smiling. "They're part of me. I feel everything! I've died countless times. You'd need to kill me for eternity to break my mind!"

Seamus stayed hidden in the dark, watching her. He knew it was true, but all he could do was wait, wait for Isolde to come.

Diane had sent a letter to her mother after he defeated Lucien. There'd been no reply yet, but surely she would never abandon him, never let him be taken by Corvene… right?

At least, that was what he wanted to believe.

Then his eyes widened. From somewhere deep in the realm came screams of his name, the sound of a fight. He snapped his head toward the noise and moved from his hiding place—only to see Elle's clone striking at Diane.

He clicked his tongue, preparing to move when a voice from behind him froze him.

"What do you think you're going to do?"

The hair on the back of his neck stood up. He hadn't sensed her at all. She was just like Madeline, able to slip into any realm he created, just as Madeline had entered Isolde's. It had to be her Sagacitas and the fact that she could wield multiple blood styles.

Pain ripped down his back as she slashed him. He groaned and twisted, driving his blade straight into her heart.

"What a shame this is only a dream," she mocked, even as her body melted into blood. "If this weren't, you might have killed me by now." Her laughter echoed from everywhere at once, taunting him.

Seamus tried to steady his breathing, eyes closing. When they opened again, the view had shifted into something worse.

Maria knelt before him, a blade pressed against her neck. Behind her stood Elle, grinning. "My time here is almost over. I need to go back… so why don't you come with me, Seamus?"

He stiffened. Diane appeared at his side, eyes wide with shock and fury at being bested by that childlike form.

"Don't do it, Seamus. That woman's life isn't worth yours!" Diane shouted.

Her voice barely reached him. His gaze locked on Maria. Maria met it steadily and nodded at Diane's words, closing her eyes as if already accepting death. Then a whisper curled from the back of his mind:

Seamus… will you let your companions die again, like me?

He shivered. Why was Viviane's voice here?

"Seamus… just go. I'll be fine," Maria said softly.

Seamus exhaled, lowering his sword. "Fine," he said at last, voice low. "I'll come with you. Don't hurt her."

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