Erinn executed a mid-air brake.

  Three light arrows shot into the wall. No explosion, they just stuck there, then dissolved back into energy and reabsorbed by the owner.

  It seemed Gio's guess was correct. Erinn was incapable of destroying the building. Hiding inside was the right choice.

  The blonde girl lowered her altitude. Slowly, white combat boots touched the front yard’s grass. Facing an indoor close-quarters combat scenario, Erinn reconfigured her weapon loadout.

  Three bows melted and reconstructed into three oval-shaped shields—ancient Greek Thyreos style. Same material: similar to amber, but stronger.

  The three shields rotated around her like defensive satellites, covering all blind spots. Erinn walked calmly to the front door. In her mind, "His aura is so thin... Is it that cloak...?"

  Lack of data didn't stop her advance. She arrived at the terrace, reached out, and turned the unlocked doorknob.

  Door opened. The Valkyrie breached the enemy domain. A pretty wide living room for a standard Type 45 house.

  Erinn stood in the center of the room, shields on auto-rotate. Her sharp eyes scanned the corners, processing room geometry and potential hiding spots. Arms down, no combat stance. She looked relax, but that was a trap.

  Dead silence. Only one other entity in the room: a middle-aged housewife asleep on the couch. Or by Erinn’s perspective, an Ophema projection.

  Meanwhile, in a corner untouched by light, a pair of eyes watched. Gio hid behind a slightly opened bedroom door. His black cloak blended perfectly with the darkness.

  Gio observed the shields rotation. "One...Two...Three..." He calculated the orbital frequency. There was a forty-centimeters gap between the hovering shields. He waited for the perfect alignment timing.

  Five seconds passed. Silence. Ten seconds. No change.

  Twelve seconds. Now! Gio launched from the shadows like a predator. Gauntlet reached forward, ready to deliver a lethal electrical discharge.

  Perfect timing. The hand should've slipped right through the shield gap. But he underestimated her reaction speed.

  The millisecond Erinn heard the wind shift at her five o'clock, she didn't even turn. Nothing moved, except her mind. The shield satellites responded instantly with sudden acceleration. Gio's target gap closed in a blink.

  WHAM! A muffled collision rocked the living room. Gio's gauntlet smashed into the convex surface of Thyreos shield. But the barrier didn’t crack. Gio knocked back instead.

  Erinn snapped her head, locking onto him. But Gio wasn't done. His two super-elastic tails whipped out from the back of his skull, bypassing the outer shields like striking cobras.

  Target: her neck. One touch. That was all he needed to dump a high-voltage payload and paralyze her.

  Yet once again, Erinn proved the difference in their skill level. With flat expression, she activated a Telekinesis Nexus.

  The Thyreos shield shoved him back. CRACK! Gio slammed into the drywall, hard enough to crack it. Even though his tail tips were one inch away from her skin.

  She didn't even let him drop. The shield pinned Gio’s body against the wall. "Got you," Erinn muttered.

  Then, transmutation. The hard shield pressing against him softened, elongated, and thinned out into an unbreakable rope.

  She de-spawned the other two shields to save her brain’s computational load. Focus management was narrowed to a single point for max precision. The binding strap coiled around Gio. Torso, limbs, tails—totally shackled.

  "No—!" Gio struggled, trying to break the hold, but it was useless. Total defeat. Erinn didn't waste a second, dragging her prisoner out of the living room into the open yard.

  Gio cursed his own stupidity. He should’ve known. A flight Nexus was high-tier ability, rare for both Supernaturalists and Spirits. It required constant power, pinpoint accuracy and control, high-speed brain processing, and insane calculations.

  Didn't matter if it was her Primary Nexus (talent, specialization) or a Subordinate (non-talent), execute such smooth maneuvers put Gio at a severe disadvantage right from the beginning.

  They arrived at the middle of the lawn and stopped. Erinn turned around, cold interrogator glare locked on. "Alright," she said harshly. "Answer the question. What the hell are you?!"

  "M-My name is Gio... I'm a Demihuman," Gio answered nervously, attempting to be honest in the midst of a life-or-death situation. Erinn's brows narrowed. She wasn't buying that nonsense.

  "Liar." Erinn manipulated the molecular vibration frequency of her strap. The transparent yellow lit up like plasma, temperature spiked.

  Sizzle! The horrifying sound of roasting flesh. "Aghhh-!!!" Gio screamed, the agony drilling into his marrow. "It's true! I'm not lying!"

  Seeing the genuine reaction, Erinn dialed the thermal agitation back to baseline. She paused, letting her captive catch his breath. "Impossible..." She shook her head slowly. "You're not a Demihuman."

  Before Gio could reply, a voice dropped from the sky. "Well, well... Looks like someone's throwing a BBQ without inviting me..." A loud shout, projecting across the vast distance.

  Erinn and Gio snapped their heads up, searching for the source. There, hovering arrogantly at 35 meters altitude, horizontal distance of 50 meters, a guy stood upon empty air.

  His entrance was pure theatrical. Robes danced dramatically, accompanied by the rhythmic flow of the afternoon breeze. He wore a specific costume, looked like he just leaped straight out of PlayStation console.

  It was a costume of Ezio Auditore da Firenze from the Italian Renaissance. Ivory-white robes with an elegant doublet cut. Red sash around the waist, silver Assassin crest stamped right on the leather belt. A short brown velvet cape hung from his left shoulder, give an extra noble drip.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  His face was completely hidden. Pointed, eagle-beak hood and a gray cloth mask covering everything except his eyes.

  "That looks familiar," Erinn muttered, recalling some pop-culture references. Meanwhile, Gio was internally cheering. "Aru!"

  Who else but him? The only Spirit User who prioritized cosplay aesthetics over combat efficiency. His voice was deeper, pitched down by a wave modulation Nexus, but Gio knew that it was Arua’s standard tactic to mask his identity from other Supernaturalists.

  The brown-green trench-coat from their first meeting ten months ago was his default skin, but he rarely equipped it. He more often use fictional character costumes. The reason? Simple. "If you're gonna risk your life in a fight, at least do it with style."

  Gio exhaled a sigh of relief. The ridiculous yet lethal reinforcements had arrived.

  Challenged from the sky, Erinn didn't just sit there. She ascended, matching her enemy's altitude.

  Down below, Gio remained tightly shackled by the strap. The fact that the bindings didn’t fade even as Erinn's distance increased indicated her high Locus Range. She was capable of maintaining a Nexus over dozens of meters without any signal degradation.

  A few seconds passed. Now, the Valkyrie and the Assassin faced each other in the sky.

  At a glance, it looked like a mirror match. Both levitating, defying gravity. However, their flight mechanisms were fundamentally different.

  Arua flew mechanically. Upon closer inspection, his Assassin robes were pulled taut at specific anchor points—shoulders, arms, chest, back, waist, thighs, feet. The fabric stretched upward, as if hooked by nothing.

  Because he wasn't flying. He was being "lifted." Beneath the thick costume, Arua had embedded pure graphite plates at critical points.

  Why not just use direct telekinesis to his body? Well that's suicide. The human body is a mess of complex compounds, fluids, and air cavities. Lifting your own meat-suit requires cellular-level force distribution. A little miscalculation, and uneven pressure snaps your bones or shreds your muscles.

  So, Arua took a shortcut: Graphite. A single carbon element with a highly stable, non-reactive hexagonal atomic structure. The information was beautifully simple—easy for Psion-wave synchronization.

  He converted ambient air particles into kinetic energy, generating high-frequency micro-impulses aimed right at the graphite plates. The result was an artificial lift. A complex, elegant Subordinate technique. Pure physics hacking to mimic the miracle of flying.

  As for Erinn? Her flight mechanism remained a mystery.

  The atmosphere between them froze. High-altitude winds whipped Erinn's blonde hair and Arua's white robes. Dozens of meters apart, but their eyes were dead-locked onto each other.

  "Who are you?" Erinn shouted.

  Arua spread his arms wide. Velvet cape fluttered dramatically. He took a deep breath, loading up what he thought was an epic introduction.

  "The Codebreaker of the Universe... The Harbinger of Calamity... A tragic soul trapped in the abyss of despair by a vile defamation..." His voice-modulated baritone echoed across the neighborhood. "A gentleman trying to keep his promise. In other words... I'm the master of the demon down there."

  Erinn frowned. The cringe levels were too high for her logic to process. "You... You're not a demon. A Shaman? I've never seen you in the Purwokerto Association branch. Are you from another region?"

  Erinn assumed their connection was just a standard contract. But that still didn't explain the mystery: how could a demon possess a human body?

  Out of nowhere, Arua tilted his head toward the sky. "MUWA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA...!!!" A classic Saturday-morning-cartoon villain laugh exploded over the battlefield.

  Gio and Erinn just stared with deadpan faces. Speechless.

  "HAA-HAA-HAA-HAA..." The volume lowered.

  "Haaa...Haaa...Ha." It awkwardly died out. Silence.

  "What is he even doing," Erinn and Gio thought simultaneously.

  "You're seriously never see me before?" Arua asked, his voice dropping with fake disappointment.

  "I know you’re Aruna, ‘The Disturbing Content’," Erinn replied with no hesitation. “The Disturbing Content?” Gio confused. Yeah, that was Arua’s nickname at school. Pretty cruel and outrageous epithet, actually.

  Erinn glanced sideways, trying to pinpoint this incident's ground zero—the mango tree near the food stall. But they’d displaced far. From this altitude, every tree looked exactly the same.

  "Don't play dumb," She stated coldly, shifting her gaze back to Arua. "I've been tailing you two since the start. I heard the whole conversation."

  Mystery solved. It all started when Erinn caught the Demihuman's strange residue in the School’s South Courtyard. She stalked Gio from the gates, rode the same bus, got off at the same stop, and dropped the ambush at the critical moment.

  Gio went pale. "Oh no!" he thought in panic. "All this time, Arua has fought hard to hide his Spirit User identity. But now..."

  But Arua's unhinged reaction broke every logic. "Wrong," he cut in abruptly.

  "Huh?" Erinn frowned. Gio gaped.

  "Do you truly not know who I am?" Arua asked once more. His tone shifted, becoming cold and heavy.

  No reply came, a faint smirk painted beneath his gray mask. "Tch, tch, tch..." Arua shook his head slowly. Gio's mind was full of question marks. Identity blown, but zero panic, no negotiations, and no witness elimination protocols? Instead, he was playing riddles.

  Erinn, feeling her authority get mocked, decided to switch to legal protocols. "I don't care who your real identity is," she shouted. "You've violated Association Law Article 18, paragraph 2 regarding—"

  "Skip," Arua interrupted, acting like a gamer button-mashing through a cutscene.

  "—regarding forbidden rituals, and Article 22 concerning—"

  "Skip."

  Erinn's patience hit the threshold. "—I'm dragging you both to the tribunal!"

  Negotiations aborted. Offense mode engaged. Erinn spawned a single Persian Composite Bow and a luminous arrow. But no telekinesis this time. She gripped the bow herself, pulling the string back to max contraction. Even though the damage wasn’t much different from automatic mode, but the manual gesture indicated one thing: Intention. She was dead serious.

  Shot! The arrow released, ripped through the air at high velocity, locking onto Arua's shoulder.

  Meanwhile, Arua just smirked under his mask. He raised his right hand, palm open toward the incoming threat. A casual, yet arrogant "stop" gesture.

  Down below, Gio smiled dismissively. "Heh," he sneered. "Low-level attack like that will never work on him!" Arua would undoubtedly shatter the arrow or deflect it with a mere flick of his finger, just as he always did. That was what Gio thought.

  However, reality hit different. Milliseconds before impact, the smirk beneath the mask vanished. Arua's eyes widened. There was a critical miscalculation in his Nexus.

  Too late. The arrow didn't stop. It pierced straight through the Assassin skin like a hot needle through butter.

  Schlick! The horrifying sound of tearing flesh echoed. The arrow impaled his left chest, penetrating through the Renaissance robes until the tip poked out his back.

  Fresh blood spilled out in two states of matter. Phase one, liquid: thick red fluid soaking the ivory-white robes. Phase two, gas: the arrow's extreme heat flash-boiled the water content in his blood. A loud hissing white steam erupted, mixed with the red aerosol mist.

  Arua stared at his chest hole. Blank shock. Blood seeped from under his mask, dripping down his chin. "Shit," he groaned weakly.

  Nervous system collapsed. Consciousness faded away. His blurred mind failed to sustain the graphite lift force, initiated a 35-meter free-fall.

  "Wait... What—?" Gio's brain blue-screened. Arua lose scenario wasn't even in his prediction.

  Erinn went pale. "Dead?! Impossible! I aimed for the shoulder! Why didn't he dodge?!" Panic spiked. Her initial objective was capture, not an execution.

  Erinn dove hard. She dragged the strap-shackled Gio along, flying straight to Arua's drop zone. They landed in an open, dry field seconds later.

  Arua lay sprawled on the ground. The man staring up at the clear twilight sky—a brutal contrast to his tragic fate.

  His breathing was shallow. The eyes hollow. His face turned deathly pale.

  "Arua...!!!" Gio screamed hysterically. The demon thrashed, desperately crawling forward, but Erinn's bindings held him down.

  Hearing the voice of his "little brother," Arua's head slowly turned sideways. His trembling right hand tried to reach out for Gio, only to fall back to the ground.

  He gathered his last strength into a final words. "Gio..." he whispered, choking on blood. "Keep..." Breath gagged. "...Studying..."

  An academic testament that sounded profoundly sacred in that moment of death. Gio stared at him, eyes tearing up. "No..." he whimpered.

  Then, the degradation process began. Without consciousness authority, Arua's matter lost its existential validity. His body and the Assassin costume decomposed, shattering into dust that drifted on the wind.

  Slowly, the fragments shrank. Micro to atomic, atomic to non-physical. Until finally, he vanished completely—returning to the fundamental energy of The Existentiuum.