Moonbyul leapt down from the Woolsthorpe as soon as they landed and made a mad dash towards the bubble dome that contained the colony they had seen from space. A low gravitational force, coupled with the natural power of the space-suit, allowed her to make large advances as she skipped towards the colony. Apprehensive, Solar followed her, keeping what she decided was a sensible distance from the excited woman.

As they approached the dome, Moonbyul soon realised that as the colony was located at the bottom of the crater, they would have to make their way down on foot. Jumping down was impossible; there was no strong gravitational force to pull them downwards. Moonbyul stared down from where she was stood at the edge of the crater and slowly began to inch down.

“Solar.” Without taking her eyes off the crumbly surface of the crater, Moonbyul proffered a hand to Solar. “Come down carefully.”

Solar harrumphed. “I believe I can make my way down by myself.” Stepping down from the raised rim of the crater, she planted a foot on the slope, then the other -- and immediately lost her balance, her feet skidding down and her arms pinwheeling to gain some control over herself.

“Hey! Watch out!” Moonbyul grabbed Solar’s forearm before it hit her face and dug her other hand into the rocky surface of the crater. Hurriedly activating her space-suit’s strengthening ability, Moonbyul managed to stop their downward slip before they both fell down.

“!” she exclaimed. “Didn’t I tell you to be careful? Science above. Talk about reckless.” The hand that was gripping Solar’s arm moved down to hold her hand instead. “Let’s go.”

Chastised, somewhat embarrassed, Solar kept mum and quietly followed Moonbyul down the side of the crater. On occasion she would glance at their clasped hands, and involuntarily a small smile would creep onto her face until she wiped it off. This continued all the way until they reached the bottom of the crater.

The colony itself was built on an uplift in the very middle of the crater. Essentially, the base of the colony bubble was flattened so it rested a few inches up from the rest of the original bedrock that was dented upon impact, forming a sort of odd w-shape. There was a small fence-like structure circling the colony, but it didn’t seem to serve much purpose, as it was probably just about the height of Solar’s waist. Attached to the fence was an equally small gate with a simple latch.

Moonbyul lifted the latch and walked through the gate.

From up close, it was very clear that the colony was nothing like Central. For starts, there was no impressive, imposing building like Merc HQ. There wasn’t even any large, high-rise buildings that Moonbyul could see. The colony was built close to the ground, with whatever houses there were only having the one storey. Moonbyul wouldn’t have called them houses, even -- more like rocks piled on top of each other to enclose a small space. There were fewer proper beds than there were thrown-about piles of blankets and clothes pretending to be beds.

The two women removed their helmets and glanced around, looking for signs of life. “, it’s so cold here,” Moonbyul noted, shivering. She covered her nose and mouth with her hands, letting the self-heating suit warm her face. “Where’s everyone?”

“I suppose they are in hiding,” Solar whispered to Moonbyul. “It is no surprise that one would be cautious of strangers.”

“That makes sense.” Moonbyul inhaled deeply, then shouted: “Hey, anyone there?”

Solar smacked her on the arm, shocked. “Why would you do that?”

“Nope!” an unknown voice shouted back.

Solar gaped. “Why would you say that?”

Moonbyul grinned. She could get with this kind of friendly. “Where are ya, ya little ?”

The sound of delighted giggling from behind a pile of rocks attracted her attention. Putting a finger to her lips, Moonbyul gestured at Solar to follow her as she tiptoed to the source of the sound. She pointed to one end of the rock pile, then jabbed two fingers at the pile. You go that way, and we’ll both attack at the same time.

At Moonbyul’s signal, both of them jumped out at the same time. Another squeal, and they watched a small figure clad in rags run away.

“You want a chase, huh?” Moonbyul gritted her teeth. “Then a chase is what you’re gonna get.”

The figure didn’t manage to get very far, mostly for two reasons -- one, they were small, and two, the colony’s boundaries were not spread out enough to allow someone to gain distance between themselves and their pursuers. In this case, the figure ran face-first into the fence that surrounded the space, allowing Moonbyul to descend onto them with evil glee.

“Gotcha!” She grabbed the figure by their hood and hauled them up. “Now, who are you?”

The figure swung around in the air until they were face-to-face with Moonbyul. Under the hood was a chubby, pink face with a cheeky grin and shining chocolate-brown eyes. His hair, a few shades darker than the colour of his eyes, poked out in tufts. He looked no more than five or six years old.

“Who are ya, kid?” Moonbyul asked, pretending to frown sternly.

“None ya business!” The child stuck out his tongue and giggled. Lifting his hands, he clapped and twisted away from Moonbyul’s grip. What landed on the ground was not a child.

It was a small bear cub.

“What the ?” Moonbyul yelled as the cub scampered away. Absolutely discombobulated, she turned to Solar. “Did you see that? What kinda magic trick was that?”

“Follow that bear!” Solar cried, racing after the disappearing cub. It took a confused Moonbyul a few seconds to gather her thoughts and give chase, but when she did, she flew like the wind. Her overwhelming sense of curiosity and adrenaline powered her movements as she leapt over piles of bedding and dodged the rocks and pebbles kicked up by the fleeing bear cub.

She was only an arm’s length away from the cub when something hard hit her head.

“Ow!”

Moonbyul swivelled around just in time for another sharp rock to glance off her cheek and scratch her. She slapped a hand to the bleeding cut as she glared at her attacker. “What was that for?”

“Why did you stop?” Solar ran up, slightly out of breath. Her eyes followed Moonbyul’s pointed finger to the origin of the attack.

dropped at the sight of a woman, breathing heavily with rocks in her arms. The woman’s curly hair was shorn short, tufts of honey and caramel framing a fierce face. Like the boy, she was dressed in a hooded robe that brushed against her thighs. Her feet were bare and stained with dirt. Solar took a hopeful step forward. “Callisto.”

“You’re not welcome here,” the woman repeated, completely brushing Solar aside. “Not since you banished me from your group for something I did not do!” She picked out another stone from the pile in her arms and, pulling her arm back, threw it straight at Moonbyul.

Moonbyul caught the projectile in her hand and slowly walked towards the stranger. “I don’t know who you are and I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you can’t just throw at people and expect them to listen to you.”

“Callisto.” Solar rushed forward and put a hand on Moonbyul’s shoulder. “She isn’t her. She is human.”

“Human?” Callisto froze in the act of selecting another rock to throw. “No. She looks exactly like her.” She picked up a rock, but Moonbyul and Solar could see the doubt and hesitation clearly on her face.

“Look closely,” Solar insisted. “Diana and Moonbyul are nothing alike.”

Moonbyul raised her eyebrows. Leaning towards Solar, she muttered out of the corner of , “I thought you said that Diana lady and I look exactly the same.”

Solar shook her head. “Maybe at first. But now it is blindingly clear that you two are not the same person.” She turned her head to stare at Moonbyul. “No, not the same at all.”

Meanwhile, Callisto’s gaze was still fixated on Moonbyul as she examined her from a distance. A lumpy object suddenly bumped into her leg, and she dropped all her rocks when she realised what it was.

“Arcas!” she exclaimed, crouching down so she could fuss over the sniffling bear cub. “What happened to you?”

The cub growled and moaned before burrowing itself into her chest. “You were playing chase? With whom?” She pointed at Moonbyul and Solar. “With them?”

“Arcas,” Solar repeated the name, nodding as if she just understood something.

“I don’t get it.” Moonbyul nudged Solar. “What’s going on?”

“Arcas is my son,” Callisto said. She picked him up -- now transformed into a child and not a bear -- and, turning her back on the two women, began to walk away. She paused and looked back. “Do not follow me.”

Moonbyul and Solar exchanged glances behind her back. “That means we should follow her, right?” Moonbyul whispered.

“I believe so,” Solar replied.

“Okay.”

They followed Callisto and Arcas to what could be called, if chanced upon by a person with nothing but utmost optimism, a man-made cave. From afar, it could easily be mistaken as a pile of rocks if seen from the surface, if not for the massive hole that was dug deep into the ground. The cave -- if one was really to call it that -- was heavily padded with bedding, supposedly to keep it as warm and comfortable as possible. To Moonbyul, however, it was still freezing cold, and every breath she exhaled came out as mist.

How did these two people manage to live here without any proper clothes or heating, or food for that matter? She hadn’t seen any signs of food anywhere in the colony.

“Aren’t you hungry?” Moonbyul blurted, concerned about the serious lack of basic human necessities on the moon.

Before Callisto could answer, or Solar could admonish her sudden question, Arcas peeked out from behind his mother’s back. “I am!” At his mother’s subtle shake of her head, he pouted. “But I am hungry,” he muttered.

Moonbyul got to her feet, bending her back to accommodate the height of the cave. “Hold on. I’ll get some food for you.”

Solar grabbed Moonbyul’s wrist, stopping her from leaving. “That was not what we came here for. Was it?” She directed her question to Callisto who turned red-faced and quickly shook her head again.

“Solar.” Moonbyul’s tone was patient but dark. “You’re supposed to be a god? And you’re letting a kid go hungry and cold and whatever.” She sneered. “Maybe that’s why we stopped believing in y’all. ‘Cause it seems you gods are pretty people.” Shaking Solar off, she strode out of the cave and headed back towards their shuttle. Arcas, delighted by the idea of food, jumped out from behind his mother and ran after Moonbyul.

Callisto watched and waited until the two were out of sight before leaning back. “You’re right,” she said, clearly impressed. “She’s nothing like Diana. Nothing like any of us.” Callisto grinned. “She’s so much better.”

Solar looked down at her feet, shamefaced. It hurt to admit that maybe Callisto was correct, that Moonbyul’s scorn and contempt of her actions and feelings was understandable. But she could say nothing, do nothing to defend herself, not when Moonbyul risked her life not once but twice to save and protect her. The only thing she could do was nod quietly in agreement. “She’s human, after all.”

Moonbyul glanced at the small boy trotting beside her. When she realised that Arcas was following her, she had slowed her pace down so he could catch up. She let him babble on about life in the crater, how he and his mother woke up in the middle of the abandoned colony one day without any of their personal belongings on them. How they looked for any other sign of life, the despair his mother felt when she realised that they were the only two existing in the colony. There was no food, no water, no no people. Nothing.

After a while, when they were desperate for something, anything, Arcas discovered water. It was amazing, he explained with such wonderment in his eyes that Moonbyul had to smile, that one day when he was digging through the cold ground he realised that the cold hard crystals he dug up melted in his warm hands. Not only that, but that they were edible. “Lucky mom wasn’t there, you know,” he whispered conspiratorially. “Or else we would never have water. Ever.”

Moonbyul nodded in agreement. After all, didn’t the same thing happen to her only a while back, with her miraculously stumbling upon a treasure hoard of ice? The memory made her miss Lars and the rest of the miners terribly and elicited a heavy sigh from her.

“What’s wrong?” Arcas asked, tugging on Moonbyul’s space suit when she went silent. It was a simple question asked with innocence only a child could have. Oddly enough, it was that same innocence that strengthened her. If a young boy such as Arcas could still stay this positive and happy, why couldn’t she?

She ruffled his hair. “Nothing.” Looking up, she spotted the Woolsthorpe peeking out from behind the raised rim of the crater. “Hey, I see it.”

“Huh? Where?” Following the direction of Moonbyul’s finger, Arcas’s eyes lit up. “I wanna see it! The whole thing!”

“Um.” Moonbyul pursed her lips in thought. There were definitely working helmets, that she knew. But here weren’t any space suits that came in Arcas’s size, although she did wonder whether it was safe enough to just bundle him in one and let him waddle around. “Tell you what. I’m gonna bring some stuff over and we’ll see whether you can fit into them.”

Arcas grinned. “Okay!” He waved at Moonbyul as she fixed her helmet over her head and left the colony bubble.

Climbing back up the crater, she made her way back to the Woolsthorpe. She rummaged through the giant pile of items tucked away at the back of the shuttle, finally pulling out the bag that Mes -- or Hermes as she now knew him -- had given her. She picked up handfuls and handfuls of nutrition bars and packets of water and dumped them all in the bag, slung it over her shoulder, and headed back out, grabbing a couple of space suits and extra helmets on her way out.

Arcas greeted her with a delighted shriek and the food she took out of her bag with even greater glee. “Eat up,” Moonbyul said, tearing the plastic casing and offering the bar to the little boy. “It probably don’t really taste nice or nothing, but…”

“It’s so good!” Arcas exclaimed with his mouth full. “Can we bring it home? Then we can all eat it!”

How hungry must he have been to find something that tasteless so delicious, Moonbyul wondered, but did not say it aloud. “Why do you think I packed this much?” She winked at him instead and readjusted the bag over her shoulder. “Come on, let’s go.”

Back at the underground abode, Solar and Callisto were sitting in icy silence that was further intensified by the terrifyingly low temperature of the actual cave. Although they were facing each other, their arms were crossed in front of them -- the sentiment was more than clear. Don’t talk to me.

Fortunately for everyone, Arcas seemed to not have noticed this, and leapt into his mother’s arms. “Look!” He waved his nutrition bar in front of Callisto’s face with a guileless grin stretched across his face. “I have food!”

Callisto chuckled. “I can see that.” She met Moonbyul’s gaze and nodded. “Thank you.”

“No problem.” Moonbyul knelt on the ground and started unloading all the rations she managed to carry from the shuttle. “We’ve got your food bars. We’ve got your rationed water. And here” --she placed the space outfits next to the rations-- “we’ve even got some space suits and extra helmets so you can go out and explore without running out of oxygen or dying from the pressure of outer space.”

Callisto stared wide-eyed at the haul. “All of this… is for us?”

“Well, yeah.” Moonbyul side-eyed Solar who was still sitting quietly. “Any complaints?” Solar looked up at her out of the corner of her eye and shook her head before quickly looking away again.

Moonbyul sighed inwardly at her action. They needed to talk. She took Solar’s arm and gave Callisto a polite smile. “Sorry, do you mind if we talk outside for a bit?”

Once they were outside, Moonbyul and Solar stared at each other for a few seconds, both waiting for the other to make the first move. Moonbyul huffed a breath; Solar bit her lip.

“So,” they both started simultaneously. Moonbyul blinked. Solar inhaled sharply.

“You go first,” they tried again at the same time. Both women grinned; and just like that, the tension was broken. Laughter had never felt more liberating.

“Look,” Moonbyul said when she finally managed to curb her laughter for a moment, “look. I’m sorry I snapped at you just now. Maybe you gods have a different way of doing things, and I… You know, I just didn’t feel right about it.”

Solar shook her head. “No, you were right. As much as gods are reckless, so are humans compassionate. That is something we need to learn. It is something I need to learn.” She laughed and sat down on one of the piles of bedding lying about on the ground. “And for me to sulk after that telling off too… I could not have been more childish. I’m sorry.”

Moonbyul sat down next to Solar and petted her hand. “Apology accepted. Now. Did something happen between you and Callisto?”

“How did you know?”

Moonbyul rolled her eyes. “It’s too damn obvious, y’know that? The air between you two was, like, so thick with tension I couldn’t cut it with a high-powered laser.”

“She said terrible things about Diana,” Solar admitted. “Mean things, bad things. About our relationship.”

“But why?” Moonbyul frowned and scratched her head. “Not like you did anything to her, right?”

Solar laughed drily. “Innocent people often have bad things done to them, Moonbyul. Callisto and Arcas are no exception.”

Moonbyul cocked her head. “I don’t get it.”

Solar nodded wisely; this was to be expected. After all, their stories were all but gone to humankind now. “First, you should know who Diana is.”

As the goddess of the hunt, and of nature, Diana -- more commonly known as Artemis -- was also a goddess. She had a devout following, a group of nymphs who swore to never lay with a man. Callisto, Solar said, was one of them. She was a particularly youthful nymph at the time of this story, and was madly infatuated with Diana, and would never do anything against Diana’s will.

And yet she did lay with a man, though not of her own volition.

“She was… No,” Moonbyul breathed, hands to . “She was ?”

Solar nodded. “And by Zeus, no less. To have such a thing done to you by the king of gods is humiliating and painful, and not only that, but no one would side with you, for who would be willing to go against a powerful king?”

“But what does this have to do with Diana? Or with you?”

“Diana refused to listen to her and banished her once she realised Callisto was with child,” Solar explained. “As if everything she had done, all her love for Diana before the tragedy was forgotten. And it was not even her fault.”

“So Callisto thinks the same thing’s gonna happen to you? That Diana’s just playing with you the same way she was playing with her?” Moonbyul asked, slightly wary of Solar’s response.

“Our relationship is not a game!” Solar blustered, clearly offended, but quickly reined her temper in. “I’m sorry, but… Love should not be a game,” she repeated in a softer voice.

“I agree.” Moonbyul took in a deep breath, then let it out, watching her breath leave as fading mist. “But I think that like friendship, or companionship, there should be communication between both parties who are in love. What’s important is that people shouldn’t be keeping secrets from each other, or else they’ll never really be able to trust each other.”

Solar sat quietly, mulling over Moonbyul’s words. Once again, the human was right. But how was she to tell her about Diana taking over her body -- possessing her, really -- and speaking to her? It didn’t make any sense, not to such a scientifically based human mind such as Moonbyul’s. It didn’t even make any sense to Solar. How did she do it, and more importantly, why?

“Well, since I’ve said that, can’t be a hypocrite, can I?” Moonbyul chirped. “So I’ll tell you a little something about me.”

“What is it?”

“Honestly? I don’t have any memories from my childhood, or my teenage years, or anything,” Moonbyul confessed. “The only memories I have are from working on Mercury as a miner, and that’s all I’ve got. I dunno what happened before that, and truth be told, it kinda weirds me out a bit when I try to think about it. About the before.” She glanced over at Solar and grimaced. “Weird, innit?”

“It is strange,” Solar agreed. “And you do not know why you cannot recall your past?”

Moonbyul lifted her shoulders and dropped them. “Nope.”

“Strange indeed,” Solar murmured. “But do remember -- the past does not always define you. Perhaps not having those memories is for the better.”

“I guess,” Moonbyul sighed.

“I need to tell you something as well,” Solar admitted in a quiet voice. “Before, when we were on the way here… Diana, she talked to me. She talked to me through you.”

Moonbyul frowned and shook her head. “What?”

Before Solar could explain further, a small figure leapt onto Moonbyul’s back and tackled her to the ground. “Are you done yet?” Arcas turned back and grinned at Solar, his short arms wrapped loosely around Moonbyul’s neck. “You were taking soooooo long!” he whined as he flopped his entire weight onto the poor blue-haired woman beneath him.

“Kid, has anyone told you how heavy you are?” Moonbyul grunted. “I’m gonna roll around and squish you like a bug if you don’t get off me.”

Arcas blew a raspberry at her but shuffled off her back. “You’re not good at being scary, are you?” Like the bear cub he was, he scampered over to Solar and climbed onto her lap. “The other lady that came was way scarier.”

“Lady?” Both Moonbyul and Solar stared at him. “What lady?”

“She is dangerous.” Callisto stepped out of her cave with a thick blanket wrapped around her that swooshed around with every step. “Dark hair, dangerous eyes. She must not know where you are, and more importantly, who you are.”

“Did she carry a whip of some sort?” Solar pressed.

Callisto frowned. “How did you know?”

Solar shot up from her seat, causing Arcas to leap from her lap. “Tell me where she is. This woman… She knows where Diana is.”

“And how do you know that?” Callisto demanded.

“Because Diana spoke to me. Through Moonbyul. She showed me visions. I felt what she had felt, wherever she was, held in captivity.” Solar curled her hand into a fist. “She was in pain.”

Something in Callisto’s eyes flickered. Whether it was worry or disdain, Solar could not tell. She pressed on. “Please tell me where I can find this woman.”

“Tell us where this lady is,” Moonbyul agreed, placing a supportive hand on Solar’s back.

“I am telling you she is dangerous! She could kill you with a glare if she wanted to,” Callisto insisted. “Why do you not listen to me?”

“Because we need answers, Callisto, and I am not going to stay here and hide like you!” Solar erupted, her eyes burning gold. Callisto froze, her heart thumping erratically against her ribs. She could feel closing up under Solar’s terrifying gaze, and for the first time since meeting the young goddess, she felt fear. Fear similar to that she had felt when she set her eyes on the black-haired woman with the whip.

“Very well!” Callisto spit out. The fire in Solar’s eyes slowly extinguished, leaving speckles of burnt gold in her brown eyes. “I overheard her saying that her next stop was Io. It is another moon, nearest to Jupiter’s planet. She’s headed there.”

She picked Arcas up and turned her back to the duo. “If you really leave for Io, please don’t ever come back.”

Arcas waved forlornly as he was forcibly taken away. “Please come back!” he shouted. “I’ll be very sad if you don’t.”

Moonbyul waved back at him, a determined look settling on her face when she turned to Solar. “Io it is, then.”

Solar paced the length of the Woolsthorpe, only pausing to look out of windows or out of the giant glass windshield-like screen. There were so many questions to be answered, she knew, and she only had one lead: this mysterious, and certainly dangerous, dark-haired woman Diana had showed her.

Turning towards the cockpit, she watched Moonbyul fiddle with the galaxy map that Sal had given them. It didn’t feel right having the blue-haired pilot fly her to Io, considering how potentially unsafe this expedition was going to be. After what happened on Hygieia, she could not bear to see Moonbyul in that state again, wrapped head to toe in bandages and scarred and wounded all over her body. And if it happened again on Io, there was no Sal around to help.

“If - no, when we find this woman, you should leave immediately,” she informed Moonbyul. “If she really is as dangerous as Callisto said, then you will not be safe. This is a risk you should not take.”

Moonbyul chuckled, highly amused. “Solar, ever since I met you, my life’s been in danger a lot, you know that, right?”

“Exactly my point.” Solar stopped beside Moonbyul’s seat at the cockpit and placed a hand on its armrest. Sighing, she stared out at the smaller, nearly insignificant moons whizz by as the Woolsthorpe swept past gossamer rings of dust that encircled Jupiter. “You have risked a lot for me, nearly dying, even, and… I do not want to put you in that position again.”

Moonbyul leaned back in her chair and tilted her head to look up at Solar. “Did I say it’s a bad thing? Solar, let’s be real here: I wouldn’t be exploring the galaxy right now if I never met you. You’ve changed my entire ing life, and it’s awesome. Wouldn’t trade it for a billion credits.”

She lightly smacked Solar’s arm. “Besides, you’re the first ever friend that looked my age. I say look, of course, because you’re probably as old as Galileo himself.” Cackling, she swivelled around in her seat to check her map.

“Moonbyul, I am being serious.”

Sighing, Moonbyul swivelled around to face Solar again. “So am I. You need to realise this: you’re not forcing me into anything. Helping you find Diana, flying around in an epic world-renowned shuttle, all this stuff -- I chose to do it. And I’m telling you now, I ain’t gonna just ditch you with some random scary lady just to save my . That’s what I’m choosing to do too.”

She winked at Solar. “Now sit down, we’re fast approaching and I need to focus to land this baby.”

The first thing both women noticed when they landed on Io was the significant difference in temperature between this moon and Callisto’s moon. Despite wearing their thermo-regulated space suits, they could feel the blistering heat piercing their skin. To Moonbyul, it was almost as if she was back on Mercury again.

Like Callisto, there was also an oxygen bubble surrounding the moon despite the lack of human presence, almost as if it was previously inhabited.

“Look there!” Solar tugged on Moonbyul’s arm, drawing her attention to a large group of unknown machines in the distance huddled together near a mountain. “What is that?”

Moonbyul squinted, trying to discern their purpose. “Can’t say for sure from here. Let’s go closer.”

As they headed towards the machines, treading carefully in case the dangerous woman from Solar’s vision was still around, Moonbyul felt a rumble underneath her feet. She immediately stopped and held up a hand. “Did you feel that?”

“Feel what?” Solar asked just before another rumble echoed around them. It was almost as if the ground beneath their feet was growing hotter and hotter, and even… turning into liquid?

“Moonbyul, the earth! It’s melting!”

Moonbyul glanced down and pulled Solar aside. Scanning the ground, she noticed cracks propagating around them. Bright, glowing orange liquid started to pour out of the cracks and snake towards them. “, it’s lava! We gotta get out of here, now!”

Taking Solar’s hand in hers, Moonbyul sprinted away from the lava as quick as she could. The faster they ran, the more cracks that grew around and under them, causing vast amounts of magma to erupt. It would have been impossible to survive the lava if not for their space-suits, but they eventually managed to outrun the flow of lava and reach the machines that Solar had spotted.

Upon closer inspection, these machines were very familiar to Moonbyul. “These are mining drills,” she announced, climbing into the driver’s seat of one of the machines to further examine it. “For… iron. That’s what Io’s made of. Iron and silicate rock.”

“As expected of a Moonbyul, I suppose,” a husky female voice drawled out. Shocked and surprised by the sudden entrance of a stranger, they whipped around to see a curvaceous dark-haired figure approaching them in a white space-suit. Solar’s quick eyes spotted the mole on her cheek, while Moonbyul’s attention was drawn to the whip coiled on her belt.

“Oh ,” Moonbyul whispered.

“Oh indeed,” the dark-haired woman agreed with a teasing grin. “Hello, Moonbyul-yi. I missed you.”