「 episode 2; arc 1.2 」 —the final piece//saying goodbye— 「 yeojin ii 」  

The plan set in motion by the two high-level mystics left Yeojin in a baffled sort of wonder.

Just moments prior, Sooyoung had initiated combat with the scarlet passenger in an explosive maneuver—small pillars of ice expelled themselves upward from the frost underneath her feet with great force, launching her skywards.

Synchronized with her immediate ascent, the collection of icicles behind her turned inwards and were propelled forward without warning. Too sudden for it to step out of the way, the passenger was forced to go on the defensive. It raised its shield in front of it and ducked behind cover, protecting itself from a flurry of jagged pain as the icicles steadily stabbed into it.

As Sooyoung quickly reached the apex of her ascent, her voice boomed. "Now, Kahei!"

With permission now granted, Kahei's left eye briefly lit up with an amber glow. The crystal in her staff resonated with her as it released a pulse of ether, signaling the onset of her attack.

The stalagmites poised above the passenger began to plummet towards the earth below with intense velocity. The sharp rocks pierced their way into the back and shoulders of the fiend, becoming lodged into its body. The toughened plastic of its torso started to crack as more and more of Kahei's projectiles stabbed into it. The onslaught of earth and ice began to weaken its constitution, its defensive stance visibly losing form.

The rush of pointed aerial stones showed no signs of stopping, more quickly taking shape and shooting down as their numbers started to diminish. With her torrent still assailing their enemy, Kahei breathed in as she freed one of her hands from her staff and extended it towards Sooyoung.

As Kahei exhaled, a sizable mass of dense ether coalesced at a startling speed behind the airborne mystic. With her breath, a large runic circle simultaneously materialized in front of Kahei's outstretched index and middle finger. The chestnut ether behind Sooyoung wasted no time thinning out into a vertical line, reaching all the way down to the ground and spreading out there.

Her framework laid, Kahei pierced the runic circle with a forward of her fingers. As it shattered, the tall collection of ether took the form of another pillar stationed directly behind Sooyoung and the staggering passenger.

Working in tandem with her ally, Sooyoung's sky blue eye shimmered brilliantly as a paper-thin misty cloud of cyan aggregated onto the surface of the rocky formation. It instantly transformed into a sheet of ice along the side of it. As far as Yeojin could tell, both of their actions occurred within a single moment. The degree of synchronization present between the two of them felt like the eighth wonder of the world to her.

As her descent began, Sooyoung shifted her body back slightly and lined her feet up with the frozen side of Kahei's newest structure. Making contact, she leaned forward and glided down the frozen slide, coming back down towards her enemy at a breakneck speed.

Yeojin couldn't help but crack a smile as the realization hit her.

"That was her answer for a crazy fast dive, wasn't it?" the young girl suggested. "She's dropping way faster than she would have if she let herself fall normally! I kinda do the same thing too! Just, uh, not as cool looking…"

"More or less, yes," Haseul affirmed, her fingers working her ether needle across the remainder of Yeojin's wound. "Normally I would do it for her, but they managed to replicate a similar setup without much communication. Sooyoung and Kahei's long history with each other really shows itself when they fight together. That's why I said you shouldn't worry about them. Even less so once I finish up here and can properly help them out…"

Glancing over to Haseul, Yeojin's smile faded into a downcast frown. "I'm, uh…I'm sorry that you have to babysit me, Haseul."

"Don't apologize."

"W-what?"

"None of this is your fault. Not a single part of it," Haseul remarked calmly, betraying Yeojin's expectations of a raised tone. "You absolutely need to understand and accept that you aren't to blame for what's happening right now."

"But I—"

"Please, Yeojin," Haseul softly commanded, preventing the girl from turning even the slightest in an attempt to face her. "The energy you spend needlessly apologizing for a situation out of your control is much better spent on staying still so I can finish this up."

Silently, Yeojin gave Haseul a small nod. Her eyes still fixated on the older woman, Yeojin was feeling particularly perplexed. It was a strange, positive sort of confusion. Haseul's deep, invested concern for the wellbeing of a complete stranger on levels both physical and emotional was something the young girl hadn't seen or experienced in a fair while. Her heart felt full knowing that there were good people still around.

An exceptionally loud noise summoned Yeojin's attention back to Sooyoung and Kahei.

On the road below, the swordswoman had just leapt off the frosted column of earth. With a tremendous amount of speed gathered from her sliding descent, her body was curled slightly as she held her giant weapon in front of her with both hands. Pointed to the ground below and positioned right above the passenger, her extreme velocity added an immeasurable amount of force to the piercing she brought upon its raised shield.

With a loud crack, her sword forced its way through the shield. Digging several inches into it, Sooyoung's weapon was also now lodged into the arm that acted as the handle for the shield. Despite her powerful strike, the shield suffered only moderate damage. The passenger had found the strength to anchor just one of its feet to the frozen pavement more securely even in the midst of Kahei's barrage.

The cracks stemming from Sooyoung's implanted steel gave way slightly, but stopped before long. The doll's frame briefly surged with an intense aura, but it didn't act as it settled down.

"Not bad," Sooyoung murmured with a neutral expression that shifted into a scowl, "for a mindless puppet, anyway."

Sooyoung's odd eye momentarily glossed over with light as cyan ether started to coalesce near her hands.

Still grasping onto her greatsword, she breathed in and held her breath for a split second before exhaling. The blue hue of her newly summoned dust quickly transitioned into a bright red and settled into a line on her blade. It went down the edge and onto the shield's surface where it then expanded into a thin blanket over it.

The fiend made an attempt to wriggle free from her hold but was promptly stopped by a resumed hailstorm of stalagmites. Leaping over to another vantage point closer to the ground, Kahei continued her assault. All attempts the doll made to move in the slightest were subjugated.

A sizzling noise snapped as the edge of Sooyoung's greatsword suddenly burned to life with an orange flame. The trail of ether acting as a gas line, the flames cascaded down the steel until it reached the shield. The pool of ether on the shield ignited a wave of fire that quickly washed over it and burned steadily.

Yeojin blinked in surprise. "Aha!" she cheered quietly to herself, the scene unfolding before her distracting her from her operation. Having had pieced together Sooyoung's plan in her head early once again, she giggled excitedly. "So that's what you were gunning for…!"

A smile crept on Sooyoung's face as she breathed in.

The blazing blanket set atop the shield exponentially intensified in the blink of an eye, a blast of heat erupting from it and causing Sooyoung's hair to flow wildly. The passenger looked down towards its protective appendage as it continued to suffer a downpour of Kahei's stony weaponry. It tilted its head slowly, as if it suddenly understood the unfortunate situation it was in.

Like snow underneath a flamethrower, the icicles that had pierced the shield earlier were now melting absurdly quickly. As they thawed into liquid, the flames at Sooyoung's control snuffed themselves out before they could begin to evaporate the water. Now sufficiently damp with moisture, Sooyoung quickly exhaled.

A substantial mass of icy ether took shape around the passenger's shield and its arm anchored to it. As it coalesced, the entirety of the shield's surface was covered with rock solid ice so quickly that Yeojin didn't even see the water freeze.

The ice extended halfway up its arm, effectively freezing the whole appendage in place. A single, quiet crack sounded off at the center of the shield—Sooyoung had pulled down on her sword gently as she finally touched ground, the passenger's opposing force no longer keeping her airborne. Leaning backwards, Sooyoung flashed her foe a quick smile.

"I'll be taking this thing off now."

The muscles in her arms tensing up, Sooyoung twisted her upper body to the left and pulled hard to the right with both hands. She drove her impaled sword further and further into the frozen shield, the cracks on it rapidly spreading like veins until there was nowhere else for them to go. An array of earsplitting noises ricocheted within the walled in city street as the passenger's shield and arm split into thousands of tiny frozen shards.

Following through with the resulting spinning momentum of her body that occurred as she broke free of her anchor, Sooyoung dexterously slid towards and around a turned over car. She emerged from behind the vehicle with a low stance, her greatsword at her waist and pointed behind her. Her body was still and composed as she glided on the ice, maintaining a form so perfect that Yeojin felt like she was watching an esteemed athlete.

The image was suddenly stained, however, as a closed fist came inches away from Sooyoung's abdomen.

"H-hey, watch out!"

"…!"

Sooyoung suddenly found herself covered in a coat of mirrored light.

The rune on her tank top shined fiercely as a red, plastic fist slammed hard into her barrier. Even as it met the resistance of her shield, the fist continued to exert force into it. The density of the ether being emitted from Sooyoung's shirt steadily dwindled. When the fist's momentum stopped a moment later, a burst of energy exploded between them from Sooyoung's core, pushing both her and her attacker back. Inflicted with more severe recoil, she slid backwards on her feet several meters across the ice compared to the minimal knockback the passenger suffered.

The force of the attack had disarmed her of her weapon, but it vanished into thin air before it could even hit the ground.  The instant Sooyoung lost hold of it, a large cyan runic circle had spawned at the tip of it—the weapon evaporated into ether as the circle hurried across it, practically swallowing it whole. Once it was fully dissolved, another runic circle materialized around Sooyoung's wrist. Following the same motion, it rushed upwards as the blade was hastily reconstructed in perfect fashion.

No longer unarmed, Sooyoung took a sharp breath as she violently stabbed the icy pavement below her, seeking an immediate recovery. The deceleration of her slide came about quickly as she became anchored to the ground,speeding up her arrival to a full stop. A deep, long cut in the frozen floor from her departure point came to an end as she lifted the slab of steel.

"Tch."

For the first time, Yeojin saw the tiniest bit of frustration display itself on Sooyoung's face.

Leaping a few vantage points over, Kahei stood atop a short pillar near her recovering ally, her expression washing over with concern. "Sooyoung! I'm sorry, that happened too fast for me to form anything…"

"It's fine," Sooyoung reassured her friend, her cold gaze still focused on the fiend down the road. Her barrier began to flash for a moment, a large series of cracks present by her stomach. "I've never seen one change to a different weapon type so fast. That was a cheeky er punch…"

Yeojin had barely caught a glimpse of it herself. In a span of time too quick for her to have measured, the passenger's bladed arm had unbelievably reformed itself into a standard arm and fist. It was beyond her understanding how it had managed to transform it so quickly; for all of the passengers that she had taken down, not once had she seen one shift a limb with such haste. Granted, today was also the first day she witnessed one of them willingly kill another one of its own kind for its own personal gain…Yeojin shuddered with troubled discomfort as she remembered the scene again.

"That wasn't a er punch. That was simply a potential action that you should've accounted for."

A raging series of turbulent currents accompanied Haseul's voice. Yeojin looked to the left of her, but blinked as she realized Haseul wasn't there. Looking up and then down, she watched Haseul carry herself to the road below to approach her fellow mystics. The frozen pavement was of no trouble for her to walk on, much like Sooyoung. Yeojin's eyes darted back to her left arm.

"Already…?"

The open cut on her arm was slowly but surely sealing itself up. Haseul's ether thread was connected between all of the anchor points on both sides of the gash. The thread gradually released ether as it dissipated, causing Yeojin's skin to slowly pull itself back together. With masterful control of the wind at her fingertips, Haseul brought about a hyper accelerated form of a stitching job.

"Trying to look cool in front of your patient?" Sooyoung asked.

The patient in question stood up from her seat at the edge of the rooftop. Feeling her vitality come back to her, she had to fight the instinct to jump down on a stream of wind to join the battle. As much as she wanted to help the ones who so bravely saved her, the image of Haseul being disappointed with her kept her from any rash decision making.

It's not like its shield being destroyed suddenly puts me on par with that passenger anyway, Yeojin admitted to herself, grimacing with a sigh. This thing is beyond my pay grade. I should stay out of their way and let them handle it. That dumb doll really doesn't stand a chance now with Haseul back by their side.

"It was collecting mana this whole time, even before you two started your assault," Haseul explained, not giving Sooyoung's banter the time of day. Approaching Sooyoung, she stood to the side of her and extended an open palm towards the swordswoman's stomach. In response, Sooyoung turned halfway, holding her greatsword on her shoulder with a single hand. She placed her other hand on her waist as verdant ether began to materialize within Haseul's palm.

"I should have known better," Kahei remarked, her brows furrowing as she shouldered the blame for their misstep. She and Sooyoung both kept a steady watch on the scarlet mannequin. Haseul's close presence incited another series of erratic body movements from it as it turned its head in her direction. "I'm sorry, Sooyoung."

"Stop apologizing for something that was my fault," Sooyoung coldly stated with authority. Her words rang in Yeojin's ears, reminding her of what Haseul had told her not even minutes ago…even if it was far more stern. "You did exactly as you should have, Kahei. Any less concentration on your end and it would've managed a better defensive stance against me. I only got that shield off thanks to your offense."

"I did notice the mana it was building up," Sooyoung addressed Haseul indirectly with a clear and level tone, her eyes still locked onto the convulsing doll. It was clear to Yeojin that she wasn't trying to save face, but was instead simply being honest about her mistake.

"Given the inclination these things have to just use mana for outward bursts of energy, I figured it'd try it again, so I readied a counter-play for that option," Sooyoung explained, "but it made a last second decision and refocused all of its mana into its sword arm. You'd then think it'd use that for an augmented slashing attack, but then it took it a further step forward and jumped another hoop. It actually went and used the mana to accelerate a new transformation…"

Sooyoung scowled. "I've never had one actually get into my head like that. Really feels like it knew what I was going to do…"

"They're not like they were all those years ago," Haseul lamented with a shake of her head. In the palm of her hand, a small sphere of concentrated winds had formed.

Haseul's forearm became wrapped in a gentle breeze. It swept forwards, carrying the sphere floated towards Sooyoung's tank top. Coming into contact with it, the barrier rune imbued into the black fabric showed itself with a dull flash of light. The shirt whipped wildly as it appeared to the wind into the rune. "It really seems that with every universe they destroy, they get a little bit stronger and a little bit smarter," Haseul pondered. "It wasn't that noticeable after the first few enhanced ones, but now…"

Haseul's voice trailed off as a vortex materialized around Sooyoung. The hair of the three mystics flailed madly for a moment as the whirlwind encompassing Sooyoung raged furiously. As quickly as it spawned and increased in potency, it ceased just as fast.

When the swordswoman emerged from the vanishing cyclone, the runic symbol on her tank top radiated a significant amount of ether. Sooyoung's barrier briefly blinked into existence. Yeojin was mesmerized as she witnessed the cracks in the shield produced by the punch recede into nothingness. With little to no effort whatsoever, Haseul had entirely recharged Sooyoung's fractured shield from noticeably damaged to pristine and untouched.

"You're good to go," Haseul recollected herself, stepping away from Sooyoung. Taking a breath, she looked towards the passenger. Sooyoung stepped forwards a few feet ahead of Haseul and Kahei, her massive sword still relaxed over her shoulder. The passenger's eerie convulsions came to a slow halt as Sooyoung took the foreground of its focus. Turning its head back to her, it stood up straight, standing perfectly still.

"Well, that short intermission didn't make me lose enmity entirely," Sooyoung confirmed with a relieved sigh. "I'm not sure how much of a hold I've still got on it, though. Want me to draw more aggro, Haseul?"

"Please don't," Haseul politely requested. "We've defeated a lot of fiends in the past several hours. Not only are you very likely reaching your corruption threshold, but we might also be getting close to mana deprivation at this point."

"Then we should make this especially quick," Kahei suggested, pushing her glasses up.  She repositioned herself to another pillar near the opposite sidewalk, gaining altitude. "It's already gathering mana again."

Sooyoung's eyes narrowed as the fiend stared her down with its own nonexistent eyes. Bringing her greatsword down from her shoulder, she held it in front of her with both hands. She turned her body slightly as she leveled her weapon with its chest. "Alright, then. Guess it's time to pretend like this is an actual raid encounter. Haseul, ready up."

Sooyoung's call to action was answered with a hurricane.

Originating from a tranquil, perfectly still Haseul, overwhelming winds lashed out from around her. They rushed outwards with a speed and intensity that Yeojin could hardly believe was real. Haseul's off-shoulder white dress shirt and her hair seemed to float for a moment.

The tempest of a lifetime battered the street, launching several cars through the windows of nearby buildings and even starting to uproot a tree close by. In no time at all, the storm found its way upwards. The lightweight girl was nearly pushed over the edge of the rooftop as she closed her eyes in fear. Before she could summon winds of her own to prevent her from falling—not that she was sure they'd do anything against Haseul's vastly superior currents to begin with—Yeojin suddenly felt nothing pushing against her.

Opening her eyes, she found herself floating, being carefully suspended by a calm breeze. As the soft winds let her down, she was quickly surrounded by mixed clouds of ice and earth ether. In unison, they took shape, materializing into a fusion of frozen walls and earthen stone around her. There was an opening in the rocks next to her, making her realize she wasn't even in a position to worry about suffocating. The storm raged on outside as Yeojin's heart raced.

As the winds settled, the ground-based half of her enclosure crumbled into dirt. With an exit presented to her, Yeojin stepped out and quickly ran back to the edge of the building, peering down.

The three of them had worked together to protect her from her inability to withstand Haseul's winds, all without looking at her or moving an inch.

Yeojin gulped. The tension was palpable even from her perch on the roof.

"I'm sorry about that…Healing Yeojin resulted in me using more mana than I expected," Haseul explained courteously. "I just needed a deep breath."

"That…was a single breath?" Yeojin murmured to herself, her widened eyes trembling in bewildered awe.

Dense verdant green ether coming to life around Haseul's wrists caught Yeojin's excited attention. Haseul remained stoic and focused as the dust formed a strange shape…a thin line extending from the center of one of her hands, and then a curved line parallel to it. As it coalesced, Yeojin found the mystery of her weapon solved.

"Alright, Sooyoung," Haseul said with a nod. In her right hand, a metallic recurve bow of sizable length rested. Along the front of it, a slew of runes were etched into its steel.

In Haseul's free hand, a stream of green ether formed. It materialized in the form of an arrow, the steel of the arrowhead also bearing various runes. Haseul nocked the arrow onto the bow, resulting in a small burst of wind expanding outwards from the tip of the arrowhead. As the wind rolled over the bow, the runes activated, shining with light. Haseul's left eye followed, her brown iris warping into a deep forest green. "Whenever you're ready."

"Good to have you back," Sooyoung spoke with a genuine heart. A smile that Haseul couldn't see showed itself on her face for just a moment.

Ether began to coalesce around their foe. With a sufficient amount gathered, it moved to its arm. Like before, the plastic appendage underwent a freakish transformation at a quick speed, becoming the sharpened blade once more.

A bed of winds formed behind Haseul. It carried her up to one of Kahei's pillars, not far from Yeojin.  Raising her bow, she closed her right eye as she pulled back on the string. Her sights focused on the passenger's cracked torso, Haseul's hair flailed as a gust of currents came to life around her nocked arrow. "Kahei's already done sufficient damage to the body. If you can damage the chest a little more and freeze it, I can destroy it in a single shot."

"Gladly," Sooyoung said with a smirk. "Alright, girls. Let's show a fledgling Neophyte sorceress what a Master line is capable of."

Chills rolled down Yeojin's spine as her body temperature dropped slightly.

A cold wave rushed down the street as Sooyoung's body pulsed. A cloud of icy ether enveloped her, hiding her from view. Yeojin blinked, and when she opened her eyes, Sooyoung was in the middle of a rushed slide across the ice towards the passenger. The edge of her greatsword had become frozen solid in a thick sheet of ice.

As she neared the doll, she raised her body from her low slide and lifted her sword into the air. She clutched it with both hands as another mist of cyan took form, shrouding the sword.

The passenger started to raise its own sword in response, seeking to clash blades. Reacting to its move in an impressive fashion, Kahei's left eye and the crystal in her staff shined together as a runic circle spawned above the enemy's blade.

As if she had been waiting for it, Haseul aim snapped to the circle as she let her arrow loose. It flew forth with a tremendous burst of speed, the small vortex of air around it adding to its velocity. Cleanly, it pierced Kahei's runic circle straight through the middle. Broken into pieces, the ether of the circle spread down and coalesced into a pointed shape. It materialized into a tall stalactite and dropped down to earth fast, piercing the passenger's sword and anchoring it to where it was standing.

Its arm immobilized, the doll's head tilted as Sooyoung slid to a stop in front of it while fiercely bringing her sword down in a diagonal arc. The snowy ether aggregated around her blade rushed forward ahead of her swing, settling onto the passenger's torso and quickly compounding into layers of ice. The swing itself, however, struck nothing but air. On the contrary, Sooyoung experienced a force pushing against her back.

With noticeable agility, the passenger had swung around its anchor point on the rocky spire by kicking off the ground with its legs. The energy it spent doing so was noticeable, as was the effect it had on its centrifugal force. Coming back around, it raised a foot and delivered a swift, powerful kick to Sooyoung from behind. Her barrier triggered, cracking slightly in the center of her back.

Sliding forwards from the knockback, Sooyoung took an especially sharp, sudden breath as a large cyan mist took shape in front of her. The ether quickly coalesced, bursting into a formation of ice in the shape of a ramp just ahead. Using the forward momentum from the attack she was struck by, she seamlessly transitioned into a boosted slide up the ramp. Rising up into the air, she turned herself over and faced her foe below.

Standing up straight, the passenger looked down to its stone-impaled sword. With a disturbing calmness, it exerted a powerful force forwards with its stuck appendage. The stone didn't budge as it ripped its own weapon clean off. With nothing but its legs left to its name, it looked up towards Sooyoung in the sky. It waited patiently, expecting another sudden dropping attack.

The passenger found itself falling for a feint, however, as a veritable rush of gale force winds carried Sooyoung's body through the air. Turning around, the passenger followed her aerial path and watched Sooyoung land safely on the vantage point closest to Haseul. The winds that carried her down quickly reformed around their owner's newly nocked arrow. With her shot lined up, an explosion of wind came from Haseul as she released her bow's string.

The passenger staggered hard as the arrow pierced into its chest. Even with the support of immense winds adding to its speed, the hardened shell of its torso prevented a clean shot all the way through. The three mystics seemed unbothered, however, as its torso began to quickly crack from the ice. Ether coalesced between the middle and ring fingers of Haseul's free hand. Another arrow materializing, she nocked it as a small cyclone formed around her. The winds moved behind her before rushing forwards, launching her off of Kahei's tower and onto the ground.

Landing on the frost-covered road, Haseul faced her prey and took a deep breath as the cracks spreading on the fiend's body increased in pace and size. The passenger took a step back, hunching over slightly. Its frame started to shake. Slowly, its locked-on focus towards Sooyoung shifted to Haseul, it's head turning towards the archer.

"I've lost enmity," Sooyoung announced. Yeojin took notice of the swordswoman's body giving off a faint, dark gray glow for a moment. Despite no longer being their enemy's intended target, Sooyoung was relaxed. She brought her greatsword down, gently stabbing it into the top of the stone pillar. She placed both of her hands atop the bottom of its handle as she glanced over to Haseul. "Better not miss."

The tip of Haseul's arrow began to swell. Winds of a monstrous force quickly aggregated on it as the mess of cracked veins reached the edges of the fiend's torso.

"I won't."

Haseul released the arrow in the same instant that the passenger's chest broke into pieces. Fragments of ice flew in every direction possible, revealing its crystal core. Measurably larger than the core in her pocket or the one that belonged to its shielded ally, Yeojin stared in amazement as the passenger didn't immediately fall to pieces like its brethren.

Stemming from its dark gray core, a similarly colored web of ether was spread outwards. It was much more dense than the ether web Yeojin had seen inside of the cannon equipped passenger she defeated prior, as well as all others before it. Segments of the web spread up to its head and down to its legs, the passenger almost vibrating with energy as it made a discernible effort to keep its body together. With that kind of tenacious resolve, it could have kept fighting, even if only for a little bit longer.

But it didn't matter.

Haseul's arrow rocketed down the street. A visible tunnel of spiraling wind trailed behind it as it soared. It crashed into the fiend's core, the arrowhead piercing it and becoming imbued in the crystal as it was lodged inside. The passenger fell to its knees as its heart was struck. Leaning backwards, its head looked up to the sky almost solemnly.

The energy of the wind collected on the arrowhead promptly detonating, the fiend perished in an explosion of hurricane force winds.

The crystal core shattered from the inside, splitting into thousands of shards as the web of ether holding the passenger together instantly dissipated. Defeated, it fell backwards as its legs separated from one another. Its head fell into the floor and rolled away, as lifeless and still as it was when it was alive.

For a brief moment that felt like years to Yeojin, she stood in wonder as the three experienced monster hunters stood with an almost threatening level of tranquility. Each of their odd left eyes were alight with life—Sooyoung's frozen cyan, Kahei's rocky hazel, and Haseul's forest green. Even with the threat finished off, their intense focus didn't break, nor did their stabilized breathing.

The young girl was speechless, unable to process the fact that she was in the presence of not just one, but three mystics of such a high caliber. Before this, such a degree of mastery was unfathomable to her. Truly, her own capabilities felt like a drop of water compared to the ocean of their insurmountable might.

In her stupor of their combined prowess, Yeojin had almost forgotten that she was a single breath away from having her life taken from her before Sooyoung stepped in. The moment played over and over again in her head like a broken record as she looked on at them. She already knew it, but after the battle, the realization hit harder than ever before. Had it not been for them, she would've…

"Good riddance."

Sooyoung broke the silence with a shake of her head. Lifting her hands off of her greatsword, it slowly began to disintegrate into icy ether as a runic circle spawned and moved down the length of it. She sighed, running a hand through her hair as she jumped straight down, not bothering to use other towers as stepping stones. "Just about had enough of these s for one day."

As Sooyoung touched ground, the ice covering the street and the two frozen barriers at the ends of the road all began to melt. Their vanishing act coincided with Sooyoung's greatsword; as it finally blinked out of existence, so too did her winter wonderland.

"You two did great," Kahei said softly, a relaxed smile showing itself on her face. She carefully jumped down from tower to tower, approaching Haseul with Sooyoung. A mahogany circle came to life at the bottom of her staff. As it traveled upwards, it dematerialized in unison with the gradual crumbling of all of Kahei's earthen creations. As her vantage points turned to dust and gravel, the ether emitting from her encased crystal diminished before disappearing with the rest of the staff. "That should be the last of them in the area. We're safe now."

Silently, Haseul lowered her arms. A green circle manifested around the hand which held her bow and split into two. One traveled up and the other downwards, the weapon vanishing in the same manner as Sooyoung's and Kahei's. As it was erased from existence, the winds in the area came to a calm stop. With a sigh, her odd eye was washed over with her normal deep brown.

"Are you alright, Yeojin? Has your wound healed?"

Haseul spoke up as she turned towards the sidewalk. Hearing the young girl bring herself down with a serene current, she gave the girl a warm smile as they approached one another. Sooyoung and Kahei followed.

"Yeah, I'm, uh, it's…yeah," Yeojin stammered, almost at a loss for words as her three heroes looked down at her. Fitting herself into her hoodie again, she removed her earbud and shoved her headphones back into her pocket. Kahei shared in smiling at her with Haseul while Sooyoung gave her a small grin.

The wind at Yeojin's back ceased, and with it, the green of her left eye flushed with brown again. Her daggers, still tossed to the floor from the passenger's strike against her, began to evaporate. "You guys really saved my there. I don't know how to repay you."

"You can start by helping us find some food," Sooyoung said, her request halfway between asking for help and demanding it. "We haven't eaten in a few hours now. I'm not in the mood for dealing with both hunger and near mana deprivation…"

"Yes, that would be ideal," Kahei agreed. "Would you have any idea where we could find food, Yeojin?"

"This part of the city's been empty for a while now. I think most of the stores are cleared," Yeojin admitted, scratching the back of her head with a grimace. "We might find some luck at a gas station not far from here, though. It's past the outskirts of town, a bit into the freeway. Most of us never really bothered going out that far. If we head back south and then follow the astral highway, it should only be about a forty minute walk."

"Astral highway?" Sooyoung parroted with a raised brow. "Do you mean the leyline…?"

"Leyline?" Yeojin parroted back, blinking with confusion. "What the hell's a leyline?"

"By astral highway, are you referring to the pathway of mana that travels in the sky?" Kahei inquired, pushing her glasses up.

"I'm getting confused again," Yeojin declared with a shake of her head. "You guys keep saying that word, mana…not to mention the way Haseul asked me if passengers were what I called the mannequins. I don't really get what's going on. You're mystics, aren't you?"

"No," Sooyoung answered. "We're magi."

"Yeojin, what's your word for this?"

Yeojin tilted her head as Haseul answered the question with a question of her own. A small cloud of  verdant ether began to collect, the dust-like particles becoming more and more visible as they unhurriedly coalesced.

"Well, obviously, that's ether…" Yeojin responded slowly, the question coming off to her as so rudimentary that she had to wonder if she was being tested. "Wind ether, to be specific."

"Do you spell that with an 'A' at the beginning…?" Sooyoung asked as she crossed her arms.

Yeojin shook her head again, never once having had seen or heard the substance being referred to as 'aether.' "No, it's…just ether."

"I wonder how divergent this universe is from ours or Archmagus Lee's," Kahei mused quietly to herself, curiously tapping her finger on her chin.

"Yeojin, our word for this is mana," Haseul spoke, bringing the topic back to its original point, "and we call the incredibly condensed roads of it that run across the sky leylines. So, presumably, what you call a mystic, we call a magus. Male magi are sorcerers, and female magi are sorceresses."

"Okay…" Yeojin replied slowly as Haseul's ether dispersed. She shot glances at both Haseul and Kahei. "Haseul, when you told me you guys called the passengers fiends, I was imagining this to be a cultural difference of a more…local degree. Like you guys were from another country or something, but Kahei…you said this universe?"

"Yes, well…"

Kahei's voice was cut off by the rumbling of Sooyoung's stomach. With an exhausted sigh, she turned around and started heading back down the road. "Surely this lesson can take place on the way, yeah? Let's get a move on."

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」

"Yeojin, have you heard of the multiverse theory?"

Kahei looked up at Yeojin as the group ventured beyond the ghost town. The smaller girl was walking atop the metal guardrail on the side of the abandoned expressway, carefully balancing herself with one foot over the other. Just a little bit ahead, Haseul walked at a relaxed pace. In front of the archer, the swordswoman took point. Sooyoung was at ease as she led the party down the five lane highway. Vehicles of all sorts were scattered about the area, with an amount of them even being tossed over on the grassy plains to either side of the pavement.

"Yeah, sure. Parallel realities, alternate timelines, divergent worlds, parallel universes, world lines…jeez, there's a lot of names for that stuff, now that I think about it…" Yeojin mused aloud, taking precise, calculated steps on the tightrope of a guardrail beneath her. "Anyway, it's basically the concept that our universe isn't the only one out there, right?"

"That's right," Kahei affirmed with a small smile. "This universe is more like…a bubble in a huge sea of bubbles. All universes within the multiverse coexist simultaneously within the same flow of time."

"I've played a few video games that have had stories based around the concept," Yeojin said. "The last one I remember had this crazy twist where alternate versions of the main characters showed up. They came from a reality that was close to their own, but the things that happened to them ended up making them evil and stuff. It was a pretty wild thought, facing another version of yourself that's been through more than you have…didn't get to finish the game, though. Kinda want to."

Kahei laughed softly. "You get the idea, then. That being said…Yeojin…"

The spectacled sorceresses' voice slowly faded, experiencing difficulty in finding the right words. Haseul heard the break in the conversation and turned around, coming to a stop with Kahei. Sooyoung's pause followed, turning halfway as she stopped her stride to look back to them.

A heavy sound of shoes stepping down broke the silence. Yeojin had hopped from the guardrail to the top of a nearby convertible's trunk. The roof already down and the front door open, she hopped down again and took a seat behind the wheel. She looked between the three of them curiously. Kahei's eyes were downcast, still struggling to express her thoughts. Sooyoung sighed, looking off to the side. Haseul was the one who exchanged glances with Yeojin as she spoke up.

"We're from somewhere much further away than another country, Yeojin. We crossed into this world from another reality."

Silence set the stage. Kahei looked up with a solemn expression, wistful eyes peering at Yeojin from behind her lenses.

"Seriously…?"

Yeojin's response was curt as she took a breath, shaking her head. Her eyes wandered up, gazing at the river of ether flowing high in the sky above them.

The astral highway sprawled across the length of the expressway, going well beyond the horizon. The ether within it traversed its course at a snail's pace, flowing towards the direction they had come from. She was fixated on the sight of it for a brief moment, her eyes becoming lost in the swaying passage of the light gray dust. She turned her head, following the sight of it down the road.

The further out it reached, the darker the ether became. On the horizon, it started a transition into a much deeper shade of gray. The color strangely reminded her of every aspect of the passengers—the normal coloring of their plastic bodies, the ether they used when they fought, and their crystal cores and the webs of ether tied to them. The other three remained quiet as Yeojin looked off into the distance.

With a breath, Yeojin turned her head back to them. Her usual carefree expression and childlike demeanor were absent. "I guess this isn't some sort of dumb prank or something, given by how serious you guys look."

Neither of the three immediately responded, to which Yeojin nodded silently to herself before continuing. "So why'd you come here, then?"

"This timeline's screwed up pretty bad," Sooyoung answered, her gaze still focused to the road ahead. "Needed to assess the damage."

"We're also…looking for magi. For mystics," Haseul explained, drawing Yeojin's eyes from Sooyoung to her. "Because…"

Like Kahei, Haseul's words failed her. She looked to the ground, and then to the sky, and then to Yeojin. The younger girl was taken aback, not sure how to process the conflict present on her face. Haseul's hand balled up in a fist as she seemed to find her thoughts, but it wasn't her words that Yeojin heard next.

"This entire universe is going to die, Yeojin."

Sooyoung's calm declaration had enough power behind it to cut through steel.

Yeojin looked over to her as Haseul and Kahei both looked away. Their expressions showcased simultaneous relief that they didn't have to be the one to break the news and immense regret that they couldn't. A natural breeze swept the air, causing the girls' hair to sway in the wind.

Yeojin felt a serious intensity coming from Sooyoung. She noticed that the swordswoman's left eye was still off-colored from her right, standing out with its distinct shade of light blue. Yeojin looked over to Kahei, confirming that her odd eye was also still active as the older woman looked to her. Her expression was as serious as Sooyoung's, eyes of dark brown and light amber gazing upon her.

"The leyline above us isn't a singular pathway specific to your world," Sooyoung started. Yeojin looked up to the otherworldly sight once more. The incredibly thick stream of ether that she had stared at in wonder for years flowed peacefully. "It's just one of an unimaginable number. For every universe, there exists an accompanying leyline. They run through throughout the bubbles of their individual universes, but at the end of that bubble, they break free. They continue to spread out into the multiverse, eventually mixing with leylines from other realities. The mana you're looking at isn't just from your world, nor is it confined to it. It's mana spreading across every conceivable plane of existence…and it's going to bring an end to this universe.

"See how its getting darker on the horizon?" Sooyoung asked, pointing to the dark gray end of the leyline. "That's corruption. Your world is being fed tainted mana. Do you know what's over in that direction?"

"Um..." Yeojin pondered, swaying her legs in the car seat as she tilted her head. "Once the forest starts up after the gas station, there's a path into it that leads to some cave. It's a bit before the next major city. I remember hearing some people talk about an ether reservoir being in there. It's like a big sinkhole or something…I haven't seen it. I'm kind of scared of falling in…"

"No doubt in my mind, then. It's a manapool," Sooyoung decided, turning back towards the road as she started to walk ahead. "Let's hit the gas station and then check it out. We're burning daylight."

Kahei gave Haseul and Yeojin a nod before walking ahead. Haseul glanced down to Yeojin as she jumped out of the car seat. The two strolled side by side, Yeojin's hands still in her pockets. Her brows were furrowed, deep in thought about something.

"I'm sorry this had to be sprung on you like this, Yeojin," Haseul apologized sincerely. "I know it's hard to believe, but—"

"It isn't."

Haseul was surprised to hear Yeojin's response. Yeojin's eyes focused on the astral highway above her. "It's not that hard to believe at all. I think you're telling the truth."

"Really?" Haseul asked with slight shock, having had expected resistance. "Why is that…?"

Yeojin turned around mid-stride, walking backwards as she faced Haseul. She shrugged with a sigh, a strange look of peace set about her face.

"This is the second time this exact situation has happened to me."

Haseul's heart practically came to a stop as Yeojin nodded to herself.

"When I was eleven, I was almost killed by passengers. An old mystic shows up out of nowhere, saves me, says the same stuff you guys just said, and then he just…leaves," she explained. "Nine years later, I'm about to die again—which isn't a regular occurrence or anything, I promise—and three of you show up this time, save me, and then tell me the same story?"

"Come to think of it, he used a lot of the words you guys use, too," Yeojin realized as she dug into the depths of her memories, extending a hand and counting her fingers. "Mana, magus, leylines…the same exact weird terms for stuff that didn't match up with what I was taught. It's been so long that I forgot. Can't even remember his name, actually…or maybe he never even told me it in the first place? Find it hard to believe I'd forget that much about a time I nearly died..."

"Anyway! It's kinda difficult to scratch this off as a coincidence," Yeojin said as she turned around, walking ahead. The lively girl made a jump onto the top of a vehicle, looking ahead as she continued. "So if it isn't a coincidence, you're either lying or you're telling the truth. I'm sure most people would think its the former, but you guys…you just…"

Haseul felt a caring warmth from the innocence Yeojin displayed as she burst into a small fit of giggles. She turned her head back to Haseul, revealing a radiant smile. "You're the most amazing mystics I've ever seen! You're way beyond me...you practically summoned a hurricane, Haseul! Not to mention Sooyoung's huge ice walls, and Kahei's towers, like…dude, that kind of stuff just doesn't happen here! It's like comparing a newbie player running to an endgame raid team, you know? I'm over here trying to kill level one trash mobs for a fetch quest and you guys run by with some godlike equipment on your way to slay an elder god or something…but then you stopped and you helped me. Could've just strolled by and ignored the newbie who accidentally drew aggro on a high level mob, but you didn't."

Yeojin took a small breath after her excited outburst, her smile relaxing. "I'm just putting two and two together, Haseul. You guys are good people, and good people don't lie. Especially not to the extent of telling someone that their world's coming to an end, y'know? So you must be telling the truth."

"What the hell that means for my sorry is another story!" she announced abruptly as she jumped to the roof of another vehicle. "Guess we'll find out on next week's episode of 'Wow, Yeojin's Life Really Kinda Sometimes!' Hopefully our main character gets to finish that video game before she fades away from existence! She was, like, level 74 and everything!"

With a bout of self-deprecating humor, Yeojin began jumping from car to van and van to truck as she caught up with Kahei and Sooyoung. For a moment, Haseul remained still. She found herself smiling as the youthful mystic dropped from the top of a pick-up truck with a heroic pose before jogging towards Kahei to chat with her.

"Yeojin..."

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」  

"Catch."

Three room temperature bottles of water were tossed through the air in a successive chain. The first two were caught, and the third was suspended in place by a cylindrical stream of wind.

Through a large hole in the wall of a small deserted building, Sooyoung emerged after the water bottles. She stepped out, rummaging through a small plastic bag filled with snacks. Yeojin's currents dispersed, dropping the bottle in her hands safely. Seated atop what remained of a badly damaged vehicle, she playfully kicked her legs over the edge of the car as she rehydrated herself.

Haseul and Kahei took measured sips of their drinks while Sooyoung approached them. The swordswoman pulled out a couple of bags of chips and some packaged cookies. "Mostly junk food in there, just like the other stores from this morning. Not much of a meal, but it's better than nothing. Can't wait to get back and have some real food…"

"I'm sure Chaewon's cooking up a storm for you right now," Kahei teased with a grin as Sooyoung handed her a snack.

"And I'm sure it'll be worth the price of the whole building nearly burning down again in the process," Sooyoung remarked after a small laugh, smiling as she handed Haseul her share. "Least that mess made us realize the smoke detector was defective. Yeojin!"

Yeojin looked over to Sooyoung, swallowing the water in . "Did they have them?"

"No luck, unless you wanna go check yourself," Sooyoung responded, sending a package of vanilla-frosted cookies towards her with an underarm throw. "There's still some food in there."

"Mmmphkay!" Yeojin mumbled with half of a cookie in , already having had opened her snack. She walked in through the same opening in the wall that Sooyoung walked out off, vanishing into the depths of the convenience store.

With her gone, Sooyoung leaned against one of the gas station's pumps, looking towards Haseul and Kahei as she started to munch. "So, she believes us, then?"

"Yes, thankfully," Haseul said, looking up towards the astral highway above. The ether in the stream was coming closer to a darker shade of gray. "She…she said this is the second time she's heard of this."

"The second time…?" Kahei said, pausing a sip of her drink. "What exactly do you mean?"

"She said an old sorcerer saved her when she was eleven. Nine years ago, that is," Haseul clarified, her contemplative gaze still lost to the flow of aerial ether above. "She was about to be killed by fiends, but then he showed up. After saving her life, he told her everything we just did. About the multiverse and the state of her universe, the nature of the leylines across all realities…and then he left."

"Was it him?"

Sooyoung's voice carried an unusual combination of both fear and hatred. Her eyes equally brimmed over with a fusion of intense dread and malignant fury as Haseul looked back down to her.

"She can't remember," Haseul answered with a shake of her head. Sooyoung's tension eased, but only slightly. "If it was, I imagine he was checking the fruits of his labor and seeing how corrupted things were."

"But stopping to save a girl?" Kahei pondered aloud, rocking her head side to side after pushing up her glasses. "That's not like him…I don't believe he's the type of person to save anyone, let alone an eleven year old girl."

"You're right, but…" Haseul started, looking ahead towards the building. "Yeojin said he used the same exact terminology we did. Mana, magi, leyline…so he must have been from Archmagus Lee's timeline."

"And Archmagus Lee said she had never visited this particular world before," Sooyoung confirmed. "This is the first time she's caught trace of its existence from the leyline. And it was man Yeojin met, so..."

"Please don't forget that a single timeline, while only one of a near infinite amount in the multiverse, is still, well…quite literally speaking, an entire universe," Kahei reasoned, her soft voice steady and tranquil. Haseul and Sooyoung looked to her, her level-headed words relaxing them. "I don't believe I need to explain how many people it could have potentially been even when you narrow it down to a single reality. I know our sense of scale on the grand scheme of things expanded dramatically when we started exploring parallel realities, but the amount of life found in a single reality is still encompassing beyond measure."

"Even if it sounds like it was him, it's more likely that it wasn't," Kahei continued. "Not to mention, that's not even including the possibility of other timelines sharing terminology. Given the sheer breadth of the multiverse, to believe that Archmagus Lee's timeline is the only one which would refer to things as it does is a complete fallacy."

"Yeah, Yeojin really tripped me up when she said ether," Sooyoung said, slight surprise still etched into her face as she remembered Yeojin's words. "If our timeline was still around, I would have thought we actually ended up back home for a second…"

"Kahei's right, then," Haseul agreed with a nod, looking to the two of them. "There's no saying one way or the other if it was or wasn't him, so it's best not to worry about it."

"Fine by me," Sooyoung conceded, easing up with a sigh. "Not like a single good deed would make him a saint or anything, anyway. The leyline corruption's his fault. Entire universes being overrun by fiends and dying off is his fault. Everything is that piece of 's fault..."

"It's alright, Sooyoung," Kahei comforted her friend, gently rubbing her back with slow movements. "With any luck, Yeojin could end up being what we need for our project to really get off the ground."

"Assuming she not only wants to come back with us, but also wants to join our cause," Sooyoung countered, bitter realism acting in opposition to Kahei's optimism.

"I'm sure she'll be the one…"

Haseul spoke with uncontested certainty, tipping the scales back on the side of optimism. She smiled as the young girl emerged from the debris of the half-destroyed convenience store.

"…LOONA's final piece."

With a prideful cheer, Yeojin valiantly raised her hand. Within it, she held a small jelly pastry. "I found one! It was at the end of the second aisle, you lazy good-for-nothing ice mystic!" she shouted with a big grin, teasing Sooyoung playfully. The girls shared a laugh as she approached, eagerly biting into her snack after breaking open the packaging.

"Good work, kid," Sooyoung said with the warmest smile Yeojin had seen from her yet. "You're more perceptive than you look."

"What, you thought I wouldn't find it?" Yeojin said with a smirk. "Get real! I've had to scavenge for stuff tons before."

As she swallowed another bite of her food, Yeojin looked up curiously to Kahei and Sooyoung. They stared back. Yeojin said nothing, simply peering at them inquisitively. Kahei giggled as Sooyoung brought up her hand, tapping Yeojin's forehead. "Hello? Anybody in there?"

"Why are your eyes still different colors?"

Yeojin's straightforward question to Sooyoung's tease caught the girls off guard. Their expressions fell slightly as Yeojin looked up at Haseul. "Haseul's eye went back to normal, just like mine…why didn't yours change back?"

"It's just something that happens when you have to live your life like we have," Sooyoung answered, sighing lightly. She had an almost pained smile set about her face as she looked to Yeojin, her bright cyan eye standing out.  "Use your mana, it changes colors. Use it enough, and eventually…it just gets tired of switching and settles in, I guess."

"Doesn't that make life hard?"

"There's no damage to the magus' body or vision," Kahei began to explain. "It's purely a cosmetic after effect. Sort of like a…permanent contact lens."

"No, I mean, like…in a societal sense," Yeojin corrected herself. "People would know you're mystics, and that's no good, right? That's how you get exiled like I did."

Sooyoung and Kahei blinked in surprise. "Yes, it's an undesirable side effect," Haseul confessed with a nod as she turned towards the two mystics. "Yeojin told me that this universe is much like the others. Magi are ostracized."

Sooyoung tensed up.

"To what extent?" Kahei asked Yeojin, her curiosity for knowledge almost superseding her concern for the young girl's past.

"You get kicked out of most cities here if you're seen performing any act of mysticism or messing with ether," the young girl explained after another bite of her pastry. "For as long as I've been alive and way longer than even that, pretty much everyone's believed that the passengers were a direct result of mystics messing with ether. Mystics hiding out in town need to be careful not to let anyone see them doing the kinda stuff we do. Even then, if their odd eyes stayed as they were, it was an easy way to get thrown out."

"From there, mystics just have to live like I've been: wandering," Yeojin said with a sigh that seemed more annoyed than depressed. "Trying to find food is a hell of a trial some days. A lot of cities have long been completed wiped of all life thanks to passengers. There's still animals to hunt, I guess, but even the wildlife can get pretty sparse. On top of that, there's the threat of having a group of passengers see you. A lot of fighting..."

"They survive, though? There's still people around, then?" Sooyoung asked. "People like us?"

"Well, normal people have gathered around and built settlements and communities out of the ruins of the places that the passengers destroyed, so they're hanging out, yeah," Yeojin said, finishing off her snack. "They've got local militias and stuff that take care of the basic threats. Not sure how well they'd handle anything on the level of that red guy, though. They have farms and their own means of producing food, so they don't have to go out. They just relax, refuse to take care of mystics, and wait for the end of the world…which, according to you guys is right around the corner, so I guess they won't be waiting much longer."

"No, Yeojin," Sooyoung reiterated, a heavy weight present in her tone. "People like us."

"Oh, mystics…" Yeojin said slowly, her eyes going downcast. "If it's mystics you're looking for, you're out of luck as far as this continent is concerned. I've been down the coast and back ever since getting exiled, as well as pretty far inland. Like I said before, you guys are the first ones I've seen in a while. Feels like we're on the brink of extinction, honestly…"

"It's that bad, huh?" Sooyoung lamented, biting her lip for a moment. "This isn't good…"

Kahei spoke up, offering a counterpoint. "At least there's still some form of human life here. It could be worse."

"Yeah," Sooyoung regrettably agreed with a sigh. "Could've been Hyejoo's timeline."

"So you were born around here, Yeojin?"

"Yeah, close by. I was born in the city down past the cave with the ether reservoir," Yeojin answered Haseul, pointing down the road. "That's where I lived for a while until I moved into a house on the fields out of town. I only just got back into the general area."

Silence fell as time passed, a sorrowful respite settling in while they finished eating. Overhead, the sky's hue gradually transformed into a warm hue of orange as the sun started to set.

"Good to go?"

Sooyoung's voice from the edge of the gas station called out to her allies. The three of them walked over after disposing of their trash in a nearby garbage can. Coming together at the center of the expressway, Yeojin stepped forward and peered ahead. Trees began to litter the grassy fields on both sides of the road, and not far beyond on the horizon, they quickly multiplied into a dense forest. "Okay, the ether reservoir shouldn't be that far ahead. Twenty minutes at most."

Yeojin started to walk ahead, quickly outpacing them as she resumed her vehicle leaping shenanigans. Sooyoung started next, and Kahei and Haseul followed by closely.

It was quiet for a short while until Sooyoung spoke. "We're leaving once we check out this manapool."

"Shouldn't we go about the standard procedure of a half-day search?" Kahei asked. "We only just got here a few hours ago…"

"You heard Yeojin," Sooyoung said. "They're practically wiped out on this continent. Looking for other magi in this timeline is pointless. We're lucky enough we found her. If our luck continues, she'll want to come back with us and we won't show up at the lab empty-handed."

"You say that as if Archmagus Lee would ever be upset by that," Haseul spoke up, bothered by the sentiment. "She's never been upset with us for coming back without anyone before."

Unseen to Haseul behind her, Sooyoung frowned.

"I know she wouldn't. We're just too close, Haseul," Sooyoung clarified. "Once we properly form a third team, these excursions can be done so much more efficiently. Aside from the fact that there's nothing here for us, every second we spend not operating at full potential is a second wasted. We could look around for another few days and come up with nothing, or we can be smart and judge this as a horrible investment of time and effort. There's plenty of other timelines out there filled with magi who we can save from damnation…magi who can help us."

"Sooyoung, please don't talk like non-magi don't matter," Kahei responded, sensing growing unrest from the swordswoman. "They're—"

"No, Kahei, they're not worth saving. They're monsters that would be glad to see us die."

Sooyoung's stride had come to a stop as she spoke up, harshly cutting Kahei off. She was turned halfway, looking straight ahead of her. Kahei and Haseul stopped, met with the profile of Sooyoung's face. Seeing only her odd eye, they remained silent as icy ether coalesced in front of her.

"This world's like all the others. Magi, arcanists, diviners, conjurers, necromancers, mystics…it doesn't matter what we're called. It doesn't matter what good we've done. It doesn't matter how many times we run into town and save bystanders from fiends. For every magi we've helped, we've helped a hundred non-magi. And yet, out of all of those people, who're the only ones that ever look us in the eye with respect? Who're the ones that don't immediately run in terror, as if we're going to strike them down next?"

The cyan cloud in front of Sooyoung grew in density. Her greatsword materialized, already stabbed into the ground as her odd eye shined briefly. Quietly, she stood there motionless, merely gazing upon her weapon in deep thought.

"Yeojin was exiled. Jungeun and Jiwoo were shunned. Chaewon's parents disowned her. And Hyejoo…don't even get me started on what non-magi put that poor girl through. It's despicable. Reprehensible. To think that we share a name with those who broke that innocent girl's world…if humans are the ones who hurt Hyejoo, you better damn well believe that I'm not human," Sooyoung proclaimed. A disgusted scowl showed itself on her face as she clenched her teeth. "I'm only an arcanist. A magus. That's all I am."

"I said it three years ago," Sooyoung continued as her scowl rescinded, "but I'll say it again."

Sooyoung looked back up, turning her gaze towards them as she grabbed hold of her weapon. Lifting it out of the ground with a single hand, she pointed it towards Haseul and Kahei. The two didn't flinch. Opposite of a threat, Sooyoung's motion was a promise of protective action. There was a flagrant determination set about her eyes, a vehement resolve coming to life as she spoke.

"I'm going to do my absolute damnedest to make sure everything we're working for ends with my sword plunged into YG's heart. I want that just as dead as the next guy. He took everything from us. He took everything from everyone. He's flooded realities with corrupted mana, giving birth to fiends across the multiverse. He's a heartless old man who gave up every last right he ever had to live, and I'm going to give him the death he rightfully deserves. But Haseul, Kahei...please…"

Sooyoung's eyes narrowed.

"…do not believe for a ing second that I'm doing it for non-magi who look at us in disgust. I'm not venturing into the depths of the multiverse and fighting fiend after fiend for the trash that calls itself human—the trash that would willingly inflict irreparable damage to the life of a girl like Hyejoo…"

Her ether began to coalesce around her greatsword. With a phenomenally massive amount of force, an immense wave of frost expelled itself outwards from Sooyoung's blade. It whipped the hair of the three women wildly, shirts and sleeves equally thrashing about chaotically.

Haseul stepped forward, her odd eye briefly washing with green as a veritable gale of wind came down in front of them with currents bending around them. Sooyoung's cold front crashed into Haseul's wall of storms and was quickly redirected behind them. In the opposite direction, the surge of cold reached out far enough to hit Yeojin in a matter of seconds. She quickly found herself shivering in discomfort as she turned around in confusion.

"…because the only people I'm doing this for are people like her. People like Yerim. Hyunjin. Heejin. Jinsol. Yeojin."

Standing still with her sword outstretched, the indomitable will burning within Sooyoung took the shape of gargantuan spires of ice. They flashed into existence across the expressway, her ether having had taken shape instantly with a sweeping expansion of ice. One by one, they rose above the trees ahead, reaching stories high. Haseul took careful note of how pristinely they were crafted—unlike her walls of ice during their previous battle, Sooyoung handled their formation with delicate precision and attention to detail.

The freezing temperatures in the area subsided. Silently, Haseul and Kahei remained focused on their longtime comrade. There was an intense respect in their locked-on glances towards her, even if every aspect of her values didn't line up. Arriving from the road ahead, Yeojin stepped off her wind skates and cautiously approached. She read the mood and remained quiet as she came to a stop near them. The tension in the air was so thick that it was quickly becoming uncomfortable.

Slowly, Sooyoung's greatsword began to dissipate as a runic circle formed and moved across it. She turned around as she spoke, walking ahead.

"I'm doing it for magi. For LOONA. For us. That's why I'm out here. Don't make me remind you again."

Yeojin was left speechless as she watched the swordswoman walk off. Kahei looked to Haseul. Haseul simply nodded, and in response, Kahei began to walk ahead behind Sooyoung. She seemed to be giving her space, walking a little further away than usual.

"Uh…" Yeojin began, unsure of what to make of the ordeal. "What, uh…what happened?"

Haseul took a breath as she looked up, fully taking in the sight of Sooyoung's frozen architecture. Her eyes moving across the collection of her frozen spire, she counted them. Ending with the one closest to Yeojin, she smiled.

"Just our lovely Master sorceress Ha Sooyoung doing what she does best," Haseul explained with a soft smile. "Come on, let's go."

As she walked off, Yeojin was left with little else to do but blink in confusion. "Alright then…"

Her wind skates forming again, Yeojin jumped onto the plates of air as she began to cruise forward, weaving around displaced vehicles. As she traveled, she turned around and began to skate backwards, counting Sooyoung's icy spires.

"Huh…twelve of them…"

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」  

"It's worse than I thought."

Haseul, Kahei, and Sooyoung were stood near the edge of a titanic hole in the ground. Led by Yeojin through the insides of a cavern, the small entrance on the outside betrayed how deep the underground cave system would become upon further descent. Eventually, they came to a massive clearing within the cave. They had found the ether reservoir.

"I fear this is far beyond salvation," Haseul muttered under her breath as she walked along the outside of the sinkhole. It was a bottomless pit of dark gray ether, so densely coalesced that she couldn't even see through it. From the impressively dense and deep collection of ether, they rose: branches of the astral highway. The thick roads of corrupted ether rotated upwards in a slow, heavy swirl, flowing from the abyss and going out into the world.

Yeojin was further away, standing near the entrance of the clearing. Aside from her own fear of the ether reservoir, it became painstakingly more difficult for her to breathe the closer she got to it. While the other three weren't as horribly afflicted by it, she noticed their own breathing was a bit deeper and slower than usual. She was relieved to know that she hadn't suddenly come down with a strange shortness of breath. Being in the presence of such an unreal amount of ether in a contained spot was simply a great toll on the human body.

"Archmagus Lee was correct, then," Kahei said, her curious gaze seemingly lost to the void of ether below her. The way it breathed with tainted life disturbed her in an inquisitively morbid fashion. "This universe doesn't have much time left…"

Between the two of them and Yeojin, Sooyoung had her arms crossed as she studied the astral highway above her. "Could be less than a decade. Maybe even half of that," she said, her eyes downcast as she looked down to Kahei. "Looks like there isn't much to see here. I'm gonna make the crystal so we can get out of here."

"Sooyoung—"

"I'm fine," the swordswoman cut off Haseul as she approached the hole of ether. "The enhanced fiend's corrupted mana is out of my system. So long as we leave soon enough that we don't have to get into another fight, I'll be fine."

Quietly, Haseul nodded as she came back around to the other side of the hole. Sooyoung stopped close to the edge, extending her hand with an open palm upwards.

"Careful."

Kahei's warning was acknowledged with a small nod from Sooyoung. With peerless focus, Sooyoung took in a remarkably slow, deep breath. In response, the well of ether began to stir further. Her body started to radiate an aura colored the same as the corrupted ether, similar to when she had established enmity on the red passenger. Finishing her breath, she held it for a few seconds. The aura around her began to gradually intensify as she did so, until she finally exhaled. Instantly, it diminished quietly as corrupted ether coalesced in the palm of her hand. Her odd eye shined as it took shape, resulting in a small dark gray crystal dropping into her grasp.

"That's…the crystal core inside of the passengers…"

Turning around, the three girls were met with the sight of a slightly quaking Yeojin. She had muscled through her fear of the sinkhole to get a better look at what they were doing. Looking at the core in Sooyoung's hand, a wave of unease settled on her face.

"Make the connection?" Sooyoung asked, prying her curious brain. "Fiends, passengers…they're a direct result of mana poisoning. Wherever corrupted mana flows on the leylines, fiends will follow. They swarm the timeline and slaughter everything around them without discrimination. Once a universe's leyline reaches complete corruption, it takes over the genocide itself. Fully tainted mana is dangerously lethal to all forms of life. Forests become shriveled wastelands. Cities become massive graveyards. From there, all life in that universe fades away, and eventually, its leyline withers away into nothing and it's over."

"Then…it really wasn't our fault…"

"It never was," Haseul comforted Yeojin. The younger girl's eyes were absorbed by the abyss of corrupted ether as Haseul put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sure people had you believe that your kind have long been the cause of the fiends, but that was never true. Their appearance and the resulting destruction…we don't have anything to do with it."

Yeojin failed to respond. Her mind was ablaze with thoughts that the trio couldn't even begin to guess by the vague expression on her face. Pocketing the crystal, Sooyoung looked behind her towards the abyss for a moment before walking ahead. "Alright, Yeojin. We need to talk."

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」  

"So, there's a crazy evil warlock dude who's doing this to the multiverse. You guys check the state of parallel realities and try to save any magi you can in the hopes of recruiting them into a team. You enlist enough magi, farm up experience by training real hard, and then hunt him down. Kill him, save the multiverse."

Yeojin gazed upon the corrupted ether highway above her as she spoke. Back outside, the group of four had relocated to the expressway. Night was fast approaching, with the edges of the sky shifting to black. Laying down on top of a small car, Yeojin's eyes were remarkably pensive.

"So…you want me to go back with you to help you out with that plan? Leave my timeline and jump over to yours?"

"Not ours," Sooyoung responded sharply from her seat on an abandoned motorcycle. A melancholic cyan eye peered towards the horizon. "It's Archmagus Lee's timeline. Ours is long gone. Sorry to say, but yours will be soon, too."

"Sooyoung…"

"It's alright," Yeojin apologized on Sooyoung's behalf, sensing Kahei's disappointment with the swordswoman's lack of tact. "I know I look like it to the point where people still call me one, but I'm not a kid. I'm not blind to the gravity of the situation."

Sitting up, Yeojin sighed as she scratched the back of her head. Sooyoung fixated her eyes to her while Yeojin's eyes looked to where Sooyoung was looking—the expanse of the freeway ahead, towards the horizon and beyond. "The old man said it nine years ago. You're saying it now. The ether reservoir's screwed up, and passengers have claimed this universe…"

"Yep!" Yeojin exclaimed as she suddenly hopped down from the vehicle. She stayed facing the other end of the expressway, leaving the three mystics to stare at the back of her hoodie. "This place isn't gonna last much longer after all. , to say the least, but what's a girl supposed to do, y'know?"

Her words stopping there, silence draped itself over the group. It felt heavy as a natural wind slowly passed, caressing the girls' hair. Patiently, they waited for Yeojin to speak. Before long, she did.

"Earlier today, before you guys saved me…before I was about to die, I told myself that twenty years wasn't a bad run, that it must've been worth something. I forced myself to accept the fact that because I wasn't strong enough to keep going, it would be okay for me to die there. Even if I didn't fully believe in it, I lied to myself and told myself that that was an acceptable line of thought, because if I didn't…I would regret dying there."

Get up, kid.

Sooyoung's words resonated from within her mind, instilling Yeojin with a type of resolve she hadn't quite felt before. "I don't want to feel like that again. I don't want to have to lie to myself in order to feel like I'm worth something. I don't want the foundation of what I decide to do to be based on a lie, because good people don't lie."

Haseul's core shook with warmth as a proud smile appeared on her face.

"I don't think I'm all that great of a mystic after seeing you guys in action," Yeojin admitted with slight shame, kicking the ground idly, "but that doesn't mean I shouldn't try. Besides, it's not every day you get invited to visit a parallel world so you can start training to take down a wizard threatening the entirety of creation. That's pretty wild…"

"So, yeah," Yeojin said after a short pause. "To me, twenty years isn't a run worth much anymore…"

I know you heard me. Your legs are fine, so get up already!

She turned around, looking at them. As the sun set across the horizon behind her, her smile was painfully contagious.

"…think I'd rather just stick around for as long as possible."

Rejoice in the form of wide, relieved smiles spread across the group as Yeojin approached them. Sooyoung stepped off the motorcycle and joined Haseul and Kahei in walking towards Yeojin. The spirited girl seemed to be set on a course. "You guys are something else, you know? Saving my life twice in one day…that's a little crazy."

"Thank you, Yeojin," Haseul's voice came to life as she released Yeojin from a tight hug.

"What am I being thanked for exactly…?" Yeojin asked, her confusion doubling over as she stepped back. "I didn't—"

"You didn't give up," Haseul explained. "You want to continue on, to persevere…it's difficult to fully articulate, but it means the world to us."

Yeojin nodded slowly as she looked between the three girls. Their shared smiles bounced back to her as she sheepishly grinned. "Well, uh…you're welcome, I guess?"

"Shall we depart, then?" Kahei asked.

Yeojin was the first to answer. "Um, could we…go somewhere first? It shouldn't take long, and given that I'm probably not gonna get another chance…"

The response was delayed as the older mystics could only imagine where Yeojin wanted to go, but Sooyoung nodded. "Yeah, of course. Where to?"

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」

By the time they arrived, the moon was on a steady ascent through the night sky. The run-down house was the only one for miles, far and away from the skyline of buildings towards the horizon. Kahei and Haseul shared a dusty bench seat on the patio while Sooyoung sat on the flight of stairs leading up to it. Her arms on her legs, she rested her chin on her held together hands as she watched Yeojin with quiet, intense eyes.

"Hey, Mom."

Across the field, Yeojin stood in front of a secluded burial site. The gravestone and its markings were illegible, having suffered from vandalism long ago. Her hands in the pockets of her hoodie, a peaceful calm came from Yeojin as she spoke.

"I'm, uh…heading out, I guess you could say."

Yeojin idly shuffled her feet as she took a breath. "I don't know if I'll be back. Things might not…play out in a way that lets me visit. There's a whole lot I wanna talk to you about, but I don't think I really have enough time. I've got to get going soon."

"Just wanted to make sure I got to say goodbye," Yeojin says with a small nod to herself, words becoming difficult to get out. "And I wanted to let you know that you were right, Mom. It wasn't our fault. Turns out mystics didn't do anything, just like you always said. You and I did nothing wrong. Even then, they still…"

Yeojin's voice trailed off. Sooyoung's watchful glance towards Yeojin turned into a cold glare aimed at the marks of vandalism on the gravestone.

"Alright, Mom. I've really got to going now. Talk to you again sometime. Love you."

With a deep breath, Yeojin turned away from the burial site and walked back towards the other three. As she approached, Sooyoung eased up, looking at Yeojin quietly. Yeojin returned the glance, strangely focused on Sooyoung's odd cyan eye for a moment. "Thanks for waiting."

Standing up from her seat on the patio stairs, Sooyoung exhaled. A small smile set itself about her face as she patted Yeojin's head. "It's alright. I'm glad you took the opportunity to tell her goodbye. Not everyone gets the chance to do that."

"Is there anything else you need to take care of, Yeojin?" Haseul's voice came from the patio above. She stood up with Kahei and the two approached the steps. Yeojin shook her head as she stared at the doorway to the house behind them.

"That's all she wrote," Yeojin replied wistfully with a shrug. "Doubt there's much left in there anyway…"

"Then let's make our departure," Kahei suggested, coming down the stairs with Haseul.

"Right, uh, about that," Yeojin said, looking around for a moment. "I think I missed the part of the plan detailing, uh…crossing over into another world?"

"With this."

Yeojin looked over to Sooyoung. With an outstretched hand, she displayed a glowing gray crystal in the palm of her hand. It was slightly bigger than a passenger's heart and much lighter in hue, appearing almost white. Yeojin eyed it curiously as Haseul and Kahei stood at her side.

"Doesn't look like any crystal I've ever seen," the young girl commented. "How's that get us back?"

Sooyoung's odd eye glimmered as she took a breath. A small cloud of icy ether took shape in her hand, enveloping the crystal. Coalescing, the ether became frost and covered the crystal in ice. Closing her hand, Sooyoung's muscles tensed as she crushed the crystal to pieces.

Immediately, a subdued wave of energy expelled itself outwards from Sooyoung's fist. Opening her hand, a cloud of ether the same shade as the crystal materialized. The three experienced mystics stepped back, leaving a befuddled Yeojin to merely follow their lead and step back with them. For a moment, the ether remained still, merely floating in a tranquil state.

"Uh…I don't get it? What's—"

A flash of light answered Yeojin's question before she got a chance to finish it.

Covering her eyes in reaction, Yeojin slowly lowered her arms from in front of her face. Before her, an ornate white door had come into being. White in color with a black handle, it was labeled with an expensive look plaque at its center. With careful caution, Yeojin approached the door, analyzing the label.

✦ Leyline-Oriented Organized Nexus of Alternatives – Main Laboratory ✦
✦ Subset of the Broken Boundaries Coalition ✦

"Let's go."

Sooyoung smiled as she grabbed hold of the handle, opening the door. A bright light escaped, blinding Yeojin briefly. As she walked through, it began to subside. Following her, Haseul and Kahei stepped in next, disappearing into the light. Sooyoung stepped through after, closing the door behind her carefully. Once closed, it began to dissipate, becoming ether that floated away into the sky.

The door completely erased, a lonely calm returned to the secluded home in the middle of the plains. The tranquil silence was broken by the sound of boots stepping onto wood.

A figure of average height rose from a seated position on the steps with a serious, composed expression on its face. Its eyes, one hazel and the other a deep scarlet, gazed upon where the summoned door had stood. Long blonde hair flowed with a gust of wind. An open red dress shirt and its accompanying black undershirt rustled as the breeze passed. A gloved hand grabbed a large double-sided battle axe, the edges of its steel stained with a streak of red.

"She wasn't kidding," a woman's voice arose from behind the figure. A second body stepped out from within the home. "Place is empty, Jennie."

Jennie turned to the woman who addressed her. "Sure you checked everything?"

"There was nothing to check," the woman assured with a shrug. "They ransacked her years ago, by the looks of it. I know it to be a magus in this timeline, but damn. You see the they did to her mother's grave?"

Jennie's eyes followed the woman as she stepped past her down the stairs. An inch taller than Jennie, a head of dark brown hair with bangs came down to her shoulders. Opposite to Jennie, she wore an undone black blazer with a red undershirt, the long sleeves of which peeked out under the sleeves of her blazer. Navy jeans and black shoes adorned her lower body. She sighed, her mood more relaxed than her blonde haired companion. She directed mismatched eyes of brown and bright gold towards Jennie. "What now?"

"Let's get back to the rendezvous point," Jennie answered, coming down the stairs herself. Holding her axe with one hand, she rested it on her shoulder as she looked towards the expressway in the distance. "Rosé and Jisoo should be done by now."

"Can't wait to get out of this place," the other woman complained with a yawn. "Pretty boring stuff. The fiends here aren't even all that tough. Kinda wish we ambushed them back by the gas station..."

"Always looking for a fight, aren't you, Lisa?"

The brunette known as Lisa flashed Jennie a smile as her body was suddenly enveloped in a coat of crackling electricity. "And what about it?"

"I'll meet you up ahead if you're planning on double checking the place yourself," she announced as her electric aura died down. Turning away from Jennie, she made way for the road. Jennie began to follow, but after a few steps, she turned around and faced the broken home again.

Jennie took a deep breath. A massive cloud of crimson ether formed above the house. It settled downwards, encasing the worn structure completely. Slowly, she exhaled through puckered lips, whistling in a low pitch.

Her crimson odd eye glowed as a pillar of smoke rose into the air from the resulting explosion.

Flames rising and spreading as the house burned to the ground, Jennie turned back around and walked off slowly. With her gloved hand holding her axe, she slipped her opposing bare hand into her pocket and whistled away as memories burned down behind her. Her face unmoving, she wore an expression of eerie serenity as she headed towards the expressway.

"LOONA's final piece, huh…?"

「 ➤➤➤ ★ ➤➤➤ 」

As the door closed behind her, Yeojin looked around and nodded slowly. "Well, the plaque wasn't kidding. This is definitely a laboratory…"

Now in foreign territory, Yeojin took in the area around her as the other three mystics walked forward, convening with someone just ahead. Large computer screens littered the walls of the room. There were various desks and terminals strewn about, occupied by a number of men and women in white lab coats walking between them.

With a strained breath, Yeojin realized she was having difficulty breathing. As she turned around with a gasp for air, she understood why.

Before her, towards the end of the room, an enormous crystal was suspended in a vertical stream of ether. It spun around very slowly, revealing fragmented indents all over that made it look like it was being mined. The behemoth of a crystal and its accompanying ether were colored the same shade of light gray as the crystal that Sooyoung had used to materialize the door. Feeling overwhelmed by its colossal size and becoming more and more starved for breath, Yeojin turned away from the crystal. She opened to inquire about it, but promptly shut it as she came to face someone.

In front of her, a woman stood. Taller than Haseul and Kahei by a head, she smiled warmly at Yeojin. Neatly straightened voluminous hair of near pitch black running down to her midback, she was looking at the Neophyte sorceress with welcoming eyes of a gentle deep brown. Though Yeojin failed to notice it at the time, the woman looked remarkably much like Sooyoung. Bearing strikingly similar eyes with the selfsame facial features and structure, albeit with signs of slightly visible aging, she could have quite easily passed as the Master sorceress' mother or older sister. Or perhaps, even more interestingly, one could have interpreted her as Sooyoung herself in a number of years.

"Hello there."

Her voice greeted her, surprisingly soft in volume. It was followed by the extension of an arm, offering a handshake. Wearing a lush buttoned up fleeche jacket that looked soft to the touch, slim dress pants, and black shoes, her presentation was cleanly professional. The sight left Yeojin feeling as if a high ranking executive of a well-to-do corporation had just introduced themselves to her.

"H-hi," Yeojin stammered, presenting her hand. With careful respectfulness, she shook her hand gently. Yeojin was particularly dumbfounded as she pulled away gracefully. She had never been treated with such diligent reverence before. "I'm Yeojin. Are you Archmagus Lee…?"

"That's correct," she answered politely as she put her hands behind her back. "I know you've been hearing them refer to me by that title, but such lengths aren't required. Please, call me Sunmi."