Elsewhere…
The veil between worlds shimmered faintly as Aiyu reemerged deep within the whispering woods, where time trickled slower, and the leaves carried secrets older than kings. His unit lay nestled beneath the canopy's emerald hush, the wounded cradled in the arms of murmuring healers, their hands pulsing with quiet light spells as old as the first breath of dawn.
Aiyu moved like smoke, drawn toward Mr. Williams, who stood vigil beside a soldier wrapped in moss-silk bandages. He gave a solemn nod.
"Thank you… for what you did in Country M," he murmured, his voice hoarse with the weight of unseen things.
Later, enclosed in the quiet hum of his car, headlights slicing through the mist and memory, he studied the faint scar on his shoulder, a small thing, and yet the only mark left from the encounter. A token. A whisper.
He hadn't asked for her name.
She was young, almost translucent in the dim light. But beneath that youthful glow was something ancient, a presence that moved like wind through prayer flags, elusive and holy. She had looked at him not like a stranger but like a guardian remembering an oath from long ago.
At headquarters, the air thickened with unspoken omens. The elders had gathered mystics robed in twilight hues, their faces lit by inner vision. At their center stood Joseph: ageless, sharply perceptive, his eyes like polished obsidian beneath silver lashes.
Born of two nations, two worlds, his mother of the Aiyu clan, his father from Country M, Joseph bore the lineage of contradiction with quiet reverence. Aiyu remembered when Joseph was just a boy, brought by his mother to their ancestral house, the scent of jasmine and clay always trailing her.
"You alright?" Joseph asked, voice low, like thunder behind distant mountains.
Aiyu gave only a grunt. "Fine."
But Joseph's gaze lingered, noting the subtle shimmer of foreign herbs in the air. "You were treated… by someone outside the Circle."
Aiyu's jaw tensed. "Later."
Joseph nodded, silence wrapping around him like a well-worn cloak. He knew that truth emerged not by force but by invitation.
Then came President Hills, his presence cutting through the chamber like a blade of polished brass. Without ceremony, he sank into his seat, the chair creaking beneath the weight of his hunger.
"Aiyu," he said, voice clipped. "What did you do with the spirit?"
Aiyu's eyes, like cold obsidian, met his. "Sealed. It won't return."
But Hills, ever the shadow-chaser, leaned forward. "I want the essence. The core. Now."
Aiyu didn't blink. "Then give me the list of agents who stepped into the Mystic Forest in the last month."
The room shifted like a collective breath held too long.
"Someone fed that thing," Aiyu continued, voice edged with storm. "I'll find out who."
He could see it the hunger coiling behind the president's eyes. Hills didn't want justice. He wanted the spirit core stone, a relic pulsing with raw ether, a forbidden conduit to the Mystic Realm.
But he'd forgotten the ancient laws: To harness power not your own, you must offer the soul that bears your name.
The Predator waits for such ambition.
Without another word, Aiyu turned, the hem of his long coat whispering secrets to the stone floor. Joseph followed quickly, urgency in his stride.
"My master wishes to see you," Joseph said. "He felt something. I told him about your wound."
But the forest had already claimed Aiyu again.
The night swallowed him like a wisp of incense on the wind, leaving only silence in his wake, the kind of silence that feels like prayer.
Back in the tree house, Yuzi resumed her work. The puppet still lay on the sacred table, its form half-finished, needles waiting. The little spirit returned to her side, handing her another silver pin.
She inhaled deeply, resettling her thoughts.
But before her fingers touched the puppet, The tree groaned.
This time, it was different.
The floor trembled, and the needles in the puppet rattled violently, as if resonating with something... or someone.
Yuzi's eyes widened.
The formation hadn't settled.
Something else had entered the forest.
And it wasn't human.