Clara's chamber was farther than Vel had expected.
They didn't go up. A platform carried them down instead, into the lower levels, the air turning cooler the deeper it sank.
He might have lost track of the way. One turn looked much like the last. But the guards made sure he never forgot where he was. At every turn, every archway, a knight and a battlemage stood paired. One for steel, one for spellwork.
The lights from mana crystals stayed bright the whole way down, like daylight, no shadows left anywhere.
When they reached the corridor at last, four more guards waited at the door alone.
And someone else.
A figure in a white robe, gold trim along its edges, the emblem of a sun stitched into the cape down his back. He sat in a chair that had plainly been carried down for him alone, and he was waiting for something.
The chamber door stood open. A voices drifted out from inside.
"Father Vecar." Moana said it as he came closer.
The man turned.
"I wasn't aware the Church had any business here today."
"Instructor Moana." Father Vecar inclined his head. "Forgive the unexpected visit. There was a request from the Guild that needed our hand." His eyes drifted to the open door. "Before the tribunal formally begins."
"What kind of request could the Guild not handle on their own?" Moana asked.
Vecar stayed as he was, unhurried, his voice calm, like a man stating something that should have been plain to everyone.
"Well...they believed our subject was possessed. So we brought a few experts in the field."
"Exorcists?" Moana asked.
"Certainly. If it were anything close to that, we'd know the moment they—"
The room went off like a thunderclap.
A figure in purple robes shot backward through the doorway, hit the opposite wall, and landed flat on the floor.
Every head turned to follow it. The guards. Moana. Vel. Hileya.
Vecar didn't. He kept his back to the door, still facing them, gone completely still.
Then, slowly, he turned toward it. Whatever calm he'd been wearing had left his face. His eyes were wide. Flabbergasted.
The figure on the floor pushed itself up. The hood slid back off a young man, a pair of round spectacles sitting crooked on his nose, one lens dropped lower than the other. He coughed, dragging in air, one hand braced on the wall, the other shoving the glasses back into place.
"Good news," he wheezed.
Another cough.
"Definitely not possession."
"Kenji?!"
It was out before Vel could stop it.
The young man turned, looking back over his shoulder for whoever the name belonged to.
"Huh? Who?"
For a moment, the resemblance had been uncanny.
Then the illusion broke.
Different eyes. Different voice. Different person.
"Sorry. I thought—"
"What happened?" Vecar asked.
The young man sobered, glancing back at the open door.
"The arm." He was still winded. "That's the bad news."
"It's a cursed object."
He rubbed the side of his face where he had apparently met the floor.
"A very angry cursed object."
"And it's actively resisting removal."
The corridor grew quieter.
Father Vecar folded his arms.
"Resisting?"
"Violently."
The young man pointed at himself.
"I was the non-violent attempt."
Vel's interface had already shown him the same conclusion. The fact that the Church's people had arrived at it independently spoke well of their expertise.
"Are you finished?" Vel said. "Can I see her?"
"Of course. We just needed to—" The young man stopped. "Wait. Who are you?"
Vel paused, working out how to introduce himself.
"That's Saint Landre's brother. Velarian." Vecar said it before he could.
"Whoa, really?" The young man's face stretched in surprise. "There's been a lot of talk about you."
He shot forward, hand out for a shake, and in his hurry stepped right past Vecar, nudging the Father aside.
Vel took it on reflex. The grip came back firmer than a handshake needed to be, the kind that belonged to someone who'd never learned an introduction didn't call for full force.
"I'm Gordon. Exorcist consultant. Delegated to the Tir sect of the Lona Pantheon."
He was still shaking Vel's hand.
"Well, technically I'm a Scholar Researcher, but if it's anything that touches new knowledge, ancient, forbidden, anomaly—"
"Gordon." Vecar interrupted, his voice tight. "Perhaps we should let them through before you give your entire life story."
"Right, right."
"Actually, wait. Give me a second."
He darted back into the room. Metal clanged inside. Then a thud.
He reappeared dragging an oversized bag behind him, and a few more hooded figures filed out at his back, each with something in hand. A scroll, a box, an armful of instruments. They bowed to Vecar and the others.
"Wait for us in the main hall," Vecar said to the exorcists.
They withdrew down the corridor, slow.
Gordon watched them leave, then dusted off his sleeves.
"There."
He stepped aside from the doorway and spread his hands.
"All clear."
Vel stepped through into a circular chamber.
Blue light pulsed from crystalline orbs in the corners, the same warding that held Celia's room. Four guards stood at the compass points, faces impassive beneath their helms.
Four chains extended from runic anchors set into the inner ring of the chamber, converging toward its center.
There sat Clara.
The platinum-rank adventurer who had saved him from the Wulfangs years ago. Her metal arm gleamed in the blue light, and she paid it no mind. Not the chains. Not the guards. Not the people walking in.
The rest filed in behind him. Hileya right at his back, then Moana, then Vecar, with Gordon last.
"Clara."
Vel walked closer. Every eye in the room followed him, and the nearest guard shifted, more alert now.
"Do you remember me?"
Nothing.
"Do you remember your sister? Celia?"
Nothing.
She sat in the chains like a doll waiting to be put away. Both hands cuffed, one of flesh, one of metal. Her gaze stayed fixed on the floor, her dark brown hair unkempt. Her chest rose and fell, slow.
Vel's chest tightened at the scene.
She had fought her own sister in that arena, and even that hadn't reached her. What could his words do?
Reaching someone like this, heart first, had never been his strength. He worked with his mind.
And the one who might have managed it wasn't here anymore.
"Have you tried a full appraisal of her condition?" Vel asked.
"We've tried every analytical approach in our arsenal." Gordon said. "But the readings comes back almost incomprehensible. We assumed it was some demonic language."
Vel let his own interface open. The moment his focus settled on Clara, the readout from the arena returned.
[Heart of Deceit: Tier 4]
[Demonic Influence Efficiency: 94.7%]
He pushed deeper into the curse.
[Reading full body structure...]
A translucent diagram formed across his vision. Clara's body assembled itself layer by layer, pathways of energy branching through her. The metal arm glowed an angry red.
"It's... not simply an attachment."
The room stilled, waiting for him to go on.
"The arm isn't behaving like a replacement limb. It's driving everything else." His eyes traced the diagram. "Her thoughts. Her emotions. Even her heartbeat."
"Like a parasite?" Gordon asked.
"Worse."
Like a malicious rootkit.
Vel kept his eyes on the arm.
"A parasite feeds on its host. This thing has woven itself into her."
To tear the arm off by force would cut away the very thing keeping her alive.
Years ago he had purged a void entity out of Landre. That had been nothing beside this.
Back then, he had possessed a tool capable of operating directly on the world's underlying structure. He no longer had that luxury.
Which meant he needed another approach.
He started to pace, slow, in front of the chains.
"How do you even remove something that's become part of the system?" he muttered.
Tsk. A pulse of pain throbbed behind his eyes as he forced himself to think.
He stopped.
The room fell silent.
Everyone was watching him now.
"A hard reset..." His gaze slowly lifted.
"What?" Gordon asked.
"Gordon. Earlier. You were trying to remove the arm?"
Gordon nodded.
"And it fought back."
"Very aggressively, yes."
He knew the shape of it from another life. A rootkit, built to resist removal, built to change how it behaved the instant it sensed someone prying. There was no taking it out by force. Not while it was awake to fight.
Vel lowered his eyes again.
Then a possibility surfaced. One he hated the moment it did.
"What if we could make it go dormant?"
"How?" Gordon frowned.
"By..."
He didn't want to say it. Saying it aloud would make it real.
His gaze drifted toward Clara. Toward the metal arm.
"Killing the host..."
The chamber froze.
"Temporary."
"Are you out of your mind?" Vecar said. "You want to save her by killing her?"
"Do you want to put her in the same state as the other girl?" Moana asked.
Both Vecar and Gordon turned toward him.
Vel shook his head.
"It's different."
He looked back at Clara.
"Celia's body stopped functioning. That's why I had to preserve it."
"This arm only holds control because it's keeping Clara alive."
"If we can make it believe the connection is gone..." He said it slowly. "...even for a moment, it might loosen its hold."
"Might?" Vecar repeated.
"You sound awfully confident for someone proposing murder," Gordon added.
"I'm not." Vel rubbed at his temple. "But I know this much. If you've ever pulled someone out of the water after their heart stopped..."
He paused.
"...their body doesn't immediately forget how to live. I'm saying it may be the only path I can see."
The room fell quiet again.
"Then what?" Moana asked.
"I need to think about it more. Maybe the arm comes off safely once it loses control. Maybe there's another way to interfere with whatever connection it's using." He shook his head. "This isn't something we decide today."
"What should we do now?" Vecar asked.
"For now, we watch." Vel gestured toward Clara. "Everything. Her health. Her behavior. Her mana fluctuations. Anything unusual, no matter how insignificant."
If he wanted answers, he needed data. The same way he always had.
"We'll need instruments, artifacts..." Moana said. "I'll bring word to the Archmagister."
Vel nodded. There was nothing more to add, not today.
He gave Clara one last look, then turned for the door.
It closed behind them with a heavy thud, and the corridor felt strangely quiet after it.
Hileya was watching him. Their eyes met. She didn't ask what he was thinking.
Two sisters. One trapped in ice, one trapped inside her own body. Different fates, different prisons. And yet they felt like two sides of the same coin.
And he still didn't know how to save either of them.