On the night of the no-moon, Allan and Nora arrived at the cursed house prepared for anything—but not for Fred. He was already there, tense and alert, as if he had been waiting for them. At the same time, far away, Crystal's encounters with the stalking entity had grown more terrifying, the presence inching closer with each passing day, as though whatever haunted her was gaining strength or courage.
Fred quickly explained why he was there. He had been investigating the woman involved in the knife incident and, after days of digging, discovered she had stolen something from a witch's hut and had been collecting bizarre magical artifacts.
Her true goal was unclear, but all signs suggested she was searching for items capable of killing people. Digging deeper, Fred uncovered that she had once been a partner of IAG, an organization that had cast her out for being too unstable and erratic. IAG, however, had darker ambitions: they wanted to revive a forest entity to use as a weapon, an operation overseen by someone even more powerful.
Their plan required sacrificing devotees with awakened abilities to generate enough magic. Nora, with her immense power gained from her time in the other dimension and her bond to the ring, was their ideal target. When their earlier attempt failed, the former partner became obsessed. She began stalking Nora, determined either to extract her power or kill her before IAG could destroy her first.
Fred confessed he had stolen a device the woman had been gathering, along with the tracker she had secretly placed on Nora. Following it led him to the house—but he arrived a second too late. Allan and Nora had already stepped inside, just as Fred came running toward them.
The moment they crossed the threshold, a man appeared and asked the first question: "Do you actually love each other, or is it because of a curse?" The house shifted, trapping them in a sequence of nine cube-like realms, each a different setting filled with strangers. To escape each one, they had to solve a hidden puzzle that would attract the mysterious questioner's attention. If they failed to answer within thirty seconds, the environment would change.
The first room became a bar. A mismatched couple danced while a lone man sat at the counter. Desperate to progress quickly—especially after seeing Fred outside—they tried everything: dancing, talking, opening doors, mimicking others. Nothing worked. Finally, exhausted, Allan muttered that the dancing couple didn't suit each other. That was when Nora noticed the same ring on the drinking man's hand as her own. They brought him to the dance floor, and when he joined her, the questioner appeared again and asked, "How many lies have you told today?" Unable to answer, they were thrown into the next room.
The second space was a looping courtroom. Through observation and deduction, they realized one of the jurors was secretly helping the defendant in a murder case involving a boss who had killed his employee to hide an affair. By reading the lawyer's notes and studying expressions, they identified the traitor.
The judge then turned to them and asked, "Do you wish to die?" Before they could respond, they were pushed into another realm where they encountered the three missing students. In a hospital-like setting they failed to answer correctly when asked how many times they had been sick; they guessed "many," which triggered another shift. Suddenly they found themselves in a witch trial scene. Fred appeared there too, having entered the house after them.
While the students tried solving the puzzle, Fred explained everything he had learned about the stalker, the artifacts, and the danger closing in on Nora. Together they deduced that the true witch hidden in the crowd was actually a young boy. The questioner turned to Fred and asked, "When you entered, how many were there?" Fred answered instantly, "One." The illusion shattered. The house released them all.
Afterward, life seemed briefly brighter. News of Allan's courage spread, and when he appeared on television, his calm charisma and striking looks made him unexpectedly popular. Admirers even sent him a gift: a sword capable of absorbing mana and amplifying it tenfold. Fred also managed to recover the missing doll pair, which they kept together in Allan's home as a protective charm.
But peace didn't last. While Nora spent time with Crystal, the latter finally confessed how frightening the stalking presence had become—and Nora saw it too, closer than ever. Using the equipment Fred had stolen, they managed to trap the entity temporarily. Fred warned them that Tina would soon approach Nora to lure her back toward IAG, and they decided to use that to their advantage.
When Tina appeared, they subdued her with a truth serum shot, forcing her to reveal everything: IAG had already arranged replacements in case she failed, their operation would unfold that very night, and worst of all, they had planted a curse on Nora during the retreat that would attract the forest entity to her for an entire year with no cure.
They rushed to stop the ritual, but they arrived too late to prevent it completely. Though incomplete, the summoning was enough. The forest itself seemed to awaken, branches twisting like claws as the entity manifested and lunged for Nora, drawn to her power. Chaos erupted—roots tearing through the ground, shadows lunging, wind howling like a living beast.
Allan fought desperately to shield her while she struggled to activate the mana-amplifying sword. Her body was weak, her experience limited, and the weapon's force nearly overwhelmed her. She stumbled, nearly collapsing, as the creature closed in. With Allan buying her seconds, she steadied herself, focused, and struck.
The blade ignited with magnified energy, slicing through the entity's core. The creature shrieked, collapsing into fragments of fading magic. In its death throes it lashed out wildly, killing both the IAG partner and the rogue former member who had tried to control it. They had never truly possessed the power to command what they summoned. The entity had only ever wanted Nora.
When the forest finally fell silent, everyone was still alive. Exhausted, shaken, but alive. The threat that had stalked them from shadows and dimensions was gone—for now. And as dawn crept over the horizon, they realized they had survived not just a battle, but the opening war of something far larger. The season closed on that fragile victory, with the promise that whatever lay ahead would test them even more.