The bugs in Area 9 were threads: spider threads, drawn out from the veins of the corpse of the fallen Scarlet Kin. During the day they were manageable. Not invisible, not thin enough to miss entirely.

But the dark was a different matter. The threads merged with it completely, and anyone moving through without knowing was risking a limb. Maybe two. Not just that, these threads suck blood too.

It was day and the party moved through the woods, threads stretching from tree to tree across the path. Some were thinner than the description had suggested, but the sharpness of them caught enough light to give them away. Navigable, for now.

"Scar... what do you think? Could there be someone here? It feels too quiet."

Scar frowned. Solus had Storm and Walker directly beside her, neither of them a negligible option, and the distance between her and Scar was nothing to dismiss either. She’d asked him anyway. Passed over both of them and aimed the question straight at him.

She had a point though. They’d been walking long enough that something should have turned up by now. Nothing had.

"This might be a false alarm, or we simply haven’t gone deep enough."

Scar knew empty words when he heard them. They’d already covered more than half the land and turned up nothing.

Though he wasn’t about to complain too loudly, this wasn’t Area 17. Area 17’s bugs peeled skin away and ate the person whole once they had them. Nothing here had been done yet.

Area 17, for all its horrors, had at least allowed Amber and her group to camp. The bugs here didn’t extend that courtesy.

Camping was impossible, which meant the clock on this search was tighter than it looked. Night was approaching.

"Stop!"

Abruptly, Amber and Luccy both said this in unison.

Amber moved without waiting, launching from one trunk to the next in quick succession, and then she was above it all, floating over the forest canopy like gravity had simply stopped applying to her.

Luccy launched a bolt of lightning into the distance, directing it with a motion of her hand like it was an extension of her arm.

"Wait, what? She can fly? I thought she didn’t have any Inheritance!"

Walker looked petrified. That gave Scar the impression that either he knew nothing about the Scarlet Moon’s Blessing or had no idea anyone could control it so perfectly. But Walker was ranked 94th, which made the first option hard to believe.

Amber’s ability to fly didn’t shock him. He was certain no one alive controlled the Blessing better than she did, and at the moment she wasn’t even flying, exactly. She was walking on it, treading the Blessing in the atmosphere like solid ground. Less flight, more something else entirely.

What actually had Scar’s attention was Luccy, specifically the directional control she had over her lightning. He’d fought her twice. Not once had she done anything like that.

"Are you going to tell us what’s going on, or just stand there flexing your muscles? Hey, you up there... how are you flying? Say something before you get on my nerves."

Walker’s concerns went nowhere, nobody was listening. Storm made an attempt to settle him.

"I think they’ve spotted something. Calm down."

"Calm down? How can I calm down? She’s flying! How can a human do that?"

Solus exhaled in disbelief, still looking as soulless and mysterious as ever.

"You can take her place if you want."

"What did you say?"

"I said nothing."

"What the heck? You definitely said something."

Solus stared at Walker, fuming for a second.

"I think you need to see a doctor. You’re hearing things. This is a sign of death... your ancestors are calling to you."

Walker’s face had reached the particular shade of a man moments away from losing it entirely.

"You little..."

"You can hear me after all."

Storm moved in before it could go any further, offering Walker a vague explanation for why Amber was flying. Vague enough to placate.

"She’s wearing Heaven’s Garment. I heard it’s the second most powerful weapon Michael created, so I’m sure that’s what’s allowing Amber to fly."

Walker still had Solus in the corner of his eye but turned to Storm with understanding, as if the explanation had answered everything.

"I’ve found it... go a little further, Luccy. Now, to the left."

The group listened as Amber relayed the creature’s exact location to Luccy, and Luccy took it down before anyone had time to prepare for more than that.

The moment Amber’s feet hit the ground, the group was already moving, weaving through the forest toward the exact spot where the Danger-level threat creature lay.

The familiar sensation from the village returned the moment they arrived, Scar felt it before he saw anything. Interestingly, the creature itself. Spider-like, yes, but not fully dead when they got there. Luccy finished it.

This was bizarre. He knew the Chosen One tablet wasn’t ordinary, the energy alone confirmed that. It had either been written by a fallen, or perhaps acquired by one at some point throughout history.

But who?

"Which creature did Yeshe slay exactly? Did anyone witness it, or even see the carcass?"

Luccy glanced through her mind for a moment.

"Yeshe isn’t someone even Dain likes to talk about... so I’m not sure he killed this creature. And if he did, the villagers would know something."

Everyone looked to Amber, hoping she’d caught something, an idea, a detail from when the villagers were talking that might connect. She hadn’t.

This made Scar rethink his question.

"Is there anyone who holds an Inheritance of darkness? The myths alone should be enough to give birth to one."

Storm was the first to speak.

"I don’t really know, but if someone did possess that kind of Inheritance, the Supreme Council would have them under a God Killer’s command right away. It’s far too overpowered."

It was strange and getting stranger. The dark energy was undeniable, he’d felt it too clearly to second-guess.

But if no one within the human realm had been responsible for filling the tablet and these creatures with it, then the question of who had was sitting open with no good answer.

If answers existed anywhere, they started from within. There was a creature chained in his inner realm. It had been there long enough that he should have looked closer sooner.

He wanted a proper look at it. Maybe seeing it clearly would help him remember what exactly he was dealing with.

His eyes swept the distance. Night was only a few minutes away, and the forest wasn’t going to tolerate anyone walking through it in the dark. They hadn’t found the source of the problem either, so leaving wasn’t an option.

"There aren’t any bugs around here. Maybe we should stay and continue our journey once the sun rises again."

Everyone nodded in agreement. Walker wasn’t having it.

"Who died and made you the leader? Who exactly do you think you’re talking to, ordering us around?"

Luccy looked slightly agitated. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

"Stop talking. You’ve done nothing but complain. We’re a team, and I don’t intend to use my authority like you did."

Walker grimaced as if his pride were shattered.

Strange didn’t quite capture it. The oldest among them behaved like the youngest.

Walker had been the leader before this mission. Highest ranked, oldest, the kind of person who was supposed to hold things together.

Missions had succeeded under him, but people had died in every one, and the last had been the worst of it by far. Only he, Storm, and Luccy survived.

Leadership was passed to Luccy, and Walker had apparently never made his peace with that.

The anger in Walker’s eyes was genuine and considerable, not something to dismiss lightly. But Scar had other things demanding his attention. He needed to get into his inner realm.