- “The elf has already returned.” The director smiles wide, revealing the gaping void in her mouth. Her voice was echoing around the laboratory.

  - “Don’t…” Julian starts, gritting his teeth and fighting his fear as best as he could. “Don’t you move! I’m holding Sergius hostage, if you take even one step I’ll kill him!”

  - “Oh? Let us see about that.”

  The director steps forward, staring straight at Julian. The latter could feel himself infinitely falling again as his gaze is almost forcibly drawn to her eyes. He trembles slightly but doesn’t move an inch.

  - “Go on.” She takes another step. “Defy me.”

  - “...Well shit. I tried.” Julian drops on the floor, the last of his strength slowly leaving him. He painfully manages to raise his arm, forms a fist towards her and raises his middle finger. “Feel defied enough?”

  - “I acknowledge your bravado. But I will not tolerate the insult.” The director loses her smile and raises her hand towards him, a light downwards pressure spreading across the entire room. “You will find solace in the fact that I was the one to extinguish the light of your existence.”

  - “...I wish I at least got to see Theo again. Guess that’s as far as I go." Julian’s arm drops and he leans back to look up at the ceiling, smiling in resignation.

  That’s when he hears the sound of multiple sets of footsteps running towards the door. Said door is kicked open by none other than Agnes, whose eyes immediately dart around the room to assess the situation at hand. Her murder of ravens was hovering around her, all of them fixated on the director.

  - “Alright what’s going on here?” Agnes asks, staring at the director.

  - “Agnes Syka.” The director replies, turning her head towards her while her body stays perfectly immobile. “You are in no position to question me. Know your place.”

  - “Oh but I think I am! What’s this impossibly large underground structure? I don’t even know if the Dungeon goes down that deep! I didn’t know it existed, and if I don’t then nobody in the Guard does.” She stares at the giant glass columns in the background. “What’s that? Are those people? Wait… I recognize a few of those faces from our files!”

  - “...How bothersome. Begone.”

  The director shifts her hand towards Agnes, but before she can do anything someone’s head pokes through the doorframe, eyes literally sparkling with small stars. The mysterious pressure in the room vanishes.

  - “Whoa! How deep into the Earth do you think we are now Agnes? Do you think we’ll get to see the core?” Nyx asks as she waddles past Agnes and into the laboratory, the pink cast around her leg producing a muffled thud with each step. “Oh hey Julian!”

  - “How did you even get here?” He replies, dumbfounded.

  - “I flew! Well kind of, I decided to ride an astero?d from the top of the tower to check out what was going on inside the mansion, since I couldn’t see anything !”

  - “You know, you would’ve died if I didn’t catch you.” Agnes comments, taking her attention away from the glass columns for a second.

  - “Don't worry about-”

  Nyx stops when she notices the director looking down at her. Julian stops experiencing that sense of endless falling, and notices a very faint light inside the two dark voids that were the director’s eyes, slightly reminiscent of small white irises. The room falls silent for a few seconds.

  - “Yikes!” Nyx finally exclaims. “You definitely look like someone’s villain! Julian, is she yours? Nice to meet you!”

  - “Villain?… She’d definitely be one yeah.” Julian grumbles.

  - “Me? A villain?” The director lightly laughs, the light in the room inexplicably dimming more and more every second. Julian could feel a hint of irritation underlying her tone. “I used to be. But I have decided to change that.”

  - “Wait, you’re already trying to redeem yourself?! But you haven’t done anything yet!” Nyx complains. “Or maybe I missed out, do you mind telling me what you did to Julian?”

  - “You know Nyx, it almost sounds like you WANT me to die.” Julian comments.

  - “...Nyx?” The director asks, leaning down towards Nyx and projecting her shadow over her. She tilts her head to the side and lightly frowns.

  - “That’s me!” Nyx replies. “Who are you?”

  - “What nonsense are you speaking? I cannot say I care for your little act of disrespect. I should extinguish you all, starting with you.”

  - “You know, I really, really don’t like you for some reason! Like, at all!”

  - “She’s the director of the Fifth Branch.” Agnes interjects. “She has officially been at the head of the department ever since its creation a few thousand years ago, but never accepted to register under a proper name.” She turns towards the director, squinting her eyes. “She’s very secretive, and very rarely appears in public. She has shapeshifting abilities, and people classify her as a spirit even though other spirits refuse to acknowledge her as such. She insists on being referred to as Lady Night.”

  - “You hold a surprising amount of knowledge about me, human.” The director comments, glancing at Agnes.

  - “All part of the job. Granted, the job in question just got a lot more complicated.”

  - “Lady Night?” Nyx tilts her head to the side. “I’m pretty sure that name is exclusive to me! I’ve never seen humans naming themselves like that before!”

  - “Oh it is exclusive to me.” Lady Night replies. “I would extinguish any human daring to compare themselves to me.”

  - “Wait… Extinguish?…” Julian pauses, his eyes widening in realization. “There’s no way.”

  Nyx and Lady Night stare at each other for a few seconds, blankly blinking in perfect sync. Nyx squints at her, and Lady Night deeply frowns.

  - “You can’t be me, I’m me.” Nyx says.

  - “What a preposterous assumption, I am the only instance of myself in the universe.” Lady Night says at the same time.

  - “If you’re me, why are you so creepy looking? And evil? I’m not supposed to be evil.”

  - “...The years have taken a toll on my vessel. And I will not allow you to call me evil. I am doing what is best. Mere humans cannot understand my work, and neither can you.”

  - “You don’t even sound like you like humans in the first place!”

  - “I do not. In fact, I despise them more than any other creature on this accursed planet.”

  - “...Okay.” Nyx drops her smile. “That can’t be right.”

  - “Delude yourself all you want.”

  - “I’ll give you one last chance to tell me that you’re just a human joking around, or I’m seriously going to atomize you.” Nyx’s magical energy violently flares up around her, the aura of light it created illuminating the entire room in a blinding white glow. She was shining like a star, her eyes glowing so brightly that Julian, Agnes and Sergius had to look away. “I’m not about to let my followers think I hate them because someone who pretends to be me goes around doing bad things to them.”

  - "Whether you jest or not, you will meet your end here.” Lady Night calmly replies. “The sheer difference in our ability will prove that I am the goddess you so desperately claim to be.”

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  A wave of darkness surges from the ground at her feet, engulfing Nyx’s light and quickly overpowering it. In a matter of seconds, most of the laboratory has turned pitch black, with the faint light coming from Nyx’s body forming a very small circle around her. She could sense a phenomenal amount of energy from that darkness, many times more intense than that of the Night Touched she fought during her first day at the capital.

  Huh ? That’s weird, normally I can see in the dark just fine. But I can’t see anything past my light right now…

  Nyx hears light footsteps slowly closing in directly in front of her, but before they can reach her Agnes’ voice resonates through the darkness.

  - “Lady Night, if me or any of my agents are harmed here you will be held responsible by the government of Specta.”

  - “...Then you shall be spared. Leave at once.” Lady Night replies. In the darkness, it sounded like her voice originated from the shadows themselves, coming from all directions.

  - “That also includes my witnesses!”

  - “So you do plan on revealing to the world the experiments conducted within this laboratory. Then I cannot let you live.”

  - “Experiments? What experiments? You’re the one who brought that up, Nyx is my witness to Julian’s missing case and Julian is the victim.”

  - “...You have witnessed the contents of these stasis chambers. Do not lie.”

  - “Yeah and I’m pretty sure I saw that wrong. Actually, a few of the people I recognized have already been found thanks to the hard work of my department ! Now if you’re saying that what I saw was right, that would be a much different issue. One that would probably get the attention of the Archmages, or the Church of Solomon.”

  - “...I see.”

  The darkness covering the room subsides, and Nyx’s light also dims. The director was less than a meter away from Nyx, and the latter flinches, taking a step back.

  - “Additionally, we infiltrated the mansion due to having discovered that a rogue mage was conducting illegal magic experiments on humano?ds. A Polemian official generously offered to join forces with us, but misunderstood our instructions and assumed we were attacking the Branch itself. Julian and Nyx were attempting to assist us in our investigation without permission, and will be dealt with accordingly. You will receive full compensation for the damages.” Agnes continues as she turns her head towards Sergius, slowly blinking to readjust her eyes to the light level of the room. "Now that we have located him, we are going to arrest him and put him through a fair trial, even though he destroyed most evidence and we were unable to investigate his workshop."

  - “So this is the story you choose to tell.” Lady Night scoffs. “Very well, take him. I will overlook your transgressions.”

  - “Director?!” Sergius exclaims.

  - “You will not object.” Lady Night cuts, before smiling at him. “Or are you in need of another reminder of your place in the universe?”

  - “...” Sergius silently stares at her, his hand instinctively rising up to his face to touch his eyepatch.

  - “With this, I return to my slumber.” Lady Night concludes.

  She walks past Nyx and leans down to get through the door, her footsteps growing distant.

  - “That was the most stressful moment of the month.” Agnes sighs before walking up to Julian. “I tried to get there as fast as I could. Can you stand?”

  - “Appreciate the help. And no, I can’t.”

  - “I’ll do my best to drag you along then, I can’t summon my stronger birds in these tight corridors.” Agnes then frowns. “Now, why did you run? Did you really think I was affiliated with these guys?”

  - “...No, not really. It’s just… I knew that the moment the info goes around the Arcane Guard that I’m not missing anymore, I wouldn’t be able to sneak into the mansion anymore. They aren’t on high alert right now, but they’re very familiar with my style of…” He suddenly stops, realizing that he said too much.

  - “...Assassinations?” She finishes his sentence.

  - “Looks like the cat’s out of the bag.”

  - “My ravens reported everything you said to me. We’ll talk about that later, but for now I really think you should come clean about this to Nyx and Beatrice, at the very least. Hiding something that big for so long really can damage their trust in you.”

  - “...I’m not looking to build trust.”

  - “You keep telling yourself that.” Agnes helps him up, letting him lean on her for support. She then walks towards Nyx, who hadn’t moved an inch. Her hands were shaking, and her eyes were fixated on the indigo slime slowly swirling in the giant columns of glass, keeping the unconscious people in stasis. “Everything alright?”

  - “...I don’t know. I have this... feeling that’s rising inside of me, that’s making me WANT to collapse stars into supernovas to destroy solar systems. And… I think I’m scared too? She’s just so much more powerful than me, it’s making me want to run somewhere away from her…”

  - “Oh, Nyx.” Agnes puts her hand on Nyx’s head with a sorry smile. “That’s perfectly normal for you to be upset. Let’s go back to the surface, and we can sort this out there alright? Try to breathe, it’ll help.”

  - “...I’m always breathing.”

  - “Slower, I mean.”

  - “Okay.” Nyx points to the tubes. “Are we leaving them here? I think I also see someone under the rocks and dust over there.”

  - “...I’m sorry Nyx, but we can’t take them with us. If we did, Lady Night would probably come after us no matter how I try to turn the situation, or the consequences associated with killing us. We have to keep this a secret if we want to live.”

  - “Okay.” Nyx repeats, turning towards the door without another word.

  They exit the laboratory, Sergius in tow while Nyx’s extremely loud breathing fills the silence. Agnes’ ravens were surrounding him, blocking off any escape routes he could consider. Agnes does notice that Sergius didn’t seem interested in running away at all. Eventually, they reach the stone staircase, and when they finally reach its end they are met with a scene of disaster. The main hall was thrashed, barely recognizable due to all the giant slashing marks in the walls. A giant, gaping hole was in the ceiling, the moon’s light shining through it and lighting up the battlefield. They could see the receptionist hiding under his desk, holding his head in his hands with his tail nervously tapping the floor. Dozens of guards were lying on the ground, unconscious. Thaddeus was laboriously breathing, using an ice spear as a crutch to remain standing, his suit torn to pieces. A few meters in front of him, Angelica was whirling her greatsword around with one hand as if it weighed nothing, grinning while covered in cuts and bruises. Pieces of her night gown were lying around the mansion, and she was wearing one of the mansion’s white curtains instead as a makeshift toga. She notices the group as they go down the stairs from the first floor.

  - “If it isn’t Julian!” She exclaims. “Are they your allies?”

  - “You actually fought them off.” Julian comments.

  - “As promised! Feel free to praise my overwhelming strength and martial prowess.”

  - “Congrats. Now please put something on.”

  - “Ah, the people of Specta.” Angelica shakes her head. “It was the same with that Thaddeus fellow, he suddenly had trouble fighting the moment those spears tore through my clothing. A true warrior has no shame fighting in the nude! Your domain can be attacked at any moment, especially in the middle of the night.”

  - “I get it, but…” Julian sighs, facing down to avoid looking at her. “You know what, I don’t have the strength for this. Do whatever you feel like.”

  - “Erm, Thaddeus?” Agnes calls out.

  - “Give me… a minute…” Thaddeus irritatedly replies, his ears rapidly flicking back and forth in anger. “I just… need to adapt… to her fighting style…”

  - “You don’t have to do that! This whole thing is a big misunderstanding, I’ll explain it to you tomorrow. You should go to the hospital and get some rest, I can have one of my birds take you there.”

  - “...So you’re involved… in something shady. Again…”

  - “What? No ! Why would I be?!”

  - “Forget it…” Thaddeus shakes his head.

  - “Wait, Thaddeus?” Nyx raises her head to look at him. “Hi, I didn’t know you looked like that. I feel like I would’ve at least seen the big ears on your head poking up under your hood.” She comments in a deadpan tone.

  - “Our traveling robes are enchanted to conceal our identities.” Agnes answers. “But don’t worry about it for now alright?”

  - “...Okay.”

  Agnes summons her harpy eagle, and it flies everyone back to the headquarters of the Fourth Branch. Angelica waves goodbye from the ground as more members of the Arcane Guard head towards the building from all directions while they take off.

  - "Farewell, elf boy!" She yells. "May we meet again!"

  - "God I hope not." Julian sighs. "But then again, I don't know if I could've done this without your help. Thanks."

  - "I can't hear you, your voice is too faint! Do speak up!"

  - "He said he can't wait!" Agnes shouts in his stead. "Also, I'm sorry about shifting the blame on you!"

  - "The blame?" Angelica looks around at the remains of the mansion's hall. "You don't mean..."

  - "Sorry, I can't hear you anymore!"

  - "Get back here you vixen! I cannot be bothered to deal with that much paperwor-"

  Her voice is muffled by the wind as the harp eagle accelerates towards their destination. A few minutes later, it descends towards the street next to the Fourth Branch's headquarters.

  - “The dorms are on the second to eight floors, drop by the infirmary on the ground floor first.” Agnes says as they land in front of the entrance of the tower. It was a massive marble gate with equally large double doors of glass that open by themselves when they walk close to them. “You should also check on Beatrice, I don’t know where you left her.”

  - “I will.” Nyx replies as she walks alone into the building.

  - “...I’ve never seen her like that.” Julian comments.

  - “Worry about yourself before worrying about others!” Agnes exclaims. “I’ll call the doctor for you, that’s pretty advanced magic-induced necrosis. I pray that he can salvage your hands.”

  - “That’s reassuring…”

  - “Don’t worry, he’s pretty competent. Anyways.” She turns to Sergius, who was still sitting on the back of the harpy eagle. “I’m taking you in for a nice, long interrogation.”

  - “Sure…” Sergius grumbles.

  - “Investigating the Fifth Branch is probably going to be the biggest case of my life.” Agnes comments, looking up at the stars in the sky. “I wonder where I should start…”

  - “Wait… you’re actually going to try to do something about this?!” Julian exclaims before coughing a bit of blood and dust.

  - “Obviously? They’re conducting human experiments and manufacturing Night Touched.” She whispers the last part of the sentence, glancing at Stergius.

  - “You’ll get killed!”

  - “Not if I take a more subtle approach. But I’m not compromising on this, it’s my duty to at least try. I didn’t sign into the Arcane Guard to watch people get kidnapped and do nothing about it.” Agnes clenches her fist, shaking in anger. “I can’t let this stand, under any circumstance.”

  - “...I probably can’t shake your resolve.”

  - “No you can’t! Now go to bed!”

  Agnes navigates through the main hall of the tower, a large open space with many glass windows, posters displaying faces of missing individuals, cushioned waiting seats and marble pillars neatly arranged around the room. She drops off Julian in front of a closed wooden door with “Infirmary” carved in bold letters on it, and knocks three times before leaving with Stergius. She turns towards him, staring straight into his eyes.

  - “We’re off to the interrogation room. Trust me, I’m getting that information out of you one way or another.” The vertical slits in her eyes turn so thin they become barely visible. “I’m not a fan of torture, so be cooperative if you don’t want me doing something I might regret later.”