The ughter grew louder as the hallway widened into a grand atrium. Lanterns dangled from invisible strings above, flickering with sickly light. The walls were painted with endless murals of smiling masks, until the masks blinked.

  Lea froze.

  The paintings peeled themselves from the walls, joints cracking as the ft colors thickened into depth. Wooden limbs, dangling strings, painted faces.

  One puppet.

  Then ten.

  Then hundreds, crawling free like insects shaken from their nest.

  Soon, the entire chamber was alive with their cttering steps.

  "Thousands...", Lea whispered, her grip tightening on her sword.

  Each puppet had the same grin, the same hollow stare, but they moved with a jerking rhythm that was unnervingly synchronized, like the heartbeat of some vast creature.

  Auger whistled low, tapping his cane against the stage, "A fine guard, wouldn't you say? Efficient, cheap, repceable. Truly, Creation has its practical side."

  Lea gred at him, "Now is not the time to admire them...!"

  "Oh, but it is.", he said mildly, "For me, at least."

  The first wave surged forward, limbs rattling, cws snapping like broken marionettes.

  Lea raised her sword, intercepting the front line. Their strikes hammered against the canopy, each blow sending vibrations through her bones. Her arms shook under the strain.

  She ducked low, twisted, then swept her sword free.

  The bde hissed with a faint golden glow as she overps Judgement's astral edge with her own, but bck cracks veined across it, Malediction's power eating at the light.

  Her heart pounded. She lifted the weapon high, the words forming unbidden on her lips.

  "Judgement."

  A radiant sword, rger than she was, manifested in the air above her, forged from raw golden light. But it wasn't pristine like the Judges' bdes. It flickered, edges frayed with writhing darkness.

  Lea swung.

  The astral sword came crashing down, cleaving a dozen puppets clean in half. The fragments burned away into smoke, leaving only their grins floating for a heartbeat before vanishing.

  The entire horde staggered back at once, as though startled.

  Lea panted, sweat already beading at her temples. She had no clue what to do, "Haah… haah… okay… that works."

  But the puppets regrouped. More crawled from the murals, their numbers unending. The chamber seemed to stretch, offering infinite space for infinite soldiers.

  Lea braced herself, her sword trembling in her grip, "Judgement!"

  Another golden bde formed overhead, darker than the st. She hurled it forward, cleaving through an entire row, scattering wooden limbs across the stage.

  Her knees buckled slightly. Every swing drained her, the borrowed authority of Judgement gnawing at her body and mind. Her lungs burned, her vision fuzzed at the edges.

  Yet she forced herself onward, each invocation more desperate than the st.

  "Judgement!!"

  Sword after sword fell, carving swathes through the puppets. The atrium shook with every impact, echoing like a cathedral under siege.

  Still, more came.

  Lea's arms quivered. She could barely keep her weapon raised. Her breaths came ragged, her chest heaving as though she were drowning.

  The puppets advanced again, undaunted. Their hollow grins never faltered.

  Behind her, Auger had not moved. He leaned on his cane, eyes glinting with schorly delight, his smile faint but sharp.

  "How fascinating.", he murmured, half to himself, "So your Judgement manifests through Malediction's filter… not a gavel of w, but an executioner's bde. Less order, more destruction."

  He tilted his head, amused, "Raw, inelegant, and yet… devastating."

  Lea's sword slipped in her grip, nearly falling from her fingers. She caught it, panting, gring at the endless tide.

  "I… I can't…", she whispered.

  "Mm, Can't?", Auger's smile deepened. "Or won't admit this is beyond your skill level?"

  Her knees hit the wood. The puppets closed in. Their grins loomed above her.

  The astral bde flickered weakly overhead, straining to hold form.

  But Lea still clenched her teeth, forcing the word past her lips, her voice cracking but defiant.

  "…Judgement."

  The sword split apart mid-fall, colpsing into shards of golden-dark fire that rained indiscriminately across the horde. Puppets shrieked as they were shredded into splinters.

  But the explosion knocked Lea back, smming her into the floorboards. She coughed blood, her vision swimming.

  For a heartbeat, there was silence.

  Then, the pitter-patter of countless wooden feet. The survivors stepped forward again.

  And Auger, still untouched, still calm, finally moved—lifting his cane ever so slightly.

  "Well then.", he muttered, eyes still on Lea's trembling form, "Let me show you what I can do."

  He stepped in front of Lea, smiling.

  "Contract, Bond, Pact, and Creation. What do you think a Pathstrider wielding these is called?", he asked, half-jokingly.

  "I... don't know...?", Lea frowned, but her eyes were still on the incoming puppets, "Businessman?"

  Auger ughed, "Haha! But no, it isn't what you would expect at all."

  He tapped his cane on the wooden floor, creating a crisp sound and sparking electricity.

  "A Pathstrider walking those Paths is called..."

  In the blink of an eye, the thousands of puppets were destroyed by a surge of lightning. Lea could only stare with her eyes wide.

  "Hero."

  =0=0=

  Deep within the spiraling heart of the maze, Dickenson staggered through a corridor of painted doors that ughed at him in a thousand voices. His chest heaved, his fingers twitching against the strings he used to control the horde. Sweat poured down his face, soaking the colr of his crimson performer's jacket.

  He had prepared for intruders, yes, he had expected Hunters, Judges, perhaps even a Bureau Inquisitor if the Bureau had caught wind of the ritual too early. He had countermeasures for all of them.

  But this?

  The sudden colpse of thousands of puppets in a single stroke sent pain ncing through his temples, backsh shredding across the tether of his craft. His own creations, snuffed out like candles in a storm.

  And then, the lightning.

  It wasn't just destruction.

  It was wful.

  Ordered.

  A strike that decred itself absolute. And with it came the echo of a presence that weighed down the entire byrinth, heavier than the painted doors, heavier than the god's gaze he was trying to court.

  Dickenson's knees buckled, his back hitting the cold stage-wall as he scrambled backward, muttering like a man unraveling:

  "No, no, no, no… that's impossible, no Pathstrider should—"

  He felt it.

  He knew it. This wasn't some overeager Abyss Hunter or a masked Judge testing their authority.

  This was someone who had walked past the Fifth Step and still kept climbing. Someone the Paths themselves bent toward, not out of reverence, but out of contract.

  He bit down on his finger, drawing blood, smearing it across the string sigils tattooed on his arm, trying to stabilize his colpsing control.

  But the shadows flickered, and in them, he heard the sound of a cane tapping wood. Steady, patient.

  Dickenson froze.

  His breath quickened as he felt the weight of that presence draw closer, each step measured, each spark of residual lightning humming through the maze itself.

  "Not normal…", he whispered, his voice breaking, "Not normal at all…"

  His ughter came thin, hysterical, as he smmed his palms against the wall and tried to command the byrinth to close, to fold away, to hide.

  But the wood only shuddered like a guilty servant, unwilling to obey.

  "Fifth Step… no, more than that…", Dickenson's thoughts raced, his eyes darting. He remembered scraps of rumors, half-forbidden notes traded between Pathstriders who thought themselves safe in secrecy.

  A Hero from the previous era, hunting down evil, someone who challenged divinity itself.

  And now, he realized, that very presence had walked onto his stage.

  Dickenson's painted smile mask cracked at the edges as he whispered, voice shaking,

  "I was only supposed to draw the god's eye… not his."

  The cane tapped again.

  Closer.

  And this time, the ughter of the maze did not belong to the puppeteer.

  ...

  The atrium still smoked with the splinters of countless puppets, the acrid tang of burnt wood and varnish clinging to the air.

  Lea coughed into her hand, golden sparks flickering weakly from her parasol's bde as she tried to push herself upright. Her arms trembled, legs shaky under her own weight.

  Then she looked up.

  Auger was standing amidst the ruin as if he'd merely brushed dust from a table. The entire horde, thousands of puppets, their painted grins, their jerking limbs— all gone.

  Vaporized, erased, like they had never existed. The air still crackled with residual arcs of lightning, humming in reverence to the man with the cane.

  Lea blinked at him, incredulous. Her lips parted before she could stop herself, "You could've done that the whole time?!"

  Auger gnced over his shoulder at her, a faint smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.

  "And rob you of the chance to test your strength? Perish the thought.", his chuckle was deep, amused, like an old man entertained by a child's tantrum, "Besides, your Judgement… messy, but impressive."

  Lea groaned, dragging herself to her feet, brushing splinters from her coat, "Messy, impressive, whatever!! You could've saved me from coughing blood, you know!!"

  That earned a ugh, a full, warm ugh that echoed against the painted walls, "Ah, youth. Always so dramatic."

  She squinted at him, parasol resting against her shoulder, the golden aura flickering faintly, "Seriously, though… who even are you?"

  Besides some noble from another country who casually reveal his name... Let grumbled in her mind.

  Auger turned, leaning lightly on his cane, eyes glinting with that ageless sharpness. He looked down at her, the faintest grin cutting across his face.

  "Me?", He tapped the cane once against the broken stage, electricity sparking at his feet.

  "Just a passing by demigod."

  Lea blinked, "That is not funny."

  "Mm. Who said it was a joke?", He strolled forward without another word, the byrinth itself shuddering as though recognizing his cim.

  Lea exhaled slowly, tightening her grip on her sword, "…I'm so screwed, aren't I?"

  Auger's chuckle drifted back to her, low and pleased, "Oh, absolutely."