Acacia's blood flowed backward. Standing up after so many punctured and broken bones was a death wish, yet he forced himself upright regardless. He limped to Elias while Malleus recovered from the blast of wind. Pain assaulted his system like a myriad of barbed nails. He ignored it, dulling his senses. Pain was a mental construct. It could be overcome. The success rate was exceedingly low, but his plan finally came to fruition.

  When he'd first seen Malleus in her theatrical display of self-inflicted wounds, he hadn't actually wasted time calling for the police.

  Instead, he'd sent Elias coordinates through text—a contingency he'd prepared the moment he sensed the theatrical nature of her performance. Her wounds had raised too many flags, patterns that screamed of deception to his analytical mind. So he'd carefully linked Elias to potential locations, buying time while his friend raced to intercept them. As Malleus led him through Windsor's twilight streets toward what she thought would be his execution, Elias was already en route. Acacia's sole task was survival until help arrived. Getting Malleus to monologue had been crucial, and her flamboyant pride had given him the precious minutes he needed. Though she had nearly killed him regardless—would have if Elias had been even seconds later.

  The pieces were in place now. Malleus would face a real fight at last. Yet Acacia harbored no illusions about his improved situation. Even with her attention divided between them, Elias was likely pushing against the upper limits of his abilities. But divided attention meant divided focus, and in that narrow margin lay their only chance at victory.

  "I called the number you gave me," Elias began. "I won't comment much on your connections, but... Sirius Trafalgar? You're kidding, right?" A sharp exhale punctuated the name that belonged in Windsor's highest echelons. "When I told him about your situation, he understood immediately."

  Perfect.

  Even in crisis, Elias had pieced together the implications. Though Acacia had hesitated to involve Pandora, Sirius remained a reliable constant despite his eccentricities.

  "I'll explain everything once we survive this," Acacia managed with a gaze locked on the woman who towered over them both.

  "Aye," Elias replied gravely, refusing to take his eyes off Malleus.

  "When you get out of this?" Malleus's laughter split the night like breaking glass. "My god, I can't even—" She cut herself off with another peal of manic mirth. "Pretty boy, what exactly do you think you can do? Fight me? Kill me? Look at your friend. I've been toying with the cripple all night." She spread her hands in a mockery of welcome as she advanced on Elias, bloodlust rolling off her in waves. "When you first saw me, your eyes quivered. You know exactly who I am—how infamous I am become. Leave now, and I might let you live." Her white gloves tightened, flaring red for just a moment.

  Elias’ blood ran cold, anticipating that something really bad was going to happen.

  "Gran Flie?en!" Turquoise circuits blazed across his form, different from Malleus' focused patterns. Where her power concentrated in specific points, Elias' spread like lightning through his entire frame.

  If Acacia remembered correctly, spells could be amplified upon their base state. There were two additional ways to differentiate a spell on top of its type. Class and Order. he recalled reading it in "Thaumaturgy in the Modern Form" at Ocarina's libraries.

  A spell's "Class" was the immutable parameter that determined its primary function, danger, and "intention" when creating it. Two classes existed: Elementary and Strategic. 95% of all existing spells in Thaumaturgy are Elementary Class, meaning that they were created for public use, typically taught in education as they're not deemed as overly dangerous or problematic to teach. Strategic Class spells were created for the sole purpose of military and Centrum Supremum use. It's not necessarily because they tend to be on the stronger end that they're restricted, but rather, their effects will always beget death, mass destruction, and societal upheavals if used without restraint.

  A spell's "Order" defines its mutable parameter, specifically its "degree of operation," "mechanism of manipulation," and "impact on the convergent reality." Whereas Class defines a spell's function, Order defines a spell's variation and "ranking". All spells possess their original incantation, which would be the "Base Order." However, spells could be amplified past their Base Order at the cost of Prana and more calculations. Two more Orders existed past the Base Order: Gran and Magnum. Gran amplifies the base spell's potency to a considerable degree, but Magnum calculates and then actualizes the absolute potential of a spell's existence based on the caster's abilities.

  Where [Flie?en] merely enhanced the body, [Gran Flie?en] transformed it into a living weapon. So when Elias moved like a bullet, displacing air in his wake, Acacia was ready. Before he could blink, Elias had him by the collar, yanking them both left to dodge the orange light erupting from Malleus' fingertips. They burst backward toward the alley's mouth, riding currents of displaced air.

  A firestorm coalesced around Malleus' hand, flames dancing like captured sunlight. She hurled it forward, forcing them to separate or burn. Acacia rolled right while Elias propelled himself left across the pavement. Even without formal combat training, the aspiring knight knew how to use terrain to his advantage. He glided across stone with a matador's grace, letting the fire dissipate harmlessly.

  But the flames didn't die.

  "[Gran Fiamma]." A sickeningly sweet smile crawled upon Malleus' features.

  The world transformed into an inferno.

  Fire erupted—bright as a volcano's heart—sweeping across every inch of the desolate street. The inferno's roar carried an otherworldly howl as reality itself seemed to burn. Unlike [Fimma’s] controlled burst of kinetic force, [Gran Fiamma] worked by first creating a vacuum, compressing energy to its breaking point before releasing it in a devastating explosion. The sudden expansion of matter and energy birthed a large-scale flashover that transformed the night into day.

  Heat waves, brilliant light, and thundering energy merged into a singular assault on the senses. Black smoke billowed outward, painting the world in shades of ash and ember.

  "Maybe I overdid it." Malleus dejectedly muttered in front of what looked like the aftermath of a bombing. "I wanted to play with them longer, especially that pretty boy." Her casual dismissal of such devastating power sent chills through the superheated air.

  The flames suddenly spun.

  Malleus' eyes widened as her inferno twisted into a spiraling vortex against her will. She retreated a step, feeling the scorching heat she'd created reflect back against her pale skin. Then, as suddenly as it formed, the fiery tornado dissipated into nothing.

  Her tongue clicked against her teeth. "The Windwaker Birthright?"

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  In the heart of where her inferno had raged, Elias stood guard over Acacia's struggling form. Only a trace of soot on his cheek betrayed that he'd weathered an inferno. [Gran Flie?en’s] circuits had evaporated in the hellfire, but something far more powerful had taken its place. A whirling vortex encircled them like nature's shield—elementary particles churning in endless rotation whilst creating a barrier that bent reality itself. Debris caught in its flow simply ceased to exist, drawn into the infinite spiral. At the edge of this anomaly, where Acacia lay, the air pressure remained gentle as a summer breeze—a pocket of calm in the eye of the storm.

  "Acacia, listen carefully," Elias whispered through gritted teeth. "I've burned through two high-cost spells; I can't waste any more prana. When I drop this barrier, we run left. We stay together—if we split up, she'll pick you off first. Be ready."

  Beaten and bloodied, Acacia forced himself to stand.

  "You know sign language?"

  "Required for the military track.” Elias tersely nodded.

  "Then follow my lead." Acacia raised his hand in a deliberate "okay" signal, which Elias acknowledged with the barest inclination of his head.

  Malleus, however, had run out of patience.

  "Enough games, brats!" She charged forward, new flames already gathering around her form.

  Right. It’s time. Acacia thought before lowering his center of gravity.

  As Malleus launched another Fiamma toward their vortex, Elias canceled his barrier at Acacia's signal. The assassin realized too late that she'd cut off her own pursuit route with the wall of flames. In that fractional moment of awareness, everything changed.

  Elias burst left, riding wind currents beneath his feet until he glided past Malleus like a shark on water. Acacia ran more slowly, letting the backdraft push him forward as he passed her position. But where Elias went left, Acacia veered right—splitting their forces in direct rejection of their spoken plan!

  "Acacia!" Elias tried to arrest his forward momentum, but Malleus was already there.

  "Gotcha!" Her grin flashed white in the darkness as her fist connected with Elias' cheek. Even with [Gran Flie?en] active, the follow-up kick still sent him flying across the street.

  Acacia never looked back, maintaining his course even as Malleus pursued Elias. His gambit had worked perfectly—though not for the reasons Elias had assumed. Despite being her primary target, she would have to neutralize the more immediate threat first. A skilled Thaumaturge like Elias couldn't be left at her back. More importantly, Acacia had already pieced together a darker truth.

  There’s another Bloodhound in Windsor.

  The evidence had been there from the start: the inexplicable traffic patterns, the way drivers had seemed oddly disconnected, Malleus' use of "we" instead of "I" when discussing her mission. Her instant decision to chase Elias rather than her target only confirmed it. She clearly trusted her partner to handle one powerless Irregular.

  Acacia forced himself to focus through the pain, calling up his mental map of Windsor's layout. Every street corner, every possible route calculated and recalculated as he ran.

  I'm trusting you can handle whatever she throws at you, Elias. He closed his eyes for a moment before reopening them with reinvigorated determination, channeling everything he had into his legs and heightened perception.

  He then checked his phone, thankfully it wasn't broken.

  7:57 PM.

  The battery was nearly dead, leaving him without a way to contact Pandora or Sirius. But time was still on his side. The next public area lay about 200 meters ahead—if he could reach it, he might be able to get help for Elias. He knew his friend would be smart enough to lead Malleus somewhere populated, but in their line of work, certainty meant survival.

  Just a bit longer, please.

  Streetlamps cast pools of sickly light across his path as he headed south. Everything hinged on reaching those crowded spaces, on finding a working phone to call for backup. Then he could double back to support Elias, praying he wasn't too late. Each step was a gamble against fate.

  But as he'd learned through bitter experience, when one prays to God, sometimes the devil answers first.

  Five minutes stretched into eternity before he finally reached South Plaza. But where there should have been the usual nighttime bustle—street vendors hawking food, music spilling from speakers, crowds moving between shops—there was only silence. The plaza lay abandoned, as if its entire population had vanished mid-moment. Display cabinets stood empty, tables and chairs scattered like debris after a storm. Shop doors hung open, cash registers abandoned mid-transaction, half-prepared meals left to grow cold. The entire scene carried the eerie stillness of a photograph, frozen in the instant its subjects fled.

  The second Bloodhound's work? Acacia realized, his ragged breathing loud in the unnatural quiet. He forced himself to focus on the immediate goal—finding a working phone. His eyes caught on a booth near the central fountain. Ignoring his mangled muscles, he pushed past abandoned umbrellas and discarded bags as he made his way toward what might be his only lifeline.

  Everything rested on this call. He could handle Pandora's inevitable fury, her cutting remarks and harsh reprimands. What mattered was that she would come, and with her, the tactical insight they desperately needed against these Bloodhounds.

  Something flickered at the edge of his vision just as he reached for the booth's handle. An odd sound followed—liquid striking pavement. He tried to dismiss it, focused solely on reaching the phone.

  Until he realized that liquid was his own blood.

  A silver blade had materialized from the darkness, opening a line of fire across his cheek just beneath his left eye. Pain bloomed fresh and sharp, drawing an involuntary hiss from his throat.

  "I’ve never been good at throwin' knives. Looks like I gave ya quite the cut. Either way, it's fine."

  Death's reminiscent bells reverberated in his mind. The presence stood quite a distance behind him, yet his ominous chill made the dozens of meters between the two feel like nigh-zero.

  He turned slowly, facing his executioner. A brown bun, scruffy beard, unremarkable build—everything about the man should have been ordinary. Yet something fundamentally wrong emanated from him, an absence rather than a presence. His gray eyes rejected light, reflecting nothing while somehow carrying the weight of countless murders. He wore his ordinariness like camouflage, making his underlying wrongness all the more disturbing.

  Sweat mingled with blood on Acacia's face as his breath caught in his throat.

  "I'm quite surprised you survived this long. Then again, y’all Irregulars just like cockroaches in a Fiora summer." The man's accent carried easily through the still air. “But I digress, this here was a fun game."

  His hand jerked back in a casual gesture.

  Invisible force seized Acacia's body, yanking him forward. The motion, the acceleration, the complete loss of control—all of it defied physics, yet his feet left the ground as he flew toward his attacker like a puppet on strings.

  No matter how much he struggled and yelled, it was useless.

  The man observed his approach disinterestedly, the other hand rising to catch Acacia by the throat. Despite his average frame, a whispered [Flie?en] transformed his muscles into something inhuman. He lifted Acacia up with terrible strength.

  Fingernails broke skin as the grip tightened. Before blood could even well from these fresh wounds, Acacia's entire body screamed in agony. He couldn't voice his pain, couldn't fight back, couldn't even draw breath. The man's grip had severed every connection between will and action.

  "I thought ya had skills, with how long it took that fool woman to deal withcha. Now I see she was just playing around. How annoyin’." The grip constricted further, drawing desperate gasps from Acacia's burning lungs. "It's getting late and I'm mighty tired. She'd probably complain if I didn't leave ya alive, but maybe I oughta just rip ya in half and hang the pieces from them phone lines. Make her a nice present." His toneless voice sent ice through the boy’s veins despite the clinical nature of his words.

  "Hmm. Nah. That's too messy and a waste of time." A contemplative pause, then: "Sorry for the sudden announcement, lil’ myunkey, but it's lights out for ya." The assassin's lips curved into the barest suggestion of a smile. "Know that Apollo, Revolver of the Bloodhounds, is ending yer pathetic life."

  Darkness crept across Acacia's vision like an eclipse, narrowing his world to pinpoints. Elias's rescue from Malleus had been calculated, planned—but this was an unknown variable, a factor he couldn't have accounted for. Just when he thought he'd escaped one nightmare, a deeper purgatory opened beneath his feet. Monkeys might not die easily, but even they couldn't escape when fate itself decided their time was up.

  He wanted to scream for help, to cry out for Pandora or Sirius or anyone who might hear, but that would only waste what little breath remained in his failing lungs.

  But, then, he saw it.

  Light.

  Swan Song with someone who enjoys high-stakes fantasy with a cerebral edge.

  is as bad as he seems.