The dim room was bathed in a thin, blood-tinged veil of crimson moonlight. The glow leaked through the half-shuttered window, spilling shadows across the floorboards and turning the air heavy.
Klara Moriarty stood just inside the doorway, her breathing careful, her cane resting lightly in her hand. Her eyes tracked the three men in black coats. They had collapsed—or been arranged—around the bedroom like discarded marionettes. One against the bed, one slumped by the sofa, one leaning stiffly near the closet.
Their chests rose and fell, but too evenly. Too measured. Their posture was wrong: their limbs weren't sprawled like those of true sleepers, no slouching surrender to gravity, no twitch of muscles caught in dream. Their breathing was perfectly synchronized, each inhalation and exhalation folding into the next like a rehearsed chorus.
Her gaze shifted to the sofa. She had sunk into it earlier, gathering herself, but now she watched the faint outline she had left in the cushion's fabric. Her body remembered the weight of the room pressing down. She remembered letting her eyes slip closed, letting the veil of sleep—or what passed for it—carry her away. She hadn't expected the plunge to come so swiftly.
Her consciousness drifted, and the room, the crimson light, and the rigid sleepers fell away.
Her dream was not a dream at all.
It opened as a gray, distorted world. The air churned with strange flashes of brilliance, as if broken lanterns flickered in the dark. They came and went—there one heartbeat, gone the next—until finally, mercifully, one steadied. The light solidified, pulling her into a scene.
It was a corner. A narrow, filthy one. Sewage pooled and sloshed underfoot, rippling with each drip from a cracked gutter. The stench hit her like a slap.
And there—against the mold-streaked wall—slumped a man.
He had short brown hair. A white shirt clung to his frame, and a brown vest sagged open. For a heartbeat, she almost convinced herself this was him, the missing detective, Zreal Viktor Lee.
Then her gaze caught his face.
Half his lips were gone. Torn away, chewed into raw pulp that bared yellow teeth and blackened gums. His nose—what was left of it—was a blotch of blood and clotted hair. Chunks of flesh had vanished from his cheeks, his jaw, his forehead, until the white of bone gleamed through like shards of porcelain.
And he was not alone.
Gray rats swarmed him. Dozens, perhaps hundreds. They skittered over his boots, his knees, his chest. Their teeth nipped and tugged at loose flesh. Maggots, fat and slick, writhed across the wounds, pushing and squirming in glistening waves. They clung to the raw edges of his throat, which gaped like something had ripped it out with savage force.
Klara's breath hitched. She staggered a step back, even though the scene existed only in her mind. Her gloved hand covered her mouth before she realized she had moved. The smell of rot was too vivid, the wet chewing of vermin too loud. She wanted to shut her eyes, but she couldn't.
It was him.
Zreal Viktor Lee.
Or what was left of him.
Her mind flickered back to the photograph Ian had shown her: the man's firm jaw, his steady gaze, the faint curve of a confident smile. That image mocked her now. Because here, in this pit of sewage and vermin, there was no detective. No man at all.
Only a carcass gnawed to pieces.
Her chest clenched. A sour nausea coiled in her throat. She had seen corpses before. She had seen violence, murder, bodies mangled in alleys and rivers. But this—this desecration—this consumption—was different.
Klara pressed her knuckles hard against her thigh, forcing herself to breathe.
Zreal was already dead.
Not missing, not hiding, not captured with hope for rescue. Dead. And in a few more days, there might not even be bones left to bury.
Her pulse hammered as she tore herself free of the vision. The sewage, the rats, the hollow sockets of Zreal's face dissolved into a whirl of gray static. Her mind clawed its way up, desperate for the surface.
And then—
She opened her eyes.
The crimson moonlight had not shifted. The room was exactly as it had been. The three black-coated men still breathed in their dreadful synchrony, still slumped where they had been.
But Klara could not calm herself. Her hands trembled. She had to curl her fingers into her skirt to still them.
It wasn't just what she had seen. It was the weight behind it.
A corpse torn apart in filth, yes—but more than that. A warning. A glimpse of rot that was not merely physical but spiritual. Something had its claws in this case, and she could not name it.
She looked to the window. The crimson moon stared back, unblinking.
Klara shut her eyes briefly, gathering herself. Ten seconds. Twenty. She breathed until her heart slowed, until her mind could form thought again.
She would need answers. Not from rats or sewage, but from the living—or what passed for it.
Her gaze slid to the man slumped by the sofa. His aura had been faint, blurred in her earlier vision. But perhaps his soul had more to say than his body.
She reached into her coat, fingers closing around the vial she had prepared: Amantha extract, sharp and bitter, its scent like crushed leaves after a storm. A second vial—Eye of the Spirit—joined it, a pale liquid that shimmered faintly in the moonlight.
Tools, no more. But tools to open a door.
The Serenity Agent, she discarded. She didn't need it. She had always been good at stepping into dreams, at forcing her way into souls if need be. And tonight, she would need that strength.
Klara set her cane aside and cleared a small patch of floor. Her hands moved in practiced rhythm, laying out the chalk, the candles, the simple altar to focus her will. The air thickened with the quiet fragrance of burning herbs, and soon the room felt like it hung suspended between waking and dreaming.
Her lips parted, whispering a name.
Not a god's.
Her own.
"The Fool that doesn't belong to this era," she murmured, voice steady despite the tremor still in her chest. "The ruler above the gray fog. The King of Yellow and Black who wields fortune."
The words rippled outward, carrying her will. She let herself drift, crossing through the veil.
The world dissolved. For a heartbeat she floated in a storm of thoughts, a sky littered with stars, a chaos too vast to name. Then her focus sharpened, her spirit latching onto the tether of her prayer.
She returned. Or rather—she returned elsewhere.
In that space, she saw him.
The man's form wavered before her, translucent and fragile, as if a mere breath could shatter it into shards of mist. His illusory eyes were vacant, his tone flat and slow, caught between waking and dreaming.
"Who sent you to Zreal's home?" Klara asked. Her voice was steady, but her chest burned from the strain. Her spirituality, already stretched thin from the dream and the prayer, tugged at the edges of her mind.
The figure's mouth moved sluggishly, words dragging themselves free.
"Meursault. Meursault sent me to wait for the boy named Ian."
Klara stiffened, her gaze sharpening. The space behind the apparition rippled, light shifting and rearranging until it condensed into an image: a lean man with dark skin, hard lines cutting across his face. His posture was sharp, his eyes brimming with violence. She recognized him instantly.
The leader of the group that had chased Ian aboard the steam train.
Her knuckles whitened against her skirt. So it was him after all.
The strain in her temples grew sharper, but she pressed forward. She had no luxury of hesitation. "Who ordered Meursault?" she asked, each word clipped.
The man's spectral eyes blinked, slow and hollow. "No idea… He's an executioner of our Zmanger gang. No one can order him other than the boss."
Zmanger.
The name struck Klara like a hook dragged across her memory. The word meant "warrior" in the language of the highlanders, a name buried deep in footnotes of old records she had once studied in her obsessive searches into mysticism and forgotten cults. Threads of knowledge tugged at her mind, half-formed, dangerous.
A sudden pain lanced through her skull. It was sharp enough to rip a gasp from her lips. Her body convulsed, and the storm of thoughts she had forced herself into wrenched her out violently.
Darkness swallowed her.
When her eyes opened again, Klara was back in Zreal's bedroom. The stench of herbs—Amantha extract, Eye of the Spirit—clung heavy in the air, sharp enough to sting the nose. Her head throbbed with a brutal rhythm, each pulse reminding her how recklessly deep she had delved.
For a moment she sat still, shoulders heaving with each breath. Her hand trembled as she rubbed her temple, but she forced herself to move methodically. One by one she collected the ritual materials, packed away the candles, folded the short yellowish-brown hairs into a pocket. Order was the only shield she had left against the shiver crawling down her spine.
She crossed to the oriel window and tugged it open, letting in the night wind. It rushed across her face, cold and biting, dispersing the fog of incense and charred herbs. She lingered there, staring out at the quiet street of Rose Street. Shadows stretched long, lamplight flickering. Every corner seemed too still, as though someone—or something—watched.
She shook herself free of the thought. There was no time to indulge that creeping paranoia. With quiet efficiency, she moved back through the room. She wiped every place her hands had touched, straightened the sheets, adjusted the chairs, restoring the bedroom to its untouched state.
Her gaze lingered on the three black-coated men. They still sat in their false slumber, chests rising and falling in perfect, artificial rhythm. She pressed her hand to her chest, bowing slightly to them. The gesture was half instinct, half habit—a silent apology to the souls bound to bodies not their own.
Straightening, she drew on her gloves, tugged them tight, and strode back to the window.
Her body moved with the precise control of the Clown. Every muscle, every weight shift, calculated. She swung herself over the sill, tiptoeing along the narrow ledge. The vertical latch of the window hung loose, ready to betray her with a clatter. She slid a tarot card into place, holding it steady, adjusting until the balance was perfect.
Her breath slowed. Her hands steadied.
A twitch, a slip—and then she pulled the card free. The latch dropped—
But she was already moving. In a fluid twist she closed the first half of the window. A heartbeat later, she jumped across to the other, her hand snapping it shut with a practiced jerk.
Clang!
The latch struck home, slotting perfectly into its hole. The sound rang out, sharp as glass struck by wind.
Klara's stomach dropped.
Inside the bedroom, the rhythm of breathing shifted. The three men stirred. Their slumber was breaking.
No time.
Without hesitation, she leapt from the second-story ledge. The fall jarred her ankles, sent a sharp ache through her knees, but she landed solidly. The cobblestones of Rose Street were merciless underfoot, but her body absorbed the impact, and she darted into the shadows before the noise could betray her.
Her breaths came harsh now, visible clouds in the cold night air. She pressed forward, cloak snapping behind her, forcing herself not to look back at the bedroom she'd left.
She did not head directly for Cherwood Borough. That would have been foolish. Instead she wove through the streets, slipping down narrow alleys, turning corners until the map of Backlund blurred.
The air cut sharp into her lungs. The cold gnawed into her bones until her teeth ached. She shivered once, violently, and muttered under her breath, "A sweater next time. And charcoal. Gods, I'll need more charcoal."
The thought felt absurdly mundane in contrast to the roiling dread still curled in her chest. But it anchored her, kept her feet moving.
Eventually, she found herself in East Borough. She had no map, but her instincts carried her, the same instincts sharpened by rituals and glimpses into the gray fog. The moon guided her, crimson and pitiless, carving faint light across streets that would otherwise be black voids.
She slowed. Something flickered at the edge of her sight.
A silhouette.
Tall, deliberate, unmistakably familiar.
Adrian.
He moved with his usual calm precision, white gloves catching the faint moonlight as he handed out parcels of food and folded blankets to the homeless scattered along the street. His voice was quiet, steady, reassuring as he bent down to speak with them, his posture free of judgment.
Behind him lingered guards—uniformed men, their jaws clenched, their eyes narrowed. Their dislike was palpable, their frustration almost comical in its restraint. They bit the insides of their cheeks, their expressions disciplined into silence as they trailed Adrian like unwilling shadows.
Klara's instinct was to turn away, to slip back into the alley and vanish. Her body tensed, steps faltering. She pulled her collar higher, shading her face in the gloom.
But then Adrian's gaze found her.
"Detective," he said, his voice carrying easily through the cold. "Hard at work, I see?"
The words made her sigh. She lowered her collar, giving up the pretense. "I see you are too," she retorted, the words weary but not without edge.
Adrian merely shook his head, the faintest smile touching his lips. "I am merely on a walk," he answered evenly.
He knelt briefly, draping a blanket over the shoulders of another shivering man. Then, without breaking stride, he continued down the road, sauntering past her with unhurried calm.
As he passed, his eyes flicked over her face. Something in them lingered a beat too long.
"Do get some sleep too, Detective," he said softly. "You look… worn out."
The words struck more deeply than she cared to admit. Her exhaustion, the gnawing dread of Zreal's corpse, the searing ache behind her eyes—all of it suddenly felt visible, as though Adrian had peeled back her carefully arranged facade.
She held her ground as he moved on, the guards falling in line behind him. Their steps were rigid, their scowls intact.
Then a cackle split the night.
Ronan, bounding after Adrian like a mischief let loose, waved at her with exaggerated cheer. "Sleep well, Detective!" he shouted, laughter bubbling behind the words.
Klara's shoulders slumped. She didn't answer. She only watched as they disappeared into the shadows, Adrian's white gloves the last thing to fade from view.
The night clung to her like damp cloth as Klara drew in a slow, steady breath. Her lungs ached with exhaustion, her temples still throbbing faintly from the séance she had forced herself through hours before. She had managed only a few hours of shallow rest in her modest East Borough room before rising again. The job left no room for indulgence, and the case—it gnawed at her.
On the worn table beside her lay a broken branch, stripped of leaves, plain to the eye but consecrated by her whispered intentions. A dowsing rod, improvised and fragile. She held the short lock of Zreal's yellowish-brown hair tightly between her fingers, repeating softly like a prayer:
"The location of Zreal's corpse. The location of Zreal's corpse."
The words left her mouth over and over until they seemed to hum against her ribs, threading themselves into her pulse. Each repetition pulled her forward, her steps carrying her through the narrow, crooked streets of East Borough.
The neighborhood breathed misery. Dilapidated brick houses leaned into one another like drunks staggering home; the air was thick with coal smoke, rotting refuse, and that persistent wetness that seemed to seep into every stone. Yet Klara barely noticed. Her eyes were fixed, her senses sharpened, the tug of the ritual pulling her like a string wound tight around her sternum.
It led her, eventually, to a corner where the earth reeked of something far worse than decay. A sewer entrance gaped like a wound in the cobblestones.
She froze at its edge, her lips tightening.
The Loen Kingdom prided itself on these sewers, great subterranean veins carved beneath the capital after the plague. A triumph of modern engineering, they had called it. She knew better: triumph or not, the sewers had always been death's companion. Disease, rot, secrets discarded in the dark—they all lingered there.
But she had no choice.
With a grunt, she shoved aside the manhole cover, iron groaning in protest. She pulled her collar high over her nose and began her descent down the slick, vertical rungs.
The stench hit her first—thick, wet, suffocating. It clung to her clothes, seared into her lungs, and for a brief second she thought she might retch. Her hands trembled on the rungs, but she forced herself lower. Ten seconds, twenty. Her boots sank into muck when they finally reached the ground.
The texture alone made gooseflesh rise along her arms. Sticky, viscous. Filth seeped through the thin seams of her boots and crawled cold between her toes. She suppressed a shudder, gathering herself.
This is nothing, she told herself. Nothing compared to what you've seen before.
The tunnel stretched before her, quiet save for the faint drip of water. Her steps echoed as she pushed deeper, the rod in her hand twitching as though it were alive. She followed its pull until she reached a fork, half-hidden in shadow. A stronger smell wafted from there, sharper, acrid, crawling down her throat like acid.
Her stomach twisted. She already knew what she would find.
Klara pressed onward.
She didn't need a candle. The world shifted as she opened her sight, Spirit Vision blooming across her eyes. Light swam into view, colors layering themselves over the darkness. Threads of spirituality clung thick to the walls, glowing motes flickering like swarms of fireflies.
And then—
The corpse.
It lay slumped in a corner, consumed by vermin. Rats swarmed it, their teeth tearing, their gray fur slick with filth. Half the face was gone, skin stripped to bone. Maggots wriggled fat and pale where flesh still clung, their writhing bodies like worms in spoiled fruit. The air was so thick with rot she tasted iron and bile on her tongue.
She knew him. Or rather, she knew what he had been. Zreal Viktor Lee, handsome in his photographs, respected by those who spoke his name. Now reduced to a ruin so vile she could barely reconcile the two.
Her throat tightened. For a moment, she couldn't breathe.
The rats squealed, scattering when her presence disturbed them. Some retreated into the shadows, others lingered stubbornly, unwilling to part with their feast. Their eyes gleamed in her sight, twin pinpricks of cold light watching her.
Klara steadied herself, pressing down on the tremor in her chest. Her hands moved automatically, drawing chalk and candles, arranging the ritual with practiced care even as nausea churned inside her. The air thickened with the whisper of incense, the faint coil of breath drawn into the pattern she carved around the corpse.
She shut her eyes, intoned softly:
"The cause of Zreal's death. The cause of Zreal's death."
Her voice blended with the sound of dripping water, with the shuffle of rats, with the silent weight of the sewers pressing down on her.
When she opened her eyes again, the blackness had swallowed them whole. Pupils and sclera alike drowned in ink, her gaze turning into endless void. Her consciousness slipped, turning inward, deeper, until she was no longer in the sewer but drifting into that liminal haze of dream and death.
Mist coiled. Shadows whispered.
But nothing came.
No figure. No voice. No answer.
Klara's brow furrowed. She pressed harder, her will cutting through the fog. Again she called, again she demanded.
Still, nothing.
Her grip on the ritual slipped, the tenuous threads unraveling around her. A sharp chill raced through her body as she was thrown back, gasping. The blackness receded from her eyes, leaving her vision blurry and her head heavy.
The mediumship had failed.
Her hand curled into a fist.
There was no mistaking it—Zreal's spirit was gone. Not just gone, but dealt with. Severed, erased, plucked clean by a hand far more precise than death's ordinary scythe.
Someone had been here before her. Someone who knew what they were doing.
Her mind flashed back to Ian's words, to the accounts of Zreal being seen at a party even after he had vanished, of other detectives refusing the boy's plea because they themselves had met the man. An impostor. A disguise. A Beyonder.
She straightened slowly, the weight of the realization pressing into her bones. The air in the tunnel felt colder now, as though the shadows themselves recoiled from her thoughts.
If Zreal had been consumed by something—someone—with such precision, then this was no simple disappearance. This was not merely another body in the sewers of Backlund.
This was power. Hidden, deliberate, orchestrated.
Klara knelt by the corpse, forcing herself to look one last time at what remained. She closed her eyes, whispering under her breath: "Rest." It was a hollow word, but it was all she had.
Rising, she snuffed out the candles, scattered the chalk, erased the circle until no trace remained. The rats crept back cautiously as she stepped away, their squeaks swelling once more into a chorus.
She climbed back toward the surface, each rung heavy under her hands. The manhole groaned open again, spilling her into the night air. She drank it in, even tainted with coal smoke and damp mist. Anything was better than the reek below.
For a long moment she stood at the edge of the street, her hand pressed to her temple, her breath uneven.
She should end it here. That was the sensible choice. Zreal was dead, his spirit gone, his case far larger than any single detective had the right to pry open. Her responsibility had been fulfilled: she had found the truth, or at least enough of it.
And yet—
Her thoughts returned to Adrian.
The Judge, who had dismissed Zreal's disappearance as insignificant. The Judge, who nevertheless involved himself just enough to nudge the case into her hands. Who spoke with that infuriating calm, who seemed to see more than he ever admitted.
Klara shivered, though the wind had stilled.
"...maybe this is why the Judge is interested in this case," she murmured aloud.
The words echoed in her chest, heavy as stone.