"That's sexual harassment!" a small girl's voice cut in sharply, as the wolves' chants of praise turned instantly into screams of agony, and their bodies splattering across the snow like spilled red ink.
They had slammed themselves violently into the ground.
Standing in the center of the carnage was Gold, glaring down at the remains.
"Hmph. Scum will always be scum," she sneered. "Of course Red is adorable. Don't state the obvious just to earn her favor, fur-trash!"
Gold had the power to control minds and to plant powerful telepathic commands in the vulnerable.
The wolves had not simply died—they had been forced to smash themselves violently into the ground by her will.
Elsewhere in the domain, dozens of wolves had frozen in place, their bodies firm as only their wide, terror-stricken white eyes rolled in panic.
"You have a few seconds to answer my question," Green said with a calm smile, her voice carrying a sinister cheer. "If you answer correctly, you will be spared. But if you fail…"
Her eyes slid toward Blue, who was murmuring to herself while biting her knuckles. "Never forgive, never forget," the girl whispered, her tone low and unstable.
The wolves' fear deepened, their eyes practically begging for mercy, but they could not move from that spot.
Green held authority over time.
She could loop it, reverse it, or stop it altogether, though only within a defined space. To tamper with the entire concept of time would consume her magic far too quickly.
Blue, by contrast, commanded authority over space. She could bend and manipulate it however she pleased—compressing objects to their last form, folding distances, and even vanishing through teleportation.
"Okay, firstly!" Green began, loosening her power on their mouths so they could answer. "Who currently has the greatest potential love interest to marry our Master?"
The wolves exchanged frantic looks, then one stammered out, "T… Tamayō…?"
"Correct answer!" Green chirped. The wolves exhaled a shaky sigh of relief.
SPLASH!
Their bodies instantly burst into pulpy blood streams, staining the snow without warning.
"You were correct," Green added sweetly, giving a playful wink to the lifeless rags left behind. "But how dare you refer to Haha-ue so casually as 'Tamayō'? At least add 'sama,' you ignorant flea-bags!"
"Tsk! Those ones have terrifying abilities!" one wolf lamented. "Let's go for the purple one! She mostly just gives orders, so she might be weaker!"
"ROAR!!"
Several wolves charged toward the purple kitsune in reckless fervor.
"Oh my goodness," Silver muttered from where he shielded Blue, shaking his head in quiet disbelief. "Why would they abandon salvation, in form of dying at our hands, only to run straight into annihilation? Can they not see the difference in magic power and presence? These Specter Wolves are painfully reminiscent of the foolishness of human races. Either way, I see nothing but death awaiting them."
"Silver, you're so cool and mature!" Blue praised him brightly from the safety of his back.
Silver carried authority over perception.
He could appraise and analyze phenomena with ease, even glimpsing into the future to predict outcomes before they unfolded.
"Ohoho?" The purple kitsune raised her hand to cover her mouth, a sly smile tugging at her lips. "You all want to play with Onee-sama now?"
With a light clap from her delicate hand, and a deep vibration, dozens of wolves were torn apart by a powerful shockwave that ground away most of the frozen earth, melting the snow at its edges as the force rippled outward.
"Eek!" the survivors shrieked, stumbling back in terror to escape the girl.
But like a flickering light, she appeared at their flanks in an instant, using her hand to slice them cleanly in two, then using her feet to crush others without hesitation.
"H-Have mercy?" one wolf begged, pressing his paws together in desperate plea.
"Mercy? This is a playgrou—sorry, a battleground," she declared, her voice sharp and final. "There is no mercy for the weak."
With the mere flick of her finger, a shockwave burst forth, splitting both the wolf into two jagged halves, including the ground behind him.
Onee-sama was the most powerful of the eight Kitsunes.
She did not possess a peculiar authority as her siblings did, yet she bore double the measure of their magical energy combined with a level of physical strength so immense it bordered on the absurd.
Turning toward the White Kitsune, she strode casually in her direction, flicking blood from her hands as if it were nothing more than a minor inconvenience.
"Shiro, are you not going to partake in the bloodshed?" she asked evenly.
Then Brown arrived, hurling a group of terrified wolves bound tightly in a blue fox fire cord.
Shiro slowly opened her eyes to the chaos that engulfed the Wolves' domain. Her crimson gaze gleamed, and within her pupils, a golden cross was etched in intricate detail, giving her the aura of a holy priestess.
Raising her arm, she drew her flowing garment across the lower half of her face.
"I dislike violence and bloodshed," she said calmly, her voice soft yet unwavering. "My purpose is to bring comfort and warmth to everyone I meet… but…"
She stepped toward the trembling wolves bound before her.
"My warmth does not extend to enemies… Still, I will share it with them nevertheless."
The moment her hands brushed against a wolf, a radiant golden light enveloped them in a dome that pulsed with warmth.
Shiro smiled gently and patted them, and for a fleeting moment, the wolves wagged their tails as if touched by kindness.
Until, all at once, nothing remained but tufts of dark fur scattered across the snow.
The wolves had been purified.
Shiro was unlike the other darkness-attributed beings of the Shadow Realm. She alone wielded Holy magic, a power of purification: an ability so dreaded that all the Principalities of darkness regarded it with terror.
The Kitsunes continued their onslaught, tearing apart the domain and staining the land with the blood of unwitting wolves, until—
SMASH!!
Brown was suddenly driven into the ground, half-buried and twitching from the force of a crushing blow.
"You diseases dare come to scourge us again?" roared a towering muscle-bound man, his presence blotting out the chaos around him.
He had short, deep blue hair, and his pitch-black eyes gleamed with pupils of blazing red. "Even if you wear the appearances of children, this is still a battlefield. I will show no mercy unless you turn back."
Upon his massive shoulder sat a small girl, cheerful and unshaken.
"You all just never learn, do you?" she said, shaking her head with a sigh. "One of these days, Hachiman-sama will truly lose his temper, and when that happens, you'll regret it."