Another dawn came to Oden wrapped in thick, gray fog. By the time the temple bells rang for morning prayers, the streets of the capital were already in chaos — shouting, galloping syndyrs, and frightened whispers spreading from corner to corner.
The news hit like a thunderclap. High Priest Ji Dae-Hyun, who had vanished from his locked chambers in the Sun Temple just hours after an emergency council meeting, had turned up again in the market district near the central canal. But he hadn't come back to preach.
Dressed in torn, filthy ceremonial robes and gripping a heavy iron blade, he'd walked straight into a crowded street and attacked. He cut down several worshippers of his own faith, cornered High Cleric Ahjin of the rival Yeoljin order outside an apothecary, and stabbed him again and again in broad daylight. When imperial guards finally cornered him with spears raised, he did not surrender.
Witnesses said he just stared through them with empty eyes, dragged the blade across his own throat, and dropped dead on the stones.
The killings were so brutal and strange that the magistrate ordered the printing presses to hold back the worst details. Even the town criers hesitated to repeat what they'd heard.
Outside the district watchhouse, a crowd gathered around a woman weeping on a bench, her two children clinging to her skirts.
"He was insane!" she sobbed. "My husband only stepped up to bow to him! He never missed a morning blessing, he was a good man! But the priest didn't even look human anymore — his eyes glistened in yellow for a brief moment, like some animal in the dark. Then he just attacked. Pulled a knife and stabbed him over and over. There was so much blood..."
She pressed her hands to her face as her son began to cry beside her. "The temple has to answer for this," she pleaded to the guards. "My husband hauled timber from sunup to sundown just to keep food on our table. What am I supposed to do now? How do I feed my children?"
The guards said nothing, eyes down.
Across the district, a crowd had swarmed the Sun Temple of Hwadosen. Writers, furious citizens, and the merely curious packed the plaza, hurling rotten fruit and stones at the temple's white doors. A line of imperial guards locked shields together to hold the mob back from burning the place down.
Inside, behind barred doors, the temple's high clerics sat around a low table, pale and shaking.
"This is madness," said Cleric Fujiwara Riku, an old bald priest, slamming a trembling fist on the table. "Dae-Hyun spent thirty years buried in scripture. He wasn't capable of this. Something happened to him after he disappeared."
"None of it makes sense," agreed the younger Cleric Zai Lurang, twisting his prayer beads nervously. "The guards swore his door was locked from outside and his window was open. We all assumed he'd been taken or killed, like Kizuki. So how does he end up in the market with a knife? And why go straight for Cleric Ahjin before killing himself?"
At the head of the table, High Priest Soo Wu-min sat rigid, cold sweat soaking into his collar.
"Are we being cursed?" he whispered. "First Kizuki, murdered in Goryeong. Now Dae-Hyun turned into a butcher in the street. Will I be the next? Someone is tearing our faith apart on purpose. Someone wants Hwadosen erased."
"If that's true, who would do it?" asked Cleric Ito, pushing his glasses up his nose. "We can't blame Archpriest Yohan Grale this time — not when his own high cleric, Ahjin, is one of the dead."
"That's the worst part," Lurang said, slumping. "All the sympathy in the city has gone to Yeoljin. Everyone's mourning for them, not us."
Wu-min's eyes went wide. He leaned forward, gripping the table. "Don't you see? That's exactly why it makes sense. What if Yohan planned this from the start? He knew our two orders were close to open conflict after Kizuki died. What if he sacrificed his own cleric just to make us look like murderers? Think about what he gains — Dae-Hyun destroyed, our reputation ruined, and the whole city falling in love with him."
Silence settled over the room.
"Even if you're right, Your Eminence," Lurang finally said, "we have nothing. No proof. If we say this out loud, people will call it a desperate lie to save our own name."
Wu-min sank back into his chair, staring at the lamp flame, helpless.
A few streets away, outside the towering walls of Yeoljindang, the mood was completely different. Thousands had gathered in the plaza, holding candles and incense, weeping for the dead. Archpriest Yohan Grale climbed onto a black-draped stage in plain white mourning robes, his face streaked with tears, a silver sun amulet resting over his heart.
The crowd hushed the moment he raised his hands.
"Brothers and sisters," he began, voice cracking. "Do they hate our faith so much? Did they hate Yeoljin enough to send a priest into our peaceful streets with a blade?" He wiped his eyes. "I believed we were simply brothers who disagreed. I thought our rivalry in the council was honest, born of a shared desire to serve this empire and its people. But it seems they wanted my blood spilled on these stones. I am fearing for my life. My dear friend Ahjin — a man who spent his life feeding the hungry and tending the sick — was slaughtered without mercy."
The crowd cried out, some shouting curses at the Sun Temple.
Yohan lifted his hands again, shaking his head. "No, my children — listen to me. However deep this wound cuts, I will not let hatred take root in my heart. Amaterasu does not ask us for vengeance. She asks us to forgive. That is the hardest test any of us will ever face."
He looked out over the weeping crowd, eyes shining. "Let us answer this darkness with light. Let us carry Yeoljin's peace to every corner of the empire, so all people may live in harmony and safety. We do not seek violence. We seek only peace."
He bowed low, shoulders shaking, as the plaza erupted in cheers and tears. Then he stepped down and disappeared behind the temple doors, leaving the entire city devoted to him.
The news spread along the trade roads, and a day later a courier boat carried the capital's newspapers across the water to Baoahong.
In the guardhouse at the village barracks, Princess Yejin stared down at the broadsheet on the cedar table.
"You're serious?" she muttered. "High Priest Ji Dae-Hyun went on a killing spree in the capital?"
Tsuyu read over her shoulder, stunned. "What is happening inside Hwadosen? First Kizuki in Goryeong, now this?"
Vincent leaned in the doorway, chewing dried fruit. "You don't think Hwadosen's secretly some kind of cult, do you?"
Hajun shot to his feet, chair screeching. "Take that back, Vincent! Hwadosen has stood since the founding of this empire! My mother lights incense for the sun every morning of her life. Don't you dare call them a cult!"
Vincent raised his hands. "Whoa — sorry, Hajun. You're right, that was out of line. Not every priest in that temple had a hand in this. I'm just trying to make sense of it."
Hajun huffed and looked away, though his shoulders relaxed a little.
At the far end of the table, Kei sat quietly, reading his own copy of the paper line by line — the witness accounts, the timeline, the coroner's report. Finally he set it down.
"A week ago, High Priest Kizuki was murdered in Goryeong right after a meal. Now another high priest vanishes from a locked room and ends up butchering people in the street." Kei looked up. "I didn't know him, but men who spend their lives buried in scripture and court politics don't just snap and become killers overnight. The timing's too convenient."
"You're right," Yejin said, tapping the paper. "Something's rotten inside Hwadosen's high clerics. But what bothers me is that mark you found on Kizuki's palm back in Goryeong." She looked at Kei. "How does the All-Seeing Eye fit into this? There seems to be no mention of it in the newspaper either."
Kei didn't answer right away. His mind drifted back to a rooftop in Gammora, to Cero's warning about monsters who kill not out of hunger, but for the pleasure of orchestrating chaos from the shadows. A branded eye was a signature. A signature meant intent.
"Whether they're involved or not," he said quietly, "all of this was arranged."
The room went quiet. The empire was already bleeding from pirate raids and war in the south — and now its oldest faith was tearing itself apart from within.
Vincent finally broke the silence, pushing off the doorframe and walking to Yejin's side of the table.
"Princess," he said, more serious than usual. "Could I ask a favor? For the rest of our time here, let me take the night patrol with Kei."
Yejin tilted her head. "Why? Expecting trouble?"
"I want him to help me track down that yellow-eyed thing the boy mentioned," Vincent said. "His ocular ability might be the only way to catch a trail like that."
Yejin looked between the two of them, then nodded. "Fine. I'll put you both on the northern watch. But you give me your word — if you see anything, you fall back and wake the squad before doing anything reckless."
Vincent grinned and gave a small bow. "You have it, Princess. No trouble, I promise."
When night fell, the island settled into the rhythm of the waves. A cold sea wind cut through the alleys between the huts, and by the time the moon rose over the pines, the village was dark and locked up tight.
High above the streets, Kei and Vincent crouched on the roof of an old granary, watching the square, the roads to the docks, and the black treeline beyond.
Vincent pulled his collar up against the wind. "Cold night," he muttered, rubbing his hands.
"What exactly did the kid tell you?" Kei asked, eyes on the streets below.
"Well, he said a monster with glowing yellow eyes took his friend last month," Vincent said, all humor gone from his voice. "The boy was supposed to meet his friend by the woods. He never showed. All they found were his sandals, left in the mud."
"And no one looked for him?"
"The Southern Alliance hit the coast around the same time," Vincent said, staring at the horizon. "The kid's mother died in the raid, his father was already gone. Everyone just assumed the boy fell in the sea or got taken by pirate slavers. The old garrison laughed at his story. I can't just let it go, Kei. Kids don't vanish for no reason."
Kei said nothing for a moment, and then his eyes lit up with a bright, unnatural blue. Through his Deathsight, the world dissolved into gray and shadow.
The island's life force revealed itself to him — soft golden light pulsing from the sleeping villagers inside their homes, the slow blue glow of two oxen in their pen by the mill, tiny sparks of crickets and mice moving through the grass. All of it.
He turned his gaze outward, sweeping across the fences, the empty docks, and the dark edge where the path disappeared into the trees.
For hours they sat in silence as the night grew colder. But Kei did not look away. Though he sensed nothing. No hostile presence, no trace of corrupted prana flow, no sign of any anomaly moving through the village.
When the watchtower bell rang for the third hour, Kei let his breath out slowly and released the ability. The blue light faded, and the world returned to ordinary darkness.
"We've been here for hours, and I couldn't find anything," he said.
"Nothing at all?"
Kei nodded.
Vincent sighed, dragging a hand through his hair. "Then sitting up here isn't going to do us any good. We have to change our approach. Let's head back."
"This is likely just wasting time, Vince. Every day we delay, the barrier grows weaker. Are you sure we should be spending our efforts on this?" Kei asked.
"We searched for the Heavenly Crystal you found in the underground caves of Saeho — and it had vanished entirely, remember? We also asked Mistress Lizhan for permission to enter Shengyowon and learn more about these crystals, and she refused. This is the only course of action we have left that is truly worth our time," Vincent replied.
Kei considered his words and saw the truth in them. "Very well. Let's return then," he said.
They dropped from the roof without a sound and jogged back through the quiet alleys to the barracks.
Inside, a single oil lamp burned on the command table, where Princess Yejin still sat in her armor, reviewing patrol schedules. She looked up and set down her brush as they entered.
"You two are back," Yejin said, resting her chin on folded hands. "Did you find anything out there?"
Vincent leaned on the table. "Nothing, Princess. The perimeter's quiet. Kei checked every inch with his sight — no sign of any anomaly."
Yejin sat back, arms crossed. "I see. Maybe the monster was just not in the hunting mood last night. You would still continue the investigation, right?"
"Yes," Vincent said firmly. "I doubt that kid was lying. Watching from a rooftop won't work. We will try going into the forest tonight and finding it ourselves."
Yejin looked at him, then at Kei, who nodded once, resolute.
She sighed, knowing there was no talking them out of it. "I understand. The forest isn't large, so I know you won't get lost. But again, if you spot anything, inform us immediately. Got it?"
Vincent bowed. "Thank you, Princess."
"Get some rest," she said, picking up her brush again. "Food is ready — go have breakfast first. It is served in the kitchen."
Kei and Vincent nodded and made their way to their rooms. They ate before settling onto their beds to rest.