What came next was inevitable—I had to take the powers of the Stasis Door once again.
his time, it was stronger—far harder to control. It wasn't the Third Door.
It was the Fourth.
An overwhelming power surged inside me, a force hundreds of times more difficult to restrain. Even my own body began to change, unable to endure it. I kept shifting between the form of a child and that of an adult, my appearance warping again and again as I struggled to maintain control.
Once again, I found myself surrounded by a vast sea of shifting light and color.
Then something unknown spoke.
It felt as though the void itself was talking.
It said it would teach me how to control this power—but I would have to do it a favor.
I agreed instantly, without thinking.
Moments later, I found myself in the ballroom once again. This time, however, I was in control of the Stasis Door, and my body had shifted back into my original female form.
The next thing I had to do was far from simple. I needed to extract the demonic aura Marika was holding within her body, a violent and unstable power that resisted every attempt to be removed. At the same time, I had to force her body out of its berserk state, suppressing the madness that was eating away at her reason.
It required absolute focus. One mistake could cause the aura to erupt, or worse—shatter her body from the inside. As I reached out with the power of the Stasis Door, I carefully peeled the demonic energy away, layer by layer, while binding her shifting form and stabilizing her mind. Only by maintaining perfect control could I keep her from losing herself completely.
The seal broke apart completely. Mr. Soren had run out of mana, his body giving in as he fell unconscious.
Thankfully, he had given an order to the Valentina twins. His command was simple—help me. With the support of the twins' seals, I continued holding Marika in place.
While chaos consumed the scene, the Church headquarters responded in silence. Their answer was swift and decisive—they sent Lenz Henrik, a holder of the Door of Fortune.
The Church was fully aware of the situation. However, the mission regulations restricted participation to those below the Fifth Door, and no higher-ranking Door holders were available at the time.
While the Door of Fortune would normally have been an enormous asset, my mana control functioned differently from that of standard Door holders, making synchronization impossible.
To consume the power of the Door of Fortune, there was only one choice left to me. I had to kill Lenz. I was confident I could revive him later, and that certainty erased any hesitation. The sword of demonic aura formed in my hand, and with a single strike, I cut off his head.
At that moment, I was stronger than I had ever been. Power flowed through me so naturally that it felt as though it had always belonged there. I held the Fourth Door of Stasis, a force capable of freezing even concepts themselves, and the Fifth Door of Fortune, bending probability subtly in my favor.
Alongside them was the raw power of demons, violent and unrestrained, yet obedient under my will. And beyond all of that, I possessed something far more disturbing—the ability to consume the powers of the dead, to claim what should have vanished with their final breath.
That authority did not feel natural. It carried a quiet weight, heavy and cold, as if it watched me from within. If I had to name its source, there was only one answer.
It was probably the power of the Door of Tragedy.
With the luck granted by the Door of Fortune, I successfully returned Marika to her original state.
Seeing that Marika was finally safe, the Valentina twins collapsed and passed out.
Before I revived the other two, an idea crossed my mind.
Then an idea struck me—what if I used the Stasis Door in the opposite way?
Heart pounding, I hesitated for only a moment before using the Stasis Door in reverse on Marika. The air around us shimmered violently, and then… it worked.
I had achieved something impossible. I had bent the natural order itself, giving someone the chance to ascend to a higher Door. I knew, deep down, that every action carried consequences—but the temptation was too great.
Without hesitation, I did the same for the others. One by one, I guided them past their limits, elevating them to a higher Door. The air around us seemed to hum with the surge of power, a dangerous energy that promised both greatness… and peril.
Mr. Hale had already leveled up during the time he had been dead—he was now a Fourth Door holder. According to the book I had studied before coming here, a near-death situation could push someone to the next Door. That meant that once he was fully revived, he would become a Sixth Door holder.
The same would happen for Mr. Soren and Mr. Lenz. I could already sense the magnitude of what I had done: in a single moment, I had created beings far stronger than the world might be ready for.
I chose to revive Mr. Lenz first. If I had attempted to bring back Mr. Hale before him, there would have been no chance of restoring Mr. Lenz. The stakes were too high for hesitation.
Next, I turned my attention to Mr. Hale. The weight of what I was about to do pressed down on me, but I could feel the path had been set. With careful focus, I began the revival, channeling every ounce of power to restore him fully.
At that moment, I felt the power surging out of me, slipping like sand through my fingers. The strength of the Fourth Door of Stasis and the Fifth Door of Fortune left me, departing as suddenly as it had come. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, I was powerless, my body and mind suddenly aware of the void where that immense strength had been.
Upon waking up, the once-calm Mr. Lenz shouted, "You crazy people! How dare you?! I'll curse you all to death!"
By that time, everyone else had woken up. They rushed forward, desperate to stop Mr. Lenz from doing anything reckless. I watched them move, feeling the weight of everything I had just done. My body trembled under the strain, and I realized I could collapse at any moment, completely spent from the surge of power I had wielded.
The moment I fell asleep, I found myself once again in the vast sea of shifting light and color.
After a moment of thought, I gave it a name: the Source. It felt fitting, as if this place was the origin of everything I had experienced—and everything yet to come.
The voice spoke once again. It told me that the demonic power within me would have to be removed.
Do you have any objections?
I said no. After all, this had been the condition from the beginning—the price for teaching me how to truly control the Stasis Door.
The voice then spoke again. It said I would be placed into a deep sleep for a while—my body had taken far more damage than what a First Door holder could endure.