A scream of pure agony tore through the air as the wooden door connecting to the corridor twisted and shattered like a filthy rag. Shards exploded outward just as a light, black-clad figure leapt into the room, a pitch-black longsword clutched in her hand.
A rounded mahogany table—over a meter wide and five meters long—sat in the center. Its polished glass surface was laid with plates, each holding human limbs, animal parts—some boiled, some roasted, some half-cooked—still hissing with steam. A few knives and forks floated midair, some slicing meat on porcelain plates, others lifting food into unseen mouths.
Yes, those invisible things—
They were eating.
The scattered wooden debris landed on their bodies, revealing vague, humanoid outlines where the fragments stuck.
Jeanne crouched low, then sprang like a cat. The black short-cloak around her shoulders flared with her movement. The world seemed to flip upside down—or perhaps it was she who had flipped. Midair, the Inquisitor saw those unseen beings drop their utensils, shift their chairs, and attempt to rise from their seats.
Disgusting things, Jeanne sneered inwardly.
Her body traced a perfect arc through the air. With all her weight and the force of her spin, she came down—
And stomped hard onto the glass tabletop.
Crack.
A sharp, piercing shatter echoed out.
The pristine glass erupted with a deafening crash. Milky-white webs of cracks bloomed outward like a stone dropped into a still lake. Hairline fractures split and splintered, shooting out in all directions under the force of impact.
Jeanne crashed down onto the wooden table, and the glass beneath her foot shattered outward from the center—just like a water splash from a falling boulder. Candlelight reflected off the thousands of gleaming shards, refracting into a chaotic, dazzling storm of color and danger.
The razor-sharp fragments tore into the transparent beings—some embedding deep into their flesh. Others cut across Jeanne's own skin, drawing streaks of vivid red.
Step one: locate the targets.
Step two: clear the room.
By the third heartbeat, the shards were still flying through the air. Jeanne burst through the rising steam and falling debris, her blade thrust forward.
Thunk— The sword pierced straight through one of the transparent creatures' chest cavities. In the next instant, the blade whipped upward, splitting its head apart.
The sound was like slicing through cured leather.
The blade, double-edged, long and slender, didn't look like it could cut through bone. Yet it was unexpectedly sturdy—and razor-sharp. The sword sliced effortlessly through the target's life, and black smoke gushed from where its eyes and mouth might have been—burning, foul-smelling smoke. It collapsed to the ground, now just a mangled corpse.
That black smoke…
It brought back far too many unpleasant memories for Jeanne.
Back when she fought black sorcerers—
Their enchanted weapons would burn the soul directly upon piercing the body, killing not through mortal wounds, but through spiritual annihilation.
And now, she thought bitterly, I'm using their enchantments to destroy my enemies?
The scene felt surreal. If not for the sting of glass slicing her skin, she might've believed she was dreaming.
Just then, she caught a glimpse—on one wall, a crossbow rose into the air by itself—lifted by a transparent shadow with two shards of glass embedded in it. The thing crouched, aimed, and fired.
The crossbow twanged. In a flash, the Inquisitor dropped low like a mother cat. The bolt zipped past her shoulder, shaving a shallow cut before thudding into the wall behind her.
The creature cautiously stepped back and began reloading.
"Die—!"
Jeanne didn't even know who she was cursing—she just let the words fly, then hurled her sword.
The blade cut a cold arc through the air, like the spoke of a spinning chariot wheel, and cleaved straight through the creature's chest. A rush of black, foul-smelling smoke erupted from the wound—soul-fire smoke, the kind that came from burning spirits. The creature's agonized shriek was cut off in an instant.
Then, Jeanne felt a slight tremor beneath her feet. A low, bestial growl rose from behind her.
Something was wrong.
She realized—it had waited for her to throw her sword before lunging.
As unseen claws slashed through the air, Jeanne kicked a plate of roasted meat off the table. Boiling broth splashed across the thing's face, chest, and arms.
A deep, guttural howl followed.
Jeanne threw the strength of her whole body into her right hand and clamped down hard on its furry wrist. Her other hand shot up and locked around its neck. In the next instant, she yanked downward while raising her knee—slamming it brutally into the creature's soft face, caving it in against her armor's hardened metal plate.
She still didn't let go. With her left hand, she swung the now-limp body sideways and flung it hard into several other transparent figures climbing onto the table.
At the same time, the Inquisitor used the force to leap toward the crossbow's position and landed lightly on the floor. One hand yanked her longsword from the invisible corpse it was buried in and plunged it into the ground. The other gripped the crossbow, raised it—
Wait.
Looks like she didn't need to.
The shards of glass embedded in those transparent things—glass that had been shifting with their movements—had all gone still.
She heard translucent "blood" splatter to the floor. At the same time, she heard them—those creatures—sizzle like flesh dropped into a scorching pan, toppling one after another, crashing onto the floor and the scattered fragments.
They were being boiled alive—
Literally boiled.
A rich, nauseating aroma of cooked flesh hit her nose. Jeanne had seen this before.
Not the transparent creatures—but the spell.
Silent, subtle, and stripped of all detectable magical fluctuations—until the moment of detonation, nearly impossible to sense.
"You don't need to be so tense," Cesar said, stepping through the crunching shards of glass. Jeanne noticed that, for a moment, his pupils had narrowed into vertical slits—like some kind of demonic race—but they quickly returned to normal. The black sorcerer strolled over to the invisible corpses with interest and added offhandedly, "I only targeted the ones focused on you. Didn't boil you, if that helps."
No response.
The Inquisitor rose to her feet in silence, eyes fixed on the black sorcerer as he hissed softly, inhaling the souls of the dead like wisps of gray-white mist.
"Don't tell me one of your friends was killed by this spell," Cesar said, glancing her way. "Your mentor, maybe? Or a secret lover?"
"I don't need your commentary," Jeanne replied curtly. "And I don't have a secret lover."
"I once liked a girl," he said cheerfully. "We never even had the chance to enjoy a proper physical relationship. She went insane after touching an Outer God. Ended up peeling off her own skin and diving into a vat of acid in the lab—said she wanted to merge with the Great Divine Being."
"…Was that supposed to be a joke?"
"You can decide for yourself."
Cesar crouched down. With a flick of his blade, he chopped off an arm from one of the transparent creatures—one of the ones Jeanne had killed, not the ones he had boiled. He tucked it casually into his cloak.
Might make for excellent test material. Worth taking back for analysis.
He looked into Jeanne's eyes. "If you're still hungry, grab a few cooked pieces that didn't get covered in soul ash, wrap 'em up, and let's move. Until the house's master is officially dead, this game of hide-and-seek isn't over."