— The Empty Seat —
"Clara. Clara!"
I shook Clara hard by the shoulders. She didn't respond.
Damn it—she'd been put under.
I forced a sharp stimulus, snapping her back to awareness. She let out a faint groan and finally stirred.
"Huh...? Rhan? You're back?"Her eyes were unfocused, clearly unaware she'd lost consciousness.
"Where's Selene?" I asked immediately.
Clara froze. She looked at the empty seat beside her, then slapped her forehead, her face draining of color.
"Oh no. Something happened to Selene."
My chest tightened. A numb chill raced through my limbs, like a thunderclap splitting straight down my spine.
"What happened?" My voice came out rough.
Clara blinked rapidly, forcing herself to remember.
"We... we saw Nyx. She was calling out to us—asking for help."
Nyx. The streamer.
I had already seen her body.
"So you opened the door and let her in."
"Yes. She said something was chasing her. She looked filthy, terrified—like she'd been running for her life. And she wasn't repelled by the Heavenly Cross you left us, so we thought she was alive. We let her in." Clara's voice dropped. "After that... I got so sleepy. I barely said anything before I passed out. I don't know what happened next. I'm sorry, Rhan. I—"
The world swayed.
This was bad. Very bad.
I stepped out of the car, instinctively reaching for my divination tools—then stopped myself.
It was nearly four in the morning. The transition between midnight and dawn.
Residual energy and living energy were overlapping, unstable, indistinguishable.
Any reading taken now would be meaningless.
What now?
My thoughts burned with urgency.
"Selene!" I shouted into the darkness. "Selene!"
"Rhan... I'm sorry. This is my fault..."Clara followed me, her voice breaking.
"This isn't on you. Get back in the car," I ordered. Selene was already missing—I wouldn't risk losing another.
"Rhan! Rhan!"
Just as dizziness threatened to pull me under, Selene's voice rang out.
"She's there!" Clara cried, pointing toward the narrow trail I'd come from.
Selene was running toward us—stumbling, desperate, barely keeping her feet.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
I was afraid she'd vanish the moment I touched her.
She didn't.
She didn't disappear.
I grabbed her hand. It was warm. Real.
Hot tears splashed onto the back of my hand.
She was alive.
Back in the car, Selene was still shaking, her face pale with lingering terror. Whatever she'd experienced had been far worse than she could put into words.
I handed her some water and waited until her breathing steadied.
"Tell me what happened."
She swallowed hard.
"That woman—Nyx—she said you saved her. But that some female spirits had caught you and were dragging you deeper into the mountains. I panicked. She told me she knew a way to help you... that I had to follow her. I believed her."
"What?" Clara stared. "I didn't hear any of that."
"You were already asleep," Selene said, then continued.
"We walked for a bit. Then the woman in white appeared—the same one who stood in front of the car earlier. The moment she showed up, Nyx vanished. She told me Nyx wasn't human and that I had to run back immediately. So I did."
I fell silent.
That woman in white had sent Selene back—meaning she'd saved her.
And earlier, when she blocked the village entrance, she may have been trying to stop us from entering at all.
Why?
Then the one-eyed old man's words surfaced in my mind:
New arrival. Old replacement.
Each new soul meant another would be consumed.
She was probably afraid of being replaced.
Stopping us was her way of surviving.
As for Nyx—she was different from the others.
She had likely died from shock or terror, not long ago. Her form hadn't stabilized yet—no true spirit, no complete soul. That explained why she wasn't repelled by the Heavenly Cross.
She'd lured Selene for one reason only: to find a replacement.
Stories like that were common enough.
"Rhan," Clara asked hesitantly, "why did she only go after Selene? Why not me?"
I looked at her. "These past few days... have you been physically unwell?"
She blinked. "...You mean—oh." Her face reddened. "That?"
"Yes."
"...That actually makes a difference?"
"Sometimes," I said. "A living body in certain physiological states can be naturally resistant—more so than a charm."
Clara stared, then muttered, "Huh. Guess there are advantages to being a woman."
I didn't respond.
"Rest for now," I said quietly. "When it's daylight, we'll go in again."
Neither of them dared sit in the front seats—and they wouldn't let me either.
In the end, all three of us squeezed into the back.
---
— Findings —
"Rhan," Selene said softly after a long silence. "I have a question."
None of us were sleeping.
"Go ahead."
"Did you... lie to Edward's family?"
I paused.
I had lied. But how did she know? Had the woman in white told her something?
"There's no point hiding it," I said. "Yes. The spirit attached to Adrian wasn't malicious. She was the same one who approached him eleven years ago. We didn't come here to find another spirit—we came to find her remains. The person I meant to help was her."
"I knew it," Selene said quietly. "You never liked Edward's family. And you're not the kind of person who does this for money."
She'd never trusted them.
"Can you tell me," she asked, sitting up straighter, "what you talked about with her that night?"
I hesitated—then decided not to withhold anything.
I told them everything Elena had said to me.
When I finished, both women were silent for a long time.
Finally, Clara whispered, "Rhan... you didn't just help a person. You helped a spirit. What you did saved Adrian—and probably the entire Blackwood family."
Her voice hardened with anger.
"But that one-eyed Alrik—how could he do something like that? Every story paints him as a saint, a true master. I swear, I'm telling everyone what he really was."
The image they'd held of the "One-Eyed Master" shattered completely.
Selene sighed, her voice heavy with emotion.
"I never imagined Elena's story was like this... There must be so many others like her in there, aren't there?"
I nodded. I had seen them myself.
"Then you have to save them," she said firmly. "Help them move on. Don't leave them trapped."
I nodded again—but didn't answer.
It sounded simple. It wasn't.
I still didn't know what kind of formation Alrik had used, or how that palace had been constructed at all.
Silence filled the car.
Each of us was lost in our own thoughts.
Eventually, exhaustion claimed us, and one by one, we drifted into uneasy sleep.