The inner city smelled of incense and rust.
Narrow streets twisted between leaning towers of black stone, every wall scarred by centuries of claw marks. Paper lanterns drifted overhead on invisible strings, glowing soft gold against a permanent bruise-colored sky.
People moved in hurried silence.
Eyes down.
Brands burning on wrists and throats like chains they'd forgotten how to protest.
Zero walked three steps behind Cecilia.
Barefoot still.
Her white cloak swallowed his thin frame like a borrowed innocence.
Hana — the burn-scar girl — limped at his left.
Minjun — the trembling college boy — kept trying to thank Cecilia and failing every time his voice cracked.
Crowds parted for the crimson cross on Cecilia's chest without realizing they were doing it.
The Saintess Order didn't need soldiers.
Their mark was a blade sharper than any steel.
Zero studied her back the way a starving man studies a locked door.
Silver hair falling straight to her waist like moonlight cooling on steel.
Shoulders that never quite relaxed, as if the weight of a thousand dying prayers pressed upon them.
And beneath her cloak, the faint glow of her brand:
Twelve white lilies bound by golden thorns.
The Highest Saintess Candidate of the 700th Cycle.
The girl who would one day be called the Light of Humanity.
The woman who would kill him with love still trembling on her lips.
He knew every inch of that brand.
He had kissed it once.
In a life he had torn apart himself.
Cecilia stopped beneath a stone arch carved with dying seraphs.
Beyond it rose the Cathedral of Ashen Mercy — headquarters of the Saintess Order.
Six spires like broken fingers clawing at the heavens.
Stained glass windows depicting beautiful women burning alive.
"Home," she murmured. "You'll be safe here."
Zero lowered his eyes.
Safe.
What a cruel word.
Hana whimpered at the sight of the cathedral.
Minjun dropped to his knees and openly sobbed.
Cecilia knelt before Hana, brushing the girl's cheek with gentle fingers.
"What is your name, little one?"
"H-Hana."
Barely air.
"Hana. A good name. Strong."
A soft smile.
"The Order will heal you. No child dies on these steps. Not while I breathe."
She lifted the girl as if she weighed nothing, then glanced at Zero.
"You too. Come."
He followed.
Inside, candle smoke thickened the air, mixing with the faint sweetness of decaying lilies.
Hundreds of white-robed healers moved between rows of wounded lying on straw pallets.
Some prayed.
Some bled.
Some stared upward, waiting for permission to die.
A woman with half her face burned away reached for Cecilia.
"Saintess… my son…"
Cecilia knelt again, pressed her forehead to the woman's knuckles.
"He is with the Goddess now. Painless. I promise."
SFX:HUMMMMM
Golden light spilled from her palm, weaving into the woman's chest.
The breathing steadied.
The eyes closed.
Peace, of a kind.
Zero watched the miracle and felt his shadow twitch, hungry.
The Saintess Order — distilled into a single truth:
Born from the tears of the First Saintess when the gods abandoned humanity.
Wielders of Mercy —
the power to heal, to ease suffering, to absorb pain into their own bodies.
Every Saintess carried scars no one saw.
Every Saintess died young.
Cecilia was seventeen now.
She would live exactly nine more years in the old timeline.
Long enough to fall in love with a monster wearing a boy's face.
Long enough to kill him.
Long enough to regret it every day afterward.
Zero knew the exact night she would cough up her first lily petal of blood.
He had held her as she drowned in white flowers.
They reached the central nave.
A colossal statue of the First Saintess stood with arms spread, eyes hollowed by time.
At her feet lay a shallow pool of water so still it looked like black glass.
Cecilia set Hana on a cot and turned to Zero.
"Your turn."
He blinked.
Slow.
Harmless.
"My… turn?"
"To be cleansed. The Order removes curses, bindings, anything that stains the soul. Especially for the broken ones."
She gestured toward the pool.
"Step into the Pool of Absolution. It remembers every sin you never committed."
Zero stared at the black surface.
His shadow screamed without sound.
If he touched it, the pool would recognize him instantly.
It had been forged using a shard of divinity stolen from the god he had later murdered.
One ripple — one breath —
and every Saintess in the cathedral would see the truth:
The Shadow Sovereign had returned.
Wearing a boy's stolen face.
He stepped back.
Just a fraction.
Cecilia's eyes narrowed.
Barely.
"You're afraid."
His voice trembled on cue.
"I… I can't swim."
A lie so pitiful it became truth.
Cecilia's expression softened into something heartbreakingly gentle.
"No one has ever drowned in the Pool of Absolution."
A pause.
"I will hold your hand the entire time."
She extended her hand.
Zero stared at it.
These were the fingers that once stroked his hair while he slept.
The fingers that signed execution orders for ten thousand shadow slaves.
The fingers that rested on her belly as she whispered maybe our child will have your eyes—
Right before the spear went in.
He reached out.
Their hands touched.
Every candle in the cathedral guttered at once.
SFX:FWOOMPH
Cecilia inhaled sharply.
A flicker — a flash — a shard of memory not belonging to this life glimmered behind her eyes.
Warmth.
Betrayal.
Lilies burning in the dark.
Zero stayed perfectly innocent.
"What is it?"
"Nothing," she whispered, voice smaller than a prayer. "Just… déjà vu."
She pulled him gently toward the pool.
One more step and the cycle would shatter too soon.
His shadow coiled, ready to devour the entire cathedral if necessary—
Hana screamed.
They both turned.
The girl convulsed, dark veins snaking up her neck. The ghoul claw she'd held had carried poison.
Cecilia dropped Zero's hand and ran.
Golden light exploded from her palms —
SHRAAAANG — as she poured her own lifespan into saving a child she'd known for less than an hour.
Zero stood alone at the pool's edge.
The black water reflected his face perfectly.
Then smiled with too many teeth.
He murmured to it:
"Not yet."
He stepped away and went to Cecilia's side, kneeling.
He took Hana's trembling hand.
Her terrified eyes met his.
"Thank you for saving me earlier," he whispered.
Hana's lips moved, trying to speak, but no sound emerged.
Zero smiled that harmless smile.
"Sleep now. No more pain."
Cecilia's light flared brighter.
The black veins retreated.
Hana collapsed into unconsciousness.
Cecilia sagged, drenched in sweat.
Another invisible scar.
Another piece of her life burned away.
She looked at Zero — confused, soft, astonished.
"You weren't afraid she'd die. You were comforting her."
He lowered his gaze.
"I know what it feels like… to be the one left behind."
Cecilia stared at him for a long, fragile moment.
Then:
"What… is your name again?"
Zero met her eyes.
And for the first time since returning, he spoke the truth that was also a lie.
"Zero.
Just Zero."
Cecilia's fingers brushed the brand on his hand — the fake F-rank circle hiding a calamity beneath.
"Zero…" she repeated, almost reverently.
Outside, thunder rolled — though the sky was clear.
Inside, lilies began sprouting from cracks in the stone, white and impossible.
No one noticed except him.
He inhaled their scent and felt something deep in his chest fracture.
Soon, he reminded himself.
Soon he would teach her what it meant to love a void.
For now, he stayed on his knees beside the Saintess —
holding a sleeping child's hand,
letting her believe she'd saved something worth saving.
The lilies kept blooming.
One day, they would choke her.
And he would be there to watch.