Two weeks had passed since Elara departed for Feynapotter.
Matt no longer slept in the hidden corner behind the altar. He had stopped using Harvest Church as a permanent residence, though he still returned from time to time—two or three times a week—to help the priest arrange the altar or handle small tasks. The old priest never asked questions. He only smiled with that same tired calm and said, "May the Mother feed you." Matt would answer with a nod and a crooked smile, always thinking the same thing: What a perfect irony. The wildfire helping prepare a sermon about the harvest.
During the day he moved through the streets like any other resident of East Borough. Sometimes he sold black bread at the same stall where he had once worked for a single penny; other times he stole with a smoothness that no longer surprised him. A moneylender here, a careless merchant there, a thug who let his guard down.
Nothing personal.
Nothing malicious.
Things simply… happened.
Because nothing mattered enough to him to leave untouched.
In two weeks he had accumulated exactly 100 pounds, 2 soli, and 10 pence, stored in a small leather pouch tied to his belt. It wasn't a fortune, but for someone who had stolen a loaf of bread to survive only months earlier, it was more than enough.
He no longer needed the underground refuge. He slept wherever he pleased: on abandoned rooftops, in alleys no one watched, or in cheap rooms at the Dockside Motel when he wanted a real roof overhead.
The brown priest's robe stayed rolled in a bag. He wore it only when he was cold or when visiting the church. The rest of the time he dressed in stolen or simple clothes, always with the bone dagger hidden and the Pugilist's bracelet wrapped in soil from the garden.
And every night, when the Tussock fog thickened, he walked.
Tonight was no different.
Matt moved through the streets of the lower-middle district, that gray strip where two-story houses and small workshops tried to pretend they still possessed dignity. The Tussock fog was thick, turning the gas lamps into blurred yellow halos.
His footsteps were silent, almost nonexistent.
The brown priest's robe was hidden beneath his dark shirt and loose brown trousers.
He had no hurry.
No goal.
He simply walked, because the world was a forest and he no longer needed excuses to be in it.
Then he heard it.
The sound of a fight nearby.
Muffled shouts. The dull impact of something heavy against flesh. The crack of breaking wood.
And a flash of golden light that illuminated the fog for a brief second.
It came from a narrow alley between a closed blacksmith shop and a two-story house whose windows were still lit.
Matt stopped.
He tilted his head slightly.
His eyes—now carrying that characteristic dirty gray—narrowed.
Beyonders.
He felt no curiosity.
No urge to help.
Only a cold, calculating calm.
Something interesting is happening.
And I… simply happen to be here.
He stepped toward the alley, moving with the instinctive precision of a Criminal who no longer needed to think in order to disappear. He slid through the shadows, using his heightened awareness to place each step where the ground wouldn't creak.
He stopped behind a pile of broken crates, about fifteen meters from the fight.
And watched.
In the center of the alley stood a woman.
Tall. Black hair tied in a quick braid. She wore simple traveler's clothing, but a golden sun amulet hung from her neck. Her eyes shone with an inner, sacred light.
She was the one who had produced the golden flash Matt had seen.
Opposite her stood a man.
Thin, with pale almost translucent skin. His eyes were sunken, and his smile looked too wide for his face. He wore a ragged black coat and moved as though the shadows themselves embraced him.
The woman opened her mouth and began to sing.
Her voice was clear and pure, like a hymn rising above the filth of the alley. It wasn't an ordinary song. Every note carried power. Matt felt the air around him grow warm and luminous.
"May the light of the Eternal Sun strengthen you…
may fear fade away…
may your strength be multiplied…"
The woman blessed herself through the song. Her body became faster, more agile. A soft golden radiance surrounded her, pushing back the cold darkness of the alley.
At the same time the light spread about ten meters outward, illuminating the ground as if it were midday. Her eyes ignited like two miniature suns, allowing her to see perfectly through the fog.
The man—of the Hanged Man Path—smiled with malice.
He melted into the shadows of the wall as if he had never been there. His figure turned dark gray and semi-transparent, the surroundings blurring around him.
From that hidden position his voice emerged, distorted, like something speaking from the hollow depths of a star-filled sky.
"Shadows… lurking…"
A creature formed.
A twisted black shape erupted from the ground—something monstrous and unstable, a being that seemed to feed on darkness itself. The creature lunged toward the woman with claws made of pure shadow.
She did not retreat.
Her song changed, growing stronger.
The sunlight radiating from her body intensified until it resembled the blazing sun at noon. The shadow creature shrieked as its body partially melted under the light, though it did not disappear entirely.
Still hidden, the man used Shadow Manipulation.
An invisible hand seized the woman's shadow within the Shadow World, attempting to wrap it into a black chrysalis that would immobilize her.
She responded instantly with a spell from the Sun Domain.
Raising her hand, she released a beam of Fiery Light from her fingers, piercing the shadow chrysalis. The man grunted in pain and was forced out of hiding.
His left arm was burned black and smoking.
But he did not give up.
He used Shadow Curse.
With a swift motion he cut his own palm and flung droplets of blood mixed with shadow toward the woman. The curse activated immediately. A degenerative cold crept up her legs, slowing her movements and causing her song to falter for a moment.
Matt watched everything without moving.
His gray eyes absorbed every detail.
She uses light and song to strengthen herself and attack.
He uses shadows to hide, curse, and shape living weapons.
One is pure light.
The other is darkness that devours.
The woman regained control. Her voice rose again, stronger than before, filling herself with courage and power. She created a second blazing sun that illuminated the entire alley, burning the shadow creature until nothing remained but black smoke.
Then she invoked a Blessing that weakened the man's curse and increased her damage against darkness.
The man, now desperate, used Shadow Shaping.
The shadows on the ground twisted into a long black spear, razor sharp. He hurled it straight toward the woman's heart while simultaneously trying to wrap her in a massive black chrysalis.
The woman raised both hands.
A wall of pure sunlight materialized before her, blocking the spear. The impact made the light crackle violently, but it held.
She counterattacked with a beam of Fiery Light aimed directly at the man's chest.
He screamed.
The light burned him like acid, tearing open a smoking wound across his torso. He staggered backward, summoning more shadows to cover himself.
Matt remained hidden.
Completely motionless.
Interesting…
He did not intervene.
He felt no need to help either of them.
He simply watched with the same cold, amoral calm that now defined him.
One sings to bless and burn with light.
The other hides in darkness and curses with shadow.
And I…
I'm simply here.
Because none of this matters enough for me to preserve it.
The fight continued—violent and radiant—between searing light and devouring shadows.
And Matt, the Wingless Angel, simply watched.
Like a wildfire waiting for the perfect moment to spread.