Chapter 36: New Order

The moon shone bright, presiding over Sanctuaire de la Dame and the ritual taking place within its boundaries.

A familiar magical symbol was drawn on the ground in salt, candles, herbs and slates. And at the centre of it, laying atop an open yoyo to a glowing void, lay the Bee Miraculous.

Belle Aube, Marinette, Nathaniel and Fu were in their places at the outer rim of the magical circle, this time joined by Adrien, Alya, Nino and Zoe as well.

Following the older man's instruction, the teens chanted along with him, beginning the ritual.

Like with the Black Cat Miraculous, the Bee Miraculous began to violently shake on the open yoyo but remained within its confines until going still, the corruption beginning to ooze out of it. There seemed to be considerably less than with the Black Cat.

The cleansing light of the yoyo shone as the ooze was lit up in yellow flames this time, burning it all away until only the Miraculous was left.

Finally, the ritual finished with the extinguishing of the fire.

The stillness was broken by everyone sighing in relief.

"So, is that what happened with Plagg and my Miraculous?" Adrien asked as Belle Aube broke the circle to retrieve her yoyo and the Bee Miraculous.

"Pretty much." Marinette confirmed.

"I'm sorry that you had to go through that, Plagg." Adrien turned to his Kwami.

"It's alright. The ritual actually felt good. Like a nice long sunbath after being locked in a box." Plagg said.

"So, that's what taking part in a magic ritual is like." Zoe said. "Interesting."

"Sorry that there's not enough movement for you." Chloe teased as she transformed back, booping her girlfriend's nose.

Chloe held out the Bee Miraculous for the Kwamis to inspect.

"She should recover in about a week." Nooroo concluded. "But I can't be sure."

Fu gently took the Bee Miraculous from Chloe, thanking her as he placed it back into the box he had been keeping it in.

"Let's all move inside. It's cold out here." Marinette suggested.

The others nodded. They were all too eager to get out of the cold, despite their coverings.

Fu left the teenagers to gather in the main hall, where pre-made hot drinks and beanbags were waiting for them once they came in from the cold, going to his room to put the Bee Miraculous with the others.

"Soon, all will be restored." Fu sighed.

"With the Butterfly, Peacock and Grimoire back, it'll be better than before." Wayzz commented.

"Yes, I suppose it will." Fu agreed.

Fu left his room and entered into the main hall but remained lingering at the doorway rather than joining the group of friends.

It seemed almost wrong to interrupt, the teens chatting happily and celebrating the ritual being successful.

"You've come a long way, Master." Wayzz said. "You've even started to rebuild the Order of the Guardians."

"What?" Fu turned to Wayzz in confusion.

Wayzz simply pointed to the group of teenagers chatting happily with each other, three of them with Kwamis at their side.

"I haven't been trying to remake the Order of the Guardians." Fu denied.

But now that he thought about it, Fu had been imparting his wisdom onto the teens, specifically teaching Marinette and Nathaniel the writings and language of the Guardians, how to prepare potions and perform rituals. And everyone there had just partaken in a Guardian ritual.

"But I guess that I didn't need to think about it." Fu amended.

Wayzz nodded.

Fu then laughed.

"I suppose it's appropriate, though." He said. "I'm getting too old to be a Guardian myself. So, it may be time to pass the responsibility onto someone more appropriate and capable."

Fu regarded the teenagers.

Still, he wondered if they'd be ready for the responsibility.


"There's apparently going to be this ancient statue there, Alix mentioned something about it being this forgotten Emperor or something, and there's this big story about the guy holding a great power…Nathaniel!"

Nathaniel startled as Marc shook him.

"Wh-what? Sorry." Nathaniel blinked and rubbed his eyes.

"Did you get any sleep last night?" Marc asked in concern.

"Yeah, I did." Nathaniel said. "I just got to bed late, that's all. Our group had a late-night study session."

"You've had a few of those lately." Marc noted.

"Well, you know how much I suck at anything that isn't art." Nathaniel semi-joked.

"You don't suck." Marc rolled their eyes.

"Thanks." Nathaniel said, leaning into Marc's side.

Neither were big on displays of affection like their friends, content with just being close to each other and the occasional peck on the cheek to show their love for each other. But that didn't stop that love from being clear.

"Anyway, Hero's Day is just over a week away. Are you going to be doing anything?"

From across the courtyard, Marinette watched the two of them over the top of her book.

"Watching the fruits of your labour?" Alya appeared at Marinette's side to ask.

"Ah!" Marinette startled, dramatically flailing and almost dropping her book in the process. "Don't do that."

"It's not my fault that you don't pay attention to your surroundings when shipping." Alya teased.

"I was not shipping." Marinette denied.

Alya raised an unconvinced eyebrow.

"I'm not." Marinette insisted.

"Then what were you doing?" Alya asked, disbelieving.

"I…I was just wondering about going to the new exhibit." Marinette explained. "I'd like to go to it as a date, like Nathaniel and Marc, but that it's exactly possible. So, I'll have to go alone."

"Ah." Alya said in sudden understanding. "Well, you can go with me, as just friends." She suggested.

"Yeah, I guess." Marinette said.

Still, she would have really loved for Adrien to see the upcoming exhibit first-hand, as Adrien would likely be unable to go out freely for a while, once he turned himself in.

Sighing, Marinette pushed herself along, only to stop when she spotted a familiar face.

"Is that Adrien's bodyguard?" She questioned.

Alya followed Marinette's gaze to see the large man standing on the pavement next to a car with a bag in hand.

"I think it is." Alya said.

The bodyguard then began walking forward.

"Ah, he's coming over here." Marinette said.

Adrien's bodyguard stopped in front of the girls.

"Uh, hi?" Marinette greeted unsurely.

The bodyguard held out the bag to Marinette.

"Th-thank you?" Marinette continued to be unsure.

Once Marinette accepted the bag, Adrien's bodyguard bowed and then turned around, walking over to his car and driving off.

"What was that about?" Alya questioned.

Marinette opened the bag she was given and looked inside.

"These look like boy's clothes." She said.

Apart from the clothes, there was also a phone in the bag.

Turning the phone on, Marinette was met with a lock screen of her and Adrien.

Marinette gasped.

"I think this is for Adrien." She whispered to Alya.

Alya's eyes widened. She quickly took hold of Marinette's wheelchair handles and guided them to a more private area.

"Why would he give you stuff for Adrien? Did he work out where he is?" Alya questioned once they were less likely to be overheard.

"He must have. Why else would he give me clothes?" Marinette said.

"Does that mean that the police are going to come for Adrien?" Alya worried.

"Ah." Marinette began to panic.

"Calm down." Nooroo popped his head out of Marinette's purse. "I don't think he'd have given you Adrien's things if he told anyone."

Marinette took a deep breath to calm herself, realising that her Kwami was right.

"Still, he must know that Adrien is staying with me. But the lack of Mr Agreste means that only Adrien's bodyguard knows." Marinette then worked out. "He didn't tell them."

"I guess he cares for Adrien more than we realised." Alya said.

"Yeah." Marinette agreed. "Come on, let's go tell Adrien.


Adrien was actually doing something other than lying around when Marinette and Alya arrived at Sanctuaire de la Dame, helping Fu in preparing the plants that had been freshly picked from the garden.

"So, the monster rises from his pit?" Alya teased Adrien.

"Ha, ha." Adrien said sarcastically.

"Guess who we just saw." Marinette said, handing Adrien the bag she'd been given.

"Who?" Adrien asked, taking the bag and looking in it.

"Your bodyguard." Alya said.

"The Gorilla?" Adrien blinked, picking his phone out of the bag in shock.

"He seems to know that you're living here, or that I'm at least in contact with you." Marinette explained.

"Oh god, is he going to tell? Is father going to come and take me away?" Adrien began to panic.

Alya and Marinette's eyes widened, unsure and scared at Adrien's sudden panic.

"Cool it, kid." Plagg slumped on Adrien's shoulder. "Marinette would have said if that happened."

"R-really?"

The Kwami's words seemed to get through to Adrien in some capacity.

Marinette saw this and carried from Plagg's assurance. "Yeah. I don't think that he told anyone. He just gave me your clothes and phone. That shows that he is expecting you to stay where you are, not take you back, right?"

"Y-yeah." Adrien began to calm. "Yeah, you're right."

Everyone sighed in relief as Adrien calmed, though he was clearly still jumpy.

Adrien started pulling out his clothes and looking at his phone, smiling at the familiarity they brought.

"Looks like you've got someone on the outside looking out for you." Marinette smiled, rubbing Adrien's arm.

"Yeah." Adrien smiled back.

The Gorilla always looked after Adrien, but the fact that he had an idea of where Adrien was and didn't tell anyone, and just provided supplies, showed that he really did care for Adrien past his job. It brought Adrien a lot of comfort.

Adrien brought up his contacts and found 'The Gorilla' listed there.

"I should say thanks." Adrien said.

"It's up to you." Marinette said.

Adrien nodded, but didn't open the messaging feature.

Despite the kindness, he couldn't find the energy to send that simple message, and prove to his bodyguard without a doubt that he was hiding with Marinette.

Ashamed of himself, Adrien put his phone away.

"It's okay, we'll work up to it." Marinette assured her boyfriend.

Adrien nodded.

He then grabbed a set of his clothes out of the bag.

His friends kept him clothed through stuff they bought from charity shops, but these clothes brought a sense of familiarity to Adrien, even if they were all from his father's designer brand.


The next week passed blissfully without incident.

No nasty surprises, no unfortunate discoveries, and no villain attacks from Xue Ying.

In fact, it seemed as if Xue Ying had completely disappeared.

"Maybe she's left the county." Alya had suggested.

"Everyone in France is on the lookout for her. If I were her, I would have cut my losses and ran." Chloe had agreed.

"Xue Ying desires the Miraculous, which are all here. I doubt she is gone." Fu had denied.

But, wherever Xue Ying was and whatever she was up to, it had yet to affect the teens.

So, they were all there for the day the Bee Miraculous finally recovered from its corruption.

All the Kwamis were practically bouncing off the walls in excitement as Fu emerged from his room with the Bee Miraculous in hand. Even Trixx was out, his Miraculous being worn by Marinette, so that he could be there for the reunion. The only one absent was Duusu, as Fu still deemed it too dangerous to even wear his Miraculous.

"Hurry it up." Chloe demanded impatiently. "Tikki's going to vibrate a hole in the table."

"Yes, hurry up." Tikki agreed eagerly.

Fu smiled and began to speak.

"Pollen's corruption has hurt us all, but now-hey!" Fu exclaimed as Chloe snatched the box from his hold.

Chloe had no care for the sense of ceremony he was trying to use.

The Ladybug wielder opened the box, wincing slightly as a yellow light appeared from the Miraculous inside.

Pollen, the Bee kwami, stretched, then bowed.

"How may-"

"Pollen!"

The kwami was cut off from saying her usual greeting by being tackled by the other Kwamis.

The group of Kwamis dissolved into happy tears as Chloe slid the bee-shaped comb into her hair.

The teens and Fu smiled at the sight, feeling the happiness pouring from the Kwamis, the beings communicating in a language they couldn't understand.

"So, when do we get around to helping fix Duusu?" Alya turned to Fu.

"Actually, I think we can do it now, right?" Nathaniel said, turning to Fu as well.

"You are correct." Fu nodded. "With the other Kwamis here and recovered, we can fix the Peacock Miraculous."

"Yay!" The other Kwamis overheard and cheered, eager for all of them to be together again.

"Nathaniel, Adrien, go gather the supplies. The rest of you, clear the table.

Doing as told, with the exception of Chloe who decided that "making sure no one was peaking in on them" was more worth her time than doing any cleaning, the teens got to work.

"You're going to need to do your own cleaning someday, buggie." Zoe challenged her girlfriend's behaviour. "You can't rely on servants for all your life."

"Of course, I can. I'm rich." Chloe sniffed.

Zoe raised an unimpressed eyebrow.

"Well, when we move in together, there's no way I'm hiring a cleaning lady. So, get used to cleaning up messes." She said, throwing a cushion at Chloe.

"Hey." Chloe protested.

"Who'd ever think it. That the brave and strong heroine of Paris isn't even capable of taking care of herself." Alya teased.

"I can take care of myself. I just don't need to." Chloe huffed.

Everyone rolled their eyes at her.

Adrien and Nathaniel returned with the supplies.

With the table clear, Marinette and Nathaniel set to work drawing a symbol onto it, copying it from a page in the Miraculous Grimoire.

It was an elaborate symbol and took a painfully long time to complete.

While the symbol was being drawn, Fu took the ingredients needed for the ritual and ground them together, then kneaded them together with a liquid until the mixture was clay-like in substance.

"Uh, I think I'm going to go blind." Nathaniel rubbed his eyes once they finished.

Concentrating on so much fine detail was a strain.

"Take your places." Fu instructed the Kwamis.

The Kwamis practically teleported to their spots with how eager they were to do the ritual. Each Kwami took a spot on the outside of the symbol, a gap being left between Nooroo and Wayzz.

Fu took the clay-like substance he'd made and carefully moulded it into the basic shape of a kwami before placing it in the gap left between Nooroo and Wayzz.

And, finally, Fu took the Peacock Miraculous from the box it had been kept in and placed it at the centre of the symbol.

"Now, we may begin."

It was all up to the Kwamis now.

All the humans stayed back as the Kwamis began to sing, their voices rising higher as the symbol below them began to glow brilliantly.

Then, energy began to draw out of the Kwamis, as well as the Kwami totem Fu had made, funnelling into the Peacock Miraculous, which glowed itself.

Then, the singing stopped and the glowing died does until it too stopped. The Kwamis slumped to the table, clearly tired, while the Kwami totem crumbled into a pile of dust.

"Did it work?" Marinette asked.

Nooroo began to cry.

"Oh no." Marinette gasped, thinking the worst.

"It worked." Nooroo cried tears of joy. "Duusu is all better."

Everyone sighed in relief.

Alya didn't hesitate in picking up the Peacock Miraculous and pinning it to her shirt, summoning Duusu into the room.

And just like with Pollen, Duusu found himself being tackled by his fellow Kwamis.

"I think we better leave them alone for a while." Marinette said quietly to her friends.

Nodding in agreement, the teens and Fu vacated the room and left the Kwamis to their reunion.


Later, only Marinette, Adrien, Nino and Fu were left at Sanctuaire de la Dame, the other teens having decided to return home, the remaining two staying to keep Adrien company for a little longer.

"So, have you got any drinks here?" Nino asked, feeling parched.

"Check the kitchen. I think that there's some juice in there." Adrien said.

Since he was actually living there, he knew Marinette's house better than she did.

So, Nino left the room and went to the kitchen, finding Fu already there, making himself some tea.

The Grimoire was open in front of him, on the final page.

"Are you still reading it?" Nino decided to make small talk with the old man while he poured himself a drink.

"I've only just finished reading it completely. Beforehand, I'd only just skimmed it to get an impression of what each page is about." Fu told Nino.

"Ah." Nino said in understanding.

Looking at the final page, Nino frowned when he noticed something.

"Did you tear any of the pages out?" He asked.

"What?" Fu's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "No. Why would I do that?"

"It's just. Some pages seem to have been removed."

Nino pointed at the inner spine of the book.

Looking at where Nino was pointing, Fu's eyes suddenly widened.

There, barely noticeable to Fu, there were remnants of pages stuck in the binding of the book. With his eyesight failing from age, Fu had not noticed them until now.

"This is not good." Fu said.

"What? Were they important pages?" Nino asked.

"Very likely." Fu answered. "Marinette! Adrien!"

The two teens quickly appeared.

"Nino has brought to my attention that the grimoire is missing pages." Fu informed them.

"What pages?" Marinette asked.

"I don't know." Fu said.

"Did M-Xue Ying remove them?" Adrien asked.

Fu hummed.

"Over a century and a half has past where the grimoire has been missing. It is possible that they have gone missing before Xue Ying got a hold of it. But it is more likely that she removed those pages. Meaning, that whatever is on those pages is something important, something that could provide her with an advantage." Fu said.

"And we have no way of knowing what's on them until she does something?" Nino asked.

"Unfortunately." Fu confirmed.

But then he thought for a minute.

"Or perhaps there is a way to find out what was on those pages." He said.

"How?" The three teens asked.

"Someone I know." Fu answered. "Grab your coats, we're going to see her immediately."

Fu packed the Grimoire away in his bag and grabbed his own coat and a hat, heading to the door where the others were already waiting for him.

Even Adrien.

"It would not be wise for you to come. Someone could spot you." Fu told Adrien.

"Master Fu. I'm going crazy being locked up in here. I need to go out." Adrien argued. "I'll keep a low profile."

Adrien then pulled on a light-brown wig and placed Fu's spare pair of reading glasses over his face, wrapping a scarf around the lower half of his face, disguising himself.

"Please, Adrien needs to get out, even if it's just for a short trip to this friend of yours." Marinette pleaded.

Fu sighed, already giving in.

"Fine. But keep a low profile." He relented.

Marinette smiled in victory.

So, the three teens and old man left Sanctuaire de la Dame, Fu leading the way with the Miraculous Grimoire in his bag.


Fu led the teens through the streets of Paris, thankfully avoiding anyone recognising Adrien, until they reached a familiar shop.

"The art shop?" Adrien recognised the shop that Nathaniel had taken him to for Marinette's birthday present.

"Keep your Kwamis hidden." Fu advised Marinette and Adrien. "She does not need to know your identities beyond being my assistants."

The four of them went inside, finding the shop empty save for the shopkeeper, Casey, at the till.

"Good evening." Casey greeted. "How may I help you?"

"We need your assistance, Miss Brook." Fu said.

"Oh, Mr…Chan." Casey addressed Fu.

"No need for secrets, Miss Brook. They are with me." Fu waved off Casey's attempts to keep his identity.

"Oh." Casey said. "So, you're here on specific business then?"

"We are." Fu affirmed.

"Right."

Casey moved from around the till and walked past the group, locking the door, switching the sign to 'closed', and pulling the blinds down on the windows.

"So, what do you need?" She asked.

Fu reached into his bag and brought out the Miraculous Grimoire, which Casey took interest in.

"Some pages have been removed from this, and they are likely very important to have been removed. We need you to try and recreate them." Fu explained.

Marinette, Adrien and Nino's eyes widened as they looked at Casey, wondering if the art shop owner could really do something like that.

Casey, however, frowned.

"Mister Fu, you know I don't work well with specifics like that. I might not be able to give you any information about a book of all things." She said.

"Please, you have to try." Fu pleaded gently. "Those pages were most likely taken by Xue Ying, Serpentina. What is on them could hurt people."

Casey looked at Fu for a moment before sighing.

"I'm going to get such a headache for this." She muttered to herself. "Alright, I'll see what I can do."

Casey went over to one of the tables and pulled out some of the paper and pencils that were left out there for customers wanting to try out supplies.

"What's going on? What are you going to do?" Marinette asked as she pulled up next to the table.

Adrien and Nino sat down on other chairs around the table.

"Basically speaking, I'm a Clairvoyant." Casey explained, holding out a hand to Fu.

Somewhat hesitantly, Fu handed her the Miraculous Grimoire.

"Wait, doesn't that allow you to know stuff about people? You can really do that?" Adrien asked excitedly.

"Sort of." Casey smirked. "I can, basically, learn the history of something through touch."

"Meaning that you can see what the missing pages of the book look like through touching it." Marinette said, realising Fu's plan.

Casey frowned in response.

"We'll have to see about that." She answered. "Usually, I only get to see general information, fuzzy images and the emotions accompanying them. I'm going to have to concentrate very hard to make anything out from something as detailed and specific as a page from a book."

Casey opened the book to the torn-out pages and rested one hand on the pages while her other hand picked up a pencil and hovered it over the blank pieces of paper.

"Now, be quiet." She ordered.

The teens half expected for Casey's eyes to roll into the back of her head or go completely white, like what happened in TV. But, instead, the focus of her eyes faded out, then her irises and pupils began vibrating slightly.

After a minute, Casey began to blindly sketch on her paper, creating vague and rough shapes. Then, she flicked the paper away and began sketching again, this time is was a different set of sketches to the first. Once that page was discarded, a third piece of paper, this time the sketches being very similar to the first sketch, with a few differences in the detail; and the forth piece of paper was similar to the second but also with differences.

The process repeated several times, many sheets of paper with similar designs that had changes in the detail.

Finally, Casey gasped loudly as her hand came to a stop, returning to the present.

Both hands then immediately flew to her head.

"Ai, me head." She groaned sharply in English.

Fu gathered up the papers and then began to place them neatly next to each other, matching pages so that he could find the similarities between all of them and work out what the missing pages said.

"I am never doing that again. Everything kept shifting." Casey continued to complain.

The woman wobbled out of her chair and left the shop floor to find some pain killers.

Marinette picked up the Miraculous Grimoire and flipped through the pages, landing on the one describing the Butterfly Miraculous.

"They look like they're describing a Miraculous." Marinette said, comparing Casey's sketches to the book.

Fu looked to the book and then the sketches, nodding in agreement.

"So, that's meant to be a Miraculous then?" Nino pointed to the central sketch on one of the pages.

"It would appear so." Fu said. "Another Miraculous I do not know about would provide Xue Ying with an advantage."

"It's just a circle." Adrien said, frowning at the sketch. "No detail."

"That's all there was." Casey said as she emerged from the back, sipping a glass of water. "It was the clearest thing I could see, just a blank circle."

"What animal could be represented by a blank circle?" Nino wondered aloud.

Casey shrugged.

"Haven't the foggiest." She said. "But…"

Casey walked over and tapped some symbols on one of the pages.

"From the impression the writer was giving me as he wrote, this is the name of your 'Miraculous'."

Fu hummed and looked at the sketched symbols, not recognising them as any words he knew. But, comparing them to another sketch of those symbols Casey had done, he did recognise one of the symbols. So, Fu did know how to read the name, but Casey's inability to see those symbols straight meant he would have to hope that comparing all he sketches would give him the name.

"Though, I did pick out something else from the guy who wrote that page." Fu only half listened to Casey, focusing on the sketches.

If he took the upper half of one symbol and matched it to the symbol from another page, it became another letter to the name.

"He seemed especially scared." Casey continued.

And…there, with a little swapping and matching, he had a name.

"Like, it was a warning, instead of just information." Casey finished, frowning.

"The Null." Fu read aloud.

Attention turned to him.

"The Null?!" Nooroo popped out of Marinette's purse to exclaim.

"Nooroo!" Marinette gasped, trying the squash the Kwami back into her purse.

Casey raised an eyebrow at the Kwami's sudden appearance, but otherwise was unphased.

Plagg and Wayzz emerged as well, the latter of which looked very guilty.

"The Null, the Null." Fu said the name over and over again as he tried to place where he had heard it before. "Wait, there was a rumour about something called the Null around the temple."

"I'm afraid that it's more than a rumour, master." Wayzz said. "I'm sorry, it completely slipped my mind. But Xue Ying found the pages on the Null, I should have realised that those were the missing pages."

"What is the Null?" Adrien asked the obvious question.

"It is our shadow." Nooroo answered.

"All of our shadows, all seven of us." Wayzz added.

"When we were created, the Null was formed as sort of biproduct." Nooroo further explained. "No matter our powers, we are all elements of existence, while the Null is nothing, and so desires to return existence to nothing."

"Wait, I thought Plagg was Destruction." Adrien pointed out.

"I am." Plagg said. "But when something is destroyed, something is still left over, still something that exists."

"We are lucky that, like us, its power is confined to an object, like our Miraculous." Wayzz said. "It cannot spread its power without a host."

"So, Xue Ying is after this Null?" Marinette asked.

"I believe so." Fu nodded.

"We are all in danger is she does." Nooroo worried.

"It's still all of us against her, right?" Adrien asked.

The Kwamis shook their heads.

"As a biproduct of our creation, it is equal in power to all seven of us." Wayzz explained.

"Oh." The teens and Fu looked horrified.

"That's not all." Nooroo said. "Whereas we Kwamis are subservient to our wielders, the Null is stronger and will instead take over the mind of whoever tries to use it, turning them into a host instead of wielder, with none of the motivations or loyalties of that person, only caring in returning reality to nothing."

"Okay. That's scary." Nino said.

"I don't know why we're worrying." Plagg said. "The Null was hidden away, the Guardians made sure that there was no record of where it was. So, I doubt she'll be able to find it."

"We can't tempt fate, Plagg." Wayzz said. "The Null could still find its way into the hands of someone who desires to use it."

"Uh, the pages didn't have instructions on how to find it, did they?" Nino turned to Casey, who shrugged in response.

"I think there was some explanation of history." Casey then said.

"There is some explanation of how the Null works and its previous victims." Fu agreed, comparing Casey's pages some more.

"Could it be used to find the Null?" Nino asked.

"I don't know." Fu admitted. "I really don't know."

Everyone looked to one another in worry, realising that things were far from over.


Author's Note: Please comment.

And now we are at the eve of the finale. The pieces are in place and all that's left if for things to kick off once Xue Ying makes her move.

The concept of the Null is inspired by the Nothing Card from Card Captor Sakura, but far less benign in nature.

And, fun fact, I can actually make my eyes vibrate like my OC cameo, Casey, does when using her power; but pulling my focus really far in.

And I forgot to mention last chapter, but I got some lovely fanart, which made me very happy. It can be found on DeviantART, by the user MsPyromaniac. (I really love the throne design used for Lady Nymph's wheelchair/throne, so that is now the version she has in the canon of this story.)