A/N: Topaz and Grimm belong to two friends of mine and are used with permission.

"I understand you wanting to trust her, but something's wrong." Mikleo said, folding his arms against his chest.

"Kind of funny to bury books in a graveyard..." Sorey looked over his shoulder towards the woman who was standing at the grave. "What do you think, Alisha?"

"I think there's something going on. Let's hide and observe," she responded. Sorey, Mikleo and Alisha did so, hiding near the sanctuary and watching as a merchant walked up to the woman and she held out the book. The man shook his head, narrowing his eyes at her and then looking at the book with a look that showed utter discontent with what she'd brought.

"Don't kid yourself, Agatha. That's worth a thousand at best," the man said.

A thousand? Alisha and Sorey looked at each other before heading around while the man and the woman named Agatha talked. However, their footsteps alerted the man, who looked over at the general direction they were in. "Who's there?!"

"You-" Agatha noticed the disappointed look on both Alisha and Sorey's faces. "Haven't I suffered enough?! Can I not have something good for once in my life?!"

Both Sorey and Alisha were taken back by how quickly she reacted to their presence. The malevolence began to coalesce, surrounding Agatha and turning her into a Hellion. "I want something good for once in my life! I deserve that, at the very least!"

The merchant was knocked to the side by her swinging her arm out. He hit the sanctuary wall, falling onto the ground unconscious afterwards. There was no signs of severe injury, though Agatha abandoned the books and took off. She left behind a key, which glinted and caught Sorey's attention. Walking over, he picked it up and looked it over before looking at the merchant. "Alisha, help me get him to the sanctuary."

"Alright."

"This place is an utter mess." I looked around, noting that Marlind had a lot more buildings than I'd originally known of. But the malevolence was everywhere, and it was probably the cause of this whole epidemic. Remembering the last time I was here, I wondered if the plant hellion was still the cause of all of this. Reinstating the Lord of the Land was probably not going to be easy, especially this time around. Arvald took a look around before starting to walk in the direction of the sanctuary.

At least, until a big hulking hellion landed in front of us. Arvald backed up a bit while the rest of us prepared for battle. "Damn, a hellion? Here?!"

"Boss!" Ryda deflected the incoming attack with her sword, holding it at the ready. "If you fall 'ere, there ain't anythin' bringing ya back, ya hear?! Ain't gonna letcha be killed by no damn hellion!"

Topaz shook her head. "And this isn't the least bit worrying. Malevolence everywhere the eye can see, and a hellion right in front of us."

"You guys know about hellions?" I asked, surprised.

"There's no time to talk about that!" Grimm dodged an incoming blow from the hellion. "Fight, damn it! Fight!"

Seems like we've got no other choice. Zaveid's voice echoed in the back of my mind during the beginning stages of the battle. This hellion's going to be harder than the one we faced before gettin' here. I'll bear to you my true name! Call it, and let it become your armor!

Two words. Two simple words that could change everything. Raising my hand up high into the air, palm facing the sky, I called out Zaveid's true name.

"Fylk Zadeya!" Immediately, the power of wind converged and donned me in armor reminiscent of Zaveid's own outfit. Wings made of blades hovered behind my back, and I levitated just slightly off the ground. The hellion moved in, and I called for the blades to defend me. Holding a hand out, they converged in front of it as a shield. Something I didn't know that could actually happen. The hellion's claw bounced off the blades, and I used that chance to move in, swinging my leg in an upward arc to attack. The hellion dodged out of the way, and Topaz moved in quickly. She jumped out of the way of an attack, going in and slashing at the hellion's face before the hellion smacked her out of the way. Rokurou took her place, going in for preciser strikes than hers. Slashing at any opening he saw, making sure to make the blows count and dodging out of the way of any incoming attacks. Ryda ran over to Topaz, helping her back up and giving her a gel to deal with the healing aspect of everything. Arvald moved as quickly as possible, running in to deliver a few pummeling blows before getting hit by the hellion's attack that was directed at Rokurou.

"This thing really is tough." I said, focusing on the inner magic of a Wind Seraph. The power converged, letting Zaveid and I call out the name of the attack together. "Razor Vortex!"

Pummeled by the arte cast, it left an opening for more attacks. I decided to finish it off quickly, try to purify it before things got any worse. "Zaveid, let's finish it!"

"Gotcha!" Flying high into the air, I raised my hand to the sky. "Come, divine wings! Swarm the skies! Sylphistia!"

Millions of swords fell to the battleground, missing my allies and stabbing into the hellion to pin it down as an arte circle appeared under it. The heavy blast of Wind Magic combined with the power of Purification soon took hold. The swords disappeared as the flames purified the malevolence, revealing a woman under all of that. I recognized her from the last time I'd been here. The malevolence had turned her into a hellion instead of just sparking up this time? Landing on the ground, I released the armatization and walked over to her. Kneeling down, I put a couple fingers on her neck to check for a pulse.

There was none.

"...She's dead." I said, standing up. Trying not to let it get to me, trying to ignore the fact that it was my fault. Just like that soldier from so long ago... I just had to bury it deep and never think about it! That would definitely work... wouldn't it? "We should take her body to the sanctuary for proper burial. At least... that's all we can do for her. If Sorey's here, we can let him deal with the malevolence."

"Sounds like you don't want to linger here." Rokurou pointed out.

"I don't like being here. Everyone's basically a hellion at this point, and I'd rather not fight the townspeople." I responded, looking over at him before looking to Ryda. "How's she?"

"I'm fine." Topaz waved a hand. "Don't worry too much about me, alright? I'm a tough one."

"Alright." I gave a nod, and Aevar picked up Agatha's corpse. We walked towards the sanctuary, garnering looks from the townsfolk not there. The moment we saw a guard, we immediately passed off the body to him and asked him to bury it. As the guard walked away, out of the sanctuary came Sorey and Alisha. Sorey seemed a bit surprised to see us, but moreso me.

"Aren't you the girl from the mountain?" He asked, coming towards me.

"Yuuup." I let the 'p' pop in my response. "Didn't expect to see you coming from there. Had something to do?"

"There was a merchant meeting a woman, but he fell unconscious." Man, he was bad at lying. I could see how nervous he was upon saying that. Since it was just us, I looked behind me at the direction we'd come from. "...Something wrong?"

"We were attacked by a hellion upon entering the city." I said, looking at him. "We took care of it, but... unfortunately, Agatha didn't survive."

"You killed her?!" Came Mikleo's shocked response as he, Lailah and Edna materialized. I looked away from Sorey. "How could you?!"

"I was trying to purify her, but I..." I shook my head. "I guess I overdid it and killed her by accident."

It's the Reaper's Curse. It's that damn curse. If it wasn't for the curse, I'd... I felt tears prickling at the edges of my eyes, before I hastily rubbed my face with my arm. I wouldn't have overdone it and ended up killing her, would I? I don't know, maybe I would have?! This didn't happen before...

"It wasn't intentional." Edna stated outright. "You can tell, just look at her."

For a moment, it was all quiet before Sorey held out the key to me. "Do you know whose this is? Agatha dropped it when she turned into a hellion."

"Oh yeah, that's Neif's key." Rokurou said, causing all of us to look at him. He looked from me to Sorey and then back. "What?"

"Of course you'd know that." I muttered, looking at the key. Shaking my head, I looked around and then realized I wouldn't know where Neif was in this place. Maybe we could just look around and try to find it. "So, if you know about that, then where do we go?"

The last time I was here, we'd gone towards the museum and met Attak who had been hellionized. Basically still following the script of Zestiria and its pre-determined path. But this time, things really had gone off the rails and I wondered if Attak would be the same or stronger. Because of both Eizen and I having Reaper's Curses, it would probably be the latter option. That didn't fill me with much confidence, and I had to think of how we could do this. Was there any way to do it without me being near? Could I be bait for the drake until they exited the museum?

"Hmm..." Rokurou folded his arms against his chest and closed his eyes. "It's been a couple years since I've been here, so I'm not too sure if Neif still lives in the same place. We could look in that dusty old museum."

"Oh goodie." Edna said sarcastically. "We're entrusting this entire mission to a guy who wasn't here for two years."

"Hey!"

Arvald, Ryda, Topaz and Grimm had decided to stay behind while the rest of us headed to the museum. The medicine delivery took priority, after all, and we couldn't really blame them for staying behind. At least we knew where they were if we needed their help. But the museum looked a bit old and dusty, especially on the inside, and I glanced around. The layout was the same as always, so I supposed there was no need for it to change. I turned to Sorey, who was in awe over this place. "We should split up. I'll try and find where the hellion is. If I do, I'll send Kain to let you know."

"Who's Kain?" Immediately as Sorey asked that, Kain materialized beside me and did a two-finger salute towards Sorey.

"That would be me," Kain responded. "I'll let you know if we come across the hellion and lead you right to where Rani is."

"...You know, I just realized we never introduced ourselves and we've been talking for... what, a bit now?" I laughed a little, feeling awkward. This whole time, I'd never introduced myself and I knew their names. That came off as creepy, no matter how you put it. "Sorry, I forget you don't know me. I'm Rani."

"It's nice to know your name after all this time." Alisha pointed out. "We just called you the cloaked girl."

That was some sort of nickname for certain. "Yup, I can see why you'd call me that. Well, anyway..." I started to walk off in the direction I needed to go. "If I find the hellion, I'll have Kain come your way. If you guys find the hellion, send Mikleo my way."

"Why am I the one being sent off?!" Mikleo demanded to know. I just laughed and waved, walking away and not responding. It really didn't take all that long for me to find the way there, recalling it from the previous time I'd been here with Sorey. This did mean that I would just linger outside, sitting with my back against the nearby wall and taking stock of the situation. First, Agatha turned into a hellion and I ended up accidentally killing her while armatized with Zaveid. Second, after Rayfalke, it seemed that Mikleo was more tense than usual about everything. And third, despite me knowing their names and them not knowing mine... it didn't seem like they were too bothered about it. I had to wonder what had changed from the last time I was here to now. What had truly changed when Maotelus set everything back to before I'd gotten caught up in everything and was it because of me or something else? I honestly didn't know.

Standing up after about thirteen minutes of sitting there and debating, I turned towards the door and walked over to it. "Kain, go find Sorey and tell him we've found the hellion."

"But it isn't here," Kain said, pointing that out to me. "That would be a false alarm."

"The moment I get to that faded painting, the hellion's going to come out of hiding." I said, looking back at him. "I want Sorey on his way here before I initiate the fight."

"Alright." Kain shrugged before running in the way we came. I walked towards the painting and prepared myself for the fight that was soon to come.