The corridor felt too narrow. Dust clung to the cracked stone walls. Broken pillars leaned into the passage, narrowing it further. Blood from earlier cuts had begun to dry on the ground, but fresh drops still marked where Shizume stood. Her side throbbed with every breath. The cut along her ribs burned each time she moved. Her shoulder felt weak when she raised her blade. Her legs were steady, but only barely. Two Inquisitors faced her, while the third was behind. They were closing in.

  “Now, let’s finish this,” one of them said quietly.

  They stepped forward together. The first attacked high, but she managed to block. The second pressed at her side. She twisted away, but steel scraped across her back again. She tried to slip along the wall and disappear into shadow. They didn’t follow her movement. They stepped into where she would appear. The third came from behind. Her Kaijin continued to flicker. For a breath, the sound of his approach dulled. Then it crashed back too loud in her ears. She shifted just enough to avoid the full strike, but the blade still cut her side. Pain blurred the edge of her vision. They separated only long enough to reset their footing. Then they advanced again.

  She tried to break their rhythm by stepping forward suddenly, driving toward the one on her right. The third was already there. Steel collided at close range. Her injured shoulder trembled under the strain. She forced herself free just before the one in front drove his blade down toward her neck. She ducked, her back hitting stone. There was nowhere left to give. They stepped in again. One in front, to her right, and one behind. If she tried to escape, they would cut her down. If she tried to overpower one, the other two would finish it. Her breathing grew uneven. Her Kaijin flickered again, unstable. Sound dulled, then sharpened too much. The world felt slightly off around her. She hated the fracture inside herself. Survive. Escape. Prove. Too many directions tugged at her.

  Raizō.

  The thought came without permission. Just the awareness that he was somewhere in this building, probably fighting something himself. If she died here, he would never know how close she had come to making it. And suddenly, the noise inside her quieted. Not because she wanted to survive. Not because she wanted to win. Because she wanted something simple.

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  I just want him to see me.

  The thought wasn’t loud, but it was clear. She wanted to reach him. For a second, she stopped splitting herself between what she had been and what she thought she needed to be. She wasn't the weapon Frostmarch labeled her. She wasn't a failure like Verrin claimed. She wasn’t running anymore. She was moving toward him. Her breathing steadied. Her Kaijin tightened. The unstable flicker smoothed into something sharp. The air around her felt still.

  The two Inquisitors in front felt it immediately. Her presence became difficult for them to hold in place. The Inquisitor directly in front of her stepped in to strike. His eyes narrowed. Something felt different. He blinked, just once. That was enough. He expected her to still be in front of him. She wasn’t. She had already stepped inside his reach. The other two saw it happen too late.

  “Behind you—!”

  “Move!”

  Their voices were sharp, urgent. He tried to adjust, but it was too late. Her blade drove upward beneath his guard before he corrected his footing. It wasn’t graceful. It was close and immediate and certain. Steel slid deep in his side. His expression shifted from control to utter confusion. He had lost her for less than a second. She pulled the blade free as he collapsed forward. The clarity broke instantly.

  Sound rushed back in too loud. Her vision blurred at the edges. The corridor tilted slightly. Her Kaijin flickered violently and thinned again, causing her to nearly collapse. It hadn’t stabilized, it had briefly aligned with her. The two remaining Inquisitors stepped back instead of forward. They weren’t relaxed anymore. They had felt it.

  “What the hell was that?” one said, breath tight.

  “She’s not what we expected,” the other answered quickly.

  Shizume’s leg trembled. Blood dripped from her blade. She couldn’t hold that clarity again. The fracture inside her had already begun to return. Shizume didn’t wait for them to solve it. She kicked the cracked pillar beside her with what strength she had left. The stone split and crashed between them. Dust exploded upward, thick and blinding. She moved immediately into the deeper shadow beyond the falling debris, somewhere they couldn’t fix their eyes fast enough. By the time the dust began to settle, the corridor ahead was empty. Blood marked the stone where she had stood.

  The two remaining Inquisitors stepped forward only as far as the fallen ally. One crouched beside him and confirmed what was obvious. The other kept his eyes on the corridor, but he didn’t advance. For a moment, neither of them spoke.

  “She changed,” the standing one said quietly.

  The other didn’t answer right away. He replayed it in his mind. She had been there, then she wasn’t. He rose slowly.

  “Let her go. We don’t know what she’s capable of now.”

  The first nodded once. They dragged the body back into the shadow of the corridor and did not follow the blood.