“Huh? Where’s that weirdo who was always hanging around with you? Haven’t seen her these past few days.” The girl seated behind Elisa chewed her gum and teased.

  Elisa didn’t answer. She only glanced back at the speaker, then quietly opened the Art Nouveau jewellery album she’d bought a few days earlier. In truth, ever since the exorcism night, Mondena hadn’t come to school once. Even when Elisa called, Mondena’s voice on the other end sounded limp, the words coming out hesitant and broken. Elisa couldn’t make sense of it—Mondena had seemed fine when they parted that night, her emotions steadier than before. So why had she suddenly become so withdrawn, as if she couldn’t even speak normally?

  After class, still unable to shake her worry, Elisa bought a slice of the cheesecake Mondena loved and carried two cappuccinos to the shabby, slightly filthy apartment building where Mondena lived.

  “Hey—are you okay? I got your favourite cake. I’m downstairs at your place right now. It’s still early… want to take a walk in the park nearby?”

  “I… I… I’m not feeling well. I’m not going out today. And…” Mondena’s voice on the phone was timid as ever, edged with the faintest sob.

  “What is going on with you? It’s been days and you still won’t see me! Hey—I didn’t do anything wrong, did I? I even helped you the other day, chased that filthy thing away! If there’s some misunderstanding, we can clear it up face-to-face, but what is this—hiding and dodging like this?” Elisa’s temper flared. She truly couldn’t understand what kind of logic could possibly explain Mondena’s strange behaviour.

  “There’s no misunderstanding between us… I just… I just don’t really want to see anyone.” As she spoke, Mondena’s trembling grew worse, the sob in her throat rising.

  “I’m really worried about you. Did something happen? Is someone bullying you? If you keep avoiding me and won’t say what it is, I’m coming upstairs.”

  “No—no, don’t! Please! I’m begging you, don’t come up… I can’t take it anymore!” Mondena finally broke, crying outright.

  Hearing the sobs through the phone, Elisa fell silent. Slowly she lifted her gaze toward Mondena’s windows, then looked down at the cheesecake in her hand. “I’ll leave the cake in the hallway. Come out and get it when you can. I won’t bother you today.” She hung up.

  Just as Elisa was placing the cake on top of the mailboxes, someone came limping down the stairs—wrapped up so tightly it was almost comical: sunglasses, a mask, every inch hidden.

  “You…!” Elisa stared, shocked beyond speech at the person’s miserable state.

  The moment Mondena saw Elisa, her restraint shattered. She stood halfway down the stairwell and burst into loud, broken sobs, lifting a gloved hand that shook as she wiped away tears beneath her sunglasses.

  Elisa rushed forward to steady her. “What happened to you? Hey—are you okay?” Mondena only cried harder. She clung to Elisa as if she might drown without her, refusing to let go—until her legs gave out and she dropped straight to her knees.

  After a long while, with Elisa coaxing and soothing her, Mondena gradually calmed. Still, she refused to say much. She simply took Elisa’s hand and, limping, led her toward the small park near the building.

  On a bench, Mondena remained silent, and Elisa sat with her in the same quiet, watching. Through her sunglasses, Mondena wiped at her tears again. When the number of passers-by dwindled, she finally spoke—the first words since they’d met.

  “I… I can’t take this anymore. Why did I have to be born into a family like this? Why do I have to carry their shadow all the time? Why is there nowhere in this world that can hold me? Why can other people live like human beings, while my dignity were always been pissed it away?” Her voice was hoarse, as if she’d burned through all her strength crying long before.

  Elisa said nothing. She only tightened her grip around Mondena’s trembling hands. Then she noticed something—beneath the thin mask, a faint red stain was seeping through. She couldn’t bear it any longer. Gently she lifted Mondena’s head, and with Mondena’s silent consent, Elisa removed the tear-damp sunglasses and the mask.

  The moment Mondena’s face was revealed, Elisa froze.

  Mondena’s left cheek was grotesquely swollen. A vast, shocking bruise stretched from her jaw all the way to her temple. The corners of her eye and mouth had been split open, oozing blood and clear fluid. On her right cheek, a palm print still lingered—faintly red.

  “My God—who the hell did this to you? You’re hurt this badly and you still didn’t see a doctor? Come on. I’m taking you to the hospital, and then we’re going to the police.” Elisa grabbed her arm, already pulling out her phone to call a car.

  “Will the police help?” Mondena tightened her grip on Elisa’s hand. She lifted the face that had been beaten nearly beyond recognition and stared hard at her. “Will the police get me away from that Bastard? Away from that house, away from those people, away from this world full of malice? Divorce, restraining orders, law, morality, doctrine—if any of that mattered, Why I living like a dog?”

  Elisa blinked, stunned. Then she slowly put her phone back into her pocket and eased Mondena down onto the bench. “But… you and your mum—have you never thought about calling the police, or finding some other way to get away from that man? At least it could protect you both, give you some peace afterward…”

  “Safety? Peace?” Mondena’s laugh came out as something raw and ruined. “Who gets their life back after it’s been destroyed with tricks like that? Ever since we came back from the exorcism, he’s lost his mind—drinking every day, beating us while he reads the Bible… If I die, fine—I’ve been waiting for it since the day I was born. But I can’t leave my mum behind. You say ‘call the police’… the police only work for certain normal people. For him—for us, stripped of dignity and drowned in humiliation—they mere Hopeless pigs !”

  Her eyes were bloodshot. She stared into the puddle on the ground as if it were a mirror. “Unless I have the power to change all of this… even if he gets taken away, even if they divorce, my life is still broken. Do you understand how that feels, Elisa? What I want—what I ask for—is not much… I’m a person, a living person. I want to breathe with dignity, with my spine straight. I want everyone to accept me, to respect my value and my rights—as a living human being.”

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  Elisa let out a deep sigh. She had rehearsed a thousand comforting lines, a thousand emergency plans for what to do next—yet after hearing Mondena’s words, she could only fall silent. Because Elisa understood, with brutal clarity, in any era, in any circumstance—to reach the kind of life Mondena was naming,will need what kind of effort,courage, even paying those countless price.

  And while Elisa was still caught in that silence, Mondena turned toward her, clutched her hands, and sank down again—trembling—onto her knees.

  “What are you doing? Get up!” Elisa sprang to her feet, trying to pull Mondena up, but Mondena wouldn’t move. She stayed there, kneeling, as if the ground itself had shackled her.

  “Please…” Mondena’s voice cracked. “I know I don’t have any right to ask anything of you, but I can’t live like this anymore. Elisa—you’re my best friend,my only friend. Before I saw you today, I’d already thought of a hundred ways to end myself. But I realised I still don’t have the courage to let go of my mum and our friendship. And I still want to see the world—the worlds I’ve never seen. I’m begging you, Elisa. I don’t want to be bullied anymore. I want to be a person—a person who is alive. And there’s only one person who can help me do that… and it’s you.”

  Mondena dissolved again, sobbing so hard she could barely breathe. Tears ran down her left eye—stained, impossibly, with red.

  “Get up first,” Elisa said, her heart twisting. She kept trying to lift her, but Mondena had made her decision. She knelt there like stone and would not shift an inch.

  “What do you want me to do?” Elisa’s face flushed; her expression was awkward, helpless, and exhausted all at once.

  Mondena clenched her teeth. Gathering the greatest courage she had ever forced herself to summon, she spoke the sentence that had kept her alive through all the grinding months of torment.

  “I want to become you. I want to become a witch. I don’t want to be looked down on anymore—pushed around by anyone. I want to live for real, just once… as a person. To live on as a person with dignity.”

  The instant the words fell, a crack of thunder split the sky. Rain began to fall—thin at first, then steady. Elisa’s eyes widened, disbelief flooding her face.

  At the same time, in the back garden of her own home, Madame Sigrún—tea cup in hand—looked up with Elder Erik and his wife Ravena, who had come to visit. After the rumbling thunder, several streaks of gold-white lightning struck, as if in unison, a dead willow by the river in the distance. Electric light flashed; the rain-soaked trunk shattered. The eerie, grotesque sound sent the young people who had been playing by the river scattering in panic.

  Madame Sigrún sighed. Slowly she set down her teacup and murmured, “Once you’ve loosed the arrow, you should expect it to snap back and seek its revenge.” The thunder grew louder. Lightning came faster, denser. Madame Sigrún stared at the river’s rippling surface, and in her eyes lived a deep, unmistakable unease—almost fear.

  Ravena laid a gentle hand on Madame Sigrún’s shoulder. Thoughtfully, she said, “You can’t take all the blame. He brought it on himself—he should pay what he’s owed. But now that we’re here… are you going to stop, or…?”

  Elder Erik turned to look at the willow, now splintered and ruined. His expression hardened at once.

  From the charred break in the trunk, black smoke rose in coils—and within that smoke, a face appeared: twisted, distorted, grotesque, grinning as it writhed. Erik’s fingers tightened around the armrest of his chair. Then, with a small tilt of his chin, he signalled Sigrún and Ravena to look as well—to see the darkness taking shape in the smoke.

  Madame Sigrún’s face darkened further. “What’s coming will come,” she said, voice low. “No one can change the things they once intervened in with their own hands. Even if I can run from it for a while, I can’t put down the guilt I’m meant to carry for life. Those things slipped in when I was weak—no… they had a plan from the start. They blinded me. They used me. And now it’s too late to take anything back. I was a fool—I should have noticed earlier. And now… this won’t just drag my daughter in,Now even all of our Beloved brothers and sisters…”

  “Enough.” Elder Erik cut her off sharply. “It isn’t entirely your fault. They’ve been lying in wait for a long time—and in this time, they’ve found a chance we rarely see in the world. Since the storm is already here, and Thor has just sent a warning, what we need to do now is keep our heads and adapt. In two months we will return to the coven for the Midsummer celebration. I assume you and Ingvar know what must be done.”

  “Did you get a reply from the message you reported earlier?” Ravena asked, looking at Erik.

  Erik didn’t answer. Instead, he dipped a finger into the tea—simmered with cinnamon and apple—and drew three runes on the tabletop, one after another: ???. Only when he was sure Ravena and Sigrún had seen did he wipe the moisture away at once, leaving the surface clean.

  For a long moment, the three of them said nothing. At last, together, they looked toward the dead willow, which had stopped smoking. Elder Erik’s lips moved. Very softly, he said, “Now it begins…”

  The night stayed brutal—thunder rolling, rain unrelenting. In her bed, Elisa thrashed, trapped in a nightmare she couldn’t wake from.

  She was back at the blood-coloured altar. She was still wearing that oversized outfit—wrong in both style and colour, nothing like her usual taste. The fabric reeked of rot and poisonous herbs, making her gag. As in the dreams before, she panicked the moment she sensed her body changing. Her mind went foggy. She kept repeating the same questions: who was she now? What was she? Or—whose body was she in?

  And then, as always, the same ending.

  The twenty-fifth person stepped out from behind a megalith and walked into the centre of the stone circle. It wore a shape so rotten that no features could be made out, as if its face had been erased. That foul thing raised a hand;Then the stones trembled. After that,It lifted a knife that gleamed coldly and walked straight toward to Elisa.

  When the blade fell toward her heart, something strange surged through her—she felt no pain at all. But instinctive terror still seized her throat, and she screamed.

  “Ah—!”

  Elisa jerked awake, drenched in sweat. She shot upright in bed, her heart still racing. After forcing her breathing to slow, she turned her head to stare at the pillowcase and sheets, soaked through.

  The nightmare had left her wide awake—or rather, she was afraid to sleep again. She climbed out of bed in a rush, stumbled to her desk, and gulped down a glass of spring water steeped with white ash leaves. Only then did the shaking in her chest ease a little.

  As she wiped the sweat from her forehead with a tissue, Mondena’s words from that afternoon resurfaced—and Elisa was pulled back into an impossible dilemma.

  If she kept it quiet and initiated a mortal in secret, she would be pursued by the council for breaking the rules. But if she did nothing, her friend would be crushed—body and mind—until she finally snapped.

  The pressure pressed so hard Elisa could barely breathe. She bent over her desk and began to sob—quietly, helplessly. And just then, her hand—still damp from wiping tears—brushed against the ritual bronze mirror on the table.

  A cold gust slipped in from outside. The mirror’s central reflection shivered, trembling like disturbed water.

  “Ger tat er tú skalt gera.

  Bjarga einum anda — ok mee tví, tá er tú m?tir myrkri ok enda, munt tú opna tér aera leie.

  【Do what you should do. Save one soul—and in doing so, when you meet the darkness and the end, you will open another road for yourself - English Version】.”

  A steady, even gentle male voice spoke at Elisa’s ear. She stiffened, shocked into stillness.

  “Who…? Who’s there?”

  Realising no one stood beside her, Elisa’s terrified gaze fell on the rune carved into the mirror: “?”.

  “Voice from the Other side…?Is the gods’ will?”

  Before she could think further, lightning struck her window.

  Crash—!

  The frame and glass exploded into shards. The scorched curtain, splintered wood, and glittering fragments sprayed across the room. Luckily Elisa sat deep in the room; aside from screaming in shock, she wasn’t hurt.

  Hearing the blast and their daughter’s screams, Mr. Ingvar and Madame Sigrún rushed in. They pulled Elisa up, and seeing the wreckage, the couple stood speechless. They hurried her into the living room. After checking her body—confirming she was uninjured—and steadying her trembling, they settled her in their own bedroom to rest.

  Then, the two of them put on their talismans and cautiously returned to Elisa’s room. After confirming that aside from the lightning’s destruction there were no signs of a break-in, theft, forced entry, or a direct magical attack, Mr. Ingvar crouched by the ruined window. He looked at the scattered wood and glass and let out a long sigh.

  He murmured a sealing spell—cutting the room off from the outside so their words couldn’t be overheard.

  “My dear… there’s no turning back now. Tonight’s lightning was Thor’s protection—and a warning. And as for those things… they can’t wait any longer.”

  Madame Sigrún began to tremble uncontrollably. Forcing herself across the room, she braced against the wall, struggling for breath. Only after a long moment did she steady.

  “What about Elisa? We can’t keep her in the dark forever. And if their methods grow more vicious… one day, surely…”

  “Telling her the truth then it would stop everything?” Mr. Ingvar asked quietly. “I think before we reach the final step, they won’t do anything even more extreme. And after tonight, I believe the gods have already noticed—perhaps they’ve begun to move. We’ll adapt as we go. If we act rashly, we don’t know what kind of trouble—or calamity—we might unleash. Elisa is grown now. I trust her ability and her judgement. She will protect herself. And we… we have to trust her. We also have to trust the centuries of history and the effort that brought us here.”

  Mr. Ingvar stood and wrapped Madame Sigrún in his arms as she cried.

  “We’ll bear it together—everything. And, my love… don’t forget: we are not alone.”