Tempest of the (Angry) Ravens...

Yuzuru's shriek reverberated like scraped metal, and from her distorted mouth emerged more crows than the air could hold. 

The meadow darkened under a swarm that no longer obeyed clear patterns: some swooped down like black spears, others crumbled to ash before hitting the ground, generating small bursts of wind that lifted flagstones and bones.

The earlier gusts had become misshapen cyclones, towers of wind that rose and fell at random, swallowing even the very crows she summoned. It was impossible to calculate their trajectory: one moment the current was an upward tunnel, the next a horizontal whip that uprooted trees.

Ayato covered himself with an arm, his teeth clenched.

"This isn't control... it's pure chaos."

A deafening caw forced him to duck as a human-sized crow, its wings torn, grazed him like a live missile.

Dakim raised his spear to protect Vera, but the blast tore the shield from his hands and flung him several meters.

"Impossible to maintain a defense against something so erratic!" he growled, panting.

Isolde, her cloak in tatters, rolled out of the way as a cyclone swallowed a tombstone whole. Her voice, deep but analytical, rose above the roar:

"She's consuming her own body to unleash this storm! Look at her arms... the skin is cracking under the pressure!"

Indeed, beneath her torn gloves, Yuzuru's veins pulsed like taut cords, each exhalation a gasp that revealed more bloodstained fangs.

Vera clutched the book in desperation.

"If she keeps this up... she'll kill herself."

Yuzuru staggered forward, her eyes reddened, her voice cracking but still heavy with contempt.

"No... I'm... weak! I'll devour... all of you!"

The cyclone contracted with a deep roar, transforming the black feathers into a razor-sharp swarm before disintegrating into a suffocating dust that darkened the cemetery.

Ayato tried to force a smile, a bad joke escaping through his teeth to keep from trembling: "Great... now he's unleashed infinite crow tornado mode."

But deep down, he knew there was no playing around: each gust of wind could take his life in an instant.

A crow pierced his coat like a spear and forced him back. Still, his smile didn't fade.

"But don't worry, Yuzuru... I love broken games."

Yuzuru's body buckled with a grotesque creak. 

The boots that had once defined her theatrical gait tore away, revealing her legs twitching, twisting until the bones seemed to snap and remake themselves. 

In their place emerged black bird-like feet, with sharp talons that scraped the stone upon contact. 

Each step echoed with the metallic screech of her nails as they tore the graveyard slab.

Vera recoiled, horrified.

"Gods... she doesn't look human anymore."

Isolde narrowed her eyes.

"Or rather, she never wanted to be."

Yuzuru, now suspended by a cyclone of crows, spread her arms like a plague idol.

"I curse you... all of you! May the wind rend you!"

The storm reached its peak: the cyclones multiplied, the crows screeched with such intensity that the air vibrated like an out-of-tune organ.

Ayato, panting, raised his sword.

"It's now or never..."

A roar of wind launched him into the air, straight at Yuzuru. In that instant, he remembered the suplex from earlier, and a bitter smile crossed his face.

"Then let's get to the sequel..."

He spun in the air, dodging a pair of crows that grazed his arm, and with a scream, drove his knee into Yuzuru's torso, breaking the cyclone that held her. The impact was so violent that they both spiraled to the ground.

CRASH!

The blow kicked up dust and stone splinters. Yuzuru lay face down, trembling, her claws scraping uselessly at the earth. The whirlwind of crows dissolved in a collective caw, vanishing like smoke.

Ayato stood up first, his shoulder bleeding and his sword half-broken.

"And so ends your 'aero-spam,' little bird..."

Yuzuru slowly raised her head. Her face, unmasked, displayed a broken smile from cheek to cheek, one eye blurred with tears.

"Why... won't you... let me...?"

"Woman, that sounds so emo..." Ayato said, already tired by this point.

For a second, the wind fell silent. 

Her grotesque figure seemed to be pleading, though her mouth only spat out crows that crumbled to ash.

Vera lowered her staff, her voice trembling:

"Because you yourself... don't know what you're looking for."

A final spasm shook Yuzuru, and her bird-like legs contracted until they creaked. Her entire body collapsed, slumping among scattered feathers.

Silence returned to the road, only broken by the faint wind and the distant cry of a lingering crow.

Ayato sighed, looking at the inert body.

"And I thought cheap cosplay wasn't that much work."

The thunder of the impact still echoed in the cemetery. 

Yuzuru's body was twisted among blackened feathers, her bird-like talons digging into the stone as if reluctant to let go of the world. 

The swarm dissolved in an agonized echo, and the once chaotic wind became a weak breeze.

Ayato, panting, turned away from her with a weary gesture.

"Damn it... she's still breathing."

Isolde raised her sword, pointing it at the defeated woman's neck.

"We shouldn't leave any loose ends. With that thing, she'll come back to kill us when she's put back together."

Vera interceded, standing between them.

"Look at her. Nothing remains but a broken shell."

Indeed, Yuzuru barely moved. Her face, unmasked, displayed that gaping smile, now slack and trembling. 

Tears glistened at the corners of her eyes, while a solitary croak escaped her throat, more a sob than an attack.

"...Why...?" she whispered, her voice cracked and weak as shattered glass. "I just... wanted to be seen..."

Silence spread between them all.

Ayato swallowed, slowly lowering his weapon.

"Tsk. Don't fuck with me... Now you're making me feel like the bad guy."

Isolde clicked her tongue, putting away her sword with visible distaste.

"This is a mistake."

Dakim, more practical, just nodded:

"Leaving her alive is a risk. But victory is already ours."

The group began to retreat. 

Behind them, Yuzuru crawled a few inches, her bird-like feet scraping the ground, her body trembling under the weight of defeat.

In her last effort, she raised a hand to her face to cover her split mouth, as if trying to restore her lost dignity. 

The cawing of a few scattered crows accompanied her, taking flight into the mist.

Her red-rimmed eyes followed the silhouettes of the heroes until they disappeared into the undergrowth.

"…I'm… not… finished…" she murmured, barely audible, before vanishing into the dust and shadows.

***

The group had advanced for several hours, the blackened silhouette of Ferro Scuro looming in the distance between the mountains. 

The air was cleaner, though the memory of the cemetery still weighed heavily on their shoulders.

Suddenly, the ground shook beneath their feet. 

A summoning circle ignited in the grass, inscribed with arcane runes that turned like gears.

Dakim immediately stepped back, raising his spear.

"Heresy! This is not the work of the gods!"

Sylphidia, still reeling from her intoxication, blinked in startlement.

"Th-that... is arcane teleportation. Magic forbidden on this plane!"

Ayato, Isolde, and Vera, on the other hand, remained in their positions, as if they had already connected the dots.

A female figure emerged from the circle, yawning and rubbing one eye. 

She wasn't wearing the classic witch costume that had intimidated them before, but rather wrinkled satin pajamas in a faded violet shade, with a nightcap tilted askew. She looked more like a sleepless student than the summoner of horrors.

Zeltha.

Isolde raised an eyebrow, her voice icy.

"No excuses this time. We defeated Yuzuru fair and square."

Vera added, with a firm but less hostile tone, "It wasn't like with Tatsuya. She chose to fight and lost."

Ayato, arms crossed and smiling sarcastically, spat out the sentence with all his accumulated fatigue:

"First the arsonist, now that emo feather face... There's nothing worse this dark elf who can barely stay awake can do."

Zeltha yawned again, rubbing her temple as if Ayato were an unbearable mosquito.

"Mm. Of course... Good work… or whatever."

Her tone was one of utter apathy, but beneath that disguise of reluctance, her eyes shone with a poisoned gleam. 

Every word the group spoke was a reminder of her failure. 

And worse: that, deep down, she was becoming the laughingstock of Dracula's followers who watched her movements from the shadows.

For a moment, the aura of the summoning circle trembled, as if reflecting her suppressed rage. 

But Zeltha simply adjusted her nightcap, feigning indifference.

"Keep enjoying your little winning streak. Dawn doesn't last forever." Her voice trailed off into a whisper, and with a blink, the circle disappeared, dragging her with it as if it had never been there.

The group fell silent.

Ayato broke the tension, shrugging:

"I told you so... She's not even a true villain…"

Isolde, without taking her eyes off the ground where the circle's burn marks had been left, murmured:

"And yet, don't underestimate someone who has the last laugh."

The group had barely begun to resume their march when the ground shimmered again. 

This time it wasn't an external summoning circle: it formed right beneath their feet, expanding with jagged runes that crackled like glowing gears.

"What... what is this?" Vera managed to murmur, her face still bloodied from the storm of crows.

A crimson circle expanded, exhaling oily smoke and the stench of burnt coal. The air itself creaked with a screech, as if an invisible engine were starting up.

Dakim groaned and tried to move away, but the edge of the circle enclosed him like a cage of light.

"Another heresy! That witch plays with forbidden forces!"

Sylphidia, still reeling, opened her eyes wide.

"It's not summoning... it's translocation! She's going to...!"

Too late.

A blinding flash enveloped them, followed by a sensation of vertigo that knocked the air out of their lungs. 

When their vision returned, they were no longer in the open field.

Before them lay the city of Ferro Scuro.

A sea of ​​blackened chimneys belched smoke into the sky, hiding the sun under a veil of soot. Gears turned in cyclopean towers, feeding incandescent furnaces whose glow dyed the clouds a hellish red. 

Armored trains roared on elevated rails, and in the distance, dominating the city, rose an impossible fortress: the Pseudo-Demon Castle, made of molten iron and bone, its towers resembling the vents of a living organism whose organs are the gears.

The crowds in the streets celebrated not kings or saints, but machines: they worshipped the wonders of the metallurgical revolution, ignoring—or accepting—that everything worked through sacrifice.

Ayato ran his hand over his face, laughing dryly.

"Sure. Of course. What better way to congratulate us than to throw ourselves straight into Hell's factory?"

Isolde spat to the side, her jaw clenched.

"A cruel joke... or a reminder that we're playing on their board."

Vera hugged her staff tightly, feeling the heat of the furnaces even from a distance.

"This place... smells like death."

Sylphidia, hiccuping from alcohol, murmured softly, as if her words were lost in the noise of the machines:

"The Infernal Tyrant... and his false castle... here, faith is no longer divine, it's metal."

Above them, a cloud of smoke parted for a moment, revealing a glimpse of the moonlight. 

In that reflection, almost like a mocking laugh, Zeltha's voice echoed in their minds:

"Don't thank me. Consider it a shortcut. Congratulations, heroes..."

And the echo of her apathy poorly disguised the mockery of the one who had thrown them headlong into the heart of the infernal revolution and the suffocating smell of red-hot iron...