After getting out of the building that was home to the Evelyn’s Heart Phantom Slayer Squadron, Iris could barely contain all the questions she had anymore. Eve was sad to see them go, but didn’t try to hold them back. They were, after all, freelance Hunters. Their defining trait was the fact that they were constantly on the move.

“W-Wait, Finn,” Iris whispered sharply by Finn’s ear as she rode on his back. Finn, after some hesitation, headed for an isolated corner of the street. The storm had cleared by now, and citizens were heading back out onto the streets. They couldn’t afford to have any careless conversations.

“… What is it?” He asked after the footsteps and voices of all the passerby sounded extremely distant.

“How did you… back there…”

It didn’t take a genius to know what she was talking about. Finn sighed. He couldn’t tell her about Zelestria, who had been the one to give him the correct answers. Saying he guessed would’ve been unrealistic, considering there’s no way anyone could’ve guessed Evelyn would throw a trick question for the last one and put her hand down completely.

“… It’s simple,” Finn replied. “The first few I simply guessed right. It was easy, since she only used one hand. As for the last one… I heard the faint sound of her hand landing on the desk.”

Iris was shocked. “Impossible… the probability of getting that right… wow. And there was a sound? Really? I didn’t even hear…”

“When you lose one of your five senses, your remaining four improve drastically,” Finn replied, calling upon some knowledge he had learned in university before any of this happened. “This has been scientifically proven. And my blood…”

It only enhances that further.

He didn’t finish the sentence, because Iris knew already. There could still be random civilians listening, after all. His special Ghost blood provided enhancement abilities—that part was true. The guessing part, though? Definitely not.

“I… see…” Iris seemed dubious still, but didn’t want to pry any further and instead merely sighed. “Anyway… you said you could take on Specters, but that was a lie, wasn’t it?”

Finn nodded. “It was.”

“Then… how are we going to go about this Emperor…?”

Finn pulled out his phone, then showed Iris the address of the Temple’s entry point to Iris.

“… We learn.”

According to Finn, the House of Spectra’s Ghost Hunters would definitely enter the Temple sometime today. This was, after all, an urgent matter, and every minute that was delayed meant another minute of possible danger for the city.

As such, all Finn and Iris had to do was wait by the entry point, then follow the House of Light Hunters inside and study them. After getting the hang of it, they could then reveal themselves and help out. The House of Spectra Hunters won’t be able to do anything against them inside the Temple—they would want all the help they could get.

And right he was.

After several hours of waiting, the time finally came. The two watched from a building quite far away, but with Iris’s Oculus Angelica, distance was of little matter.

“They’re here, Finn!” Iris whispered sharply, and Finn slowly stood up on the roof of the building. Not too far away, on the roof of the tall target structure, a sudden shimmer of yellow light appeared, and out came five individuals clad in silver armor. It seemed they were the Hunters from the House of Spectra, and had traveled here via some kind of teleportation device.

After several seconds, a swirling black portal opened up in front of them, and the five stepped through without any hesitation.

“… They went in,” Iris said, eyes blazing gold.

“I see.” Finn took a deep breath, then activated his Lightning Aura and conjured a storm by himself. The civilians, surprised that this was happening for the second time today, all quickly retreated into cover once more as the city was engulfed in rain and fog.

“… Let’s go,” he said, and Iris nodded firmly.

The two spread their wings and ascended into the air, then beelined straight for their target building—a high-rise with purely black stained windows for walls and a nice, simple, and geometric aesthetic to it: literally a rectangular prism.

This made it easy to reach the top, where the portal had already closed. But that was fine. Iris’s blood may not be pure enough through the generations, but Finn’s sure was, having gotten it infused directly into his veins.

Activating his claws on one hand, he cut open one of his fingers—making a wound as small as possible to avoid any problems later on—and let the blood spill out.

Drip. Drip. Drop.

After three or four drops, the pooling black liquid on the ground slowly began to bubble and swirl, and all of a sudden, it rose up, defying gravity, and conjured into the black portal leading to the Paracausal Realm that was all too familiar to Finn and Iris by now.

However, they didn’t go in just yet. They needed to give the House of Spectra members enough time to move forward, then enter to avoid being noticed. This way, they could observe from a safe distance while the Hunters took on the Specters in the Temple, then learn the tactics needed to defeat this specific archetype of Ghosts.

After a good fifteen minutes, the duo finally entered—cautiously. And what was the other side… was really different from the shattered churches and cathedrals they had found themselves in previously.

All around them was a dark forest. There was no layout. No signs. Just one, massive, forest. Up above them, a dark blue night sky loomed with a crescent moon and several stars, glimmering like diamonds. In front of them, a path cut straight through the middle of the forest, leading deeper in. There were sets of fresh footsteps on the ground, signaling that the House of Spectra Ghost Hunters who came here before them went this same way.

“This place… is it really the Paracausal Realm…?” Iris mused in wonder, glancing around at the beautiful nature surrounding her.

“… No doubt,” Finn muttered. “Phantoms like buildings, so their Dungeons and Temples were different. But Specters… they like forests, and other places where one can be easily ambushed at any angle. Apparently, they are also more intelligent… making them more dangerous.”

Iris inspected the sets of footprints, then settled down on Finn’s back.

“There appear to be five sets of footprints here, matching the five people we saw.”

Finn nodded. “Let’s follow it.”

But inside Iris’s mind, she had another concern she did not voice aloud, as she could not be sure if it was an issue worthy of mentioning yet, or just a red herring to cause panic when there was no real need.

There were five sets of footprints on the ground, yes, but…

What about the previous Phantom Slayer Squadron who came here?

Keeping that thought in the back of her head for now, Iris and Finn ventured into the forest, following after the footsteps on the plain path heading deeper inside.