The meeting had been moved to a room even smaller than the assembly chamber.
An old map hung on the wall,
and the terrain of the continent was laid out in rough form atop a low table.
The table was low, and that very low height held the gaze.
Whoever lowered their head, whoever moved their hand,
everything could be seen at a glance.
There was little room between the chairs.
Even the slightest shift of the body made hems brush together,
and that brushing quietly created tension.
There were not many gathered.
Langnan, Yun.
And those who had been called.
When the door closed,
the first to speak was
Muryeong.
“So.”
“Where are we supposed to catch him?”
It was a question without hesitation.
Langnan answered with his eyes lowered to the map.
“We don’t know.”
The words were brief.
Miryeong’s brow twitched faintly.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Langnan did not lift his gaze.
“The Fire Demon will pinpoint the location.”
At the word “fire,”
the breaths in the room grew shallow for an instant.
Someone curled and uncurled their fingers,
and someone deliberately fixed their eyes on the map.
The Fire Demon was not in this room.
And yet, by name alone,
his presence seemed already to have taken a seat.
A brief silence settled over the room.
Yun spoke as if to organize the matter.
“The Fire Demon is tracking the Moon Demon.”
“We will receive the location from him.”
His voice was calm.
“We move the moment the information arrives.”
The room was quiet.
It was not a completed plan.
But the direction had been set.
Langnan slowly folded the map.
“The moonless night is ten days from now.”
“Until then, we prepare.”
Someone drew in a breath.
Ten days.
Long, if it was long,
and short, if it was short.
Langnan continued.
“However, it will vary depending on when the location is pinpointed.”
“If the Fire Demon’s information arrives late, we may move immediately before the moonless night.”
“If it arrives early, we depart a day, perhaps two days, ahead of time.”
Yun nodded.
“Travel time is a variable.”
“Depending on where the Moon Demon appears, our route and preparations will change as well.”
The air in the room did not grow heavier.
Instead,
it became a little clearer.
There was a fixed date.
But there was no confirmed place.
This operation was built upon waiting.
The final place Langnan’s gaze came to rest was Bido.
For a moment, no words followed.
“The Moon Demon.”
He spoke in a low voice.
“His Mirkin dominates the space around him.”
The eyes in the room gathered once more.
A thin layer of sweat formed on Kallen’s forehead.
“...A domination type?”
Langnan neither nodded nor denied it.
“He distorts space.”
“He folds it, and leaps.”
That was not simple movement.
It was a method of erasing the distance in between.
Attacks could not reach,
and pursuit lost all meaning.
For space to fold
meant the path disappeared.
The distance one had to cross, the angle one had to swing through,
all became meaningless in an instant.
At one moment, right before your eyes.
At another, behind your back.
It felt not like “movement,” but a change in “placement.”
Bido’s vision wavered for the briefest moment.
That was why—
her attack had not reached,
and he had vanished before her eyes.
Bido’s hand stiffened unconsciously.
‘But why?’
It was then.
“Bido.”
It was Langnan calling her.
“You will stop his Mirkin.”
All eyes in the room gathered on her at once.
Bido’s heart seemed to skip a beat.
Kallen was the first to speak.
“How...?”
“Is that child a Mirkin user too?”
Yun said calmly,
“Bido can stop another person’s Mirkin.”
The gazes of three people crossed.
Low voices overlapped.
“...Is such a thing possible?”
At that moment, Miryeong cut in briefly.
“It is. I saw it.”
“You can believe it.”
Muryeong asked quietly,
“If.”
“If Bido fails to stop it?”
This time, there was no hesitation.
Langnan’s voice was composed.
“Then the operation fails.”
Someone seemed about to argue, but swallowed it in the end.
What was needed here was not courage, but calculation.
And the calculation had already been made.
The word “failure” sounded like the closing off of possibility.
The flame of the lamp trembled ever so slightly.
Only that tremor moved.
In the place where his words ended,
no one could move right away.
Those words were closer to fact than threat.
No one raised their head.
There was no need to explain what the failure of the operation would mean.
Langnan spoke again.
“It is difficult to maintain Mirkin for long.”
“That is why you cannot continue stopping his Mirkin indefinitely.”
His gaze passed over those before him.
“We will create an opening.”
“At that moment.”
Langnan looked straight at Bido.
“With that sword, sever his flow.”
“And seal his Mirkin as well.”
Stopping something
and binding it completely were different things.
Just once.
No mistake would be permitted.
Bido’s fingertips trembled.
Her breathing grew shallow.
Bido opened her palm, then clenched it again.
It was not the weight of the sword,
but the sensation of herself wavering that felt clearer.
To stop it
did not mean overcoming fear.
It was simply, for a single moment,
the act of grasping hold of that wavering.
She had proven once that it might be possible.
But proof did not end with a single time.
Ten days later,
that same moment would come again, only greater.
The thought tightened around her throat,
and Bido slowly divided her breath.
“...I.”
Her voice did not come out properly.
“How...”
The end of her words blurred.
Langnan did not waver by even an inch.
“It is something you and that sword can do.”
“Do not doubt it.”
His voice was quiet,
but decisive.
“In the time that remains.”
“You will refine your Mirkin.”
“And draw out the power of that sword.”
The room was still.
No one refuted those words.
But everyone knew.
That time was aimed at Bido.
Bido could not raise her head.
The continent spread out upon the map felt somehow far away.
Ten days.
It was a short number.
And yet within it,
the fact that her own name was contained felt strangely heavy.
The sword on her back
asserted its existence more clearly than usual.
The trembling in her fingertips did not stop.
Each time she drew breath,
it felt as though the inside of her chest were empty.
—
The discussion in the room continued for a while longer.
Estimations of travel routes,
confirmation of signal systems,
and the minimal coordination needed for contact with the Fire Demon.
No one spoke of anything as “certain.”
Instead, they quickly lined up what was possible.
How contact would be made, what alternatives there were if signals were cut off,
and what baggage to abandon and what to keep if the location arrived late.
Miryeong folded her arms more tightly,
and Aslo did not change his expression until the end.
The details were arranged,
and there was no need to prolong the conversation further.
Langnan quietly brought it to a close.
“That is all.”
Yun looked at Langnan for a moment.
There were no words,
but he nodded as if confirmation was complete.
Chairs were slowly pushed back.
Gareun glanced once at Bido, then rose from his seat first.
One by one, people left the room.
Kallen opened the door with his lips pressed firmly shut.
Muryeong followed after him.
Yun remained until the end, then stood.
Bido was the last to remain.
For a moment,
she looked around the empty room.
Then she rose from her seat.
And Bido stepped through the door.
The sound of the door closing
lingered in the room for a long time.
The remaining air slowly cooled.
The air in the corridor was a little chilly.
Every word she had heard in the meeting room
still remained by her ears, not yet cooled.
Several people remained before the door.
Kallen, Yeonhwa, Taejin.
And—
Miryeong, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed.
Aslo, standing silently.
They wore faces as if they had been waiting,
or as if they had already made up their minds.
The moment Bido saw those faces, she knew.
This was not comfort, but confirmation.
Not eyes asking, “Does it really have to be you?”
but eyes asking, “Can you really do it?”
Miryeong said nothing,
but the tip of one foot had shifted very slightly forward.
It was an ambiguous stance, as though she was ready either to stop her or push her onward.
Aslo left even that ambiguity as it was.
Bido stopped after one step.
Their eyes met.
No one spoke first.
The corridor was silent.
Then Kallen stepped forward.
“Kid.”
“I’m not convinced.”
Kallen’s gaze did not waver.
“A bastard who dominates space.”
“You’re saying you can stop him?”
His words were low,
and without exaggeration.
Yet the air stretched thin and taut.
When Kallen finished speaking,
Bido swallowed once.
It was not that she was searching for an answer.
She needed time to keep her breath from shaking.
The corridor’s chill sank deep into her lungs.
Miryeong’s toes, Aslo’s quiet gaze.
All of it was measuring the Bido of “now.”
The sword on her back touched her,
as if saying, “This is what you chose.”
Bido exhaled once more in a measured breath,
and did not look away.
Bido’s breath stopped for a moment.
No answer came immediately.
Yeonhwa watched without saying a word.
Taejin leaned against the wall, his expression unreadable.
Miryeong’s brow moved faintly.
But she did not speak first.
Only silence flowed on like that.
It was then.
Aslo slowly turned his body.
Without a word, Aslo began walking down the corridor.
As he moved several steps ahead,
he said calmly,
“Let’s go to the training ground.”
“It will be better to see it in person.”
His steps did not stop.
Miryeong was the first to follow.
Yeonhwa and Taejin followed after her,
and Kallen moved a moment later as well.
Bido stood at the very end.
Her heart had not yet settled.
However—
Bido quietly followed after them.