The Godsbane Gauntlet lay untouched on the cracked arena floor, its surface reflecting not light—but hunger.
Hayuni stared at it, her nine tails flickering with restless energy. The battle had been won, but something itched beneath her skin.
"You're holding back," Payune said, wiping stardust from her bruised knuckles.
Hayuni's third eye—the one she kept perpetually closed—twitched. "Am I?"
The Third said nothing. He simply watched, his glitching form reflecting Hayuni's unrest.
The Silent Apostate limped forward, her blindfold now torn, revealing eyes that had seen too much.
"You dance on the edge of a blade, little fox," she rasped. "One misstep... and what sleeps inside you will wake."
Hayuni's fingers curled into fists. "I know exactly what I'm doing."
Syrinn laughed—a sound like breaking glass. "No. You don't."
Then she vanished, leaving behind only a single chain link.
Hayuni picked it up.
It burned with forgotten power.
That night, as the others rested, Hayuni stood before a shattered mirror—one of the arena's many broken remnants.
Her reflection stared back, tails swaying in a nonexistent wind.
"Liar," it whispered.
Hayuni's third eye fluttered open—just a sliver—and the mirror screamed.
A tenth tail, black as the void between stars
A cage made of her own bones
A voice that wasn't hers: "Let me out."
Hayuni slammed her fist through the glass.
The vision ended.
The itch grew worse.
The next morning, a new challenger arrived—not for Payune or the Third.
For Hayuni.
The Kitsune Matriarch, a being of pure foxfire legend, descended from the bleeding sky.
"Show me," she demanded, her nine tails blotting out the sun. "What you refuse to acknowledge."
Hayuni's usual smirk faded. "I don't know what you—"
"LIES!" The Matriarch's roar shattered the arena's remaining pillars. "You cage half your soul. Today, you set it free—or I tear it from you."
Payune stepped forward, dragonfire igniting. "Back off—"
"No." Hayuni's voice was quiet. Deadly. "This is mine."
She stepped into the center of the arena.
And let the first veil drop.
First Layer: The Foxfire Cloak
Her blue flames darkened to violet
The air sizzled with every movement
The Matriarch's first strike bounced off like rain against stone
Second Layer: The Shadow Tails
Three additional tails flickered into existence—translucent, half-formed
The ground rotted where they brushed
The Matriarch flinched for the first time
Third Layer: The Closed Eye
Hayuni's third eye opened halfway
The Matriarch's oldest memory played on loop for all to see
The arena wept black tears
"Enough games," the Matriarch snarled. "Show me your truth."
Hayuni breathed in.
And—
"Kitsune's Final Veil: Release."
It wasn't a tail.
It was a maw.
A gaping, hungry void that unspooled from Hayuni's spine, its edges lined with teeth made of forgotten histories.
The Matriarch stumbled back. "Impossible. That's not—"
"Mine?" Hayuni's voice was no longer hers alone. "No. It's ours."
The Tenth Tail struck.
And the Matriarch...
...ceased to have ever existed.
The arena was silent.
Payune's dragonfire guttered out.
The Third licked his lips.
Hayuni collapsed, the Tenth Tail retreating—but not gone. Never gone.
As the darkness took her, she heard it whisper:
"Soon."