The air felt heavy.

  The womay, crazed eyes trembled with untrolble madness. She no longer seemed human. Her movements were erratic, fast, and without natural transitions, as if she were a puppet trolled by invisible strings.

  Then, she attacked.

  I saw it, but my body couldn’t react fast enough.

  Her figure vanished and suddenly reappeared beside me. Her long, thin arm swung with incredible speed, aiming for my neck with a motion clearly meant to kill.

  I could only freeze.

  But before her grip reached my throat—

  G!

  A fsh of light erupted between us, apanied by the sound of metal g. In an instant, Azami—the female version of myself—was in front of me, her knife blog the woman’s attabsp;

  “Don’t just stand there, idiot!” she snapped.

  I stumbled back, cold sweat dripping down my temples.

  The ich wasn’t fazed. Instead, she smiled—a smile that was wrong, ohat shouldn’t have been on a human fabsp;

  Theacked again.

  Azami (the female version of myself) fought with incredible reflexes. The knife in her hand gleamed every time she swung it, creating trails of light that were almost too fast for my eyes to follow. Each of her strikes was quid precise, targeting vital points.

  But the woman was faster.

  She didn’t fight like a normal human. Her movements didn’t folloredictable pattern, and every time I thought she would retreat, she instead attacked from an impossible angle.

  “Tch… She’s like a fly that’s hard to kill, stantly maniputing the space around her,” Azami (the female version of myself) muttered between heavy breaths.

  I didn’t fully uand what she meant, but it was clear that she was almost untouchable.

  But Azami—the female version of myself—wasn’t ordinary either.

  Her eyes glowed with golden light.

  I could see energy flowing faintly around her hands, enveloping her knife in an almost invisible aura.

  “You might be able to trol space… but I see the gaps.”

  The woman vanished again—

  And reappeared behind Azami (the female version of myself).

  I wao scream, to warn her, but before I could do anything, Azami had already moved faster.

  SRRAKKK!

  The kabbed straight into the woman’s stomach before she could eve.

  She staggered.

  Bck blood gushed from her wound.

  I thought it was over.

  But the woman ughed.

  Her hands still reached for Azami’s neck, even as she was dying.

  She didn’t care about her own life.

  I saw it in a split sed.

  Azami could dodge— but she was too te.

  The woman’s cws were about to reach her throat.

  I didn’t think. I just moved.

  I lunged forward and smmed into the woman’s body with all my strength.

  We both fell to the ground with a loud #THUD, loud enough to be heard. I felt my knees hit the hard asphalt, pain shooting through my body. But I didn’t care.

  Azami—the female version of myself—seized the opportunity.

  In one swift motion, she drove her knife once more, this time straight into the woman’s head.

  The woman froze, yet her face still showed a terrifying expression of excitement.

  The ughter that had eoments ago suddenly stopped.

  Her body stiffened before finally colpsing silently.

  Bck blood pooled on the ground, creating a dark puddle that shimmered uhe streetlight.

  Silenveloped the narrow alley.

  I was gasping for air, realizing that my body was trembling violently.

  Azami—the female version of myself—who was also injured, slowly k beside the corpse, staring at it with a cold expression.

  “…It’s done.”

  I looked at her, my breath ragged. “Is she… really dead?”

  Azami (the female version of myself) touched the woman’s neck, searg for a pulse that was no lohere. Then, she nodded. “Yes. In the Real World, wounds like that still kill a Witch.”

  I swallowed hard.

  The fight might have only sted a few minutes, but it felt like hours.

  Then, I realized something.

  “Azami!” I excimed, notig the blood seeping from her shoulder. “You’re hurt!”

  She sighed. “Not the first time. I’m fine.”

  “NO! That’s serious!” I was almost panig.

  Azami looked at me with a ft expression. “Listen, I’ve lost more blood than this before. Rex.”

  Even though she was an alternate version of myself in the form of a woman, I still couldn’t believe how casually she handled herself like that.

  But before I could say anything else, she was already standing.

  “Alright,” she said, ign the blood still dripping from her wound. “We o finish our report.”

  I stared at her, fused. “Report?”

  Azami—the female version of myself—sighed. “Listen, even though we know she’s a Witch, the police won’t accept something that illogical. Witches are only known to other Witches or a select few trusted individuals who keep their secret. So of course, we need a pusible expnation.”

  I was still too shocked to process it.

  Azami walked over to the woman’s body and examined her wounds.

  “Alright… we’ll make this look like self-defense. Say she was a serial killer we were trag, the mastermind behind the previous murder, and that she fought back so hard we had no choice but to kill her.”

  I gaped. “You do that?”

  She gave a faint smile. “Of course. Besides, I’m also a detective.”

  Calmly, she began arranging the evidence—adjusting the position of the body, erasing traces of ht, and crafting a sario that the police would accept.

  I could only stand there in silence, realizing that I had just witnessed something far more terrifying than an ibsp;

  Azami Yuki—the female version of myself in this ied world—was a detective who could kill and manipute facts with chilling ess.

  And now, I was trapped in her world.