Two years ago…
Only weeks after Emilia set out—she roamed the Grafenberg province, learning the world by bruises and breath, by dawn roads and dusk alleys. Somewhere along that road, she awakened the Fog Awakening.
It wasn't flashy. It didn't roar or crack the sky. But it flowed—defense made fluid, feints and veils and strangling hush. She experimented relentlessly, shaping fog into fists, shields, blades, and tricks that could turn a fight sideways.
That was when she first crossed paths with the Boss.
Emilia had joined the Adventurer Guild, the world's largest agency for quests and private contracts. Her registration granted access to classified tasks—some legal, some… flexible.
One task stood out: recover a cursed object—specifically, a cursed eye.
Curses are anomalies—bundled negative energy released at death. For one to form, the death must spill enormous malice or despair. Rarer still, that energy binds. Curses don't have a solid shape; most drift like black mist, empty and aimless—until they cling.
They can possess objects (cursed objects) or living beings (cursed marks).
Among cursed objects, three classes exist—from common to rarest:
1. Cursed weapons/tools
2. Cursed armor
3. Cursed eyes
Cursed eyes rank highest because their abilities can be overwhelming—and because almost nothing about them is known. An eye can change users under specific conditions. A mark cannot.
Emilia's contract: secure the Eye of Information—a cursed eye said to let its wielder see all information about anything they touch with a specific hand. Left eye = left hand. Right eye = right hand. Her intel said it would be illegally shipped to Grenzborg.
She was fifteen. Same clothes. Same hair. Already harder around the eyes.
She stood at the harbor, scanning crates, cranes, and gull-shadowed planks.
Emilia: "This is harder than I thought it would be. I mean, how hard is it to look for a single eye?"
She muttered, underestimating the hunt for an S-tier prize.
The Adventurer Guild grades threats and artifacts: Unranked (F), C, B, A… and beyond that, Special-tier S. Every cursed eye sits at S.
Emilia: "I have an idea."
She closed her eyes. Fog spilled from her skin and rolled outward, swallowing the entire harbor. Dockhands barely blinked; fog is fog on the seaside.
Emilia vanished into her own mist and reappeared in front of an open crate stuffed with straw.
Emilia: "Found you."
She grinned, digging out a sealed container. Inside: an orange eye with three horizontal black lines engraved across the iris, floating in yellow liquid.
She turned—then stopped. A man stood there, angry, blocking the path.
Man: "What do you think you are doing, kid?"
His jaw knotted.
Emilia: "Sorry, I'm lost. Where is the shopping mall?"
Her face turned playful, baiting him.
Man: "Who sends you? I won't back down just because you are a kid."
He dropped into a fighting stance.
Emilia: "Fuck it."
Her fist dissolved into fog and shot forward—Foggy Fist—extending to crack the man's face. He dropped at her feet.
Emilia: "Cool, right? I call it the foggy fist; I still have to work on its name, though."
She stepped over him, melted the fog away, and slipped from the harbor with her prize.
That night, in a tiny Grenzborg hotel, Emilia sat on a thin mattress. The container waited on a table, its captive eye drifting like a bright seed in syrup.
Emilia: "Why does everyone get crazy about such a bizarre thing?"
A sudden knock. She flinched, darted to the door, and cracked it—instinct snapped tight—gunfire.
She leapt back. Bullets hissed through her body, trailing thin fog filaments where they passed. She looked down—no wounds.
Three men in black sunglasses and masks pushed inside with silent purpose. Emilia snatched the container and fled into the bathroom. A hand signal. The door splintered.
Fog burst from Emilia's palm—a pressurized beam—flinging the first man backward into the second. She flooded the room with thick mist and moved for the exit.
A grip clamped her from behind. She twisted—muzzle flash at point-blank range.
The bullet passed through her face. A small fog ring opened in her forehead, then sealed—no blood, no scar.
For one suspended instant, terror overwhelmed her. She froze. The man released her. He took the container, muttered with his partners, and left.
Time blurred. She sat where she fell, shaking.
An older man appeared in the doorway. Balding. Smiling. At first, it read kind. Later, only madness fit.
Man: "Hello, little girl, I heard a lot about what happened to you."
He spoke softly. Emilia didn't answer. She couldn't.
Man: "It must have scared you, coming this close to death and that at such a young age. Why don't you come with me? I can help you."
Emilia turned, eyes bruised with sleepless rings.
Emilia: "I-I…"
Tears broke free.
Man: "It really had been hard for you, right? No problem, little one."
He folded her gently into his arms.
Man: "From now on, you will be with me."
Emilia: "I—I don't want to be like this ever again."
Man: "I will make you never feel this way again."
Emilia: "T-thank you."
Her voice was a thread.
Emilia: "B-but how do I c-call you?"
Man: "Oh, just call me Boss."
He helped her up and led her out, their hands linked.
After that, the boss trained her. Special missions. Quiet killings. Disappearances and deliveries. The underworld learned a new name: the Fog Princess.
She guarded her family from that darkness the only way she knew—by cutting herself away from them. No ties. No contact. No leverage.
So when Henry appeared on her deck two years later asking for help, shock hit first. Then fear. Then that old memory reared up, the one that froze her breath and tightened her ribs.
Reject him. Push him away. Keep him safe.
But when Henry said he wanted to help her—just like that—something old and fragile lifted its head. Hope. The first in a long time. And that terrified her, too.
Which is why now, with Daniel bleeding and the Boss a breath away, that memory returned like a trap shutting. Until—
Henry arrived.
And the prison cracked.
Emilia: "H-HENRYYY!!"
She cried, relief surging past the pain.
Henry: "What do you think you are doing?"
He asks the boss, filled with rage.
The Boss tilted his head, smiled easily, and spoke graciously—like a host greeting a late guest.
The Boss: "Too many faces I do not remember. Young man, could you be so kind and tell me who you are?"
He asks Henry with his smile and a kind voice.
Henry didn't answer right away. The sea wind curled at his sleeves. A faint blue shimmer gathered around his knuckles—like lightning hiding in daylight.