Something had changed in the white plaza of Starfall Town.

This was their third stop. As they stepped off the train, they saw that new lights had gathered within the manuscript basin. The three names that had been there before had grown to five.

“They’ve descended from the heavens,” Kuon confirmed, his prosthetic eye whirring as it focused.

The basin was still functioning. Even in Koyoi’s absence, the names that had been drifting through the sky had found their own way down. There were twenty-one in all.

“It’s still not enough,” Koyoi murmured.

The single slip of paper they had lost at Yoinami Beach remained tucked away in his inner pocket. Asahi scanned the plaza, his gaze sharp.

“One was lost,” he said. “That leaves twenty-nine.”

Kuon snapped the ledger shut.

“I have located the remaining twenty-nine pillars. Fourteen are in the sky. Seven are underground. Four are near Hoshino. And—”

Kuon went silent.

“And?”

“Four have been brought to the Observers’ stronghold. They’ve been marked for ‘Deletion.’”

The air turned brittle.

Deletion.

That meant total erasure. It wasn’t like the “leakage” they had experienced at Yoinami Beach; this was a permanent, irreversible end. Asahi’s hand tightened around the hilt of his sword.

“Where is this place?”

“I cannot say for certain. However, a single thick line remains on the sea chart. It lies at the end of that path.”

Koyoi stared into the manuscript basin. The five names within shimmered with a golden light—small, yet defiant against the white cobblestones of Starfall Town.

Asahi drew his blade.

He pressed his thumb against the edge of the steel. A thin line of red seeped out, and a single drop of blood fell to the plaza floor, leaving a stark crimson dot on the white stone.

“I’ll draw them away,” Asahi said. “You two focus on the names.”

The train’s whistle shrieked—the signal for departure.

In the plaza, the names swayed like tall grass in a breeze, as if seeing the train off. Asahi’s blood began to soak into the stones, a lone point of red in a world of white.

Koyoi gripped his drawstring pouch. The pulse of the droplet within quickened, as if responding to the warmth of Asahi’s blood. Eventually, they would have to go to that place where the four names were being erased.

But for now, he kept his eyes fixed on the five lights glowing in the square.