The story begins with an eight-foot-tall lady surrounded by ghost story ladies.

"Binding Spirits and Sending Generals".

The only one among the Eight Extraordinary Techniques specifically designed for spirits.

It can take all sentient beings in the world into its palm and make them its own.

Because that force touches upon the most fundamental thing about the spirit—the right to exist.

It doesn't ask your wishes, ignore your resistance, or require your consent.

It only says one thing:

From this moment on, you are under my command!

Once the "Spirit Binding and General Dispatch" technique was used...

In an instant!

The air in the room suddenly froze.

At that moment, Madam Bachi's pupils suddenly contracted.

She stood half a step to the side of Natsume Fanyu, and her voluptuous body beneath the white shirt tensed up in that instant.

A power she knew all too well was surging from Natsume Fanyu's fingertips.

It was so familiar that every inch of her spiritual body began to tremble involuntarily.

Three years ago, under the moonlight of Tokyo Bay, he touched her brow with the same fingertip.

She still remembers the sensation of that power flowing into the depths of her spirit.

That was the first time she felt like a clam with all its shells peeled off in front of someone.

With the soft flesh exposed to the air, every tremor was impossible to hide.

At this moment, that power was surging from Natsume Fanyu's fingertips and drilling into the gap woman's brow.

The eight-foot-tall lady paused for a moment.

It wasn't because of jealousy.

It is because the aura of that power is an etched memory into the very bones of any spirit that has ever been touched by it.

It's like a key; without any extra action, it automatically unlocks a tightly locked door deep within her spirit whenever it appears.

Her fingers involuntarily curled up.

Something was awakening deep within her spirit, and a scorching heat spread from the base of her spine to her limbs and bones, almost causing her three-meter-tall, voluptuous body to collapse on the spot.

For a moment, Madam Bachi's breathing became shallow and rapid.

The deep cleavage at the open collar of her white shirt swayed gently with the rise and fall of her chest.

at the same time...

The spiritual contract originating from "Binding Spirits and Sending Generals" has begun.

A dark golden light is spreading from the spot on Jianzhi's brow that Natsume Fanyu touched with his fingertip.

The light didn't come from the outside; it seeped out from inside.

It was as if something slumbering deep within the spirit was gently awakened by the slight force of his fingertips.

The power of "Binding Spirits and Commanding Generals" surged into her spirit body like a tidal wave.

It unfolds a rearrangement that the Eight-Foot Lady personally experienced and therefore could most empathize with.

From the day she was born from that crack, from the moment she was banished from the shrine as a ghost story, from every single second of the countless years she wandered alone in the crevice...

All the scattered, broken, and shapeless fragments of existence are picked up one by one by an invisible hand at this moment, rearranged, and rewoven.

The body of the woven creature began to emit a dark golden light.

And that pale golden thread that pierced through her heart.

The thread of obsession that had bound her to the ruins of the abandoned shrine for countless years was crumbling inch by inch in the dark golden light.

Maori's eyes widened.

The shadow of the cracks in those pale golden pupils was fading.

Instead, there is a dark gold mark that is slowly rotating.

That was the spiritual inscription of "Binding Spirits and Sending Generals," and also her new home.

"From this moment on..."

Natsume Fanyu's voice rang out in the room, neither hurried nor slow, neither loud nor soft, carrying an almost ritualistic solemnity.

"Your root cause is no longer that abandoned crack."

"Your obsession is no longer with that forgotten name."

Jianzhi's body trembled slightly.

It was a tremor that came from the inside out, a deep-seated fear that only comes when something is uprooted and then replanted in the soil.

"You are Maori."

"Gap is my body, weaving is my life."

"Having received this spiritual covenant, my soul obeys my commands."

The moment the last four words fell.

The dark golden light at Natsume Fanyu's fingertips suddenly contracted, turning into a small mark that was imprinted on the center of Jianzhi's brow.

Jianzhi's body jolted violently.

She tilted her head back, and the spirit contract imprint in her pale golden pupils stopped spinning, settling firmly deep within her iris.

Those exquisitely beautiful lips parted slightly, as if they wanted to say something, but no sound came out.

Then, she began to change.

The skin, which was originally as smooth and inorganic as a porcelain doll, began to have color.

It wasn't the warm, blood-red color of a living person, but rather a faint glow, much like white jade dyed by the morning sun.

Her once empty, pale gold pupils now had a moist sheen.

The presence that was once as fleeting as an echo in the wind has now become stable, clear, and weighty.

She transformed from a "strange tale existing in the cracks" into "a spirit belonging to one person".

Jianzhi lowered her head and looked at her hands, which were no longer an unrealistically white color.

She slowly placed her right hand on her heart; the pale golden thread that had once pierced her heart had disappeared.

Instead, a thin, dark gold line, as fine as a hair, extends outward from the very center of the heart, flowing slowly along the contours of the spirit.

"My roots..." Her voice was no longer an empty echo.

"It's no longer that crack."

She raised her eyes and looked at Natsume Fanyu.

In those pale golden pupils, the inscription of the spiritual contract was still slowly flowing.

"It's you."

Natsume Fanyu withdrew his finger.

"How does it feel?"

Jianzhi remained silent for a moment.

"Very light."

"It's much lighter than before."

She raised her eyes, her gaze passing over Natsume Fanyu's shoulder and landing on Lady Hachikami.

Jianzhi looked at the white-clad spirit who was almost twice her height, at the white shirt that was stretched to the point of being almost transparent, at the cold and dignified face and the voluptuous body beneath it that was almost sinful.

Then he nodded slightly.

She sensed that the aura of power emanating from Madam Bachi was the same as the mark on her brow, and knew that they belonged to the same person.

The eight-foot-tall lady did not respond.

Having witnessed the entire process of the spirit contract being formed, the power, though not directed at her, still leaves a lingering, slightly aching sensation deep within her spirit.

She felt that her legs might give way at any moment, and she could only maintain her composure by remaining silent.

Natsume Fanyu seemed to have sensed something.

He turned around and his gaze fell on the face of the eight-foot-tall lady.

In the morning light, that cool and aloof face remained dignified, and the distance between her brows and eyes was still like that of Guanyin in a temple.

But her earlobes were flushed with a redder than ever before.

He noticed, but didn't say anything; he just smiled slightly.

"Interspersed." He looked at the woman in the gap again.

"Yes." Maori answered quickly, so quickly that she was surprised herself.

"There's something I need you to do next."

Jianzhi raised her eyes, and in her pale golden pupils, the mark of the spirit contract stopped spinning.

"What is it?"