You Win

For a moment, perhaps a few seconds or maybe a few minutes, Kismet felt as if he had been sealed inside the Wind Eye.

There was not a sliver of light in any direction, nor could he hear a sound.

He vaguely felt as if someone were in front of him.

Perhaps it was Lucy, who had been sucked in earlier, or perhaps it was merely a hallucination.

The corners of his mouth remained curled in the same upward arc they had held a second before he was frozen. It was as if he did not care at all that he had been encased in ice to seal the Wind Eye.

But his fate did not end there.

Just before the Ice Lock Array could completely freeze Kismet's consciousness, cracks suddenly appeared on the rock-solid ice.

These fissures spread precisely around Kismet, yet they did not touch the Black Hole at the center in the slightest.

Subsequently, white threads emerged, winding around Kismet's hands, feet, torso, head, and every part of his body.

These thin lines, like the strings of a Puppet, covered his entire frame.

"A pity for Miss Lucy." Because the ice layer shattered, the corners of Kismet's mouth curled up a little further. "Without the Diary's permission, you cannot kill me. Just as I cannot kill myself."

Then, the threads wrapped around his body tightened abruptly; they did not leave a single mark on his skin, yet they pulled him out of the shattered ice bit by bit.

Fresh, cold air rushed into his lungs, allowing Kismet's stagnant brain to begin functioning once more.

He found himself floating in the air, rapidly moving away from the Old Days Manor.

Then...

"Thud!"

The elegant Kismet fell ungracefully at Thor's feet.

After two seconds of silence, he scrambled up