Under Her Cursed Scythe

Everyone else in the scene ceased their movement. Even Molly had stopped. She had turned herself away from the direction where the knife was at, and appeared to be woken up from another terrible nightmare. Once her wild rage was interrupted by the calling of the name, the tiny dark stain, as though it was done with its fun, separated itself from Molly's shadow at once and covertly returned onto the surface of the Reaper's ring.

"Wait, how did you know his name?" Molly questioned in a startled tone. "You know her?" Her eyes skewed towards Joshua.

"No, no, no... there are plenty of JOSHUAs in this world, she can be referring to any of them but me." While Joshua was saying that, he was closing in on Alivia at the same time. "Are you sure I am the Joshua you…" That was when he picked up on the thing that slipped out from her sleeve. "This... you... you have her... " His voice muffled.

Alivia traced the line of his gaze and then and there, she realized what made him halted in silence. She swiftly hid her hand under the linen blanket but it was too late.

"This isn't possible..."Joshua uttered after he was struck dumb for a minute. "No, it's impossible. She would never do things like this." He shook his head. "She would never." he repeated.

"So you do know her?" Molly asked eagerly, looking at Joshua in confusion. "Who is it?" she persisted.

"A...Alivia?" Joshua weakly sounded with hesitation, eyeing Alivia with frustration as well as incredulity.

"Alivia? Did you call this 'girl' Alivia just now?" Ming walked forth and his eyes scanned Alivia from head to toe. "Are you sure it's her? Because first off, she's much taller than you and I believe you said Alivia and you are of similar heights. And most importantly, this girl has tiny eyes. She's practically an Asian like me." he pointed out, half-jokingly, while his finger moving constantly back and forth between himself and the disguised Alivia. "The Alivia you told us about was-"

"But she had that leather bracelet that I gave Alivia the other day." Joshua cut in. "It was handmade and I'm certain that there can only be one and only one bracelet that looks like that." he asserted. "The salesperson says so."

"Maybe this Witch has stolen the bracelet from Alivia or she might have given it to this Witch." Ming suggested.

Joshua whipped his head from side to side. "Alivia will never give it to someone else. I'm certain." he said in a firm tone.

"There isn't?" Joshua asked.

"Of course NO, you mug! There's no such thing as one and only one thing in this world except... our souls, probably!" Molly uttered. "It's just one of those marketing strategies to trick naive consumers like you into buying their products. "

"Well, that's true…" Ming echoed. "Even the sun is not one and only one. There used to be ten of them in the sky until Houyi shot nine of them down."

Joshua inclined his head in thought, slowly digesting the words of his friends, and later, he turned his head at Alivia and intoned, half to himself, "So she's not Alivia?" Relief obviously marked his voice. "Of course, she's not Alivia. What was I thinking just now? Alivia would never do such things as reaping souls." He gave a chuckle at his own doubts.

Alivia, all the while, heaved a sigh of relief when realizing that her true identity remained concealed. She thought she was safe but little did she knew, the discussion of her true identity hadn't ended yet.

"No, wait!" Molly shouted abruptly and dropped her hand from her chin when an idea struck her. "Ming, remember what you said before we brought the Witch in?"

"You are the boss?"

"No. You said it looked different from last time and you think it had used some kind of disguise spell or potion...or a magical mask, remember?"

"Oh yea…so you think-" Ming didn't complete his sentence, for he was more interested in seeing what Molly was going to do next .

"Molly, what are you-"

"Hush!" Molly pressed her index finger against Joshua's lips. "Don't worry, Joshua." She smiled at him and pulled out a tiny china snuff bottle from the inner pocket of her cloak. "Just a sprinkle of blue pixie dust...it won't kill." she promised.

'Blue pixie dust!?' Alivia immediately recalled the memory of overhearing her mother telling Luke about what blue-coloured pixie dusts could do- to reveal all truths.

Molly gazed back at Alivia whose shoulders were squaring and eyes seem to be begging her not to execute what she was about to do. When Molly showed no sign of stopping, Alivia's hands remotely lifted, attempting to cover up her face.

"Give it up. You can't hide." Molly, having figured out the meaning behind Alivia's body language, bent her body and crooned into Alivia's ears before she unscrewed the top of the tiny bottle and sprinkled some of the blue-coloured dust on Alivia's face.

The moment those sparkling dusts touched Alivia's skin, they broke the guise at once like a piece of shattered mirror. Her face melted into another and her body shrunk back down to its former size.

"No…" Joshua wailed right after Alivia's "mask" was unveiled. "No..." he repeated. His voice dropped, his chin fell, the corners of his mouth turned downward and his shoulders slumped, losing his confidence and calmness. "It's really you...why?"