Oraya wakes after the second trial to find her arms empty and her worst injuries healed, but she is emotionally numb and fixated on the little human girl she carried from the maze. Mische explains that Oraya has been unconscious for days and that blood magic nearly killed her because a human body is especially vulnerable to it. Mische also reports that eleven contestants died and twenty-nine remain, with Ibrihim somehow surviving, but she cannot tell Oraya what happened to the child.

Because Mische has no answers, Oraya grows increasingly restless. She wants to demand news about the girl, yet she cannot bring herself to keep asking. Although she initially thinks she should go to Vincent for answers about her magic and about how human children ended up in the trial, she avoids him because she fears what his answers might reveal.

Instead, Oraya leaves the Moon Palace and goes into the human districts, where grief and rage drive her to hunt predatory vampires. She kills three in one night, targeting men who prey on vulnerable humans, but the violence does not ease her anger. The sight of her own bleeding wrist after the third kill only deepens her hatred of human fragility and her sense that the child's death has torn open everything she has tried to suppress about being human.

Raihn finally finds Oraya in an alley after watching her kill two other vampires. Oraya assumes he has come to condemn her and lashes out, accusing him of valuing vampire lives over human ones. Instead, Raihn says he is not defending the dead vampires and even calls Oraya's actions a public service. When Oraya finally forces herself to ask about the girl, Raihn responds with unexpected gentleness, touches her shoulder, and tells her to come with him, suggesting he may have the answer she desperately needs.