"Look," Zeno breathed, pointing into the empty space ahead of us.
The air a few feet off the ground began to swirl. Out of the vortex floated a flawlessly smooth, glowing sphere. Inside it, an image materialized: a room bathed in the warm light of lamps.
Master Valt's study.
I had never seen this place before, but from the way Zeno gripped his staff, I figured it out instantly. In the center of the sphere sat Valt, looking thoroughly bored in an armchair. Against the wall stood a man bound in heavy chains. His face was a solid mask of blood, one eye swollen shut, his breath hitching and wheezing painfully.
Zeno let out a sound that was half stifled sob, half snarl: "Jerald..."
I looked from the sphere to the old man. "Who is that? Zeno, who is that man?"
Without answering, the old man took a step toward the sphere, reaching out a trembling hand as if to touch the projection.
At that moment, Valt stood up slowly. He walked over to the prisoner and, without even looking at him, struck him full-force in the gut. Jerald doubled over, erupting into a violent, hacking cough, spitting blood onto the pristine carpet.
"Stop it!" Zeno roared. "You bastard, stop! He has nothing to do with this!"
Valt finally looked directly at us through the sphere, a thin smile playing on his lips. "Oh, he has everything to do with this, my dear Zeno."
I stood there paralyzed. Zeno's omissions, the fairy tales about the Overlord, the mystery of the Pass—everything was spinning in my head.
"Zeno, explain this to me," I grabbed his shoulder, forcing him to turn. "Who is he?"
Zeno looked at me, and the sheer agony in his eyes made me physically sick. "That's Jerald," he rasped. "The reason we're standing here."
I looked back at the sphere. The prisoner—Jerald—slowly raised his head. Through the blood and sweat, he tried to make us out. His lips moved, but the words came out as unintelligible groans.
"You've gone far enough. The game of hide-and-seek is over. I have deactivated the Pass so you can see every single moment of what happens next. You have one choice, Iron. Return to headquarters willingly. Right now."
Valt theatrically pressed a finger to his lips, demanding silence. "I don't like to repeat myself," the Master said. "Surrender now, and perhaps I will let your friend live for a few more minutes."
He snapped his fingers. The glowing band over Jerald's lips shattered into sparks. The prisoner drew a ragged, gasping breath, his chest heaving.
"Zeno! Iron!" Jerald's voice was hoarse, broken. "Don't listen to him! Run! Go deeper into the Pass before the noise returns! To hell with me... Save the kid, Zeno! Run, Iron!"
"Shut up!" Zeno slammed his staff into the ground, sending cracks spiderwebbing through the stone. "We're not leaving you, you idiot! We'll get you out!"
Valt sighed in disappointment. "Wrong answer."
The Master turned slowly toward Jerald. In his white-gloved hand, a slender, needle-like stiletto of pure, concentrated mana materialized.
"No!" I took a step forward, reaching out toward the sphere as if I could catch Valt's wrist. "We surrender! Do you hear me? Stop!"
I saw Jerald's eyes widen. He looked at me with such a profound mixture of gratitude that everything inside me twisted.
Valt made a fluid flick of his wrist. The stiletto of light drove straight into Jerald's chest, piercing his heart.
Jerald convulsed. His mouth opened in a silent scream, thick, dark blood spilling from the corners of his lips. He looked at Zeno, his lips twitching into one last, barely discernible 'I'm sorry,' before the light in his single eye went out. His body went slack in the chains, hanging as a lifeless weight.
"NO! JERALD!" Zeno's scream tore through the silence of the Pass, battering against the crags and echoing back.
The old man dropped to his knees, the staff slipping from his hands. He buried his face in his palms, and I heard the sound I feared most—dry, racking sobs.
And inside me... something clicked.
I didn't know Jerald. But killing a man just to break us... My brain, which always sought balance and logic, now issued a single, absolute command: ELIMINATE.
The entropy around me began to plummet. I could feel "Will to Live" breaching my own limits, draining energy from every cell in my body. The air around my fists began to compress, sparking with black static.
"You monster..." I glared into the sphere, locking eyes with Valt, who was still smiling. "I swear... I will personally kill you."
The sphere suddenly flickered and died, leaving us in the gray fog. From the forest at the base of the Pass, the clatter of hundreds of sets of armor echoed, followed by Richter's voice barking the order to attack.
"Death to Zeno!" Richter's voice boomed, amplified by magic. "Take Subject Alpha alive, even if you have to break every bone in his body!"
Zeno slowly rose from his knees. His face was deathly pale, but his eyes burned with a crimson fire of pure hatred. He extended his hand, and the air around him warped into slicing discs of vacuum.
"Come and get me, Richter!" the old man growled. "Today, you pay for everything!"
I felt the world around me slow to a crawl.
The first officer swung a massive two-handed sword at me.
"Negative entropy."
The air within a one-meter radius instantly dropped to critical temperatures. The nitrogen shifted into its liquid phase, then froze solid. The officer froze, turned into an ice statue mid-swing. His armor cracked under the pressure of thermal contraction, and he shattered into fine gravel.
The second and third attacked from the flanks.
"Momentum redirection."
Their swords violently veered off course, retaining all of their kinetic energy and burying themselves into each other. I felt my brain beginning to boil. My body was on fire. Mana was scorching the neural pathways of my nervous system.
The remaining seven surrounded me, trying to overwhelm me with sheer numbers.
"Localized alteration of the gravitational constant."
I slammed my palm toward the ground. Directly beneath the soldiers' feet, gravity spiked tenfold. A horrific crunch echoed. The officers collapsed into the mud, crushed flat into the bedrock.
Ten paces away, Richter threw Zeno back with a brutal shield bash. The old man was breathing heavily, his defenses failing. Richter raised his sword for the killing blow, his eyes gleaming coldly beneath his visor.
"It's over, old man," Richter hissed through his teeth.
"STOP!" I screamed, tearing my throat.
I snatched the scout's knife and pressed the blade hard against my own carotid artery. "Take another step and I'll slit my throat!"
Richter froze. His sword stopped a couple of centimeters from Zeno's neck. He turned his head slowly toward me, his expression shifting from confusion to sheer contempt.
"Look at yourself. You won't do it, boy."
"I will," I pressed the blade deeper. The skin split, and a thin trickle of blood ran down my neck. "If I die, your Master will grind you to dust for failing. Make your choice."
A suffocating tension hung in the air.
Suddenly, Valt's quiet, hissing voice drifted from the magical device on Richter's shoulder: "Richter... belay the execution. Take them both."
Richter flinched. "But Master, the original plan..."
"The plan has changed," Valt's voice was dry and freezing cold. "Subject Alpha is willing to commit suicide for Zeno's sake. That means we will turn the mercenary into a slave. I am certain Subject Alpha will be quite compliant as long as Zeno's life is kept safe."
Richter clenched the hilt of his sword, but he didn't dare disobey. He slowly lowered the blade.
"Lucky for you, piece of filth," he spat at Zeno, then locked his gaze onto me. "Drop the knife. Now."
I slowly opened my fingers. The knife clattered against the stones. The surviving enforcers immediately swarmed me, pinning my arms behind my back and clamping heavy, anti-magic chains around my wrists.
We were loaded into the dark, iron-reinforced wagon of the Order.
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