The afternoon air in the slums of Coronas was thick with the scent of sewage and stale incense, but Ailan barely noticed. He strolled through the slums whistling, the stolen package tucked happily under his arm., he thought, and shrugged. .

  He never saw the window above burst outwards.

  Lucca shot out first, Silvestre right behind, the big boy landing like a sack of potatoes that still somehow cracked the cobblestones.

  Ailan froze. Two demon children now blocked the alley.

  Silvestre’s face promised murder, as if he wanted to devour him whole. “Found you, you little rat,” the fatty growled.

  Ailan needed no further words. He turned and bolted.

  First trick: he vaulted a rain barrel, kicked it backward. It rolled straight at Lucca.

  Lucca hurdled it without breaking stride, landed cat-light, and kept coming.

  Second trick: Ailan darted into a chicken coop, scattering hens in a storm of feathers and outraged clucks.

  Lucca burst through the cloud of white, feathers sticking to his hair like snow, eyes locked on target.

  Third trick: Ailan loved: he slipped between two clotheslines, grabbed a wet sheet, and whipped it behind him like a sail.

  Lucca ducked under it, popped up grinning, now only five metres back.

  Even Mikael, watching from the inn window, whistled low. “That curly bastard’s fast… for a mortal.”

  From the rooftops, Nerion’s voice rang out calm and clear: “Left alley in three… two…”

  Ailan cursed and veered right instead, straight into a dead-end stacked with crates. He scrambled up like a monkey, reached the roof tiles, only to find Elisha already there, waiting. The Praetorian had started last, yet here he was, lion hair wild in the afternoon wind, arms folded, radiating pressure that made the air feel thick as honey.

  Ailan’s stomach dropped. He spun, leapt to the next roof, tiles shattering under his feet, and sprinted across the uneven skyline.

  Below, Silvestre thundered through the streets like an angry bull, shouting, “Stop, you freckled shit!”

  Elisha didn’t shout. He simply ran parallel on the rooftops, leaping gaps that should have been impossible, boots cracking terracotta with every landing, slowly but inexorably herding Ailan toward the old market square.

  Nerion danced along the ridges, light as a cat, calling directions like a general: “Force him east, the fountain square, he’s got nowhere left!”

  Ailan tried one last desperate play: he dropped through a skylight into a tailor’s shop, crashed through racks of dresses, burst out the back door into the square… and skidded to a halt.

  Four walls of angry orphans.

  Front: Elisha, twelve years old, Praetorian pressure rolling off him like heat from a forge.

  Left: Silvestre, red-faced, wheezing, looking ready to sit on him until he popped.

  Right: Lucca sliding in like a loach.

  Behind: Nerion, dropping lightly from a balcony, cutting the last escape.

  Ailan’s eyes darted, and didn’t need to think much. He locked on the smallest target. He charged straight at Nerion.

  The other three slowed, smirking. They trusted their little monster. Nerion didn’t even flinch. He watched Ailan’s hips, read the feint that never came, and smiled.

  Ailan threw everything into a wild punch. Nerion’s front hand snapped out, caught the wrist mid-swing, borrowed the thief’s own momentum, and flipped him ass-over-teakettle. A light push on the chest and Ailan hit the ground hard, wind gone, Nerion’s knee planted on his stomach.

  The thief stared up, stunned. He had felt his strength simply… vanish, redirected, used against him like he was a child. “Let… let’s talk this out”, he wheezed.

  Elisha, Lucca, and a still-panting Silvestre arrived.

  Nerion looked down with pity. “Told you, fatty. Lose some weight. You’re sweating like a piglet after a stroll.”

  “I exercise every day!” Silvestre roared. “I’m just big-boned!”

  “Big-boned and slow. Good thing this idiot didn’t run toward you, or he’d have waltzed right past.”

  Ailan’s eyes rolled back. The insult, on top of the humiliation, was too much. He fainted dead away. Nerion poked the unconscious thief with his toe.

  Lucca, wiping tears of laughter, gasped: “Damn Nerion. You’re capable of making even stones lose their temper”. He laughed so hard he had to lean on Silvestre. “We should call that one ‘Little Monster’s Greeting’.”

  Silvestre, still wheezing, managed a snort. “More like ‘Goodnight Kiss’.”

  Elisha crouched beside the unconscious thief, voice low, ignoring the banter. “One day, that little trick is going to empty bladders across the Frontier before anyone even swings.”

  Nerion tilted his head, all innocence. “I was just saying hello.”

  Ailan woke to the sound of his own trembling. He was in a strange, low-ceilinged room, lying on a narrow bed. He tried to move, found his hands and feet secured by tight ropes, and his heart launched into a frantic rhythm. He hadn't been hurt, but he felt utterly exposed.

  The door creaked open.

  In the dim moonlight entering through the cracked window, Ailan saw him: an old man, face carved by knives and regret, dressed in ragged, stained clothes, his mouth a cavern of missing teeth. He stank faintly of rotgut, and the way his eyes, sharp, unnervingly knowing, swept over Ailan made the thief feel as if he were completely nude, every sin and secret laid bare.

  Ailan’s mind supplied the only story every slum child knew. He started screaming like a stuck pig.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “NO! PLEASE! I’ll give it back! Don’t take me to the tenebrous valley! Don’t skin me! Don’t make me into stew! BUAAAAAAAH!”

  Mikael froze mid-step, genuinely startled. He quickly expanded his Qi, a silent, weighty blanket covering the room and muffling the terrified shrieks before they could travel through the flimsy inn walls. The door swung wider, revealing the four siblings. They stopped short, eyes wide.

  Ailan was a shaking, sobbing mess, frantically trying to hide himself. Lucca, Silvestre, and Nerion stared at Mikael as if seeing him for the first time—or perhaps the last.

  Mikael felt the accusation like a slap.

  “I just walked in!” he hissed. “He took one look and started wailing!”

  The children took a synchronised step backwards. Elisha facepalmed so hard the slap echoed.

  Mikael loomed over the bed. “Tell them I didn’t touch you, boy.”

  Ailan only screamed louder. “CHILD-CATCHER LORD! HAVE MERCY! I’M TOO YOUNG TO BE TURNED INTO CANDLES!”

  Even Elisha’s eyebrow twitched. “…Mikael, did you actually do something in the Frontier we should know about?”

  Mikael’s patience snapped. He delivered a light but extremely educational clout to the back of Ailan’s head. “Shut. Up. You’re murdering my reputation.”

  Ailan bit his tongue, whimpered, and finally shut up — mostly because the old man’s glare now looked like it could peel paint.

  With Elisha murmuring “easy, easy” and Nerion patting his shoulder with obviously fake sympathy, Ailan eventually stopped shaking long enough to explain the legend:

  “In the slums… in Coronas, there is a tale,” Ailan whispered, his voice still shaky. “About a ragged, toothless old man. He takes children who misbehave. Tortures them, kills them. The adults use it to make us obey. They call him... the Child-Catcher Lord.”

  Mikael and Elisha stared.

  Then they stared at each other.

  Then they both stared at the ceiling, praying for strength.

  It was Elisha who finally pieced together the absurd truth: years ago, Mikael had adopted several children left homeless on the Frontier to take them to the orphanage. Some of the slum dwellers, seeing a mysterious, ragged old man taking children away without knowing the background, had twisted his actions into this bizarre urban legend.

  Nerion, never missing a beat, leaned close to Ailan, while looking mournfully out the window as if searching the horizon for freedom, “Poor little brother… you’re not wrong. We’ve already been caught. Now we have to do everything the Child-Catcher Lord commands.”

  Ailan’s eyes bulged like boiled eggs.

  Mikael’s knuckle cracked against Nerion’s skull with pinpoint accuracy. “Very funny. When we get home, you’re on latrine duty for a month. Myra will be thrilled.”

  Nerion’s face went the colour of old cheese. Now it was Silvestre and Lucca's time to howl with laughter.

  The mood flipped. Ailan realised — slowly — that no one was actually going to flay him tonight.

  Then the four orphans turned as one and fixed him with the same pleasant, terrifying smile.

  Nerion crouched by the bed, voice suddenly sweet as poisoned honey. “Alright, thief-brother. You had your fun throwing us to the Tigers. Now we’re all friends, yes?” He patted Ailan’s cheek — the same hand that had borrowed his punch hours earlier. “So tell me… what exactly did you steal from Legate Sagat that made Jackal risk public crucifixion to get it back?”

  Moonlight glinted off four sets of very interested eyes. Ailan swallowed, ropes creaking as he tried to shrink into the mattress.

  Outside, somewhere in the slums, a dog howled once — then thought better of it and went silent.

  Ailan gulped, then gave a shaky nod.

  Mikael, satisfied, produced a small knife and sliced the ropes. "Talk, boy. Start at the beginning."

  Ailan sat on the edge of the bed, knees drawn up, his voice small, as if the volume of the room depended on his terror. “My name is Ailan. Twelve years old. From Karpatia. I lived there with my father and my big sister. We weren’t rich, but we were happy. Father was the best blacksmith — Rank 4, sometimes Rank 5 weapons. After Mother died, it was just the three of us. The forge rang every day, and the future looked bright.”

  He lowered his head. “Then, eight years ago, Rhodar came. Not the usual raid, but a real invasion. Men and Beastmen alike made blood rain in the city. There was no quarter and no prisoners among those who took arms. They killed a third of Karpatia in a couple of days.”

  Ailan’s fingers dug into his own arms. “They wanted Father for the Great Tribes. He refused… ” Ailan couldn’t help but let a tear escape. So the commander, after being refused over and over, ordered him tortured. Fourteen days in an iron cage under the sun. No food. No water. I watched him shrink to bones. I watched him die.”

  Tears fell silently now.

  “My sister and I were sold. We thought that was the end… until Dragon General Lirian arrived. Half the Rhodar army left in graves.”

  Nerion’s breath caught at the name Lirian. His heart screamed it was Father, but Mikael’s warning rang louder. He stayed silent, but his heart was a tempest.

  Elisha spoke quietly. “I remember the event. Worst defeat Rhodar suffered in two centuries. General Lirian had just stepped into Legend back then. One week. In just that one week, he liberated Karpatia, Samoa, and Coronas. He was about to conquer Pellam as well, when Forlan Du Sacar met him outside the town”.

  “Forlan?” asked Lucca with curiosity.

  “A TAO Legend from Rhodar. Three days, three nights lasted the fight. Trobadours sing that the heavens were sundered, and the earth cried for years afterwards. No victor declared, but Ansara kept the cities nonetheless. This campaign was the cornerstone for General Falma to take Mount David the next year.”

  Ailan nodded, wiping his face. “We couldn’t stay in Karpatia. Too many ghosts. We came to Coronas, we had nothing to our name. I became a thief out of necessity, but my sister hated it. Eventually, Eliana found work as a maid in House Renato here in Coronas. I swore I’d never steal again, and things were looking bright.” He laughed, bitter and wet.

  “Then… Mount Karol exploded. Everyone rushed to the craters. I went looking for honest work. Who knows? I might have gotten lucky and found some treasure. Instead, I saw him.” Ailan clenched his fists, his face transformed into a mask of unadulterated hatred.

  The children looked at each other and understood who that person was.

  “The very same man who had my dad killed. He was with two subordinates. I… hid. I wanted to rush. Kill him with my very hands, drink his blood until my hatred was satiated”, Ailan screamed.

  Nerion felt a tug at his heart. He wondered what he’d do if he were in front of those who took his father and mother from him. He didn’t want to think.

  “I waited for a bit on top of a tree. I didn’t have to wait long. I saw that man meeting Sagat, as well as Jackal and Ocelot, his two lieutenants. Sagat showed him a jade box. That man’s eyes lit up like he’d seen heaven. They argued, then smiled, deal struck. Jackal left with the box.”

  Silvestre folded his arms. “So you robbed him.”

  “I followed Jackal, slipped into their half-empty base, and took the box. I thought… if my sister got proof of treason to Commander Sebastian, maybe someone would finally punish the man who killed my father.”

  Lucca’s voice was ice. “So, you decided to use us as meat shields. You’re no different from the people you hate.”Ailan flinched as if struck.

  Mikael raised a hand. “Enough. Show us the box… Trust us on this. If what’s in the box is what I suspect, you wouldn’t be doing your sister any favour”.

  Ailan hesitated, then pulled the small jade casket from his shirt and opened it.

  A pink crystal shard glowed softly in the lantern light, smaller than the one Nerion had swallowed, but unmistakable. A piece of the Fruit of the Mountain God.

  Elisha went pale. Mikael’s scar twitched.

  Mikael spoke first, voice low.

  “Sagat doesn’t know what he holds, or he’d never share. Greed that big doesn’t split prizes. He must have known the shards are valuable, but not their true identity, otherwise…” mused Mikael.

  “Besides, if that man you saw is the same man who led Rhodar eight years ago, then I know who he is. Rolando Du Sakar, from the Sakar Tribe, one of the Permanent members of Rhodar’s War Council. Now, he is nothing more than a disgraced TAO Monarch, five thousand men left, burning for redemption”, said Mikael with a look of certain contempt. “Rhodarians hate losing. And Rolando’s loss was stratospheric… He’ll wring the location out of Sagat, then bury him”.

  Mikael continued, weaving the conspiracy. "If Rolando and Sagat are in contact, they may be old allies. There was always suspicion of a spy in Ansara during that invasion. If Sagat was his undercover agent, it explains a great deal. Rolando won't notify Rhodar about the Fruit. He is frustrated, hungry for his former power. He will want this entire prize for himself and his Tribe to recover everything he lost in a single step. This is where our opportunity lies. We can stop this before it gets out of control."

  Mikael looked at each boy in turn.

  “This is bigger than revenge. Bigger than Coronas. We keep the shard. We keep the boy. And we make damn sure neither Sagat nor Rolando ever learns we have it. Rest for a bit. We only have a few hours.”

  He turned to Ailan, eyes hard but not unkind.

  Ailan looked up, eyes wide. “You… you’ll help me?”

  Nerion looked at Ailan and smiled: “Welcome to the family, thief-brother. Try not to get us all killed before breakfast.”

  Ailan stared, mouth open.

  Outside, the night became darker, like the black before dawn.