The sun was beginning to set, casting long shadows over Alzharan’s towering sandstone spires. The air was heavy with the scent of spice smoke and baked dust, but in the underground levels of the city, it was something else entirely—quiet. Watchful.

  Thessia stood at the broken doorway of the correction ward. She turned back and looked at Neyxa, who was helping Rell up while still cradling the unconscious Lirah.

  “This where she stay,” Rell muttered. “No leave her again.”

  “You’re half-conscious and carrying a girl who just blew up a building with her emotions,” Neyxa shot back. “We go. She holds.”

  Ko Mala nodded from the shadows—he had emerged just moments before, unseen by the elven patrols circling above. The spirit beast loomed quietly, aura pulsing like breath.

  Thessia gave them a rare smile.

  “Don’t die without me.”

  Then she vanished into the upper stairwell.

  Time Passed: 30 Minutes Later

  Location: Royal Castle – Interrogation Annex

  Inside the marble-cut veins of the royal castle, where everything shimmered with gilded wealth and polish, Zeven sat shackled in a stone chair. A single beam of light pierced through a high glass window. His wrists were cuffed with dull magic-dampening metal. He bled from the lip. One eye swollen.

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  A door opened.

  Footsteps. Not hurried. Leisurely. Confident.

  And then—he arrived.

  Vaerid Mal’zen.

  The King’s Advisor.

  His appearance was not particularly frightening—no armor, no towering presence. But his presence was chilling. A scholar’s build with a spine too straight, robes too pristine. Hair slicked back like a blade of ink. One gloved hand, the other bare. His smile too calm.

  His scent—clove oil and ancient parchment.

  His voice? Cold velvet.

  “Zeven. You’ve been very busy.”

  Zeven spit blood on the ground.

  “Where’s my sister?”

  Vaerid didn’t flinch. He walked slowly around the room, gaze drifting over the torture instruments, the enchanted restraints—tools he never needed but kept for theater.

  “You were born in the outskirts, weren’t you? Dust-market child. Father gone. Mother died in the drought. Sister taken at eight. I remember your file.”

  Zeven’s jaw clenched.

  “You sent her.”

  Vaerid chuckled softly, like a teacher amused by a petulant child.

  “No, Zeven. The system sent her. I just made sure the system had fuel.”

  “You sick—”

  “Spare me. You’re not the first rebel I’ve broken. And you won’t be the last.”

  He leaned in close, eyes narrowing.

  “You’re already mine.”

  Zeven struggled, aura flaring—but the cuffs hissed and suppressed it.

  “When we first made deals with the Dominion Church, it was for survival. The kingdom needed the metal—ethereium. Do you know what happens when trade stops? Civil war. I stopped that. I saved this kingdom.”

  “You sold us out,” Zeven snarled. “Every poor child. Every orphan. Every cursed soul.”

  Vaerid tilted his head. That same cold smile remained.

  “And yet you still walk its streets. Drink its water. Hide in its slums. You rebels are parasites. You don’t build. You just cling.”

  He stood tall, voice deepening like a bell toll.

  “But now you will serve again. Just like your sister did. Her sacrifice built peace. Yours will maintain it.”

  Vaerid lifted his hand.

  A violet glyph—no, a script of woven magic sigils—unfurled in the air.

  Silken Will.

  A forbidden enchantment once used by royal inquisitors in the era before the Elven Accord.

  Zeven’s eyes widened as the strands wrapped around his mind—tightening, softening, warping.

  “NO—NO!!”

  He screamed as his body seized.

  “GET OUT OF MY HEAD!”

  “You’re not losing yourself,” Vaerid said calmly. “You’re becoming useful again.”

  Zeven’s feet kicked. His eyes rolled.

  The chamber echoed with the sound of an unraveling soul.

  His last clear thought was of his sister’s smile.

  And then—

  Darkness.