Reign of the War King: Heavens Must Fall

Chapter 6: The Whispering Darkness

The workshop smelled of heated iron and damp stone. Boros sat on an overturned crate, tin mug of cheap ale in hand, his scarred face lit red by the forge.

When Leon came down the last step and set his bag on the bench, Boros looked up and studied him for a long moment.

"You've got strange luck, kid." He took a slow drink. "Julian breaks his own arm on a dummy you're holding. Then the Dragon Guard nearly tears this cellar apart hunting a legend, and the General puts his hand right on you and finds nothing."

"Luck's just being in the right place at the right time," Leon said, pulling a rusted iron wedge from the repair pile.

"Or the wrong one." Boros set his mug down with a thud. "You heard the General. Two weeks, and the Court drags every noble kid with a sword up to the border. When they go, they'll need dogs like us to haul wagons, patch armor, scrub blood off shields."

Leon set the wedge on the anvil and picked up his hammer.

Clang. Clang. Clang.

"You're not scared?" Boros squinted through the rising soot. "You've never seen an Abyssal Beast, kid. They don't fight like men. Don't care about honor. They eat mana, go through plate like wet paper, and rot your flesh just breathing on you."

"I know what they breathe," Leon said quietly, under the hammer's rhythm.

Boros laughed and shook his head. "Sure you do."

The next five days blurred by in frantic preparation. The Academy's usual arrogance gave way to a low, constant dread. The upper arenas stayed packed dawn to dusk, students sparring until their hands bled, buying up every mana potion the capital markets had left.

Julian came back to classes three days after his injury, arm locked in a silver medical brace. His bones had healed. His pride hadn't. He spent his days on the balcony above Ring One, glaring down whenever he caught sight of Leon sweeping the lower walkways, never attacking again, not out of fear, but because Harold had put Ring Three under lockdown after the incident with Marcus.

On the sixth evening, long after the students had gone back to their dormitories, Leon walked out toward the Academy's northern gate.

The sky over the capital was black, no stars, heavy cloud cover.

He stopped at the edge of the cliff overlooking the northern valley and closed his eyes, breathing slowly.

Deep in his chest, the last threads of the golden curse trembled. Ninety-six percent purged now. With every breath of night air he drew in, the War Crest expanded a little further, sending slow pulses of power down through veins that had looked completely dead to Marcus's scan an hour ago.

A cold breeze touched his collar.

He didn't turn around. "You should be resting. The northern wind's carrying miasma tonight."

Ten paces back, under the shadow of an old oak, Sophia stood watching him, white travel cloak over her training uniform, a slim rapier at her hip, silver hair moving in the wind.

"How did you know I was there?" she asked. "I muffled my steps with wind magic."

"Grass sounds different when it freezes," Leon said.

She walked up to stand five feet away, looking out over the dark valley and the distant lights of the capital.

"The draft lists went final tonight," she said. "I'm assigned to the Second Vanguard, under Commander Freya. We leave for the northern fortress in eight days."

Leon said nothing, eyes on the horizon.

"My mother tried to buy me off the list," Sophia went on, a thin, bitter smile crossing her face. "Three thousand gold to the military scribes. I refused."

"Why?"

"Because I'm a Frostford. My grandfather bled for this Empire. I won't hide in the capital while others march." She paused, glancing sideways at him. "She also submitted a request about you."

Leon turned his head. "Me?"

"She wants you placed on the frontline supply line. The most dangerous logistics sector." Sophia's eyes darkened. "She's hoping the beasts finish what Julian couldn't."

Leon's expression didn't shift at all, like she'd told him it might rain.

"She's wasting her energy," he said.

"Do you understand what I'm saying?" Frustration crept into her voice. "You have no mana. Supply lines are the first thing scout-tier beasts hit. If one attacks your wagon, you won't have time to scream."

She stepped closer and pulled a heavy velvet pouch from under her cloak, pressing it into his hands.

"Take this. Ten defensive runes, and a teleport scroll keyed to the south gate. If the convoy's attacked, don't be a hero. Don't save the cargo. Break the scroll and run."

Leon looked at the pouch, warm from her grip, smelling faintly of winter lilies.

It was the first thing of real value she'd given him in three years. She didn't love him; the marriage was a cold contract from a dead man's decree, but under the ice there was a hard sense of duty that wouldn't let her husband die if she could stop it.

"Why give me this?" he asked. "If I die out there, you're a widow. The contract cancels itself. Your mother marries you off to a Duke."

Her jaw tightened. "I don't trade lives for convenience. My grandfather chose you for a reason, even if I don't know what it is. You're my husband under the law of this Empire. I won't let my mother get you killed to satisfy her vanity."

She turned and started back toward the Academy, cloak swirling. "Keep the scroll on you at all times. We leave in eight days. Don't lose it."

Leon watched her go, then tied the pouch to his belt. He didn't need the runes or the scroll. But he took the gesture for what it was: a small warmth in a cold world.

A faint, metallic hiss slid out of the dark trees thirty yards off.

Leon's eyes narrowed. The air around the treeline went sharply cold. Leaves withered black and crumbled to ash in seconds.

Two violet eyes opened in the shadows.

Not a student. Not an animal. A Scout-tier Abyssal Crawler, six feet of skinless, armored hound, six scythe-legs, jaws dripping corrosive acid. It had slipped through the outer boundary array, drawn by the Academy's mana concentration, and it was crouched low, eyes locked on Sophia's retreating.

She was thirty yards away, turned, with no idea a scythe was half a second from her spine.

Leon didn't shout a warning. He took one step forward.

A sliver of the War Crest cracked open in his chest.

An invisible wave of pure authority rolled out across the dark woods, silent as a held breath.

The Crawler froze mid-leap. Its eyes blew out. Its legs buckled under a weight like a mountain landing on its back, and then it simply wasn't a creature anymore. Carapace, flesh, core, all of it pressed flat into a coin-sized smear of black sludge against the dirt.

The whole thing took less than a heartbeat. The smoke thinned to nothing. No trace left behind.

Thirty yards off, Sophia felt a strange chill pass her neck and turned back toward the cliff.

Leon stood exactly where he'd been, hands in his pockets, looking at the sky.

"Did you hear something?" she called.

"Just the wind," he said.

She scanned the treeline, found nothing, and turned back toward the dormitories.

Leon looked down at his open palm. A faint gold-and-black rune flickered there for a second before sinking beneath his skin.

Ninety-eight percent.

"Eight days," he murmured to the empty night, something cold and satisfied finally crossing his face. "The stage is set."