Chapter 21: Aftermath
Third Floor — Luchion's Group
The dungeon floor was quiet
"Everyone calm down," Luchion said.
"That guy really does carry some weight," Delta said. The tone was almost admiring.
"Lucia." Leon was already moving. "Someone check on Lucia."
All four of them moved to where Lucia had been thrown. She was face down, unmoving. Leon crouched and pressed two fingers to the side of her neck.
"She's breathing," he said.
The collective exhale that followed was audible.
"He didn't kill her," Luchion said. He said it slowly, like he was trying to understand the fact while saying it. "Why didn't he kill her?"
Nobody had an answer. Luchion let it go.
"Leon — put her on your shoulder. We move."
Leon pulled Lucia up carefully and settled her across his shoulder. They started moving — four figures in dark cloaks, each one wearing the same wide armband beneath their sleeve, heading for the exit.
"I didn't expect this," Delta said as they walked. Her voice had dropped the sadistic edge it usually carried — this was something closer to honest. "All four of us here and we still lost."
"Nothing went according to plan," Luchion said.
"You said fifteen days minimum before Luthvania figured out where the prince went," Leon said.
"The person who saved him wasn't from Luthvania," Luchion said. "He wasn't from anywhere I can identify. I have no idea who he is or why he got involved." He paused. "He also didn't seem to be protecting the prince specifically. He seemed to be — passing through."
Delta glanced sideways at him. "Leon and Lucia both fought Edward. Lucia had almost nothing left in terms of mana. And he still pushed all four of us. With a practice sword."
Luchion didn't dispute it. "None of us went all out either."
The armbands on their wrists caught the dungeon light briefly — each one identical, a faint sigil pressed into the material.
"You and I were at twenty-five percent," Delta said. "Half-suppressed. Both of us."
"If we'd gone further, people would have felt it from outside the dungeon. We can't have our presence known — those are the terms."
"And that stranger?" Delta said.
Luchion was quiet for a moment.
"Did you see what he did at the end? How fast he moved?" He kept walking. "I think the same rule applied to him."
They reached the dungeon exit, killed the two guards on the door without slowing, and disappeared into the treeline beyond.
"We report this," Luchion said as they moved through the forest. "New plan. And the royals can't find out we were involved — if this escalates into a full conflict we aren't ready for that."
The forest closed around them.
* * *
Edward's Side
Edward opened his eyes.
The ceiling above him was familiar — stone, arched,
A sound immediately to his left — a sharp intake of breath, then something that was trying very hard not to be crying and failing.
"My lord. You're awake." The maid — Lacy — sat beside the bed, hands pressed together in her lap, eyes red. "I was so worried. Your head—" She made a small devastated sound and stopped trying to hold it in.
A shadow in the doorway.
"Lacy." Sir Hanrinson, the knight, stepped in with the particular voice of someone who believed emotional displays were a resource management problem. "You can see the prince is injured. Don't put further strain on him."
Edward exhaled. "Hanrinson. Be easy on her."
"My lord—"
"She didn't mean anything by it." He looked at Lacy. "I'm fine. Don't worry."
Lacy wiped her face and nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
"Sorry, my lord," Hanrinson said, voice flat. "I didn't intend to—"
"It's alright." Servants entered and helped Edward to a sitting position. He let them. The room steadied around him. His head ached in the specific way that says something had been done to it and then fixed — not entirely comfortable, but functional. "Hanrinson. I need to tell you what happened."
The knight stepped forward. "Is it stepping outside my place to ask, my lord?"
"No. Sit down."
Edward explained everything — starting from the beginning, which was the moment he had simply appeared inside a dungeon with nothing but a practice sword and no memory of the transition. He described the two devils who had attacked him, the fight that had lasted far longer than it should have, the second pair who had arrived afterward. He described the person who had intervened — a name, Nexus, and a weapon unlike anything in the standard catalogue. A spear that moved water like a weapon and a light beam that cut the same way a blade would, except faster. He described the fight they had run together against all four of them. He described what he had overheard — the sacrifice, the plan, the six months of preparation that had gone into teleporting him out of Sathvania specifically.
Hanrinson listened without interrupting. By the end his jaw was tight.
Then the room changed.
Not loudly — no announcement, no door crashing open. Two people simply appeared in the far corner of the room, and every person who hadn't bowed already dropped to their knee at the same instant.
The first was a tall man with the particular posture of someone who carries authority so constantly they've stopped being aware of it. King Ragnarok of Sathvania. He looked at his son in the bed and something moved briefly across his face before he put it back where it belonged.
Beside him stood a man of a different kind of presence — older, quieter, wearing the formal coat of the Magic Tower's senior rank. Eight stars on the collar. Krazer, Vice Tower Master. He had the stillness of someone who was always listening to more than one conversation simultaneously.
"Your Majesty," Hanrinson said from the floor. "You didn't need to come personally—"
"Can't a father see his son?" Ragnarok said.
Hanrinson's thoughts, which were along the lines of not when the son had just vanished from the palace and reappeared injured in a foreign dungeon and this was in fact an extremely serious situation requiring measured response, stayed exactly where they were.
"I didn't mean it that way, Sire."
"I know. I'm joking." Ragnarok walked to his son's bedside. He looked at the wound on Edward's forehead — treated now, clean, but visible — and said nothing for a moment. Then: "You look terrible."
"Thank you, Father."
Krazer laughed — a short, genuine sound. He stepped forward and looked at Edward with the particular focus of someone reading more than a face.
"What you described just now — the sacrifice, the pure noble blood as an offering — it points to something specific," Krazer said. His voice was level and precise, the voice of a man who had spent decades organising complicated information quickly. "A catalyst. Or an awakening. Something that requires a very specific kind of mana signature to activate, and a royal bloodline with exceptional clarity of character is the cleanest possible key."
"What kind of something?" Ragnarok said.
"I don't know yet. But things could have been significantly worse." Krazer glanced at Edward. "The fact that this person — Nexus — was present and intervened is the only reason we're having this conversation rather than a very different one. I've been trying to think of why they would specifically target your son when there are other noble bloodlines available. It's possible Edward was simply the most accessible."
"The devils claimed they were acting against the hunting of their people," Edward said.
"That's probably the genuine reason for their grievance," Krazer said. "It doesn't mean it's the whole story. Groups with legitimate grievances get used by people with other agendas. Rest. Get well." He stepped back. "Don't try to process all of it tonight."
Ragnarok looked at his son for another moment.
"I knew you wouldn't be dead," he said. It came out sounding both proud and slightly relieved, which was probably the most honest he would ever be about it. "You're my son."
Edward said nothing. But some of the tension went out of his shoulders.
The knights guided Edward out for proper treatment. Ragnarok and Krazer remained.
"You should send word to the dukedom," Krazer said once the room had emptied. "The teleportation circle was constructed inside their dungeon. That's their territory. They have a right to know and you'll want them looking."
"So that's where he ended up," Ragnarok said, more to himself than Krazer.
"The circle was extraordinarily complex," Krazer said. "I traced it after the alarm went up. It took me six hours to break it cleanly enough to extract Edward safely — if any of our other mages had attempted it without that preparation time, he would have emerged in a severely deteriorated state. Fifteen days before someone else found him, minimum."
Ragnarok was quiet for a moment.
"Thank you, Krazer," he said. "Because of you, my son is alive."
"It was fortunate timing," Krazer said. "I came to Luthvania to discuss your crystal request. Another week and I wouldn't have been close enough."
"Consider the request granted," Ragnarok said. "Whatever you need. And I'll send Hanrinson with a magic mail to the dukedom — they'll have the best knights on it within the day. I have good standing with the lord there."
Krazer nodded.
"One more thing," Krazer said. "This Nexus. Whoever that is — keep the name. We'll want to know more about them eventually."
* * *
Back to Karn
"That was exhausting," Zangika said.
"Yeah," Karn said.
"And that masked figure — the cape one. Even at the brief exposure we had, the output from that black beam was in a completely different category from Luchion."
"I can't even picture what he looks like at full capacity and healthy," Karn said. "With preparation time. Rested."
"Neither can I. Which is the concerning part."
They walked back toward the city. Neither of them said much — the kind of quiet that settles after a long day when there's still a lot of it to process.
"Good night, baby," Zangika said when they reached the lodging. "You did well today."
Karn dropped onto the bed without changing.
"Yeah," he said.
He was asleep in under a minute.
* * *
The Next Morning
The guild was loud when they arrived.
Not its normal loud — the crowd had that. Groups clustered around tables, voices overlapping, the notice boards completely surrounded.
Karn went to Cersy's counter.
"Nexus." She looked genuinely relieved to see a familiar face in the chaos. "Where have you been?"
"Tell her you were home," Zangika said. "The only person who knew we were in the dungeon is dead."
"Just rolling around at home," Karn said. "What happened?"
Cersy glanced around the counter — checking that nobody was close enough — and leaned forward slightly.
"Don't tell anyone I told you this." She kept her voice low. "You're my special, so."
"This woman is asking for something painful to happen to her," Zangika said flatly.
Karn said nothing and let Cersy continue.
"According to my sources — last night, our duke received a letter from his personal contact in Sathvania. King Ragnarok himself. Something about a sacrifice attempt, a teleportation attack, and a fight inside our dungeon involving devils." She paused for effect. "Actual devils. And someone apparently helped the prince."
"Really," Karn said.
"Your delivery needs work," Zangika said.
"And — okay this is the version that's spreading through the hall right now, so take it as you will — apparently Prince Edward fought four devils by himself for six hours straight, with nothing but a practice sword, and only left when he was ready to."
"Sounds like they edited us out completely," Zangika said. "Maybe his father wanted his son's reputation to benefit from the story. Or Edward decided the same. Either way — it's probably better for us."
Karn thought about the coin in his pocket. Six hours with a practice sword. He decided not to examine the story too closely.
"So the whole guild is—"
"In chaos," Cersy confirmed. "The duke has already deployed several of our best squads for investigation. White Draco is on it. Knights from the ducal side as well." She lowered her voice further. "And the dungeon is closed. Minimum five days, and only A-rank and above can enter after that."
"We're B-rank," Karn said.
"No dungeon for a while," Zangika said. "We could take a trip. Explore the area."
"So you'll have some free time," Cersy said, in the tone of someone who had been working toward this point for a while.
She stood up from behind the counter, stepped around it, and before Karn had processed the change in distance she had pressed a folded letter against his chest. Her other hand rested briefly on the front of the Shadow Nexus — the suit's surface, not him, but from the outside the distinction wasn't apparent.
She leaned close enough that her voice barely carried.
"Would you like to accompany me?"
Then she stepped back, returned to her counter, and in her professional voice said:
"Next, please."
Karn walked out of the guild and looked down at the letter in his hand.
It was a formal job offer. An escort contract — she was travelling to a nearby town on guild business and needed a B-rank or above as protection. Everything official, everything documented, everything entirely professional.
"Oh," Karn said. "It's a job."
"Yes," Zangika said. "A job. What did you think it was?"
"Nothing."
"You were thinking something."
"I wasn't thinking anything specific."
"For the record, so was I," Zangika said. "Something non-specific."
"Let's not talk about this."
"It departs tomorrow," Zangika said, already reading the letter details through the suit's camera. "We should pack tonight. Food, spare materials, the Cretanium pieces, the white stone from the Kracy. The blacksmith conversation is still pending."
"Right," Karn said. "Tomorrow."
He folded the letter and pocketed it beside the coin.
They spent the rest of the afternoon moving through the market — picking up supplies, restocking the void space, running through the checklist Zangika had already built by the time they'd left the guild. By evening, everything was packed and the city had settled into its night rhythm.
Karn sat on the edge of the bed in the lodging and turned the coin over in his fingers.
"Zangika."
"Hm."
"That group — Luchion, Delta, all of them — they had a point, didn't they. About some of it."
A pause before she answered.
"Some of it," she said. "People rarely have no point at all. That's what makes these things complicated."
He set the coin on the nightstand.
"Tomorrow," he said.
"Tomorrow," she agreed.
He lay back and was asleep before the lantern outside had dimmed.
End of Chapter 21