Drops of it fell off her palm, landing over the crimson crystals and immediately getting absorbed.
"A-Aefia! You freak! You freaking psycho!" Puppet shouted as it felt its soul leave its body. "Who the fuck does that?!"
She turned around, staring at the floating wolf with questioned eyes as her palms continued to bleed. "Don't I always do this? Why do you care so much?"
"You are weak! And you are also going to receive your daily dose of blood extraction too! Are you that stupid or what?!"
"Calm down. I know what I am doing." She answered back, turning back away.
Aefia reached out with her uninjured hand, casually wiping a stray drop of crimson from her jawline before holding her bleeding palm directly over the open crate of dark magic stones.
The moment her blood struck the murky purple crystals, the chamber seemed to hold its breath. The stones didn't merely absorb the liquid—they drank it greedily, hissing like dry embers exposed to rain. Thin, violet veins pulsed outward from the points of contact, spider-webbing through the entire crate in seconds.
"You don't know what you are doing!" Puppet shrieked, hovering frantically around her head with its fluffy paws tugging at its ears. "Those are necromantic containment stones! They absorb soul remnants and blood commands! If Kazimir or his handlers link up to these—"
"They won't be linking up to anything," Aefia interrupted, her raspy, young male voice cool and utterly devoid of panic.
She squeezed her fist tight, forcing another heavy droplet of blood to fall directly onto the central crystal.
"Kazimir thinks he can harvest soul remnants and bind them to his will using these stones. But he forgot one fundamental rule of elemental magic..." She turned her head slightly, her dark purple illusionary eyes flashing with a wicked, predatory glint. "...the blood of the original vessel always overrides the command of a thief."
Puppet froze in mid-air, its ears drooping as the realization hit. "You are... rewriting the core matrix?"
"I'm corrupting it," Aefia corrected softly, a cold smile spreading across her features.
The murky purple crystals began to vibrate violently within their wooden crate. The dim, repulsive haze that previously surrounded them dissolved, replaced by a deep, iridescent garnet light that throbbed in perfect sync with Aefia's own heartbeat.
She reached for the clean linen wrapping tucked inside her inner cloak pocket, winding it tightly around her palm to stanch the bleeding. With a sharp tug using her teeth, she knotted the cloth secure.
"When Kazimir's men attempt to activate these constructs during the siege," Aefia murmured, flexing her bandaged hand.
Puppet let out a long, shuddering squeak, slumping back down onto her shoulder like a deflated sack of flour. "You are utterly terrifying. Remind me never to get on your bad side."
"You are already on my bad side," she replied smoothly, dusting off her trousers as she hopped down from the transport wagon. "You scream too loud in my ear and keep telling me the same thing."
She walked past the silent, glowing crates, her eyes sweeping over the rest of the vault's massive inventory. Dozens of wagons filled with siege crystals, defensive barrier nodes, and silent grenades sat ready for transport.
"Alright. Now this is done." She let out a sigh of relief as she pulled the hood back over her head and walked towards the door. Not even thinking about cleaning up the area.
"Open the gate," Aefia commanded, her hand already resting against the heavy obsidian door frame.
The mechanism groaned as the heavy bolts slid back, revealing the old caretaker standing patiently in the dimly lit corridor, key ring in hand. The moment the gap widened, Aefia stepped through into the narrow passage.
With a subtle, deliberate breath, she let the dark purple illusion bleed away. The masculine frame melted into her natural, slender build, her short plum hair cascading back into long, radiant black locks with their silver edges, and her eyes shifting from cold purple back to their striking, shining garnet.
The old man's eyes widened in sheer, paralyzing shock. His breath hitched, his knees trembling as his gaze darted from her noble face to the royal crest embroidered along her collar.
It was just an illusion to make sure the old man couldn't make up an excuse not to know her.
"Your Highness, Crown Princess... Aefia?" he gasped, his voice cracking into a faint whisper.
"Shocking isn't it?" She smiled without warmth, tilting her head slightly as she folded her arms. "After all, I am the very person who you public thought I was guilty as charged. You all just want my execution... Now I am deeming your execution. Have a nice day."
Mid-turn, she stopped again.
"You will order the transport guards to mobilize every single wagon in this chamber and dispatch them to the central palace immediately," Aefia stated, her voice dropping all pretense of a raspy young lord, ringing instead with absolute, imperial sovereignty. "Not tomorrow morning. Right now. Not a single second of delay. Is that understood?"
She didn't wait for his response. Turning on her heel, she snapped her hood back up over her face, the dark purple illusion snapping back into place in a flash of red light. She began her swift stride down the passage toward the vault exit.
"Your Grace!"
The old caretaker's voice echoed down the stone corridor, stopping her in her tracks. Aefia paused, her hand hovering over the outer door handle, her eyes narrowing beneath her hood with immediate suspicion as she glanced over her shoulder.
The old man didn't reach for an alarm. He didn't summon the perimeter guards. Instead, he slowly dropped to one knee, bowing his gray head deeply toward the stone floor.
"I was never against you, Crown Princess Aefia," the caretaker murmured, his voice steady despite his trembling frame.
Aefia's eyebrow twitched upward beneath her hood. She turned around fully, her dark purple eyes fixing on him in genuine surprise.
"It is high time the Imperial Family take over this hopeless Mides territory," the old man continued, looking up with a weary, honest gaze. "There is nothing left here to save under His Majesty's madness. If a war must come to tear these corrupt foundations down so the common people might finally live in peace... then let it come. I have guarded these vaults for forty years, and I know when a house is already dead."
Silence stretched between them, heavy and unexpected.
"You aren't... Thinking of me a villain?" She asked, her tone a bit softer.
"I don't think you are the villain. If anything, you are somewhere in between and it is only right to follow your path. Ever since the late King died, most truths have been coming out. Even the fact that Kazimir and his father had been slaughtering humans and turning them into dolls for the orphans. Those children... They now..."
He couldn't force out anymore word. But a prickle of tear hung against his lower lashes. "I think your Highness has every right to burn this Kingdom to the ground like you had said. Please serve King Kazimir's head to us in a silver platter. This is our only request. Afterall... We only get one chance to ruin the people we hate so much."
Her eyes widened in shock as the words landed in front of her. It was surely going to cost her dearly somewhere along, but for some reasons... This felt like a even more valid reason to target Kazimir.
And more then that... This old man doesn't look like he is lying.
Aefia let out a slow, quiet sigh, the tension in her shoulders easing just a fraction. "I will keep your words in mind, old man."
The caretaker offered her a small, gentle smile, resting his hands upon his wooden staff as he bowed once more. "May God make your route easy, Your Highness... and grant you even greater intelligence to guide your blade."
"Thank you." Aefia offered a quiet, genuine nod, a faint smirk touching her lips before she turned and slipped out through the heavy iron doors into the freezing mountain air.
The secondary reserves lay on the southern ridge of the mountain pass, a far smaller, heavily fortified bunker hidden behind a dense thicket of frosted pines.
This time, there were no theatrical performances, no dramatic stories of black bile, and no dramatic lies. Aefia moved like a phantom through the shadows, her dark cloak blending seamlessly into the pre-dawn mist.
She bypassed the outer magical wards with effortless precision, slipping inside the bunker like a thief in the night. The operation was entirely silent.
Although...
"Hey hey! Look it is that prisoner, the Crown Princess!" One sneered, making a sarcastic command.
Two arrogant guards on patrol duty stumbled into the secondary vault corridor, blabbering loudly about how they intended to report the unscheduled energy fluctuations directly to Kazimir for a heavy reward. Aefia didn't even grant them a second glance.
Before the guards could even draw their swords, a flash of silver steel sliced through the dim light. Her thin blade cut cleanly through their throats in two fluid, effortless arcs. They collapsed onto the cold stone without a sound, their blood pooling beneath the silent crystal crates.
Great. They are out cold. Aefia gritted her teeth and made a run for it.
She quickly corrupted the secondary energy matrix with a single drop of her blood, wiped her blade clean on a guard's tunic, and melted back out into the icy night.
By the time the horizon began to bleed with the pale gold of approaching dawn, Aefia was in a full-speed sprint back toward the broken-glass portal. The cold air burned in her lungs, her boots kicking up showers of powdery snow as she hurled herself through the shimmering azure rift.
The mountain air vanished, replaced once more by the damp, earthy chill of the castle forest.
Her energy was almost grazing the grass. Though her mind screamed at her to rush back to the cell as soon as possible.
Has it been four hours? It should be three-and-a-half by now. I didn't take that long anyways. She thought to herself in a reassuring manner, keeping calm about everything despite the thoughts of nothing clicking into place loomed over her.
Argh! If only I hadn't entangled myself into this mess! I shouldn't have faced this much at least!
"Hurry!" Puppet squeaked from inside her hood, clutching her collar frantically. "The sun is almost up! The perimeter guards are going to rotate shift!"
"I know, I know!" Aefia panted, ditching her male illusion entirely as she raced through the dense trees toward the eastern wall of the central tower.
The base of the castle was crawling with armored soldiers. Panic had clearly taken hold—squads of guards were marching in tight formations, carrying glowing lanterns and sweeping the tree line in the wake of the King's magical surge.
Aefia pressed her back against the rough stone wall beneath the broken third-story window, catching her breath.
"How are we getting back up thirty feet?" Puppet whispered nervously.
"Pressurized energy," Aefia muttered, channeling a concentrated pulse of magic into the soles of her boots.
"But how?!" Puppet grabbed her cheeks, completely overwhelmed. "You are a prisoner who just escaped and is now returning! Can't you at least calculate the risk before that?!"
"Like this..."
She pulled out a small piece of red stone from within her inner cloak pockets, then pressed it against the bottom of her sole and bent her knees.
She jumped, and managed to catch onto an open window.
"Finally! It works!" She whispered to herself as she smiled in relief and thruimph over it.
She leaped a second time into the air, the magic launching her upward like an arrow. She aimed straight for the open, shattered window frame—
CLANG!
Instead of a majestic, silent vault into the room, her knee caught the jagged lower edge of the wooden sill. Aefia let out a sharp, muffled "Oof!", completely losing her momentum, flailing her arms, and crashing face-first onto the velvet carpet in a profoundly unheroic pile of limbs and cloak.
"A masterclass in agility," Puppet deadpanned from somewhere beneath her knee.
"Shut up," Aefia hissed, scrambling to her feet, shaking pine needles out of her hair, and frantically smoothing down her torn travelling cloak. "Ugh, this is busted."
"Just use your magic to sew it up later on!" Puppet shouted as it flew up and settled itself right back at her collar.
There was no time to lose.
She darted out of the room, using the shadowed alcoves to bypass the patrolling guards who were too preoccupied arguing about the King's health to notice a shadow gliding past them.
Down two flights of narrow spiral stairs, past the unguarded iron gate, and straight into the subterranean dungeon corridor. She slipped into the dark, damp hallway of the high-security block, ducked beneath the archway, and stepped straight into her personal cell.
"Finally! I made it back in time." She mumbled to herself, adjusting the wrap around her palm as she reached out to open the lock.
She took one step inside, reaching up to untie her cloak—
And froze dead in her tracks.
Sitting casually on the edge of her small wooden cot, his long legs crossed and his arms folded tightly over his chest, was Kazimir.
His pale face was unnaturally sickly, faint dark purple veins still standing out against his jawline from her spell surge, but his cold, piercing eyes were fixed entirely on her.
Aefia's breath hitched sharply in her throat.
Shit! I am caught! Her fingers were trembling, her mind entirely silent from the earlier barage of thoughts going through her mind. What should I do?! What the fuck should I do?!
Her heart slammed against her ribs like a trapped bird, her garnet eyes widening in sudden, unadulterated anxiety as her mind raced to find a single logical excuse for why the imprisoned Crown Princess was standing in her cell at dawn, covered in snow, pine needles, and fresh blood.
Kazimir slowly raised his head, a dark, terrifyingly quiet smile spreading across his pale lips.
"Welcome back, my dear," Kazimir purred softly, his voice dripping with venomous amusement. "Did you enjoy your morning stroll?"