"Him?" Fanzell repeated, his voice deep and slightly raspy. He looked Lencar up and down, taking in the black cloak and the featureless wooden mask. Suddenly, as if remembering his state of undress, Fanzell looked down at his bare chest. "Ah! Blast it all, not again! Where did my shirt go? Dominante, I swear I was wearing it when I was practicing my sword forms!"
Dominante let out a long, exasperated sigh, reaching out to smack her husband lightly on the back of his bare shoulder. "Fanzell, please. For once, try to remain clothed when we have a guest. Especially a guest who literally just saved our lives."
Fanzell scrambled to grab his shirt from the chair, hastily pulling it over his head. It was slightly torn at the collar and he missed a button, but it was better than nothing. He turned back to Lencar, running a hand through his messy red hair, his expression shifting from panicked modesty back to a deep, profound seriousness.
Lencar stepped fully into the room, allowing Mariella to close and lock the heavy iron door behind him. He reached up and slowly pulled his hood back, though he kept the wooden mask firmly in place.
"Good evening, Dominante. Fanzell," Lencar greeted, his voice calm, polite, and resonant with the mask's enchantments. "I see you received the good news."
For a moment, nobody spoke. The weight of what had transpired over the last few days seemed to suddenly crush the air out of the room.
Then, Dominante stepped around her husband. Her vibrant orange hair caught the light of the floating orbs as she walked directly up to Lencar. She didn't look afraid of his imposing, masked visage. Instead, her eyes were shining with unshed tears and a profound, overwhelming gratitude.
Without a word of warning, Dominante bowed perfectly at the waist, a deep, formal gesture of absolute respect.
"Thank you," Dominante said, her voice trembling slightly with emotion. "I don't know how you did it. I don't know what kind of leverage you hold over the High Command. But you gave me my life back. For the first time in years, I can sleep without keeping one eye open. I... I can never repay this debt."
Beside her, Fanzell stepped forward and mirrored his wife's gesture. The former Commander bowed deeply, his messy red hair falling over his eyes. "You have my eternal gratitude, stranger. You protected my wife when my own strength wasn't enough. As a man, and as a former knight, I am entirely in your debt."
"Please, raise your heads," Lencar said smoothly, extending a hand in a gesture of peace. "There is no need for such formalities. We struck a bargain. I merely delivered on my end of the arrangement."
Dominante straightened up, wiping a stray tear from her cheek, though a brilliant smile now illuminated her face. "Merely delivered? You forced the Diamond Kingdom Military Tribunal to swallow their pride and issue a public retraction. Do you have any idea how unprecedented that is? They sent out missives with the royal seal. Mariella showed me the priority dispatches. They practically threatened their own assassins with execution if they laid a finger on me!"
She began pacing around her small workshop, her hands waving animatedly as her brilliant, analytical mind tried to dissect the situation. "Did you blackmail the Minister of Defense? Do you have dirt on King Morris himself? The sheer political pressure required to make them issue a stand-down order on a high-profile defector is astronomical!"
"The methods are irrelevant, Dominante," Lencar interrupted gently, his tone firm but not unkind. He remained standing near the door, a pillar of dark, composed energy amidst her frantic excitement. "What matters is the result. The hounds have been called off your trail. You are no longer a target of the Diamond Kingdom."
Lencar paused, letting the silence settle over the room for a moment before he seamlessly transitioned the conversation. He wasn't here just to accept their thanks. He was building an infrastructure, and he needed to secure his assets.
"However," Lencar continued, his masked gaze locking onto the orange-haired artificer. "Now that my part of the bargain is complete, I must ask. Will you keep your end of the deal, Dominante Code? Will you lend your intellect and your craftsmanship to my cause?"
The room grew quiet.
Fanzell, standing beside his wife, visibly tensed. His jaw tightened, and he opened his mouth, clearly intending to object. Fanzell knew firsthand the horrors of being a tool for a ruthless master. He had watched the Diamond Kingdom twist Dominante's brilliant inventions into weapons of mass slaughter. The protective instinct in him raged against the idea of handing his wife over to another mysterious, powerful figure who hid his face behind a wooden mask.
But before Fanzell could speak a single word of protest, Dominante reached out and placed a firm, reassuring hand over his.
She looked at her husband, her eyes conveying a silent, unbreakable resolve. Fanzell met her gaze, his internal conflict warring on his face, but ultimately, he let out a long breath and slowly closed his mouth, stepping back slightly. He trusted her judgment implicitly. If she believed this was the path they had to take, he would stand behind her.
Dominante turned back to Lencar, her posture straightening, her expression shifting from grateful refugee to a proud, masterful artisan.
"I gave you my word," Dominante said clearly, her voice entirely devoid of hesitation. "You have removed the greatest threat to my family. In return, my hammer, my runes, and my mind are yours. Whatever artifacts you need forged, whatever magical theories you need broken, I will do it. I will keep my part of the deal."
"Excellent," Lencar nodded, genuinely pleased. "Your expertise will be invaluable in the days to come. But before we discuss blueprints, we need to address the reality of your current situation."
Lencar shifted his gaze from Dominante to the red-haired swordsman beside her.
"As you have likely surmised, Fanzell," Lencar began, his tone turning clinical and precise. "Your bounty still remains active. I was able to secure Dominante's freedom by reclassifying her status as a non-combatant civilian asset whose pursuit was draining valuable state resources. But you... you were a military Commander. You trained their elite. Your defection was a massive, public humiliation to the military brass. Removing your bounty would have caused an outright revolt among the Shining Generals. It was politically impossible to erase your name from the ledgers at this time."
Fanzell crossed his arms over his chest, his blue eyes calm and unbothered. "I figured as much. I appreciate you being straightforward about it. I know exactly how Morris and the High Command operate. A scientist they can sweep under the rug, but a traitorous Commander has to be made an example of. It's fine. I've spent the last few years looking over my shoulder; I can handle a few more."
"There is another complication," Lencar added, turning back to Dominante. "While the Diamond Kingdom will no longer hunt you, you are still an unregistered foreign mage who illegally crossed the borders. This is the Clover Kingdom. If you walk into the Royal Capital or any major city and display your magical tools, the Magic Knights will immediately flag you as a potential spy or a black-market smuggler. You cannot operate out in the open."
Dominante nodded slowly, her orange hair bobbing. "I know. I've already thought about it. Even without the Diamond Kingdom breathing down my neck, I'm still a ghost in this country. I can't exactly open a storefront in the noble realm."
Fanzell suddenly let out a loud, booming laugh, clapping his hands together to shatter the heavy, serious atmosphere.
"Ah, well!" Fanzell grinned broadly, his eyes crinkling with amusement. "Look on the bright side! My face is simply too handsome to be taken off the wanted posters anyway! If they took down my bounty, the female bounty hunters of the continent would riot in the streets! And as for hiding, we're already experts at it!"
Dominante rolled her eyes, though a fond smile played on her lips. "Ignore him. His ego is thicker than his skull."
Lencar felt a genuine spike of amusement beneath his mask. Fanzell's ability to inject levity into a dire situation was a rare and valuable trait.
"Be that as it may," Lencar said, gesturing to the cramped, chaotic workshop around them. "This safehouse is too small, too damp, and entirely unsuited for the level of production I will require from you, Dominante. You need a proper forge. You need a laboratory with high-density mana output, and you need a place where Fanzell can train without accidentally destroying the ceiling. Do you want a new place to work?"