Five days ago, in the silent bowels of Border Town's castle.
The corridor was immersed in a cold gloom, lit only by spaced torches that cast flickering shadows on the rustic stone walls. Arthur and Anna stood near one of the narrow windows. The young orange-red-haired witch had just informed Arthur that the witch Nightingale watched the castle at night and that he should be careful, because if she saw him, she might end up throwing a dagger at him out of pure instinct.
Arthur offered a restrained smile at the warning, but instead of stepping back, he took a step forward, closing the distance between them in the dimly lit corridor. Leaning in discreetly, he approached the young witch's ear and whispered a few words in a tone so low that the stone echoes of the castle were completely unable to capture them.
— "In the coming days, Anna, the Months of the Demons will send us a monster," — Arthur's voice was a freezing murmur, yet calm and self-assured. — "A colossal hybrid beast, the size of a house, will march to tear down our walls. I do not have the exact date in my prophecies, but its arrival is an absolute certainty. And I will need your help to destroy it." —
Anna widened her eyes slightly, and her heart raced instinctively. A blush of shyness took over her cheeks at the sudden proximity and the frightening revelation she had been told. However, the embarrassment lasted only a moment. Her features soon took on a slightly more serious and focused posture.
— "Both William and I possess the capability to easily exterminate this creature with the magic we carry," — Arthur continued, choosing his words carefully. — "But we cannot reveal this truth in public, under any circumstances. The existence of men who use magic would turn this kingdom upside down. The Church of Hermes wouldn't just send spies; given the bad reputation and influence His Highness has, they could send an entire cavalry against Prince Roland under the authority of the King himself, Wimbledon III. We need a visual shield. We need Border Town to see a friendly witch saving everyone, and not an inexplicable anomaly, like a male witch. When the beast arrives, I will be hidden, but I will make you levitate above the wall using my Telekinesis. Your only task will be to forge sharp steel needles and heat them as much as possible without melting them. I also need you to put on a performance, creating fire around yourself, raising one hand to the sky, and pointing at the beast. You will be the executioner; I will be the gear, do you understand?" —
Understanding the astronomical gravity and the meaning of what she had heard, Anna held Arthur's gaze for a second. The trust he had placed in her, revealing his deadliest secret to protect her and protect the Town, ignited a flame of determination in her chest. She nodded with a slow, silent movement of agreement before turning and disappearing into the stillness of the corridor, returning to her quarters to practice.
Arthur straightened his posture, watching her leave. He shoved his right hand into the pocket of his dark overcoat, his fingers brushing the cold, smooth surface of a God's Stone of Retaliation he had acquired from Barov for an easy and simple favor to fulfill.
The sacred anti-magic artifact pulsed faintly in his pocket. Arthur had calculated everything. He knew that Nightingale, Roland's constant shadow, frequently patrolled the castle corridors in the Mist World. With the Stone in his pocket creating a "dead zone" that blocked magic, Nightingale was forced to maintain a distance of at least five meters from him so that her invisibility spell wouldn't be abruptly canceled and she wouldn't be ejected back into the real world. And, from more than five meters away, it would be physically impossible for her to hear his low voice, let alone a whisper, and equally impossible to use her passive magic to detect if Arthur's words were lies or truths.
He had handed his greatest secret to Anna with inviolable tactical security.
In the present, the silence that followed the fall of the titanic monster at the base of the wall was dense and heavy with shock.
Witnessing such incredible and devastating power, an absolutely unprecedented force never before seen in the annals of Border Town, was, for a millisecond, a purely terrifying experience for all the men on the walkway. However, the perspective changed as quickly as the beast fell. That "evil" power had been used in favor of humanity. Seeing the flying witch annihilate the greatest threat of their lives — the apex of their greatest enemies — the militiamen's instinctive terror gradually evaporated, replaced by an overwhelming wave of confidence, relief, and profound gratitude.
Prince Roland's heart beat wildly against his chest. He hurriedly walked down the concrete walkway toward Anna, who had just set foot back on the ground, the aura of fire diminishing until it disappeared completely.
— "Are you alright??" — Roland asked, his voice choked with genuine concern, ignoring royal protocol as he held her firmly by her hunched shoulder. He expected the absurd expenditure of magical power to make her faint right there.
Anna looked up at the Prince, her face perfectly normal and without any trace of the deadly fatigue that witches usually suffered when they depleted the reserves in their magic cores.
— "I am perfectly fine, Your Highness," — she nodded, her voice serene, casting a discreet glance at the horizon before turning back to Roland. — "I didn't spend as much energy as it seems. But... I would love to explain the details of this situation elsewhere, away from the wind." —
William, shaking off the snow that had fallen on his pauldrons during the frost, took a step forward. The protagonist's confident smile had returned to his face in full force.
— "You heard the shorty. The circus's main attraction is already dead," — William said, with a tone of relaxed authority. — "Roland, you can take Anna and Carter back to the safety of the castle. Leave the militia under my command. The monstrosity has fallen, but the lesser lackeys are still advancing toward the wall. We'll take care of the common demonic beasts; you can go rest your energies." —
Roland looked at his militia commander, nodded in gratitude, and began to guide Anna and her escort back to the wall's steps.
As the royal retinue retreated, Arthur's invisible eyes followed every movement. The strategist was not in the castle, nor on the front lines. He was sheltered in a tall wooden watchtower, originally built to house a platoon of archers, situated almost three meters from the main structure of the wall, very close to the rudimentary cabins of the militiamen.
Arthur lowered the small brass and polished glass binoculars he was holding. He observed the small horde of animals still hesitating at the edge, just outside the forest, after the death of their leader. Everything was happening with mathematical precision.
He turned to the young militiaman guarding the tower who had allowed him to enter. The boy was shivering from the cold and from astonishment, still staring at the colossal beast's carcass. In the distance, he observed that some demonic beasts had not retreated and continued advancing toward the wall.
Arthur was formally recognized by everyone in Border Town as the genius alchemist, advisor, strategist, and the prestigious "Count of the Kingdom of Dawn," a close friend of the Prince and the Militia Commander — which meant no commoner would dare block his path, paying or not — still, he reached into the inner pocket of his overcoat.
Arthur pulled out eleven gleaming silver coins and placed them into the boy's trembling hand.
— "For tonight's mulled wine. A toast to our victory," — Arthur said, with a polite and enigmatic tone, before descending the creaking wooden steps.
As he walked back toward the main castle, his steps sinking slightly into the soft snow, Arthur popped his coat collar and pulled his dark scarf over his mouth to protect himself from the freezing wind. His hands returned to the warmth of his pockets.
It was then that his peripheral vision was graced with the translucent neon blue light he had been waiting for so eagerly.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: TIMELINE ANOMALIA DETECTED]
The direction of the original story has shifted for the better. Outcome: Border Town's wall suffered no structural damage nor was it destroyed, and Anna's fainting from lack of Magic Power was prevented.
[REWARD: +170 Credits]
[CURRENT BALANCE: 170 Credits]
Arthur narrowed his eyes, feeling a sovereign and calculating satisfaction course through his veins. Completely satisfied. Not only had he prevented Roland's structural disaster and Anna's magical exhaustion, but he had also profited immensely from the surgical manipulation of the timeline.
Not far from there, in a spectrum of reality that no ordinary human eye could penetrate, Nightingale watched the man in the dark overcoat walking through the snow.
The Mist World was a universe in shades of black and white, where lines and shapes distorted. But around Arthur, there was a distortion. The constant presence of the God's Stone of Retaliation in his pocket created a black vacuum, a hole in the very magical weave that prevented Nightingale from getting closer. If she tried, the mist would tear and she would be revealed to the physical world.
She stood on top of one of the nearby cabins, her mind spinning in a whirlwind of confusion and suspicion. She had seen the spectacle on the wall. The brutality of Anna's fire was undeniable, but the flight? The stable and perfect levitation in the air? Nightingale had the innate intuition of an elite assassin, and something told her that the pieces of that puzzle were all wrong.
She watched Arthur's solitary figure walking back to the castle. Nightingale seriously considered that he was the true architect behind the girl's levitation. After all, days ago, during that same conversation in the corridor, she had been hiding at a safe distance and seen — with her own eyes — the heavy ledger books floating smoothly around Anna and Arthur as if they had a will of their own. Anna had not revealed any magic to make things fly, nor did she have any reason to hide such magic.
But even so, the suspicion hit the fundamental logic of magic. How could Arthur be responsible? Since she had arrived in Border Town and sharpened her magical vision to look for the witch who was to be "hanged," she had found no trace of magic flow other than the witches themselves, Anna and Nana. If he was responsible for that, how could he hide the Magic from her sight without the Stone of Retaliation? How could he also be a male witch without a magic core? How could he have exerted an invisible force on Anna and still attack the hybrid beast while being in the wooden tower, more than eight meters from the target?
And the most unsolvable riddle of all: how could he, theoretically, use and maintain any kind of magic while carrying the God's Stone of Retaliation with him at all times? The stone devoured magic. It was a logical and indisputable contradiction.
Nightingale sighed in the Mist World, feeling a headache forming. She was confused, frustrated, and morbidly intrigued. This foreigner possessed several mysteries, and accepting that he was responsible for these mysteries would mean breaking all the logic of the world she knew.
Meanwhile, on the cold wall stained with black blood, the real cleanup had begun.
William paced back and forth on the walkway, his shield still in one hand and his sword in the other, orchestrating the militia with the relentless efficiency of a war veteran. Now without the support of the colossal hybrid beast, the smaller demonic beasts — wolves, foxes, and some mutant boars — that had remained in the rear were finally returning to their usual chaotic predatory instincts and decided to attack the wall in a disorganized charge.
It was a simple slaughter. Without the cuirass of a boss beast to protect them, the monsters quickly fell under the coordinated volleys of muskets and thrusting spears.
However, a specific group of dozens of demonic wolves violently clustered near the spiked trench in the right sector, threatening to overrun the barrier due to their sheer numbers.
Van'er, panting, dragged a heavy reinforced wooden crate to the parapet. Inside it rested a good amount of concentrated and compressed gunpowder, a device Prince Roland had originally designed and reserved as a desperate last resort to destroy the hybrid beast's stomach. But, thanks to Anna's extraordinary intervention and the "magic needles," the box didn't even need to be opened for that purpose.
— "Commander! They are clumping up too much near the eastern trench!" — shouted Van'er, lighting a long lard-soaked rope fuse with a flint.
The fuse began to hiss and burn quickly, shooting off bright sparks.
— "Stand back! I'll take it from here!" — shouted William, running toward Van'er.
William lifted the box with a single hand, as if he were holding a bale of hay. He rested it on the edge of the wall, his arm muscles tense, his eyes calculating the burn time. He watched the fuse burn down to the dangerous limit, the flames mere millimeters from the entrance of the inner barrel.
With a shout of martial strength, William pulled the weight back and hurled the heavy box through the air. His colossal strength transformed the rustic crate into a projectile the weight of a pencil.
The wooden box traced a perfect arc in the gray sky and landed exactly in the epicenter of the chaotic swarm of wolves below. The instant it touched the frozen ground, the fuse was consumed.
The explosion that followed was the size of the wall itself.
A dome of fire, black smoke, and frozen earth rose to the heavens, followed by a shockwave that swept the snow from the base of the wall and made the militiamen's ears ring intensely. Pieces of demonic carcasses, wood splinters, and black ice flew in all directions. When the dust settled, the focus of the beasts had disappeared. Only a smoking, blackened crater marked the spot.
William dusted off his hands, sporting a broad smile upon seeing the destruction.
— "My soldiers, I think we can consider the shift over," — he said, receiving enthusiastic cheers from the entire militia.
.
.
.
Minutes later, the fury of war on the wall seemed to belong to another world, contrasting with the comforting warmth and silence of the prince's office inside the castle.
Roland sat behind his large oak desk, hands clasped, staring intently at Anna. The young witch sat in the chair across from him, taking a sip of warm water to chase away the chill she still felt.
Before Roland could begin pouring out his dozens of scientific questions about her new power and the nature of the flight he had witnessed, Anna lowered the silver cup and looked around the empty office, her eyes scanning the shadows in the corners of the room.
— "Your Highness..." — Anna began, her voice soft, but laden with polite urgency. — "Before I start explaining everything that happened out there and the real reason I went to the wall to face that creature... I need to know if Miss Nightingale is here." —
Roland frowned, surprised by the request. He looked toward the darkest corner of the office, near the bookshelves.
— "Nightingale?" — the Prince called out.
The air rippled and Nightingale stepped out of the Mist World, revealing herself in her elegant and watchful posture, arms crossed. She looked from Roland to Anna, curiosity shining in her piercing eyes.
— "I am here, Your Highness," — she replied.
Anna turned her face to the older witch, with an expression that showed regret, yet firmness at the same time.
— "If Miss Nightingale is present, I ask that you please excuse us. I cannot speak while you are listening." — Anna was direct. — "I need to speak privately with His Highness, the Prince." —
Nightingale raised an eyebrow, clearly offended and intrigued by the exclusion, but Roland's silent order and understanding nod made her step back. With a sigh of dissatisfaction, she dissipated into the mist, and by the silence that followed, Roland confirmed that she had physically left the room.
With the room finally empty and secure, Anna took a deep breath, preparing to carefully weave her web of explanations.
Arthur had already revealed, weeks ago, that he and William did not belong to this world, confessing to Roland that they came from Earth — a fact the Prince accepted and kept secret. He even revealed that he and William possessed a "budget" of knowledge and magical skills, but hid the functioning of the System and what each one's magic was, leading Cheng Yan to think it was solely physical enhancement. On the other hand, to Anna, Arthur had revealed the existence of the System and both of their magic, but completely hid the earthly and futuristic nature of their interdimensional origins.
Anna was now sitting there, ready to honor the promise she made to Arthur. She really didn't want to lie to the Prince, because falsehood saddened her own nature, especially with the Prince who had given her shelter, but she was determined to hide the truth. By omitting the hidden mechanisms of that victory through silence, she would keep the secret safe, preserving Arthur's delicate and dangerous plan in the shadows in perfect balance.