Zenni followed closely at my heels, his eyes darting nervously to the armed guards and bustling carriages we passed. As we walked further away from the grand plazas of the military sector, he looked up at the shadow of my hood, a soft, genuine smile breaking across his face.
"Thank you, Eirene, seriously. I didn't know where I was going to sleep tonight. I was terrified I'd end up in an alley again."
Beneath the thick canvas cloth masking my jaw, I let out a gentle, silent smile. The boy had been a pawn in a dangerous game, but he was safe now.
Soon, the towering marble towers gave way to neat, uniform stone townhouses and clean streets. We had arrived at the 3rd District… the peaceful, civilian residential district of Caria City, where my private house was located. It was the perfect place to hide a ghost.
As we approached the district's wrought-iron archway, the gatekeeper on duty, a sharp-eyed man named Renny, stepped out of his guard shack. His boots thudded against the pavement as he stumbled right into our path, his gaze instantly locking onto my heavy, travel-worn merchant cloak and Zenni's nervous posture.
"Both of you, toll and status card," Renny demanded, holding out a brass scanning plate.
I didn't hesitate. I reached into my cloak with my right hand, pulling out my civilian identity card and sliding a silver coin onto the plate, while Zenni hurriedly did the same with his freshly minted, all-D-rank card.
Renny passed the cards through the scanner, his eyes widening slightly as my civilian registration flashed. He looked up, squinting hard under the shadow of my hood.
"Eirene? Well, damn... I barely recognized you under that massive traveler's cloak. And what in the world happened to your skin? You look like you've been baked alive in an oven. And who's the scrawny boy hiding behind you?"
I remained entirely dead silent, merely tilting my head and fixing him with a flat, unblinking stare from my lone green eye.
Renny sighed, waving his hand dismissively as he handed our cards back.
"Right, right... forgot you don't talk. Whatever. Everything clears out. You can come in now, welcome back."
I nodded curtly, pocketing my card, and gestured for Zenni to keep moving. We walked down the quiet, cobblestone avenues of the residential sector until we finally stopped before a modest, two-story stone house with a dark oak door.
House 132. My safehouse.
As I stepped up to the porch, I stopped. The doorstep was completely buried under a thick pile of scattered, yellowing newspapers. It was obvious the local paperboy had noticed my sudden disappearance over the last week and, rather than stopping the delivery, had simply kept piling the latest editions at my door day after day.
I knelt down with my right hand, scooping up the heavy stack of papers. The front pages were a blur of ink, and I already knew what the latest headlines would scream about: The Fall of the Emerald Spire and the sudden appearance of the mysterious Crimson Phantom at the borders.
I unlocked the front door with a heavy brass key, pushing it open to reveal the dark, quiet, dust-draped interior of my home. I stepped inside, gesturing for the homeless alchemy apprentice to enter the safety of my walls.
Zenni stepped over the threshold into the quiet house, his jaw dropping as he took in the clean, cozy interior. Compared to the squalid, dangerous slums of Sisiphon City, this modest residential townhouse looked like a palace to him. He awed in soft surprise, turning around in a slow circle as I carried the heavy stack of newspapers inside and shut the front door behind us.
I tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention, then pointed with my right hand toward the wooden staircase leading upstairs, gesturing that his new room was on the second floor. Zenni nodded rapidly, his eyes shining with immense gratitude.
"Thank you so much, Eirene! I'll... I'll set my bag down right away!" He scurried up the steps, eager to finally unpack his few belongings into a safe, warm space.
The moment he was out of sight, I moved quickly and silently through the downstairs floor. I went from window to window, pulling the heavy, dark velvet curtains tightly shut until the interior of the house was cast in deep twilight, ensuring not a single shred of afternoon sunlight could pass through the glass.
I carefully unbuckled my leather purse… heavy with the four royal gold coins, and hung it securely on the coat rack near the door, along with the ledger of the condemned. But I did not remove my heavy traveler's cloak. The Death Chant Shotgun remained securely bound to my frame, and more importantly, my massive, blood-red wings remained tightly pinned against my spine beneath the fabric. Zenni was under my roof now. If the fragile, low-rank boy saw the terrifying appendages of the "Crimson Phantom" bursting from the back of the quiet merchant girl who saved him, he would go into absolute shock. He would realize the demonic anomaly the Bureau was hunting was sitting right in front of him.
To keep him safe and maintain his peace, I needed to bury the executioner. For now, I had to act as a protective, grounding guardian for this displaced boy… a quiet mother figure to ensure he grew up whole.
I marched into the kitchen, the shadows enveloping my cloaked form. My own stomach let out a faint, hollow growl; I hadn't eaten a proper meal since crossing the Caria peaks. I pulled a couple of iron canned rations from the pantry, slicing them open with a small kitchen knife. Sitting at the wooden table in the dim light, I subtly reached up with my right hand, pulling the thick canvas cloth of my mask down just enough to expose my ruined mouth. I carefully fed myself with a spoon, the food soothing the raw, jagged edges of my Glasgow smile.
A few minutes later, the soft thud of footsteps echoed on the stairs. Zenni walked into the kitchen, looking much more relaxed now that his burden was lifted, though his stomach immediately let out a loud, traitorous rumble the moment he smelled the food.
I looked up, my lone green eye blinking beneath my hood, and pointed my spoon toward the open can of meat and bread I had set out across from me.
Zenni didn't need to be told twice. Without a single shred of hesitation, he sank into the wooden chair and began shoveling the food into his mouth like a wild animal. He ate with a desperate, frantic hunger, chewing and swallowing as if he hadn't seen a full meal in weeks… which, given the brutal collapse of the cartel territory he fled, was the absolute truth.
I watched him quietly in the shadows of the curtained room, a rare sense of peace settling over my cold chest.
Zenni finally slowed down, scraping the very last bits of the savory meat from the bottom of the tin can with his spoon. He let out a long, deeply satisfied sigh, leaning back in his chair as a healthy color returned to his pale cheeks. He looked across the table at my deeply hooded silhouette, his eyes shimmering with sincere emotion.
"Thank you, Eirene, I know you're a high-rank bounty hunter, and I know you do some terrifying things in the dark... but seeing you have a heart like this, taking in a completely useless stranger... I'm just so grateful."
Hearing his words, a rare spark of curiosity flickered in my chest. I reached into my cloak, pulled out my charcoal pencil, and quickly scribbled a question onto a fresh scrap of paper using my right hand before sliding it across the wooden table to him:
"What is your ambition?"
Zenni stared at the words for a moment, his posture tightening as his expression shifted from a fearful boy to someone desperately clinging to a future. He clenched his fists on the table.
"I'm done being just another nameless boy rotting away in the slums, and I am completely done working with the cartel or being a puppet for alchemists. I don't want to hide in the shadows anymore. I want to become a real student. I want to learn how to stand on my own two feet so no one can ever push me around again."
I nodded slowly in the dim, curtained light of the kitchen, understanding his dream completely. He wanted a clean slate, far away from the magic-heavy corruption of the Sisiphon cartel.
A thought immediately crossed my mind. Since his status card clearly showed a dismal line of D-ranks in magical aptitude, a standard mage institution would only look down on him.
Luckily, right over in the 2nd District of Caria City, there was a renowned institution called the Caria Mastery Academy. Unlike the prestigious magical academies, this school barely relied on mana or arcane core resonance. Instead, it focused entirely on practical combat, heavy physical conditioning, master-class swordsmanship, and tactical marksmanship. It was the perfect proving ground for a low-rank civilian looking to build real-world strength from scratch.
I pulled the paper back and wrote down a detailed recommendation, sketching out the location of the 2nd District academy and explaining its combat-focused curriculum. I slid it back to him.
Zenni's eyes scanned the page, widening with sudden hope.
"An academy that doesn't care about my weak magic? Where can I just train hard and learn to fight? Yes! I'll do it! I accept Eirene. I'll go there and register first thing tomorrow!"
I gave him a sharp, approving nod. The boy finally had a path out of the dirt. Now that his future was settled, I could focus entirely on my own grim reality. Tomorrow, the Bureau doors would open, Chief Anton would hand me the classified files from Nautilus Cotton, and I would finally descend into the dark, frozen depths of the Caria Mines to hunt the beast that tore my mother apart.