The council chamber of the Wildlands Federation simred with tension.
Eight chiefs occupied the round stone table.
The leaders of Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Goliaths, Centaurs, Beastn, Lizardfolk and Birdfolk.
At its head sat Ashreth, chief of the Human State and also the Supre Leader of the Federation.
He rose slowly then placed a hand over his chest. His expression was heavy with guilt.
"Brothers. Sisters. I have failed you," he said. His voice was so heavy it seed to press on the very air. "The Kingdom and the Holy Empire have conspired against us. Alone, I am helpless. Together... perhaps we can endure."
From his sleeve he drew a crystal magic tool. Light burst across the wall behind him, coalescing into a moving image.
The chiefs leaned forward and their eyes narrowed as scenes unfolded.
Chariots breaching their borders. Bombs raining from the sky. Monsters driven to madness. And Lucien with his n cutting them down.
Had Lucien been there, he would have laughed. The footage was sliced and spliced exactly the monts Ashreth wanted them to see... turning Lucien and his companions into villains.
Ashreth froze the image. "Look closely," he said, his tone grave. "These are not southern beasts. Wyverns. Frost mantises. Iron-hide boars. Even shadow-stags. All are creatures of the North. And the one leading them... The Black Tortoise, entwined with a serpent. The guardian beast of the North."
The vision resud.
Lucien and the soldiers on a relentless killing spree. The blood suddenly rising to fuel a large magic circle. And then... the sudden fiery destruction of two villages.
Birdfolk chief Raina shot to her feet. Her feathers bristled like knives.
"My villages! Burned to ash... my people screaming in the smoke! Twice already. Must I suffer third?"
The Lizardfolk chief, Ssar, hissed. His scales glittered in the light.
"Humans... they salt the swamps. Poison the rivers. They take and take and take. Enough. Blood will be answered."
The Dwarven chief, Thrain, slamd his fist onto the stone.
"By the forge, this treaty was once a shield for them. Now it’s no more. It’s ti to break them!"
Ashreth lowered his head as if in sorrow. "I am a human myself... and even so, I cannot deny our kind’s greed. I will stand with you all. Together, we will fight."
But one did not rise to the fire. The Elf chief, Elandor. He sat with hands folded. His eyes narrowed, searching the images. His people had lived centuries long enough to know lies when they were painted in bright colors.
"There is... sothing amiss," the Elf said carefully. "the soldiers on the wall doesn’t seem to recognize the chariots and the way the monsters raged... Why would they need to sacrifice themselves?"
Thrain’s beard bristled as a growl rumbled from his chest.
"Hah! Easy to doubt when the fires are far from your forests, Elf. But when the humans march, they won’t stop at my mountains or Raina’s skies. They’ll take your groves next. Will you sit and sing while the rest of us bleed?"
Every gaze turned on Elandor. The weight of seven chiefs pressed down like a mountain.
Elandor swallowed. Five centuries of life, yet still not strong enough to stand alone against seven others. After all, talent was the elves’ limit. And it was true. Their groves lay far to the south, far from the map’s center.
He bowed his head. "We will... of course, join."
There was no choice. Refusal would make the elves the first to earn their wrath.
A murmur of approval rippled through the table. Ashreth said nothing but in his eyes glead a satisfaction too well-hidden for most to see.
Just then...
The doors groaned open.
A shadow fell across the chamber as a lion beastman strode inside. His mane burned gold beneath the light and his eyes look like molten suns. The Supre Chief of the Western Beast Tribes had arrived.
Leo.
Feared. Respected. Untad.
The chiefs rose instinctively as his aura rolled over them like thunder.
Ashreth inclined his head. "Please, sit, Lord Leo."
Leo did not sit. He pointed a clawed finger straight at Ashreth. His voice rumbled like a storm.
"Ashreth. If you have lied to about this, I will rip your throat out where you stand. That is the only reason I ca. So tell ... Is our Guardian Deity truly in the human hands? "
Ashreth faced him calmly.
With a flick of the crystal magic tool, another image shimred into view. A small white tiger lying beneath a great tree inside human walls. A collar glinted at its neck. Etched on the band was a single na.
Byakko.
The white tiger. Guardian Deity of the Western Beast Tribes.
Leo’s roar shook the chamber. "Guardian Deity! They dare stole Him from us! The humans enslaved our god!"
He slamd a fist into the stone table, cracking it.
The collar was mistaken for a slave’s shackle.
In truth, Lucien had asked Elk to craft special collars so travelers would not mistake sacred beasts for wild monsters. The mark was protection... not bondage.
Ashreth knew none of that or cared.
He had felt the White Tiger’s surge of power the mont it crossed a certain threshold. Weeks ago he had dispatched agents under him to confirm and record it.
At first he had wanted only to devour its essence for his own power.
Now he saw a far greater use.
Ashreth’s voice turned soft. "We will go to war to free him. Join us, Lord Leo, and we will—"
Leo cut him off with a snarl. His golden eyes burned through Ashreth’s composure.
"Do you take for a fool? I know what you are doing, Ashreth. You play with outrage and weave your web of unity so all strings lead to your hand. I will not be your banner."
The chamber fell silent.
"My people will act alone. We will reclaim our guardian deity with our own fangs. When he is free, we will return. Until then, keep your sches away from ."
He turned and strode out as his roar echoed down the hall.
The other chiefs exchanged uneasy glances. So were furious for the disrespect. The others were shaken by his might. But none of them spoke against war.
Ashreth folded his hands behind his back. His expression was unreadable.
It had gone exactly as he wanted.
A thin smile crept across his lips as the council dissolved in whispers of vengeance.
Another continental war lood. Its first embers lit in that chamber.
•••
The very sa day, Ashreth made his move.
He appeared without warning above the capital of the Vaultre Kingdom.
He floated in the air as his pure white robe fluttered against the wind. His face is solemn and heavy with false grief.
The picture of righteousness.
Citizens gathered in awe, murmuring praises at the sight of the man they called ’the continent’s most virtuous soul’.
Ashreth raised a hand and silence fell over the city.
"My fellow humans," he began. His voice trembled with just enough pain to sound sincere. "I stand before you not as Supre Leader of the Wildlands Federation but as a man who has witnessed the unthinkable. The treaty that preserved decades of peace... has been shattered."
Behind him, his aides unfurled a large banner. The crystal magic tool ignited. It projected its captured visions across the large banner.
Chariots thundering across borders. Sudden bombardnts. Monsters driven mad. Lucien’s company locked in savage combat.
Then... the villages exploded. The flas devoured hos while the screams of innocents tore the air.
The images were perfect lies, cut and stitched to condemn.
Ashreth pressed a hand to his chest. He lowered his head as though the weight of grief might break him.
"We placed our trust in the Kingdom and the Holy Empire. And what did they do? They unleashed the Black Tortoise, the guardian of the North, to command monsters. They defiled the blood of monsters to ignite forbidden magic, destroying villages of the Birdfolk, the Beastn, the Elves..."
His next words cracked like a funeral bell.
"This... is genocide."
Cries of outrage erupted from the crowd.
Behind lowered lashes, Ashreth hid his smile.
If Lucien and Midas wielded the overwhelming force of Sovereign Aura, Ashreth possessed sothing subtler. The Aura of Charm. Every word dripped with credibility and every gesture painted him as a saint.
Ashreth let the fury rise before he delivered the final blow. His voice bood, carried by magic to every corner of the city.
"As Supre Leader of the Wildlands Federation, I declare the treaty null. The Kingdom and Holy Empire unleashed this horror. And the one who led the slaughter..."
His finger leveled at Lucien’s likeness, projected larger in the banner.
"...was him. The boy they call Lucien. Hand him over and peace may yet remain. Refuse... and war will co." Ashreth raised his heavy voice with feigned grief.
Everyone condemned Lucien at once.
Voices rose in outrage, branding him traitor, butcher, oath-breaker.
To them Ashreth stood radiant. He was a sorrowful saint forced into a grim choice... pleading for peace while sacrificing only the guilty. A man oppressed by duty, not by desire.
But when he turned his back, a shadow crossed his smile.
Thin. Sharp. ruel.
Then—
An overwhelming aura cracked across the square.
Midas.
An Imperial airship drifted overhead.
Ministers stood at his side as he descended through the air. His aura rolled out like a stormfront. The Aura of Charm was neutralised.
"Ashreth Vulcan," Midas declared. "This is not the way to declare war. Do you think to paint a fool before my own people?"
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. People turned toward the Imperial ministers, waiting for their decision.
Midas continued.
"Your evidence does not suffice. We will hear the other side. And if what you claim proves false, I, Midas Vaultre, will et you myself in the war you seem to crave."
Silence.
Ashreth smiled faintly. His lips parted for a reply.
But then...
A sharp cry echoed from above.
All eyes lifted.
Several Gargoyle Drones descended. Their wings folded, projecting their own visions into the air.
The true record. The full truth.
Ashreth moved in a blur as his fingers flicked to destroy them.
But Midas was faster... His own magic sealed each drone in a barrier.
One by one, the scenes unfurled for all to see.
First, the battlefield. The monsters surged from the horizon. Their numbers were unnatural. The absence of any Federation soldiers to hold them back. The sudden marching of monsters and halting as if toying with them.
The crowd gasped. The first cracks of doubt splintered Ashreth’s perfect illusion.
The saving grace was that Lucien had never hidden his Gargoyle Drones in his inventory.
Every mont they witnessed had been recorded.
The drones replayed the instant the bombs fell, the surge of chaos that followed, and finally...the corpses of the chariot riders themselves.
They were not human.
A collective gasp tore through the crowd.
This was the uncut truth. Clearer, closer... and far more damning than anything Ashreth’s crystal had shown.
And then...
The air shifted.
Lucien appeared.
Skywalk.
He strode out of nothingness. Each step carried him upward as though the sky were a road.
Light rippled around him. For a heartbeat the onlookers swore they were watching a figure out of myth...
...a knight destined to dominate.
All eyes followed him as he ascended. Awe shimred in the square. Hearts quivered under the weight of his presence.
A sovereign had arrived.
The lingering haze of Ashreth’s charm shattered beneath Lucien’s own overwhelming aura.
"Bravo," Lucien said, voice cutting clean through the silence. "You call the murderer of innocents, Ashreth. But these monsters—" he swept a hand toward the projected scenes "—I’ve fought them before. In deserts. In mountains. In swamps. Don’t tell none like these dwell in the Wildlands."
His gaze locked on Ashreth, eyes narrowing with a dangerous gleam.
"Soone gathered them... and tried to fra us. Ah! but it wasn’t us, of course."
Doubt rippled through the crowd like cracks in glass.
Ashreth’s eyes narrowed though his expression still played the part of sorrow.
"Illusions," he countered softly, shaking his head. "Fabrications to save yourself."
"Ha. I could say the sa of your magic tool. And unlike you, I have plenty more of these little things. Each one can record the truth."
Lucien scattered several Gargoyle Drones into the air. So toward the crowd. Others toward the king and even... toward Ashreth himself.
"Test them," he said. "See for yourselves. Verify it. The truth is there for all to see. Your story doesn’t hold, Ashreth."
A flicker of darkness crossed Ashreth’s face.
He hadn’t anticipated Lucien would wield the sa tools of proof.
The saint’s mask began to crack.
Silence spread like frost.
King Midas broke it first.
"I have examined the magic tool," he declared. "What Marquis Lootwell presents is genuine. These images cannot be forged."
Then Ashreth slowly lowered his head. His voice, when it returned, was no longer trembling or sorrowful. It was cold. Steady. Unyielding.
"But still... you cannot deny the magic circles that destroyed two of our villages."
Lucien’s reply was effortless, almost casual.
"Ah, isn’t that sothing you prepared yourself? A neat way to fra us."
Ashreth’s eyes narrowed to burning slits.
"You... bend reality with words. Why would I slaughter my own people?"
He turned fully to face Lucien. His voice rose like a blade.
"So be it. If the Kingdom and the Holy Empire will not deliver this criminal, you leave us no choice."
His gaze now blazed with unveiled malice.
"We, the Wildlands Federation, declare war. For the villages destroyed. For the guardian beast defiled. For the blood that cries for vengeance."
The square erupted. So still believed him. Others wavered. But the tide of anger surged too strong to be stilled.
Lucien’s voice sliced through the uproar.
"Still talking shit about justice?"
Ashreth stiffened at the open scorn.
Lucien tightened his grip on Morphis. He’d exposed much of the truth... yet not enough. He knew... Ashreth had never intended to bargain. War was inevitable.
Ashreth turned.
"Hmph. King Midas, if you continue to shield this scoundrel, your kingdom will et its ruin."
He began to leave.
A whisper of movent... and Lucien was suddenly gone from his spot.
He reappeared behind Ashreth. A hand clamped down on the man’s shoulders.
Then.. Lucien’s voice rolled like distant thunder.
"Leaving so soon? Since you’re here, stay a while."
Lucien’s eyes burned. Sovereign and absolute.
"War? If I wished for it, I would need no sches nor deceptions.
I am Lucien Lootwell.
My strength alone is enough to crush the likes of you."
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