Lionfang was barely waking when Ludger slipped out of the house, scarf tied, coat straightened, and two small shadows clinging to him like cicadas with chubby hands.
Elle was wrapped around his left leg. Arash was hanging from his right hip like a determined barnacle. They had not let go of him since his return. Ever. Elaine waved from the doorway with a proud-yet-defeated smile.
“Good luck.”
Arslan added, half-grinning:
“Rember to breathe.”
Ludger didn’t respond. He had accepted his fate.
The Torvares estate’s gardens were misty with morning dew, and the air vibrated lightly with mana. Two figures trained near the sparring grounds: Viola, blade flashing like sunlight on steel. Luna, her fra weaving wind around her step forms
They were focused. Disciplined. Precise. Until the twins saw them.
“YAAA!”
Elle charged like a giggling missile.
“BAAAH!”
Arash followed, arms outstretched.
Viola barely had ti to turn before Elle clung to her waist like a limpet. Luna froze, eyes wide, as Arash imdiately latched onto her leg and began climbing her like a tree.
Viola: “…Ludger?”
Luna: “Help??”
Ludger exhaled through his nose.
“You’re fine.”
The twins cheered. Viola groaned. Luna panicked. The world balanced itself.
With the distraction secured, Ludger and Kaela slipped inside the manor, nodding to guards who bowed in respect, and maybe fear.
He made his way to Lord Torvares’s office.
The lord sat behind a polished desk, spectacles perched low, reading reports with the expression of a man who had forgotten what peace felt like.
When he looked up and saw Ludger, he sighed deeply, an old, weary sigh that belonged to a veteran commander, not a noble.
“Sit.”
Ludger sat. Torvares steepled his fingers.
Ludger gave the details of his last two months.
Everything. Coria. Albrecht. The underground labs. Child-golems. Pirates. The flagship. The infiltration. The explosion in the sky. The aftermath. Negotiations with beastn.
He spoke in a calm, thodical tone, as if describing the steps of baking bread.
By the ti Ludger finished summarizing the self-destructing war armor and mid-air kick that sent a commander flying, Torvares’s hand had slid slowly across his face. He dragged his palm down, rubbing his eyes.
“You… acted as a diplomat without authorization.”
Ludger nodded.
“You negotiated a cross-national alliance.”
He nodded again.
“You infiltrated the Velis League.”
Another nod.
“Fought pirates, seized a warship, overthrew a commander, uncovered illegal human experintation…”
A calm blink. Torvares leaned back, staring at the ceiling.
“…and you describe this to as if you took a walk through the market.”
Ludger tilted his head.
“I’m ho now.”
Torvares gave him a long, flat stare, the kind only exhausted leaders and disappointed fathers can manage. He exhaled slowly.
“You are twelve.”
Ludger didn’t flinch.
“Feels like this isn’t the first ti I am hearing this, I wonder why?”
Torvares closed his eyes.
“This is why I’m going grey.”
Ludger simply waited, arms folded, posture calm. Torvares pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Very well. I will handle the political fallout. Again.”
He opened one eye.
“But next ti, please, try not to destabilize an entire region without telling first.”
Ludger thought about that.
Then:
“…No promises.”
Torvares groaned into his hands. Outside the office, the faint sound of Viola and Luna screaming as the twins attacked them echoed through the halls like a blessing from the gods. This was ho.
The room settled after Torvares’s long groan, papers rustling as he forced himself back into the role of statesman rather than exasperated supporter.
He lowered his hands at last and looked at Ludger with that tired, piercing gaze.
“All right. Enough catastrophes for one morning.”
He folded his arms.
“Why did you truly co here today, Ludger?”
It wasn’t scolding. It wasn’t political pressure. It was the question of a strategist expecting the next bomb to drop.
Ludger straightened slightly on the chair, watching a pebble revolve between his fingertips, a habit from thinking.
Then he answered, voice low but certain:
“During the mission… I had a flash of insight.”
Torvares did not blink. Ludger continued:
“The Rodericks, Verk remnants, they disappeared. Cleanly. Completely. Almost instantly.”
Torvares nodded slowly. He had seen the sa pattern. He didn’t interrupt. Ludger’s eyes hardened.
“Normal escape routes don’t allow that. Not even underground networks.”
A breath.
“But labyrinths do.”
Torvares’s fingers curled against the desk.
“Explain.”
Ludger stood, pacing once around the desk, short steps, precise, silent.
“Labyrinths are dangerous. Perfect for hiding.”
He tapped the desk.
“So have rooms no one has mapped. So have floors that shift. So connect to new lands, forgotten ruins, abandoned ritual sites.”
His next words were cold marble:
“If I were running a multinational criminal network… I’d hide inside them.”
Torvares exhaled sharply, not disbelief, but alarm.
Ludger pressed on:
“And if soone wanted to vanish instantly? They could escape through a labyrinth entrance, a sub-floor, a controlled environnt only their people knew.”
A beat of silence. Then the conclusion:
“I want to investigate every labyrinth in the country.”
Torvares’s eyes widened a fraction, the closest thing to shock the man ever allowed himself.
Torvares leaned back in his chair, staring at Ludger as if seeing him differently. As if the child in front of him was now sothing older, sharper, more dangerous than anyone in Velis and the empire politics could comprehend.
“All the labyrinths?”
Ludger nodded once.
“If the Rodericks or Verk are inside one… I want to find them.”
His voice dropped into sothing lethal.
“And attack imdiately.”
Torvares drumd his fingers, thinking hard. Investigating a labyrinth wasn’t simple.
You weren’t just checking terrain. You were entering ecosystems with their own rules, their own predators, their own physics. Places where armies shrank and lone madn thrived. And Ludger wanted to check every one.
Torvares exhaled a long, controlled breath.
“It’s insane.”
Ludger didn’t flinch.
“But not impossible.”
Torvares allowed himself a small, grudging smile, the expression of a man who saw a wildfire and knew it could either destroy the world or save it.
“The idea… has rit.”
Torvares slowly nodded.
“…Very well. We will consider your proposal.”
His tone softened, but only slightly.
“But understand: this is no small task. It will consu resources. Ti. Politicians will scream.”
Ludger t his gaze without hesitation.
“I’m not asking for approval.”
A hush fell in the room.
Torvares swallowed once, the only sign of nerves he allowed himself.
“I know.”
Because Ludger wasn’t asking permission. He was giving a warning.
Torvares rubbed his temples and turned toward a large map pinned to the wall behind his desk. Colored markers dotted the paper, cities, resource routes, labyrinths, guild strongholds.
But several locations were circled in dark red. He tapped them one by one.
“These… are sealed labyrinths.”
His voice carried weight, even Ludger fell quiet.
Torvares continued:
“They are sealed for a reason, Ludger. So because they were too unstable. Others because the monsters inside were considered too dangerous.”
A pause.
“And so… because the noble families who control the territory demanded it.”
That last part hung in the air like poison. Ludger’s gaze sharpened instantly.
“If nobles control access,” he said quietly,
“they could be using the labyrinths as cover.”
Torvares nodded.
“Exactly. Which ans your theory has teeth.”
He placed a finger on one of the red circles.
“These sealed labyrinths… could very well be where Rodericks or Verk are hiding. Or worse, where they’re working.”
“Of course spoiled nobles sit on top of murder caves.”
Torvares ignored the comntary and straightened his coat.
“But there is a problem.”
Ludger tilted his head.
“Why can’t I just infiltrate them imdiately?”
Torvares gave him a long, steady look, the kind adults give bright children right before explaining sothing dangerous.
“Because so of these labyrinths are protected by guild contracts.”
Ludger blinked.
“aning?”
“aning there are specialized guilds whose only job is to keep them sealed.”
Ludger narrowed his eyes.
Torvares elaborated:
“They report directly to the noble families. They maintain magical locks, barriers, and rotating access codes. Their entire purpose is to ensure no one enters… and nothing leaves.”
He tapped the map again.
“Even if you infiltrated one, without knowing the exact entrance, you could wander for days before hitting a dead end. So entrances are hidden inside city walls or private mansions.”
Ludger lowered his brows.
“So we negotiate?”
Torvares nodded.
“We negotiate first.”
He lifted his hand to stop Ludger’s imdiate disagreent.
“Not because we expect cooperation. But because the ones who resist, who panic, who stall, who refuse access, those are the families most likely to be involved.”
A slow smile crept onto Torvares’s face, sharp, calculating.
“Your investigation will beco far easier once we narrow the suspects.”
Ludger considered that. Slowly nodded.
“…Makes sense.”
Torvares clapped him on the shoulder.
“Good. Then leave this part to .”
Ludger blinked.
“Why?”
Torvares raised a brow, tired amusent slipping through.
“Because if you go knocking on sealed labyrinth doors, Ludger, I will have ten nobles sending assassins to my living room by nightfall.”
Torvares leaned back.
“I will apply the pressure. Quietly. Smartly. Let identify which families twitch the mont labyrinths are ntioned.”
He pointed toward the door.
“You? Rest.”
Ludger frowned.
“I can still move.”
“Rest,” Torvares repeated.
“Your bones say otherwise. Your mother probably says otherwise. And your guild needs you intact.”
Ludger hesitated. Then gave a small, accepting nod.
Torvares exhaled in relief.
“Good. Give a few days. I’ll begin the process, and we’ll see who screams first.”
Ludger turned to leave, another war was brewing. But for once, soone else would make the first move.
Ludger stepped out of the estate’s hall and into the garden again, sunlight filtering between training dummies and trimd hedges. Viola and Luna were exactly where he left them, only now they were both collapsed on the grass, hair a ss, sweat on their brows, twin-engine toddlers having apparently drained their entire stamina bars.
Elle was sitting triumphantly on Viola’s stomach. Arash was clinging to Luna’s arm like a victory trophy. The mont Viola saw Ludger, she pointed at him with a trembling finger.
“Why… why do you always leave the twins with us when we’re training!?”
Ludger approached calmly, like returning to pick up groceries he forgot.
He crouched, lifting both toddlers with practiced ease, Arash on his left arm, Elle on his right. They imdiately curled against him like sleepy koalas.
He almost said sothing sarcastic. Almost. But sothing else crossed his mind, sothing far more serious. His expression shifted slightly.
“Viola.”
She blinked, still panting, brushing strands of hair off her forehead.
“What?”
“Have you heard anything about Lucius’s father?”
Her face dropped the joking frustration instantly. Eyes sharpened. Tone tightened. She nodded.
“I have. After… everything… he isolated himself. Won’t see visitors. Won’t allow anyone into the manor.”
Ludger adjusted his grip on the twins, gaze steady.
“And you’re not planning to do anything about that?”
Viola scoffed faintly and sat up, though her legs trembled.
“What am I supposed to do? Barge into his state and tell him to stop grieving? I’m not stupid.”
Ludger stared. Viola squird under it. He spoke simply:
“He’s your friend. Maybe send a letter.”
Viola blinked. Then frowned.
“A… letter?”
“Or visit,” Ludger continued,
“if you have any interest in him.”
Her face exploded into a shade of red that matched Torvares’s banners.
“I—huh—what—NO—Ludger—!”
She crossed her arms defensively, chin lifting in an attempt at dignity despite the blush creeping all the way to her ears.
“I don’t have interest in anyone!”
Ludger shrugged.
“Then make that clear to Lucius.”
The final blow. Viola froze. A soft choking sound escaped her throat. She stared at Ludger like he’d thrown a boulder at her soul. Luna watched from behind her, silently nodding as if Ludger had said the wisest thing in the universe. Viola finally managed to speak.
“…You’re twelve.”
Ludger walked past her with both twins in his arms.
“That seems like everyone’s catchphrase recently.”
She groaned into her hands.
The twins waved goodbye from Ludger’s shoulders.
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