"I guess it will be better than him," Apricot said softly, the corners of her mouth lifting into a small, almost disbelieving smile. It wasn't bright; it was careful—like someone testing whether light would really reach them if they leaned toward it.
"Cool. We'll finalize everything after I kill the commander," I said, returning the smile. In my chest, a colder shape uncurled—purpose.
"Okay." She nodded, ears twitching once, as if the word itself were fragile.
"Hehe, let's go break a commander then." I pressed my palm to the ice partition; frost lines spidered outward, the wall sighing into mist as my mana unstitched it strand by strand.
"What took you so long?" Mom's voice was a dry blade. Her eyes cut from me to Apricot—and widened for a heartbeat. "Illusionist's eyes. So that's how you got through. I didn't think the Federation had more of them."
"They told me I was the last," Apricot murmured, shrinking a little behind my shoulder. "But… I don't know if that's true. The last one I knew was killed a couple of years ago."
"But wait," Trinity said, frowning, "you didn't have those eyes when you came in."
"She used contacts to hide them," I said, glancing back.
"Contacts?" Everyone except Mom and Apricot responded with varying degrees of confusion.
"Reincarnation thing," I said. That shut them up fast enough.
Mom stepped forward, the severity in her face easing. "Why are you hiding like that? We aren't going to do anything to you. You already said you'd follow my daughter, right?"
I rolled my eyes. "Ignore her. She isn't normal." I nudged Apricot forward, gentle but firm. As we passed Kayda, something on her neck made me stop—skin shading in a subtle band, like heat beneath stone.
"Kayda, what's happening to your neck?"
She swept her fingers over it with an airy smile. "Nothing. It'll fade in a few days."
"If you say so." I moved on to the commander's cell. Cold curled around my ankles; his cage still had a slim ice veil across the bars. I studied the shimmer. "How should I start with this one?" I muttered this question more to myself than to anyone else.
"So, Apricot," I said over my shoulder, "why did you use contacts to hide your eyes?"
"The commander said it was the best way to make use of them."
"Huh? The last one I fought wore a blindfold."
Apricot blinked. "Blindfold? Do you mean Lord Kaga, who was killed a couple of years ago?"
"Yeah, that Kaga guy," I said, flicking my hand. "Blindfold to conceal his eyes. He cast illusions on himself—claimed he could see straight through it, see everywhere at once. I tried replicating it with my skill, but it didn't take. It might be a trick that needs those eyes."
Mom's mouth quirked. "So you were the one who killed him." She eyed Apricot. "He never shut up about human superiority. Strong, though—scratched me once. Once I worked out his eyes, he crumbled. He relied on them too much."
Apricot bowed low, voice tight. "Thank you for killing him. He was… the worst I've met. He also killed my sister."
Silence bent around us for a breath. I let it pass.
"Got it." I looked to Trinity. "Do we have a decent puppeteer nearby?"
Trinity pointed at herself, chin up. "Right here."
"You're a puppeteer?" I stared, something complicated tugging at my mouth.
"Yes. Why that look?"
"Nothing." I lifted a hand, dismissing it. "Apricot, around the corner. I don't want him seeing you. Someone hold him when I drop the screen."
"I'll hold him," Mom sighed.
"Thanks." I dissolved the thin ice veil.
A hand lunged between the bars and drove into my chest.
Heat flared, bright and ugly. I frowned. The commander's grin gleamed—too many teeth, too much breath.
"Haha, torture me now, bitch."
"You're going to pay for that, you dumb fuck," I said evenly, closing my fingers around his wrist. A senbon bloomed in my other hand; I sank it into the back of his neck, precise as a clock hand at midnight. He slumped like a puppet with its strings cut.
I tugged my hoodie closed over the torn shirt and bra. "You really pissed me off. After tonight, you'll beg for a do-over."
Mom snagged an ice dagger that whistled toward her from his limp hand. "Sorry. Didn't think he'd try that."
"You were fast enough." I lobbed another dagger at her; she caught it without looking.
"I knew you'd be fine."
"Tsk. Whatever. Trinity, open the cell. He owes me clothes."
Trinity stared between us, pale. "How are you alive? He… stabbed your heart."
"Something that small won't kill me. Door." I didn't raise my voice, but she flinched and unlocked it.
I booted him onto his back, crouching so my shadow fell across his eyes. Confusion swam there—good. Confusion opens doors.
"Don't know if your reincarnates taught you about acupuncture," I said, twirling senbons. "Earth method—stress relief, health tweaks. But tools are just tools. It's all about how you use them."
The first needle slid into a point at his sternum. He jerked. The second found the notch near his clavicle. The third kissed the margin of the jaw, a neat pierce where nerves sing.
"Acupuncture can heighten sensation—touch, sound, heat, and cold." A needle clicked into the small notch beside his spine. "Pain too. Move while the needles are in…" I smiled with no warmth. "You'll prefer chest wounds."
He tried to sneer again. It broke into a swallow.
I kept working—map after map, line after line—until his breathing turned into staggered, high-pitched pulls. Sweat threaded his hair at the temples. His eyes went glassy, and I watched his bravado slip like oil off stone.
Then I added the crueler work—ice slivers beneath tendons to make every twitch a spark and a thin frost-coin pressed over the solar plexus to dull his breath and sharpen the ache everywhere else. The pain is not enough to kill, but it is sufficient to make the body shout with every tiny movement.
"Trinity," I said without looking up, "wire him."
Mana-filament flashed from her wrists, hooking elbows, knees, and ribs. She lifted him into a T, legs held straight, arms level. The lines trembled in the air like harp strings.
His breath hitched in little whines. "D—don't—"
"On my count," I said. "Right arm: one notch."
Trinity twitched her finger. The arm rose a fraction. The needles glinted. He screamed.
"Left arm. Stop." I held up a hand; the sound stopped only because he ran out of breath. "Good. We're calibrated."
I leaned close enough to fog his vision. "This is how it works. Every time you lie, I move something. Every time you stall, I move something. Every time you tell the truth, I still move something—but I take one needle out. That's called positive reinforcement." I smiled. "Ready to play?"
"I'll never—"
"Right leg—tiny notch," I said.
His body convulsed like a stringed instrument struck by a storm. The sound he made wasn't human; it was a trapped animal tearing its voice.
I waited. Silence has a weight; you learn to let it press.
"Name," I said.
He didn't answer.
"Two notches."
He tried to thrash; the wires held. He choked. "R—Raus Hendrik. Commander—Eighth Forward Cohort."
"Unit composition."
"Why… why does it matter…?"
"Left arm."
"Six—six hundred—no—five eighty-eight effective! Swordsmen, lancers, ten mages, and two siege-tile teams." He gulped loud enough to click. I removed a single needle from his shoulder. His body sagged with the tiny relief.
"Reincarnations in your command structure. How many in your theater?"
He clenched his teeth. I let the quiet stretch again, then flicked my fingers. Trinity raised his right leg slightly.
"Fourteen." He panted. "Fourteen in total, in the Federation proper. Four bound. Ten free."
"Names." I kept my voice bored, because boredom unnerves. If you sound entertained, they try to spite you. If you sound bored, they try to impress you.
He stared past me toward some private horizon. "I… I can't. Oaths."
I tapped a needle embedded near his ear lightly. "Oaths make pain worse when you break them, not when you speak around them. We'll go with roles. Class and specialty."
He squeezed his eyes shut. "Two elementalists—storm, gravitic. A duelist—shadowed blade. One healer that's… wrong." His throat bobbed. "Two artificers. A word-breaker. A sniper." He swallowed again. "A saint candidate."
Mom's brows lifted a fraction. Kayda's pupils narrowed.
"Locations."
"Scattered. Rotating fronts. They move us. I'm—I'm not briefed on the high tiers. I just get orders."
"Peace talks?"
He blinked, then flinched for no reason except he was waiting for me to move something. I didn't. I let him marinate in the expectation. Eventually, he broke first.
"Ongoing. They've sent three rounds of feelers to the other kingdoms. Offer tech… advisors… joint academies. They want to isolate your kingdom first. Then—then squeeze."
My jaw tightened. I pulled a needle from his ribs; he sobbed with relief. "Planned targets."
He hesitated. I tilted two fingers. Trinity didn't even touch the line—she only let it hum. After I had inserted the device into him, the vibration alone felt as powerful as a hammer.
"Supply hubs. Not the big ones—the feeder roads you don't guard. Bridges. Mid-tier academies to starve your officer pipeline. Underground arrays. Guru trees." He coughed. "They want the trees."
Apricot's shadow shifted where she hid out of sight; I didn't turn my head, but I felt the rage spike from her like heat shimmer.
"Guru trees won't be easy," Mom said coolly. "But noted."
He wheezed, fighting for rhythm. I reached out and adjusted a needle near his diaphragm by a hair; his breathing loosened. "See? I'm kind," I said. "Slave contracts on your side—who signs them, and how often do they fail?"
"High command authorizes. Enforcement is carried out by a brand-caster located in the capital. He swallowed. "People slip through. Those with strong backing… or leverage."
"Such as?"
"Bloodlines. Research we want." He attempted a sneer but ended up coughing out a laugh instead. "Useful monsters."
I stared at him until his eyes skittered away. "Timelines. When does the squeeze tighten?"
"Four months… six at most."
I took another needle out. He sagged, trembling, wrecked. He'd broken cleanly; the rest came like unspooling rope. Names didn't, not fully—oaths and seals tangled his tongue whenever I prodded—but roles, districts, staging habits, procurement patterns, preferred times for moving elites between fronts—those he bled with ugly, stuttering honesty. He tried to lie twice; both times, Trinity nudged a line, and his body gave him up faster than his mouth did. I rewarded truth exactly as promised—one needle at a time—until only a few were left, and he sobbed when the last came free like a drowning man finding air.
I didn't stop there. I froze the tiny bone between his wrist tendons, then thawed it, then froze it again, not to injure—only to remind his nerves they belonged to me. I iced the space above his ankle just enough to make standing impossible without agony. I wasn't after permanent harm; I was after a lesson his body would not forget when sleep tried to hide it.
Only when his head lolled and his answers slurred into soft repetitions did I step back and nod at Trinity to lower him. She eased the lines; he collapsed like soaked cloth.
I slid a final senbon into the needle-point at his neck to keep him unconscious and stood, rolling the stiffness out of my shoulders.
[30 minutes later]
Mom's face wore a look I hardly ever saw. "Well, that isn't good."
"No shit." The information ran a cold finger down my spine, even as the wound in my chest itched with healing. We were ahead in tech—that part I'd wrung out between screams without much trouble. But in power? They were stacking the deck: fourteen reincarnations; four leashed; ten free enough to be dangerous and loyal enough to be used like blades. And the peace feelers to the other kingdoms? If those landed, we weren't looking at fights—we were looking at a storm.
Apricot glanced between our faces, confusion knitting her brow. "If I may… why are you all so down? Wasn't the information good?"
"It was useful," I said. "But useful doesn't mean comforting. Fourteen reincarnations means the next war will be a slaughterhouse if the other kingdoms play along."
I nudged the senbon at the commander's neck, a tiny reflex of irritation, and straightened. "At least we know their habits. That's something."
"Why is that so bad?" Apricot asked again, voice smaller.
"You saw how easily I overpowered you." I didn't make it a brag; I made it a fact.
She flinched, then nodded. "You froze my muscles."
"Mm. Do you know what level I am?"
She studied me, then hazarded, "Sage-type class… maybe level 200?"
A dry laugh escaped me. "Sage type? I'm a speed typist. I don't have a class yet. I'm level twenty-seven."
"WHAT!?" Apricot and Trinity shouted together.
Mom tilted her head, bemused. "Huh. I understand why Apricot is confused, but why are you confused, Trinity? Didn't you know her level?"
"No, I never knew."