"Quillin Drop, Kraken's Tears..." Azalea muttered, scanning the ingredient list for his first potion.
"Haah... Haah... haaa..."
A pink-haired figure emerged from the smoking cavern, crawling on hands and knees like some demented creature. Anna's usually pristine appearance was now a disaster of soot and singed hair. Her academy uniform hung in tatters, and her face bore the wild-eyed look of someone who'd just discovered explosives weren't meant to be juggled.
Their eyes met. She looked absolutely nothing like the prim, proper girl who'd tormented him for months. If anything, she resembled a slightly unhinged cave troll.
"You're late," he said conversationally. "You shouldn't breathe for an hour, then we can go."
"AZALEAAAAAAAA!"
Her roar echoed off the mountainside before she collapsed, clutching her throat. He continued floating, not bothering to spare her a glance. Fascinating how she was already teetering on the edge of sanity, and he hadn't even begun his real work yet. What would happen if he actually replicated every torment she'd inflicted on him? Would she survive it? The thought brought a small smile to his lips.
"The Elven Empire," he mused, considering where to source his remaining ingredients. The shopping list was getting rather exotic.
"No... wait. This timeline..." A brilliant idea sparked. "What if I just..."
He closed his eyes, mind racing through possibilities.
"Vivian."
If things were following the game's storyline, then right now she was being secretly abducted to Morntelia by that psychotic king who orchestrated a whole massacre just to steal her.
She was supposed to be headed to a border town to heal a curse. But the king had caught wind of it. So he launched a flawless operation: Tier-five beast attacks, internal sabotage, guards overwhelmed… She vanished without a trace.
If he could intercept them—
"Alright, that seems more convenient," he told himself, already running calculations.
His brain shifted into tactical mode, processing variables he'd never bothered with before. The whole operation had occurred outside Albion, near the border with Ezram. The kidnappers would take a roundabout route since Ezram's security would stop them cold, meaning they'd brave the Jarel-infested forests. And given how troublesome those creatures were... approximately ten days to escape the forest unharmed.
The event should have happened a week after Vermillion Academy's closure.
"No, they've gone far beyond it," he shook his head, recalculating.
That meant they were already halfway to Morntelia. They couldn't use teleportation devices—those required registration and IDs, and investigations would eventually expose Morntelia's involvement. Even psychotic kings had to worry about paperwork, apparently.
He took a moment, eyes closed in concentration, then shot them open with sudden clarity.
"Got it."
Below, Anna stared up at him with wide, broken eyes. She looked like someone had put her through a blender set to "traumatize."
"You can breathe," he said, gracefully landing beside her.
She finally stopped gasping and managed proper breathing. "Please... let me go, please!"
"Funny, I think a young man also pleaded to a sadist the same way," he replied with mock empathy.
"Get up. Take me back to the hotel."
Anna closed her eyes, letting mana wrap around them both. She whispered the transportation spell, and in a flash—
"I won't lie, this really is convenient," he commented as she opened her eyes.
A ceiling. The hotel room. Success.
"Go get me something to eat."
She looked baffled, then her face cycled through anger, frustration, and finally landed on reluctant acceptance. "Alright," she said, leaving the room with dragging steps.
The moment the door closed, his breath caught. "Haah... haahh... haaah."
"What's happening?" he wondered, biting his lips to stay conscious.
He'd suspected this might happen, but experiencing the side effects was another matter entirely. Such power over another being naturally came with an immense price. He clutched his chest, gritting his teeth as he collapsed, trying to circulate ether. Instead, it only intensified.
"Haaha... haah... haaa."
After what felt like an eternity, the pain faded. He panted, holding his chest tightly, when a new sensation struck him.
Something was wrong. It felt as though... something else had just left him. A piece of himself, simply gone.
"What the hell is the price I have to pay?" he gritted his teeth.
[#$%^&*()_]
[No price is too great for revenge]
[An evil entity smiles at you.]
He stared at the cryptic message floating in his vision. An evil entity? Probably whatever had granted him this ability.
"Sighs." He chose to forget about it instantly. No use wondering about questions that wouldn't get answers, so he focused on more pressing matters.
Click.
Anna returned, still looking like she'd been through a meat grinder. "Here is your food..." she said, feigning frustrated compliance.
"Who said it was for me?" he asked, and her eyes widened in confusion.
"Eat it fast. Let's go," he commanded, and she froze in place, the implications dawning on her.