Viscount Redsheen was seated at the head of a long table next to his wife and son. All three had a head of dense gingered hair and freckles dotted around their noses.
The Viscount's hands were shaky, and his face was flushed of color.
"What have I done?" He only mumbled his regrets into his chalice, but his misgivings along with his nerves only reinforced the already low morale of the lords.
"Yes, what have you done?" Baron Bering rose to his feet, his gut was pressed through his shirt, and he exhaled a breath of struggle from the exertion.
"You said we just had to show our force, and we would achieve lower taxes and less levies. Less tribute. But since the initial notice the count sent, there has been no further communication. He is clearly readying his forces to meet us in battle."
Ashton was standing behind the viscount, shoulder to shoulder with his knights. He remarked to himself that Baron Bering seemed competent, which sealed his fate.
[His decision to rebel probably took no convincing...]
"My Lord, I can assure you that negotiation is just over the horizon. What other choice does house Albert have? Please take your seat and enjoy the remaining courses."
"No, I think it is you who should take a seat My Lord Redsheen."
Knights dressed in silver armors and white capes stormed the dining hall.
Viscount Redsheen rose to his feet and yelled for his men stationed outside.
"Save your effort My lord. My men have already subdued yours."
The rest of the rebel leaders tried to flee the hall through the door on the opposite side, but the hallway they exited into was already filled with Bering's men.
"What do you think you are doing Baron Bering?"
"Isn't obvious? Our army is incapable of fighting this war, it needs a master willing to whip it into shape!"
As Bering took Viscount Redsheen's seat at the head of the table, he motioned for his men to return everyone back to the table.
"You will never get away with this! Our knights and mages will never listen to you and tolerate your whims!"
"I don't know what you mean My Lord... I am not hostile towards the rest of our allies, only you." Baron Bering raised his hand and stretched it out over the table, "You are with me, right everyone?"
The seated nobles were little more than hostages, they could do nothing more than nod their heads and accept the change in regime.
"And your men will do the part I give to them. That is if they want to see you and your family make it out of the dungeons alive."
Viscount Redsheen tried to resist once he realized that the baron was firm in his course, but as soon as his mana left his circles the knights restraining him struck him in the back of the head.
His body went limp and the knights carried him along with his family towards the dungeon.
Ashton followed closely behind and as they walked, the previously bare hallways were now dressed in knights and mages with the same white and blue stripped cape as the men that invaded the dining room.
All of their guards were heightened to a greater degree than the watchman atop the wall.
The knight's bodies were drowned in their mana.
The mages let theirs touch the air to feel what eyes couldn't see.
But Ashton walked through the net weaved in his adversary's mana without notice.
He descended the spiral staircase again without making noise.
But this time he only watched as the knights threw the Redsheen family into a cell, listened as the other prisoners mocked and cursed at them.
"Where is the warden?"
"Now that you mention it, I haven't seen any guards since we came down here..."
The knights drew their swords as fear crept over their minds. The dungeon held the feeling of fresh death and the primal fright of pitch black darkness.
But nothing came for them.
"Let's just go. Everything's mostly in order and the guardsmen were from our barony."
The pair of men dashed from the walkway separating the cages and climbed the staircase without ever looking back.
Ashton who remained at the bottom of the staircase, waited to see if new guards would come to fill the dungeon but nobody came.
His invisibility broke as he kicked in the iron doorframe of the viscounts cell.
Emery Redsheen saw Ashton clad in all black and her soul let out a scream of despair, she assumed that there were no guards because Baron Bering planned to assassinate her and her family.
Vermont Redsheen was just as desperate, and magical circle appeared manifested in his palm as he stretched out his hand towards Ashton.
"Sit down and shut up. I can't believe these amateurs didn't restrain you people properly."
Ashton's paralysis magic forced Emery into passing out, she couldn't calm down and struggled under the restraint of the spell.
She tried to scream and worm her body, but each action tightened the spells hold over her until she was squeezed unconscious.
Vermont was choking on his own blood. The rebound of his spells forceful cancelation crushed his organs and split his mind in a deep ache.
Ashton noticed him drowning and pushed his head down then opened his mouth.
"What are you doing to my family?"
Viscount Redsheen was woozy, his head was gashed open and his vision was blurred, but he could still see his son wounded and his wife unconscious.
"Bind."
The spell he placed upon Viscount Redsheen was only meant to lock his mana within their circles, but he noticed him struggling to lift his arms.
He thought back on when he rendered judgment on the knight in the yard of the castle. He had only casted paralysis, a spell meant to prevent bodily function, but he was unable to use his mana. And now with Vermont, the spell cancelled his magic.
[The Aether system not only strengthened the spells, it combined them both in different ways...]
"Congratulations Magic Ascension Pathway Active Skill Realized
Combined Restraints - Requires mana. All restraining magic grabs the targets mana and physicality."
"Aether System open." Ashton demanded in surprise.
"Ashton Whey
Age:16
Stamina:29
Mana:4
Intelligence:92
Strength:21
Magical Ascension Pathway: Dark Arts Prophet
Passive skills: Silent Step
Active skills: Combined Restraints, Shadow's beholder"
[My values increasing makes sense, but I don't remember realizing "Shadow's beholder". It must have been when I was forcefully closing the system after Judah's rebirth.]
"What are you doing I said!" Viscount Redsheen called out, interrupting Ashtons train of thought. "Who are you? Did Duke Raine send you to silence me that quick?"
Ashton kicked the viscount in his chin, "We already know of your collusion. What kind of lord are you to allow the commoners on your lands to suffer under dark magicians?"
"You are from house Albert? Since when has the count possessed such skilled assassins... you snuck into my castle and gathered information that isn't written across any scroll..."
[It seems paralysis completely restricts a person, and bind takes all but their ability to speak...]
As the viscount was about to speak out again, Ashton kicked the underside of his chin again. "You have sold out much more than your people and your lord. You have condemned those foolish enough to follow you to hell along with you and your family. Even if your action succeeded, how could you have lived with yourself?"
"When a man like George Raine ask you to do something, you do it. Or face consequences that are impossible to shield. And dark magicians? They were already present, wreaking havoc in every village and some cities. Thousands of missing persons and murders I have linked back to them... As Count Alberts right hand, I have brought this matter to his attention on a many occasion. But nothing ever changes. I thought this way I would at least be able to monitor them... warn and protect as much as I could..."
"Let's say everything you have said is correct... This matter should have been brought directly to the Empress. You hold proof that a thorn in her side is a fallen human. She would have had every justification to raze the eastern sector to ash just off of your testimony alone..."
Viscount Redsheen hung his head, "I was scared."
Ashton drew his sword and placed it at the throat of the viscount. "Cowards like you have spread rot for much too long. Sure, he had eyes on you probably. He would have had the dark magicians kill your family in front of you then skin you slowly... But so what? As nobles it is our solemn responsibility to risk whatever we must in the war against darkness."
"HA! As a noble? What do you know about nobility? You are but someone's dog! And the war against darkness? You are foolish to believe it is even a war! These dark magicians and inhuman!"
"It matters not your philosophy. You are already dead, and this rebellion is already over."
Ashton took the sheath to his sword from his belt and aimed into the air, but the viscount called out once more.
"Wait! Wait..."
Ashton didn't lower his blunt weapon, but he did stand still to hear what he had to say.
"...What will happen to me? To my family? We are victims too in a sense!"
Ashton's eyes narrowed "That's it?" He assumed the viscount would reveal something unknown, something useful against Duke Raine.
"It is not my decision to make, but I will argue to make the gallows as public as can be."
Viscount Redsheen screamed out in condemnation, but Ashton swung his sheath down struck him in the temple of his skull.
As he locked the cell behind him and left the three Redsheen's lying unconscious, Robert who was in the cell next to them saw Ashton turn invisible while he walked.
"A hero." He mumbled.