Silence.
After Kaelos's earth-shattering declaration, the entire square fell into a deathly silence, so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Only the biting wind howled through the crowd, sounding like a mournful cry. Every gaze—the slaves' shock, the overseers' disbelief, Liliana and Bolin's utter astonishment—was fixed on the frail figure who stood as straight as a drawn sword.
On Grak's face, greed and suspicion waged a fierce war. His wolf-like eyes locked onto Kaelos, as if trying to see through to his very soul. A slave, a creature he could crush like an insect at any moment, was now meeting his gaze with a calmness as deep as the abyss—a look he had never seen before.
"You have guts," Grak ground out, slowly descending the platform. Each step landed with the heavy, oppressive thud of a great bear. He walked right up to Kaelos, his massive shadow completely engulfing the boy, the very air seeming to freeze around them.
"Do you know what happens to those who lie to me?" He shot out a hand like a cattail fan, seizing Kaelos by the neck and lifting him effortlessly off the ground. The sensation of choking instantly flooded Kaelos's brain, and his weak body began to struggle instinctively.
"I will snap every... single... bone in your body, then throw you, still breathing, into the abandoned pits for the ice wolves to feast on your guts," Grak snarled, his voice thick with bloody threats, his breath a foul stench in Kaelos's face.
Yet, even with his feet dangling in the air, his face flushing crimson from lack of oxygen, Kaelos's eyes remained unchanged, a bottomless, frozen pool. He forced out the words, his voice raspy but clear, "If... what I say is true... you will get your ticket... out of this cursed mountain... Chief Overseer. Isn't that... a risk worth taking?"
"A risk?" Grak sneered, but the pressure in his hand eased fractionally.
He's right, Grak thought. Grak dreamt of nothing more than leaving this gods-forsaken place. Discovering a rich vein of ore was a monumental achievement, enough to earn him a personal audience with the Viscount. What was the life of one slave in comparison? But if he missed this chance…
Kaelos knew his gamble had paid off. The Grak of his past life, the "Bloodthirsty General," was defined by two core traits: brutality and greed. The latter was almost always his primary motivation.
"How do I know you're not just spouting nonsense to buy yourself a few more days of life?" Grak threw him to the ground. Kaelos coughed violently, greedily sucking in the frigid air.
"Mine Tunnel 7, the branch that was abandoned three years ago due to a collapse," Kaelos gasped, throwing out a detail from his future knowledge that was sure to convince him. "Everyone thought the miners hit impenetrable granite. They were wrong. Behind that rock face, there is a companion mineral—'Azurelight Crystal.' It gives off a faint blue glow in the dark… the unmistakable sign of a high-purity frost-iron vein."
Grak's pupils contracted. Azurelight Crystal! Only the oldest, long-dead master miners knew of such a thing. A young slave couldn't possibly know! The scales of his doubt began to tip wildly toward greed.
"Fine! I'll take that bet!" Grak finally decided, a monstrous grin spreading across his face. "You have two days. The day after tomorrow, before the Blood Sacrifice begins, you'd better show me that damned Azurelight Crystal! If you don't, you, the girl, and that big oaf will all experience the most painful death imaginable!"
He turned and roared at a nearby overseer, "Strike these three from the list! Take them to Tunnel 7 at once! No one is to go near them without my direct order!"
Tunnel 7 was cold and damp. Long abandoned, it had no lamps, only a suffocating darkness and the sound of dripping water. An overseer escorted the three of them deep inside, their footing unsteady on the rough-hewn floor. Finally, they were shoved violently toward the entrance of a side tunnel, half-blocked by rubble.
"Start digging here! If you find nothing, you can rot in here and become fertilizer!" the overseer barked impatiently. He tossed three worn-out pickaxes and a small sack of rock-hard black bread at their feet before turning to leave, his heavy footsteps echoing and fading down the main tunnel.
Eternal darkness and silence enveloped them once more.
"Uh… are we… are we saved?" Bolin's massive frame was slumped against the cold rock wall, his voice still trembling with fear. The way he looked at Kaelos was no longer one of suspicion, but a mixture of awe and terror.
Kaelos didn't answer. He took a few seconds to let his eyes adjust completely to the dark, then fumbled for a piece of bread, broke it in half without hesitation, and offered it to Liliana, who was huddled nearby, shivering.
The girl didn't take it. She just looked up, her eyes still bright in the darkness, and watched him warily. "Who are you? Why did you save me? Or rather, what do you want from me?" Her voice was soft, yet it held a sharp, guarded edge that belied her age.
She didn't believe in selfless kindness, not in a living hell like the Frostiron Mines.
"I didn't save you. I made an investment," Kaelos's voice was unnervingly calm in the darkness. "Your life is now mine. In return, I need you to show me your worth."
"My worth?" Liliana let out a self-deprecating laugh, her voice laced with despair. "I'm just a slave who knows nothing."
"No, you're not," Kaelos said slowly, each word a precision scalpel, peeling back her defenses. "Your family were renowned herbalists in the southern kingdom, before the Church framed them as heretics and destroyed them. You've had an intimate knowledge of plants and minerals since you were a child. You try to hide it, but you instinctively avoid stepping on the 'frost-moss,' which is mildly toxic, and you subconsciously check your food for deadly molds… those are not the habits of an ordinary slave."
The blood drained from Liliana's face. She stared at Kaelos as if he were a demon crawled up from the abyss itself. "You… how could you possibly know that?!" Those were her deepest secrets, branded on her soul since the day her family fell!
Kaelos, of course, didn't tell her it was a memory from his past life. He simply stated, "To survive in this place, you can't afford to overlook a single detail. Right now, I need your knowledge. And you," he turned to Bolin, who was confused by their exchange, "I need your strength."
He laid out his plan, not as a suggestion, but as an indisputable order. "Grak has given us two days, and with it, the perfect opportunity to work without being watched. We have three tasks. First, Bolin, you will use your strength to create hidden cracks at key support points in this tunnel. Second, Liliana, I need you to find any useful minerals in this abandoned shaft—sulfur that can burn, saltpeter that makes rock brittle, anything we can use. And I will prepare a special gift for Grak's upcoming 'party'."
His voice carried a natural, irresistible authority. Bolin nodded instinctively, while Liliana's heart pounded in her chest. This mysterious boy didn't just want to survive; he wanted to turn the entire mine upside down.
Time flew by in a flurry of tense labor.
Bolin swung his pickaxe tirelessly, following Kaelos's precise instructions to damage rock faces and key support beams in subtle ways. His brute strength was perfectly applied, each blow heavy and precise, the sound echoing in the empty tunnel.
Liliana, meanwhile, revealed her astonishing talent. Relying almost entirely on smell and touch in the pitch-black, she scraped various mineral powders from rock crevices, carefully wrapping them in separate pieces of cloth torn from her own rags. Her eyes were focused and bright, the despair on her face replaced by the far more dangerous flame of hope.
As for Kaelos, he was at the deepest part of the tunnel, before the collapsed pile of rubble, busy with his own work. He wasn't trying to dig through to the non-existent "rich vein." He knew the real entrance was sealed by a single, structurally unique boulder. He didn't need to dig it out. He needed to blow it up.
"Sulfur powder, saltpeter, and dry coal dust… are the ratios correct?" Kaelos asked without looking back.
"According to the formula for a 'rudimentary alchemical explosive' in the old texts, the ratio is correct. But… we have no fire," Liliana said, her voice laced with worry. She couldn't believe she was actually going along with this insane plan.
"There will be fire," Kaelos said, carefully packing the mixed powder into several crevices he had already prepared. "When Grak comes to confirm the vein, he'll be carrying a torch. His greedy, impatient face will be the best lighter we could ask for."
"If this place explodes… we'll be buried alive too!" Bolin stopped his work, his gruff voice full of fear.
"No," Kaelos stood up, dusting off his hands. His eyes shone with a light that was equal parts genius and madness. "This explosion isn't meant to kill him, but to create chaos. The moment it goes off, all of Tunnel 7 will shake violently. The cracks you made will collapse, blocking the path for anyone who tries to follow us. And the sound of the blast will be our signal, calling every slave in the mines to revolt!"
He turned to face his first two followers, his voice low and powerful. "Remember, in the eyes of the overseers, a slave's life is worthless. When they think we've been buried along with Grak, their first instinct will be to seal the tunnel, not risk a rescue. That will give the slaves in the other sections their one and only chance at survival!"
"Why should I trust you?" Liliana finally asked the question that had been circling in her mind. "This is insane. Even if the revolt succeeds, where can we run? The endless ice fields outside will kill us just as surely."
"Follow me, and you will see more than just ice fields," Kaelos stared at her, his next words shaking her to her very soul. "Don't you want to see those sanctimonious hypocrites from the Church of Holy Light weep in repentance before your family's graves? Don't you want to personally… return the suffering they inflicted upon your family, a hundred, a thousand times over?"
Liliana began to tremble violently, a volcanic hatred erupting in her eyes.
"As for you, Bolin," Kaelos turned to the gentle giant. "All you want is a full belly and to not be bullied. Follow me, and I promise you'll have all the roasted meat the North can offer."
A promise of revenge, and a pledge of survival. Simple, yet they struck at the deepest desires of the heart.
At that moment, this temporary squad—composed of a former demon lord's knight, a future poison empress, and a warrior of prodigious strength—formed their first, fragile, yet unbreakable alliance.
With the plan set, the atmosphere between them shifted. They were no longer mere slaves awaiting death, but co-conspirators, guardians of a world-shaking secret.
Kaelos lowered his voice and began to detail their specific escape route and rendezvous point once the chaos began. This was the most critical part of the plan; there was no room for error.
"...After the explosion, dust will obscure everything. We won't take the main path, but the abandoned ventilation shaft on the side..."
He stopped mid-sentence. He shot his head up, his eyes suddenly sharp as daggers as he made a swift motion for silence.
The beast-like instinct for danger, honed in a past life on mountains of corpses, was screaming a warning in his mind.
"What is it?" Bolin whispered nervously, tightening his grip on his pickaxe.
Kaelos didn't answer. His gaze was locked on the deeper part of the tunnel, on a rock crevice completely cloaked in shadow. From there, he could hear it: the faint sound of breathing that didn't belong to them. And… he could feel a pair of eyes watching them.
Someone was here!
Since when? How much had they heard?
Was it a spy sent by the suspicious Grak? Or another runaway hiding in this abandoned tunnel?
Either way, to their fledgling, fragile plan, it was a lethal threat!
Kaelos slowly and silently picked up a sharp-edged rock, his body tensing like a panther about to pounce. Liliana and Bolin felt the suffocating tension and held their breath, their hearts hammering against their ribs.
The tunnel was dead silent, the only sound the drumming of their own heartbeats.
Suddenly, from the shadows behind the crevice, came a soft, repressed cough, as if from illness.
Exposed!
The next second, a small figure stumbled out of the shadows, trying to flee down the opposite end of the tunnel. Kaelos's eyes narrowed. He shot forward like an arrow loosed from a bow, tackling the figure in an instant. The sharp rock in his hand glinted as he pressed it mercilessly against the intruder's throat.
By the faint light filtering in from the main tunnel far away, he saw a small face, pale with terror and sickness.
Not an overseer.
It was another slave boy in tattered rags. A boy who, Kaelos was certain after searching all his past memories, should not have been here at all.