A sound pierced the void, urgent and trembling. Soft, but shaking all the same. “Lady Anais, please wake up.”
A hand jolted her from unconsciousness. Anais stirred, groggy, her head spinning as awareness returned. The room was pitch black, broken only by thin slivers of pale light slipping through the heavy curtains. Moonlight of three combined shades. All three moons were out tonight.
“Thank God you’re finally awake,” the voice whispered. It was a woman’s voice, frantic and hushed, unmistakable. Martha, the governess of the countryside estate. And Henri’s mother.
“Martha? Why—” Anais tried to speak, but Martha’s hand covered her mouth at once.
She shook her head, terror plain even in the darkness. In a barely audible whisper she said, “My lady, please, not a word. There are people… people who…” Her voice faltered, each word strangled, as if speaking itself caused her pain.
From her voice alone, Anais could tell Martha was scared. Scared in a way Anais had never seen an adult be before.
“Mom?” Henri’s voice cracked through the dark. He was nearby, small and afraid.
Martha turned toward him, patting his head as she forced herself to steady her breathing. “It’s alright,” she whispered, though it clearly was not. Without wasting another second, she grabbed Anais’s hand and pulled her out of bed, guiding her across the room.
“What’s happening, Martha?” Anais asked as she was brought toward the far corner.
Martha crouched and yanked open the wardrobe. Dresses swayed inside. “There are bad people coming. You must hide with Henri,” she said, pushing them into the cramped space. “And you must not come out. No matter what happens. No matter what you hear. You hear that?”
“But what about Mom and Dad? Where—”
“My lady.” Martha’s voice was not loud, but it was firm. Too firm for a servant addressing a noble’s daughter. She grabbed Anais by the arms and repeated, “You must not come out unless I tell you. Do you understand?”
Anais nodded. “Yes.”
“I’m sorry for that,” Martha said, her gaze flicking to Henri, who was growing more restless by the second. “But you must protect him. Like you always do. Even if you have to force him. Do to him what I’ve seen you do to the other servants. Do not let him speak. Do not let him move. Order him to stay still and silent.”
Though overwhelmed, Anais understood. She turned to Henri and gave him an order he would not refuse. “Sit still. Be silent.”
The sobbing boy obeyed. His fear faded, replaced by complete obedience.
“Thank you, my lady. Everything will be alright. Just sit still and wait for me,” Martha whispered, gently closing the wardrobe doors. Her footsteps retreated across the floor.
She had barely reached the main door when a resounding boom shook the room. Anais flinched, nearly screaming as the sound echoed in her ears. Then she heard a yelp, sharp and pained. One word followed, unmistakable.
“Wait.”
It was Martha’s voice.
“Wait, please—”
Then came a strange sound, followed by a silence that was not truly silent. Shouts rang out somewhere in the mansion, rough voices Anais did not recognize, mixed with screams she did. Inside the wardrobe, a space that felt both safe and dangerously fragile, Anais felt Henri begin to shake. At first it was subtle. Then the sobs returned.
Anais clenched her teeth and repeated her command. “Still. Silent.”
It did not work. She could feel his resistance returning, his will slipping free of her hold. Panic bubbled in her chest. She could not let him ruin this. If they were found, she could not imagine what would happen to them.
Desperate, she reached for her ability. Her power to compel others to obey her will.
It had always worked before. She had used it on servants, on her mother, even on her father, though he always snapped out of it quickly. But not on Henri. Not since the time she had forced him to take the blame for breaking her mother’s crockery. He had been punished harshly for it. After that, she had promised him she would never use her power on him again.
The promise had been real. But now, she had no choice. Just this once. If it never worked again afterward, that was fine. As long as it worked now.
“Sit still. Be silent,” she whispered again and again, begging it to take hold. “Please. Just this once. I’ll never use it on him again. Just let it work now.”
She did not know who she was speaking to. But somehow, something listened. Something accepted.
Power surged through her command, and Henri went still. His sobbing stopped. His breathing slowed. His body relaxed.
Relief washed over Anais. She had done it. She had kept her promise to Martha.
For now, they were safe.
At least, that was what she believed until she heard footsteps again. Soft. Careful. Were they drawing closer, or moving away? She could not tell. Clutching Henri in the dark, Anais prayed.
Her prayers were not answered. They were not even fully formed when the wardrobe door swung open.
Light burst in. Not moonlight. Artificial light. A man stood before them, someone Anais did not recognize. He was drenched in blood from head to toe. She did not know whose at first, until her eyes flicked to the corner of the room.
Martha lay there, unmoving. Pale. Red pooling beneath her.
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Anais moved on instinct, or despair. One arm locked tightly around Henri. Her other hand shot forward and made contact with the man. He flinched, stepping back, but their eyes met.
In that instant, she saw something on his face she did not understand at the time. Pity.
Anais activated her power. For the first time, not for herself. Not to escape blame or get what she wanted. But to save them.
“You did not see us. Forget you ever saw us. You will not find us.”
The man’s expression did not change. He reached for her hand, and Anais’s breath caught, but he only pulled her fingers away. Then, without a word, he closed the wardrobe.
Back in the dark, Anais truly believed she had succeeded. That they were safe.
She was wrong.
She knew it because she remembered what came next. The fire. The way it spread far too fast. The doors that would not open. The smoke. Her hands burned raw as she tried to force them apart. Henri’s screams. Her own.
Ana remembered it all. And as the memory settled, she understood this was not happening now.
It was a dream of the past.
***
At first, there was only silence, thick and oppressive in the dark. Slowly, the haze began to lift. It remained murky, but explosions of shapes started to form, and with them came sound. Voices. A conversation unfolding nearby in a language utterly foreign to her.
“Was soll ich damit jetzt anfangen, hm?” a voice barked, sharp with fury.
“Entschuldigung, Aurel,” several voices answered at once, tense and subdued.
An uneasy silence followed, the kind that settled when subordinates feared reprimand.
“Ich soll das wohl wieder alles aufr?umen, was?” the first voice continued bitterly. A heavy sigh followed. “Und ich mach’s ja auch. Aber wie soll ich dem Messias bitte erkl?ren, dass ihr nicht nur ein Ziel verfehlt habt, sondern alle drei. Und eine davon war verdammt noch mal ein Hochgeborener. Unfassbar.”
“Tut uns leid, Herr.”
“Das will ich hoffen.”
“Wir wollten wirklich nicht, dass es so l?uft. Es ist nur passiert, weil sie…”
“Genug. Diese Ausrede hab ich heute schon oft genug geh?rt.”
“H?tten wir die Mission abbrechen sollen?”
“Ist das eine Frage, Oscar?” he snarled. “Ja. Ja, verdammt, das h?ttet ihr. Jetzt ist unsere Zelle in der Heiligen Hauptstadt kompromittiert. Und ihr wisst, wie wichtig das alles für den Messias ist, und für mich, als der, der das Ganze leitet.”
“Wir wissen es, Herr. Es tut uns leid.”
“Schluss jetzt.” A pause followed. “Ich muss nachdenken. Ihre Identit?t herauszufinden hat jetzt oberste Priorit?t.”
“Einverstanden.”
“Ich auch.”
“Wir müssen wissen, wer sie ist, für wen sie arbeitet und was sie mit der Blume zu schaffen hatte, bevor Claudiu das n?chste Mal kommt.”
“Yes, He… Herr, sie wacht auf.”
Ana did not understand a single word of what had been said. Not until that final sentence. The tone shifted. The tension tightened. Attention turned sharply in her direction. She knew they were talking about her, bound in chains and slowly coming to.
The truth was, Ana had regained consciousness nearly a minute ago. The first thing she had noticed, aside from the suffocating darkness, was the harsh bite of the cuffs around her wrists. They were unyielding, unnaturally firm. A blindfold covered her eyes, and her body was bound so tightly she could not even shift her weight. During those quiet moments, she had done nothing but think, desperately trying to figure out her next move.
Her first instinct had been to draw on her skills. She tried casting Lightning Magic. Then Fireball. Then Windbust Array. Nothing responded. Her MP and SP were practically drained, numbers scraping the bottom of her stat screen and somehow dipping lower, though never below zero. There was no regeneration, no rebound. Just a flatline.
It clicked fast. The cuffs were doing this. She sensed the artifact feeding on her like a parasite.
Even without magic, she had tried brute force, testing the limits of her base strength to snap the restraints. That was when they noticed her.
Footsteps approached, quick and deliberate. The blindfold was torn away in a single motion. Dim, sterile light burned her eyes before her vision adjusted. She blinked up at the faces of her captors.
There was Oscar. There was Fynn, the monk. Two others stood nearby, unfamiliar. One name surfaced from the earlier conversation. Aurel. Now she could match the voice to the face. He stood slightly back, calm and composed, his presence quietly dominant. He carried himself like someone used to command, polished and dangerous.
Still chained and utterly exhausted, Ana did the only thing she could.
She activated Appraisal.
It was one of those skills with no cost and no drain. It always worked, even when she was completely empty of MP and SP.
She turned it toward the one closest to her.
---
Name: Mathis
Level: 7
Race: Highbreed
Class: Mage
Title: —
[Status]
HP: 13 / 13
MP: 152 / 160
SP: 11 / 11
Defense: 18
Offense: 42
[Skills]
Earth Magic: Level ??? [Appraisal Level Insufficient]
Detection: Level ??? [Appraisal Level Insufficient]
Fire Magic: Level ??? [Appraisal Level Insufficient]
[Abilities]
[Appraisal Level Insufficient]
---
---
---
As expected, the attempt triggered an immediate reaction. Mathis snapped at her, shouting in a language she did not understand before striking her hard across the face. A surge of rage and fear burst out of him, mostly fear, spilling into a stream of indistinct yelling directed squarely at her audacity to appraise him even now.
Ana’s second appraisal attempt failed entirely. The most likely cause was Anti Appraisal, a skill designed solely to counter Appraisal. For his Anti Appraisal to block hers, its level had to be equal or higher. That alone told Ana more than she liked. Even without seeing his stats, she could comfortably theorize that the man known as Aurel was at least her equal in level, if not far beyond anyone else in the room.
With a simple wave of his hand, Aurel silenced Mathis. The man fell quiet instantly, still glaring, but obedient. Aurel turned back to Ana and offered her a smile that never reached his eyes.
“Hello, Miss Ana?s,” he said, this time in a language she understood. His voice was calm, almost warm, but the restraint behind it was unmistakable.
“Hello, Mister Aurel,” Ana replied. Her voice was neutral, polite, and hollow.
He gave a single nod. “I imagine you’re confused. Rest assured, you’re not the only one.”
Ana did not respond.
“We are very curious about you,” he continued. “You appeared out of nowhere and interfered with an operation you could not possibly understand.”
“Does this operation involve the abduction of the garden’s flowers?” Ana cut in sharply.
Aurel did not answer, but the reactions around him did. She saw hesitation ripple through the room. Tight jaws. Averted gazes. That was enough.
So they were responsible, just as she had suspected the moment she realized they were after Uta.
“Why are you doing this?” she pressed.
“We’re the ones asking questions,” Mathis snapped, only to be silenced again by a single glance from Aurel.
The man returned his attention to Ana, that cold smile still fixed in place.
“Let’s not waste time,” he said, beginning to pace slowly in front of her. “You interfered with our operation under the guise of a Petal. You befriended Uta, one of their top performers, earned her trust, followed her home, and on the road back to the Garden you violently assaulted one of my men.”
“I only hope you understand why I did that,” Ana replied calmly. “You people have no manners.”
Aurel ignored the defiant comment. “I will ask once. Who do you work for? Who placed you in the Garden?”
Ana met his gaze, cool and unreadable. Her silence was not defiance. It was calculation. Every second bought her time to think, to plan.
“I am being polite,” Aurel continued, his voice still controlled but noticeably colder. “I would prefer this to go smoothly. But the person I serve values results. As do I.”
“What happens if it doesn’t… go smoothly?" Ana asked bluntly. “Will you torture me?”
Aurel exhaled slowly, nostrils flaring. “Do you understand the situation you are in, Miss Ana?s? This is not a game. You are in the hands of people who will use whatever means are necessary. I do not want to hurt you, but do not assume I will not. You are not the first.”
He crouched beside her, lowering his voice.
“One last time. Who are you working for?”
Ana stared back at him, pulse steady, eyes locked on his. She said nothing.
But inside, she was already moving. Not physically, but tactically. Appraisal was not the only skill unaffected by the cuffs. One more remained.
Hidden Spark.
A subtle, passive mark she had foolishly used as collateral less than forty eight hours ago. Now she had to undo that mistake, and fast, before it was too late.