Chapter 102: They Were Turning Bloodlines Into Merchandise

Valeria threw a blood barrier up behind him just as Nyxara disappeared with Void Step. She reappeared in front of the administrative building, tore the entire door from its frame, and cleared the entrance for Raven.

He went in immediately.

Smoke filled the room. Papers burned across the floor beside an overturned table, and one man was desperately trying to throw an entire ledger into a brazier.

Raven used Burst Step before the book left his hands.

He struck the man’s wrist, sending the ledger to the floor. The man immediately reached for a rune on his neck, and Raven recognized the gesture from the caravan.

Same kind of seal.

Raven caught his hand before he could touch it.

"No."

The man smiled. "I don’t need to touch it."

The mark began to glow.

Raven drove him to the floor as Predation analyzed the activation.

[Foreign Contractual Mana Activation Detected.]

[Remote Termination Mechanism Initiating.]

"Valeria."

She entered, saw the mark, and reacted before Raven needed to explain. Blood slipped from the man’s fingertips and formed a tight ring around the seal.

"I can slow it."

"How long?"

"Not much."

Raven swept the surviving documents off the table and into his reach. "Then we don’t need much."

The man started convulsing.

Nyxara appeared in the doorway.

"I can keep him alive."

Raven looked at her. "Do it."

For the first time since they had met, Nyxara acted without adding a comment. A layer of shadow spread across the man’s chest, and the glow around the seal slowed almost immediately.

It didn’t stop.

But it stopped advancing.

Valeria studied the reaction. "It’s interfering with the signal."

"It’s consuming part of the mana," Nyxara said.

"That would have been useful to mention earlier."

"You didn’t ask."

Raven ignored them and recovered the ledger from the floor.

Lists filled the pages.

Names.

Buyers.

Most were coded, but not all of them.

One symbol belonged to a noble House. Another marked a trading company. A third belonged to a religious order.

Raven closed the ledger.

"We have enough."

The man on the floor saw what he was holding, and his expression changed.

"You don’t understand what you have."

Raven crouched beside him. "Then explain."

"If those names leave this station, you won’t make it to Dunvar."

"That sounds like useful information."

"You don’t know who’s paying."

"That’s why I’m still asking."

The man laughed through bloodied teeth. "Everyone."

Raven’s expression didn’t change. "Define everyone."

"Houses. Merchants. Alchemists. Military officers. Collectors. People who want Skills they weren’t born with."

Nyxara stopped smiling.

"And Bloodborn?"

The man looked at her, and Raven saw both fear and recognition settle across his face.

"They pay more for those."

The darkness around Nyxara thickened.

Valeria kept the seal contained while Raven continued questioning him.

"Who runs the extraction?"

"I don’t know."

"Bad answer."

"The stations don’t receive names. Only instructions and codes."

"Dunvar?"

The man closed his eyes.

That was enough.

Raven knew the answer before he spoke.

"Part of it."

"Black Mithril?"

"It comes from there."

"Which mine?"

"I don’t know."

Raven believed him.

The man’s breathing had become shallow, and the seal was still fighting to finish what it had started.

"Why Black Mithril?"

"It interferes... with Bloodlines. Keeps the strong ones alive long enough."

Nyxara’s voice turned colder.

"Long enough for what?"

The man’s eyes moved toward the basement.

No further explanation was necessary.

Extraction.

Raven stood.

"How many stations?"

"I don’t—"

The mark flared violently.

Valeria cursed. "It’s breaking through my control."

Nyxara intensified the darkness over his chest.

Too late.

The man’s body arched once before going limp.

Predation confirmed death.

Valeria withdrew her hand. "That was designed to leave no prisoners."

"Yes."

Nyxara looked down at the corpse. "Careful people."

Raven opened the ledger again.

"Not careful enough."

The station fell twenty minutes later, but not because Raven conquered a fortress, Valeria killed everyone inside, or Nyxara simply decided to erase the entire compound.

It worked because each of them handled a different part of the problem.

Roland controlled the outer routes and stopped two messengers from escaping. Valeria identified the administrative personnel, determined who carried actual authority, and recognized which rooms were protected by Bloodline-related mechanisms. Raven secured the records before they could be destroyed and captured three people who knew enough to be useful.

Nyxara made sure no one had enough time to organize a real defense once everything went wrong.

Raven eventually stepped into the courtyard carrying three ledgers under one arm.

There were nine bodies.

There could have been thirty.

That counted as a logistical victory.

Nyxara sat on a broken crate.

"I behaved rather well."

Raven looked toward the section of palisade that no longer existed. "We have different definitions."

"I didn’t kill everyone."

Valeria approached them. "Surprisingly, she’s right."

"Don’t encourage her."

Raven placed the ledgers on a table.

One contained inventory records, another documented routes, and the third listed buyers. Not every name was complete, but together they confirmed something much worse than a simple smuggling ring.

The network did not exist on the fringes of Asteria.

It existed because too many powerful people found what it sold useful.

Valeria turned several pages. "There are buyers from three noble Houses. Two companies as well."

Her hand stopped.

"And a laboratory registered under the Church."

Raven looked at her. "Registered?"

"That doesn’t necessarily mean the Church knows what it’s buying. The laboratory could be a front."

"Or it could know."

"That too."

Nyxara took the ledger and scanned several codes.

"These three marks appeared at the Varkess auction."

Raven pointed toward Dunvar on the route records. "And six shipments originate from the same region."

Valeria frowned. "That doesn’t mean the operation is controlled from Dunvar."

"No."

"Only that someone there is supplying metal and receiving merchandise."

"Enough to start."

Nyxara closed the ledger. "Then we’re going to Dunvar."

Raven picked up a piece of Black Mithril from one of the restraints.

FORGE responded.

[Low-Purity Black Mithril Restraint Component Detected.]

[Mana Interference Efficiency: HIGH.]

[Bloodline Suppression Efficiency: MODERATE.]

[Structural Purity: INSUFFICIENT for Prototype Rifle Barrel.]

Still unusable.

But the question had changed.

Before, Raven only needed Black Mithril because FORGE had identified it as a viable material for the rifle’s barrel. Now he knew the metal also interfered with biological mana and hereditary abilities—and that a network devoted to stealing Bloodlines was using the same material extensively.

That could be coincidence.

Raven had lived too long to trust useful coincidences.

Valeria stepped closer. "You’re still thinking about the laboratory."

"Yes."

"You didn’t look particularly surprised."

"I was."

"That wasn’t what I saw."

Raven looked toward the underground structure. "I saw people trying to do something FORGE will probably be capable of someday."

"Transfer Bloodlines."

"Extract them, preserve them, and convert them into something another vessel can use."

"That’s considerably worse than building a rifle."

"Depends who has the rifle."

Valeria looked at him.

Raven continued.

"The important part isn’t that they’re bad at it. It’s that they’ve already understood it might be possible."

"Even though it still isn’t."

"Most technologies begin as something that doesn’t work well enough."

Valeria went quiet for a moment.

"Are you worried they’ll get there first?"

Raven shook his head. "I’m worried that if I get there first, someone eventually figures out how."

That made her expression turn serious.

Nyxara spoke from behind them.

"Then don’t teach them."

Raven turned.

The Bloodborn had been listening.

Of course she had.

"That was the plan."

Nyxara looked toward the basement, and for once there was nothing amused in her expression.

"If someone learns how to properly extract a Bloodline, they won’t just sell slaves. They’ll start breeding lineages like livestock."

Raven thought of the Hollow Broodmother using humans as batteries, then of the bodies strapped to tables below them.

"Probably."

Valeria’s jaw tightened. "That would change the balance between Houses."

"Between races," Nyxara corrected.

Raven looked down at the ledgers.

That was the real reason any of this mattered.

Not because of the people killed inside one station, or because of a caravan, or even because Nyxara’s species was being targeted.

A technology capable of converting hereditary power into transferable merchandise could break structures that had governed Veyr for centuries.

And FORGE might eventually go much further than that.

Raven packed the ledgers away.

"Then we should understand who’s trying to build it before they improve."

Nyxara smiled slowly. "Now I really like this trip."

Valeria looked at her. "I’m still waiting for the moment when you stop saying things that make me regret not attacking you when you first appeared."

Nyxara showed the slightest hint of fang. "You could try now."

Raven lifted his pack.

"No."

Both women looked at him.

"We already have enough work without creating another problem."

Valeria exhaled. "I’m going to pretend that was directed mostly at her."

Nyxara smiled. "I’ll do the opposite."

Raven started toward the horses.

Behind him remained a station filled with evidence that someone was trying to turn Bloodlines into transferable merchandise. Ahead waited Dunvar, Black Mithril, the rifle’s third component, and apparently a much larger piece of the trafficking network.

The search for a material had just stopped being a simple purchase.

Much better.

Buying things was boring.