Chapter 549

Nick held his position in the shadows, watching the feline laborer slip away from the merchant stalls.

Her bare feet made no sound on the dry dirt, and she checked her flanks to make sure the guards stayed focused on their conversation. Once satisfied, she darted past the outermost row of canvas tents and vanished into the trees, her presence so slight that only Nick could hope to spot her.

Since the guards didn’t seem interested in continuing their conversation about the supply troubles, he decided to follow her, confident that the Stillness and his own suppression would hide him.

She moved at a decent pace for an hour, showing no sign of tiredness despite her level not being higher than thirty, which only showed how strong the beastmen's traits could be.

The brush thickened the deeper they went, and the terrain sloped downward into a natural ravine hidden from the main logging camp. Sunlight struggled to pierce the canopy here. Wilder trees' roots tangled over moss-covered stones.

The catwoman eventually stopped at the base of a sheer rock wall, where two other Beastmen waited in the gloom: the silver-furred elder Nick had noticed earlier and a broad-shouldered dogman bearing fresh lash marks on his back.

Strangely enough, no one spoke, not even to acknowledge the others, as if they were waiting for something. Nick settled into a high branch, curious.

He sensed strange spiritual currents around the clearing, but not their purpose. That alone was intriguing and hinted that this place was much older than he’d expected.

A few minutes later, the rock wall before them blurred. The stone rippled, losing its solidity, shifting like water disturbed by a falling rock, and a creature emerged from the bedrock.

It was a ferret the size of a warhorse. Its coat was a sleek, mottled blend of dirt-brown and chalk-white, perfectly matching the ravine's colors. Its long, sinuous spine let it move with impossible fluidity, sliding over the gnarled roots without disturbing a speck of dirt. Its paws were broad, tipped with claws that gleamed with the sheen of raw earth magic.

That explains how it can move so stealthily. Ground manipulation is useful like that. But how did I not notice its arrival?

A deeper look answered that question. The beast was no mere monster but a spirit. Its essence had been scattered throughout the very earth, and only at the last moment had it gathered itself, using the ripple of the clearing’s magic to mask its approach.

This is getting increasingly interesting. I recognize some of its energies now; it’s quite similar to the guardian spirits I met with the girls in the grassland.

If this place was part of its domain, it also explained why nobody had found it yet. Most mortals weren’t exactly equipped to handle such a being, after all.

The spirit guardian settled before the three laborers. Its eyes were pools of liquid amber, and Nick sensed a cunning intelligence within them.

It lacked the weight of a Prestige-tier, but that didn’t make it any less dangerous. This creature was born of the land and the Beastmen’s collective reverence, a guardian roused from slumber by its people’s suffering.

It’s easy to forget that even these lands were once wild. Berea might have expanded into the grasslands only in the past centuries, but Alluria was founded about three hundred years ago. Before humans came, these were beastmen lands too. It’d make sense that some of their remnants still hang around, especially when beastmen are so concentrated, and no greater power is around.

The catwoman dropped to one knee, bowing her head. The elder and the dogkin did the same.

“Our plan is proceeding as expected, Grandfather," the elder whispered, his voice rough. "The sinkholes are hollowed out, and the support pillars remain thin.”

The giant ferret lowered its head and let out a low chitter that echoed through the clearing. The sound carried intent, a telepathic projection that Nick intercepted with his spiritual senses.

“Soon. We will act soon.”

"They expect the Trelan convoy in two days," the catwoman added, her ears swiveling to catch any stray sounds from the camp. "If it were lost, the Consortium would lose a month’s worth of supplies and its entire harvest of refined timber. They won’t be able to afford this, so I expect there will be reinforcements.”

“It is as I expected,” the spirit replied, pleased. “They will have to abandon the camp after this. Once you scatter into the deep woods, I will hide your tracks.”

Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

Nick listened to the exchange, surprised by the depth of their plan. The spirit intended to render the logging operation economically unfeasible. By destroying both the infrastructure and the product, it aimed to force the Cinder Consortium to halt work.

The logic was sound for a creature of the woods, and he could even forgive the beastmen for going along with it, unlearned as they were, through no fault of their own. But it was disastrous for anyone who understood the political reality of the Kingdom of Berea.

The Consortium accountants in Siderea would undoubtedly feel the loss, but they would not abandon their claim. At best, they’d liquidate the site and order the immediate relocation of the asset—the laborers. The guards would force-march the Beastmen to another camp many miles away. The elders, the very young, and the injured would perish on the road.

Furthermore, coordinated sabotage that cost a supply convoy would draw the attention of the local nobles. Everyone knew the King’s administration treated disruption as a disease, so investigators with significant power would be dispatched.

They would identify the sabotage and launch a brutal crackdown on Beastman enclaves throughout the province to reestablish authority.

Even if this group succeeded in their escape, which was a big if, the consequences would be felt by everyone else in their condition.

Worse, the ripple effects would eventually reach Floria. Eugene had granted his Beastmen citizenship, integrating them into the frontier’s economy. Once roused, the Crown’s paranoia would scrutinize Floria’s progressive policies. House Crowley might even face accusations of harboring sympathizers or fostering rebellion.

Nick could not allow this spirit to ignite a fire that would reach his home.

Still, he wasn’t an unfeeling monster. He wouldn’t deny these people their chance at freedom, so he needed to intervene.

A direct assault on the Consortium camp remained unviable. Slaughtering the guards would only hasten reprisal. Destroying the physical contracts in the overseer’s tent was equally pointless. The Cinder Consortium surely kept master copies in the capital. The moment the local records vanished, the clerks in Siderea would simply issue replacements and add the cost of the delay to the Beastmen’s generational debt.

It was even possible that those very contracts could be used to track them down. The more he thought about it, the more sure he was that it was exactly what would happen.

To break the chains, every trace of the debt had to be erased at once. Even then, the beastmen would face a perilous journey, but they’d have a chance. The muddier the waters, the less likely the blame was to fall on any innocents.

Even as the beastmen and their spirit guardian schemed, Nick formed a plan, drawing on the grim lesson Lasazar had imparted in the ruined village.

The Royal Arcanists had used the villagers’ deaths to fuel a sympathetic ritual that erased the Nameless Traitor from the World. Nick would invert the process. He would use the camp’s collective misery and longing to fuel a sympathetic ritual designed to erase the contracts, linking the paper in the camp to the master ledgers in Siderea.

Execution would require complete anonymity. His name could not be linked to such an act of sabotage, at any cost.

Soon, the meeting broke up, leaving him alone in the clearing as he ran through his options.

Nick closed his eyes, drew on his mana, and directed the energy inward, weaving a complex illusion over his physical form based on the feeling he’d experienced while using Rhea’s alchemical disguises. It wouldn’t hold up to the same scrutiny, but it didn’t need to, and power could plug many gaps.

He altered the density of his facial structure, hardening his jawline and thinning his nose. He removed his dark hair, leaving his scalp bald and weathered. He shifted his eye pigmentation, turning them a piercing, icy gray.

When he opened his eyes, the reflection in his mind matched the visage of Aleister Crowley, his grandfather from a past life. It was a harsh, cynical face, with little in common with his own features.

Over the next thirty-six hours, Nick moved through the logging camp like a ghost, drawing on subtle emotions from the ether. He waited for moments of fatigue or boredom, slipping past the guards’ natural mental defenses to plant subtle compulsions.

A lieutenant commanding the eastern section felt a sudden irritation at a cluster of ironwood trees blocking his view of the main road, and quickly justified it by saying that without that view, his role in defending the camp from the lurking monster would be harder.

"You there," the man barked, pointing at a team of Beastmen. "Clear those trunks and leave the stumps flat. I want a clear view of the approach.”

The laborers obeyed, felling the trees with the ease of experience and unbothered by the request. After all, it was what they were meant to do.

Nick watched from a nearby rooftop. Once the area cleared, the stumps formed the outer anchoring points of a binding array.

Hours later, the camp overseer reviewed the drainage trenches near the canvas tents. A sudden thought bloomed, prompted by a gentle nudge. The current drainage was inefficient. The upcoming rains would surely flood the supply tents, and they were already running a bit too low for comfort, not to mention the manpower they’d require to clear them.

Thus, he ordered a new trench dug, cutting a diagonal line across the central clearing. The Beastmen hefted their pickaxes and carved a deep groove into the packed dirt.

The trench served as the central meridian of the sympathetic matrix.

So Nick continued his invisible work, turning mundane labor into a vast ritual circle. A repositioned brazier became a focal node. A stack of discarded lumber became a channeling vector. The guards and laborers built the weapon that would free them, unaware of the esoteric working taking shape beneath their feet.

By dusk on the second day, the physical framework was complete.

The array had the capacity to link the local debt contracts to the master ledgers in the capital. The fuel for the spell thrummed in the ether for those who could sense it, a palpable miasma of exhaustion, resentment, and a desperate desire for freedom, all generated by the hundreds of laborers.

But the ritual required one final component.

A sympathetic link needed a proper anchor, and Nick had no authority over these Beastmen. He was a stranger, a human lordling from the frontier. If anything, his very nature worked against him here, and he knew that if he tried to force the connection with raw power, it would alert every mage with a lick of sense within fifty miles.

No, he needed an entity with a legitimate, recognized claim to these people's fates.

Nick returned to the hidden ravine, where he sensed the spirit guardian slumbering.

It rested atop a flat stone, its body coiled like a thick, muscular rope, watching the tree line and tracking the wind's subtle shifts.

Nick stepped out of the brush and dialed back the Stillness just enough to make his presence register on the material plane.

The ferret uncoiled, rising to its full height and dwarfing him. The ground trembled. Veins of earth magic cracked the stone walls, glowing with a threatening orange light. It bared its fangs and let out a deafening hiss that would have shaken any mortal.

Nick hid a smile, ready to negotiate.