Chapter 29: Whispers of the Red Crow

The musty stench of old parchment gnawed at his nasal cavity. Gray dust drifted in the air, illuminated by the copper light from The Red Ring Sun piercing the stone ventilation gap. Luka's head throbbed ferally. An unseen sledgehammer struck his skull walls over and over. The remaining trauma from the Soul Erosion combustion shattered his senses. He shut his eyes tight.

Pale cold hands touched his temples. Those fingers pressed the pain points, rubbing in a sluggish rhythm.

The pain subsided, drowned by the lily scent banishing the metallic tang of Silas's carcass blood from his smell.

Luka exhaled a trembling breath. "Your massage." His voice was hoarse and gritty, cutting through the suffocating air. "Always knows how to lock my sanity, Rhea."

The woman in the charcoal-gray wool uniform stood behind his wooden chair. The maid's back stood flawlessly perpendicular. Her dress was stiff without a single speck of dirt. "Your body bears the burden of a ruined kingdom, My Lord," Rhea whispered. Her tone decreed absolute obedience. "I merely ensure your vessel does not crack before the throne is reclaimed."

Luka opened his eyes. Silas's study was now his. Shadow power had shifted thanks to the bloodshed in the phosphor hall. The Hollow Syndicate was now his fangs. Hundreds of executioners had prostrated before him. Yet, a mercenary assassin force needed more than a death speech. They needed meat. Hundreds of starving stomachs could not be filled with limestone fragments.

"These forces are starving." Luka stared at the map of the Oesterian continent sprawled messy on the wooden desk. "We lack enough wheat to feed hundreds of these wild dogs. We need allies."

Rhea stopped her massage. Her slender index finger moved tracing the map's ink lines. Stopping pressing a large point in the southern territory.

"Varan," Rhea said. "He is a noble holding top-tier logistics control."

Luka locked that name in his brain. Varan. An old noble with piled wealth.

"His territory possesses abundant food granaries," the maid continued. "His fortress is impenetrable from the direct reach of Ulric's tax forces. If we can bind a dirty alliance with this man, the opportunist nobles under his wing will flock to your banner without question, My Lord."

Luka weighed the plan. Logistics were the veins of war. Yet, overthrowing a steel-armored tyrant in the capital could not be done merely with full stomachs. He would not crawl begging like a wheat beggar.

"A loss." Luka snorted rough. His eyes sharpened. "If we go there just to seek Varan for a bite of logistics, we suffer a massive loss, Rhea."

Rhea fell silent. Awaiting her master's decree.

"We need more than just food sacks." Luka's right hand, its skin now thickened by permanent reddish scales from the mutation remnants, tapped the wooden desk. "We need iron. Weapons. Steel swords that do not snap when clashing with the capital forces' shields."

Rhea leaned her body forward. The woman's pale lips approached Luka's right ear. The lily aroma thickened pressing the smell. She whispered. Knitting a rotten plan using her past information as a palace royal maid. She mentioned the name Edward. Mentioned manipulating corruption evidence. Mentioned the gap to seize weapon factory territories.

Luka listened unblinking. The heart at his solar plexus throbbed constant. This tactic was cunning. Brutally efficient. Pitting Ulric's dogs against each other from inside their own cage.

"Good." Luka nodded. His jawline hardened. "Prepare those documents. Once everything is ready, we will depart straight for his castle."

Rhea pulled her face back. "As you command, My Lord."

Rhea stepped backward. Her high-heeled boots produced no sound as she turned around. She exited Luka's study. The wooden door creaked shutting tight, caging the false prince with his delusions.

The limestone tunnel was pitch black. Cold. The Oesterian Forest's humidity seeped piercing the mountain's pores, ruining the lungs.

Rhea traced the tunnel toward the cave's west wing. Her steps halted. Her pale gray eyes sharpened staring ahead.

At the end of the tunnel, feral wind roared in from a stone window gap. Perched atop that sharp ice ledge, a pitch-black crow sat frozen. Not a normal crow. The bird possessed a pair of unnatural glowing red eyes. A curse-bringing red color tearing the dark space. An observer envoy from the shadows.

Rhea radiated no panic, without any expression change on her marble face. She walked casually, approaching the stone window.

Her pale hand pushed the worn wooden gap wider. The night wind carrying ice particles slit her neck skin, yet halted by her worn black leather choker. The crow looked down. From its beak, the bird dropped something.

Rhea caught the object swiftly.

A small-sized stone. Its surface was rough, dark blue in color, radiating a lethal cold glow.

The red-eyed crow flapped its black wings, shooting forward and piercing the blizzard. It vanished, swallowed by the Oesterian sky without leaving a sound trail of flaps.

Rhea gripped the blue stone. Her pale skin refused to tremble. Her overly symmetrical face radiated satisfaction. Her pale lip line curved upward. A smile full of calculation. Not the smile of a devoted nurse. It was the cold calculation of an architect who had just received the final brick to build her slaughterhouse.

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Flawless. Blood would soon spill staining the marble floors.

Far from the jagged mountains of the syndicate headquarters. In the center of the Eisenhart Kingdom's capital.

Edward's study smelled of thick ink and old parchment paper stinging the nasal nerves. The Red Ring's light breached in through the stained glass window, turning the flying dust into rust drops upon the room's expensive carpet.

Edward sat rigid straight behind his desk. His body posture refused to relax. His shirt collar arranged tight to the extreme, locking his neck with flawless precision lacking gaps. His clean hands flipped through the tax deposit report sheets from the nobles' territories.

The room door knocked in a constant rhythm.

A young maid entered looking down. The girl stepped in fear, carrying a silver tray containing a cup of black coffee.

"Your coffee, Lord Edward," the maid said. The silver tray in her hands trembled faint, making the porcelain cup saucer clink small against the metal.

Edward did not even lift his gaze from the numbers. "Put it there. Leave."

The maid placed the cup lacking sound and rushed leaving the study.

The tip of Edward's quill scratched the paper. His sharp eyes traced the deposit columns. Pages turned. Reports from the northern territory. Secure. Reports from the border. Messy, but natural due to the war assault.

His finger stopped rigid.

The financial report from Varan's territory.

Edward furrowed his brow deep. A serious anomaly existed. These rows of numbers were too smooth for a time of crisis. Logistics expenses for the iron ore and coal factories swelled too much. The wheat harvest deposited to the palace fell far below the reasonable quota, even though Varan controlled the agricultural granaries least affected by the sun's etiolation.

Edward's bureaucrat instinct smelled rot.

He rose. Pulling an iron key from his robe pocket. Walking toward the secret archive cabinet in the corner of the room. He pulled out piles of ledgers from previous year cycles, matching the data and aligning the kingdom's gold circulation.

The black ink whispered the truth. Rot foamed from behind the paper folds. Suspicions of high-level ledger manipulation.

Corruption. Deceit.

Varan withheld the wheat logistics, hoarding profits from the emergency taxes Ulric implemented. The stocky noble stole straight from the mouths of soldiers dying at the border.

"Greedy pig," Edward hissed foully. His fingers crushed the parchment edge until it wrinkled. The smell of old paper filled his chest cavity.

Edward walked fast back to his chair. He would not let this fat parasite undermine the kingdom's foundation from the inside while King Ulric racked his brain managing the border invasion. He pulled a sheet of official royal parchment. His quill moved ferally upon the paper, writing a forced summons letter with full court authority.

"Guards!" Edward shouted. His voice echoed, bouncing in the palace marble corridors.

A steel-plated armored soldier entered, dropping one knee to the floor.

"Send this summons letter to Varan's castle." Edward handed over the parchment sealed with thick red wax. "Use the fastest horse from the stables. I want him facing me in this room. Without delay."

The soldier accepted the letter. "Yes, My Lord."

The western border territory. Varan's grand castle.

The temperature inside the private room roasted the skin pores. The stone fireplace blazed feral, swallowing a dozen dried pine logs.

Varan sat leaning in a thick velvet chair. His stocky body wrapped in layered silk clothes, displaying sickening wealth. Sweat flooded his forehead, dripping soaking his expensive collar. He hated Oesteria's freezing air outside.

His right hand, nearly every finger decorated with large jewel rings, held a glass containing thick red wine. Several thinly dressed maids sat on the fur carpet, massaging his calves. Another girl poured more wine into his glass. This excessive luxury tore the conscience amidst a severely starving world.

His thumb twirled the ruby stone ring. A filthy gesture always appearing when he planned profit from the lives of commoners.

The teakwood double doors creaked opening rough.

A boy dressed in luxurious silk entered in a rush. His breaths hunted kicking his chest. The child held a parchment with a broken red royal seal.

"Father." The boy's voice trembled. "A letter from the capital."

Varan's facial lines tensed rigid. He clicked his tongue, a sluggish rhythm radiating disgust. Without shifting his gaze, the tip of his expensive shoe kicked the maid at his feet to step aside. He rose with effort from his plush chair. His protruding gut burdened his steps. "From Ulric?"

"No." The boy handed over the paper. His fingertips turned pale. "From... Lord Edward."

Varan's fat hand snatched the parchment.

His eyes read the rows of threat sentences. Black ink demanding interrogation. A forced summons to account for the imbalance of his border financial reports.

The ruby ring on his finger creaked clashing with the glass.

Crash.

The wine glass in his left hand shattered crushed. Red fluid spilled dirtying the white bear fur carpet. Glass shards embedded into his palm skin. Varan ignored it. Fresh blood dripped mixed with expensive wine.

His face turned deep red. The veins on his neck bulged feral, throbbing as if ready to burst the skin. Edward. The former clerk from a lowly family who always smelled of decaying paper now threw a leash around his neck, trying to drag him like a palace pet dog.

Varan's chest heaved. His breaths heavy. His exhales sounded destructive.

He kicked the small wooden table before him until it overturned. Silver plates and expensive fruits rolled ruined to the floor. The maids screamed retreating, cowering in fear in the room's corner, protecting their heads from the master's wrath.

"Edward bastard." Varan growled. Saliva spewed from his lips.

Varan turned his head sharp toward his son.

"Prepare the steel-plated carriage." He commanded. His voice vibrated the castle window glass. "Summon Eric and Albert. I will depart for the capital tonight."

His ring-filled index finger pointed to the remaining glass shards on the floor. "That lowly boy wants to challenge me? I will cut his tongue and feed it to street pigs."

His heavy footsteps crushed the remaining fruits on the floor. Personal vendetta and torn pride had just shifted the first chess piece toward the abyss of bloody ruin.