Chapter 15: Sura Field - 1

"Goddess, isn’t your system going to reward me now?" he whispered.

[.... Clank... rustle... rustle... tut... Clank....]

Thud.

A jade pendant dropped in front of Moon out of thin air.

Moon’s violent aura momentarily froze as he raised his eyebrows. "Did you just rummage through some junk?"

[It’s been tens of thousands of years since I looked into my crescent satchel. Sigh! I almost forgot I even had this one.]

Moon picked up the pendant. Its smooth touch reminded him of his mother. She had once given him a similar piece on her deathbed, only to be confiscated by his father.

Moon’s raging inner turmoil slowly calmed as he let out a deep sigh. He lifted a weak, trembling hand into the air.

"Can I... Can I touch you? Just for a moment?"

The room stayed silent.

Moon winced a smile.

"Forget it. I crossed the line."

Just as he began to lower his hand, he felt a soft touch on his head.

Then, a sudden, violent ruffling of his hair, followed by a hard smack to the back of his head.

[What are you brewing, you brat? Stop dawdling. Your time is slipping away.]

As soon as the words fell, Moon heard the sound of hurried footsteps, the heavy boots scraping against the ground. Amidst the heavy thuds, there was a faint, soft tinkling sound.

By the time the group of armed wolves burst into the room, Moon had already hidden the pendant inside his sash.

A tall woman stepped forward from the circle of guards. Moon looked up, meeting a pair of dark, deep eyes veiled in a long hood that seemed capable of tearing right into his very bones.

Her halberd thudded heavily on the floor as she came to a halt in front of him.

"So, this is your witch? Hah... What a surprise. It’s just a little boy."

Moon snorted. "Little boy? I’m just not as fat a bull as the rest of them."

"How dare you talk back to the Maestra! Prostrate yourself!" one of the guards bellowed at him.

The Grand Witch raised a hand. "No need."

She began to circle the room, her long purple cape sweeping across the floor with a soft rustle. As she traced the lines drawn on the floor with the tip of her halberd, her eyes flickered with a flash of shock, though her hood hid the expression entirely from the guards’ view.

After completing a full circle, she stopped in front of Moon once more.

"Just some lowly doodling. You called him a witch? What a disgrace!"

She turned back to the guards. "At most, he can only break those degraded, defective wolves. Bind him with shackles and let him starve. His hallucinations of being a warlock will die down soon enough."

Turning her attention back to Moon, her dark eyes narrowed dangerously.

"Find out where he stole his crafting from. Search him thoroughly. We must retrieve the stolen inheritance."

Moon choked on his breath upon hearing such a shameless accusation.

"What a Maestra! Wanting to rob a junior’s belongings. Do you have no shame at all?"

The Grand Witch didn’t even flinch at his insult. Instead, she let out a scornful smile. "A junior? A wastrel rat like you wouldn’t even be fit to look at my feet if Alpha Vaelis hadn’t personally asked me to come."

She leaned down, her voice dropping to a harsh whisper.

"We will find out where you stole this array and its materials from and exactly who sent you to this place."

With a sharp shake of her cape, she strode out of the room. Only her stiff shoulders gave away the tense, anxious mind she was hiding.

Within a few breaths, the guards bound Moon tightly in silver shackles and shoved him brutally into a corner like a giant spiderweb. They began scrubbing away the lines on the floor with a strange liquid Moon couldn’t decipher.

As the last guard finally left, the room fell dead silent. A minute later, Moon felt the air heat up as new array lines quickly spread throughout the space.

"They are pulling out all the stops to trap me this time." Moon smiled bitterly.

[You already knew it. Don’t you?]

Moon twitched his fingers and stretched his hand to reach his sash.

"Damn it, they aren’t letting my hands move even an inch."

Giving up on struggling with his hands, Moon focused on sending his divine sense directly into the pendant. After a few failed attempts, he twisted his waist sharply, forcing the pendant to slip out and fall to the ground.

Grimacing, he leaned forward, his shackle keeping his hand taut on either side, scraping his skin. He cursed and pressed his forehead directly against the cold jade.

[You know, you could have just asked me to pass it to you,] a long sigh echoed in

Moon’s mind.

"Would you do it?"

[No.]

"Then why would I bother asking?" Moon grumbled. He knew the Goddess would never willingly bail him out of a tight spot.

Keeping his forehead pressed against the jade, he pushed his divine sense inward. A massive flood of information rushed into his mind, slowly embedding itself and settling into the core of his consciousness.

Suddenly, the door burst open yet again. Silas, the crown prince, stepped inside with the arrogant grace of a royal wolf, flanked by two guards.

His menacing words vibrated through the small room.

"No need to prostrate yourself, dear sister-in-law. Get up."

Moon’s skin tingled uncomfortably at the biting way Silas chewed out the words sister-in-law. He wanted to get up, but he was terrified of exposing the jade beneath him.

What awful timing!

He should have waited until this entire farce was over. But again, he was afraid of losing the jade.

Seeing that Moon wasn’t moving, Silas frowned. He raised his chin slightly, gesturing to a guard. The guards stepped forward, aggressively yanking Moon up by his hair.

"Ugh!"

Moon winced in sharp pain, but his eyes remained glued to the dirt floor where the jade had been.

A moment later, he let out a silent sigh of relief.

It was gone.

The jade had completely vanished after he absorbed all of the information.

"Check if he has hidden anything," Silas ordered coldly.

The guard sneered. Ignoring Moon’s strained shackles, he forcefully rummaged through the inner linings of his tunic. With a brutal tug, the guard ripped the silk sash from his waist, scattering little scraps of stones, charcoal, and herbs he had been collecting across the dirt floor.

They rummaged throughout his body and the scraps without finding the scroll they were looking for.

Silas took a step forward and crouched down as he whispered, "Where is it? The scroll of the array you deployed?"

Moon didn’t answer, merely staring back with freezing, cold eyes.

Silas’s gaze roamed over Moon’s body as he muttered, "Don’t try any more funny business. I see you’re still quite energetic despite spending all this time in this hole. You’ve got some skills."

He waved his hand, signaling the guard to back away.

Moon just continued to glare at him, his knuckles crackling against the metal as he felt Silas’s gaze washing over his skin.

"How useless of them. As expected of defective wastes—not a single bite mark on you."

Silas murmured, his eyes blatantly examining Moon from his exposed neck down to his torso.

His brows furrowed as he reached out, his rough fingers grazing the skin of Moon’s nape before tightly clutching a strand of his hair.

"Your smell..." Silas sniffed deeply against the crook of Moon’s neck.

"Why can I smell you?"

Silas looked at him, his eyes filled with deep confusion.

Moon’s stomach dropped.

’No, not again...’ he panicked internally.

"It... It’s a herbal scent. Yes, it’s just the jasmine a little girl from the bar gave me," Moon stammered, desperately trying to shake his head out of Silas’s tight grip.

Silas gripped his hair even tighter, leaning in closer. "Jasmine can’t grow here in this gutter den. Especially not in the dead of winter."

He aggressively wedged his knee between Moon’s legs, forcing Moon to turn sideways as his other hand firmly cradled Moon’s waist. His breath grew ragged and heavy.

"Be my second mate. I will let you live."

Moon felt his entire worldview shatter once more.

"Get the hell off me!" he bristled in pure rage.

He kicked out wildly, his shackles rattling deafeningly against the floor as Silas’s expression grew darker and darker

Silas pinned Moon flat to the ground, biting down brutally on his shoulder. Moon flinched. He tried to gather his spiritual Qi, but his energy was completely depleted. His tense body grew rigid as a wave of fear rushed over him.

Silas let out a triumphant laugh, baring his teeth tinged with blood.

"What are you struggling for? Do you actually think your wasted mates are going to come to your rescue?"

He pinched Moon’s chin hard enough to open his scratch again. "You are delusional. Your so-called mate was latching onto my Luna like a desperate dog. He’s probably kneeling at her feet every single day, begging for a scrap of grace. How pathetic!"