Stephanie agreed immediately to the plan—it was one of the rare moments she openly sided with Victor von Doom.
No one knew white liberal elites better than she did. After all, she had studied at Columbia University, where the Frankfurt School—the seedbed of modern Western leftism—had taken root. As head of Internal Affairs, she couldn't afford to waste her clerks and administrators on meaningless tasks. Latovinia still had mountains of work: census-taking, vaccinations, issuing translation devices and personal data terminals, establishing adult schools, building temporary housing, recruiting locals into a Justice Ministry alongside the War Department, constructing public health infrastructure, and more. All of that fell to her and her staff. By the time she joined the midnight meeting, one of her clerks had already died of overwork. She hadn't even had time to sign the death notice. Even her own sleep was stolen in scraps.
This became the last document Solomon signed that night: from now on, the liberals of the Balkans would be granted the freest environment in the world—that of tooth and claw, survival of the fittest. Their combat capability was too pathetic. If sent to America, they'd cause no real trouble for the authorities—they had no courage for crime, only sit-ins, placards, and noisy protests. But dumped onto the African savanna, nature's brutal sieve would do its work. Those who survived could be sent straight to the gene-modification camps. Anyone who could walk off the operating table would at least contribute to the ideals they had once betrayed. The Immortal City never wasted resources. Even fools had their uses.
The intelligence service, his eyes, tracked the Atlantic carrier group steaming toward Europe.
Conflict needed time to ripen. Vengeance was spreading like fire. Everything was ready; only the order was awaited. Latovinia was in ruins and rebuilding. Solomon would not tolerate betrayal from allies at such a moment. After this brief pause, the flames would be stoked anew. According to the war plan, it would not last long—it was a new mode of warfare, one universal across the cosmos. History was a cycle: no matter how technology advanced, once both sides developed defenses against long-range weapons, it came back to single combat power and close fighting. Unless a truly revolutionary strike method appeared. The Asgardians fought this way because their power projection meant they had no need of artillery—they could strike the operators of enemy weapons directly.
It was also the style Solomon excelled at. The Kamar-Taj studies of the Time and Space Stones formed the foundation of his knowledge. Combined with the Ancient One's teaching (which often amounted to tossing him books and telling him to learn), he had honed his gifts from childhood, becoming known in Kamar-Taj for his erudition and combat prowess alike.
But before the battle plan resumed, Solomon had personal matters to attend to. Sixteen hours—time he allowed himself, and time he granted others to prepare for the next phase.
Bayonetta stirred, eyelids parting to let in the morning light through the curtain's gap. She inhaled, slipped free from Jeanne's octopus-like embrace, and turned to the tall figure sitting at the bed's edge. She didn't flinch at his size—she knew full well what he could do. Their private games had long since acquainted her with Solomon's abilities.
"Your armor smells of blood," she rasped. "When did you get back to the manor?"
"Three a.m. Latovinia and Oxfordshire are an hour apart." Solomon steadied her arm and slipped a pillow behind her back. Though his fingers were wrapped in alloy and machinery, the witch took no offense. She was more intrigued by his ability to handle power armor with such delicate precision. "I'm sorry I missed dinner last night. I cooked myself some pork cutlets in the kitchen. I also prepared breakfast for today—hope Diana won't mind me stealing her work."
"You worked in the study until dawn, didn't you? Don't beat yourself up—you've already said sorry. Jeanne and I weren't waiting up." Her eyes read him easily. "But that girl and Lorna threw fits last night when they couldn't see you. The manor was chaos. If you can't make it back tonight either, at least record a video beforehand. I don't dare tell them the man turning Europe upside down is you. Their knack for mischief is strong enough—they don't need lessons from you."
Hearing her call his exploits mischief, Solomon chuckled. Only with the witch could he breathe free of crushing responsibility, shed the chains of duty. He knew his choices spilled innocent blood. He knew he must, to save many more lives. But awareness didn't make him callous to the loss. Each hour was a self-interrogation, a soul scalded. Yet with head held high, without regret, he pressed on. Athena's crown forbade him to bow. The Ancient One's prophecy forbade him to stop.
When Bayonetta's hand brushed his cheek, the ice around his heart melted like snow in the sun. A soul of steel smelted into molten iron, flowing out as tears at his eyes. The white canopy draped over him, washing the blood from the Shroud. The air itself fell hushed. For a long time he knelt at the bedside, eyes shut, basking in her touch. Neither spoke.
He did not believe in gods, but where the witch dwelt was his chapel. Only there could he confess. He felt it keenly: his body was becoming a cage, his dances with those he loved fewer and fewer. Without her, he feared how far he would drift from the word "human."
"Tea?" she whispered against his ear.
"Tea?" Jeanne murmured groggily, twitching her nose like a drowsy animal toward the sweet scent. Her eyes were half-shut—unneeded. Usually she wouldn't rise for a while yet, bursting into the dining room with a mop of tangled white hair only after Solomon and Bayonetta had finished breakfast and begun training. Even after adopting the child and with little Lorna living under the manor's roof, she hadn't changed. She still lived for deep, blissful sleep.
"Honeyed." Bayonetta, freshly washed and steaming, slipped into a black lace house dress. Solomon had already set out tea and breakfast before stepping away. Jeanne still sniffed the lingering tang of metal in the air—only armor bore that scent. She knew well enough what it meant. "We've training this morning," Bayonetta said. "Up. You're joining."
Jeanne stretched and eyed the stilettos in Bayonetta's hand. "Tango again?"
All of Solomon's arts had come from Kamar-Taj's library or from Athena's tutelage—save one. Dance, taught hand-to-hand by Bayonetta. Every witch was a dancer, but she was peerless among them. It was through battles like dances and dances like battles that she won his heart.
"Tango—'One Step Away.' But we wouldn't mind Latin either. He hasn't practiced it in ages." Bayonetta smiled slyly, eyes narrowing. Jeanne suddenly found her tea flat and dull. "Besides, we need to give the children a demonstration."
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