Hiral had already anticipated Alexis's tightening maneuvers.
Every ploy, every new deployment of Ro's forces, every innovation pressed into the battlefield—it was exactly what he expected.
Anticipation was no longer the challenge; it was simply a matter of putting the right countermeasures in place.
He delegated swiftly, without hesitation.
"Seran, oversee the implementation of the counters. Make sure each front knows exactly how to respond when Ro presses. Don't let them overextend."
Seran puffed his chest but nodded sharply, already thinking through the deployment patterns.
"Tirin," Hiral continued, his tone shifting with a thread of gravity, "the logistics are in your hands. Keep the lines open. I want constant updates. From here on, I'll be moving independently."
Tirin frowned, the corners of his mouth tugging into a weary sigh.
"And you'll do it without telling us your whole plan, as usual."
He studied Hiral with quiet intensity before adding, "Be careful. Trust us to back you up whenever you need it."
Hiral's lips quirked into that faint, tempered smile of his. "I plan to be victorious. There's no other outcome."
Seran finally burst.
"That's the problem, isn't it? You always tell Tirin the details but keep me in the dark. Why him? Why not me?"
Tirin glanced at him sidelong, unimpressed.
"Because you wouldn't be able to wrap your head around it even if he explained. So why waste breath making you worry about something you can't grasp?"
Seran's face turned red, his hand twitching toward his sword hilt.
"Tch—don't act high and mighty! You're no smarter than me. You just think you are because Hiral indulges you and explains things slowly, like you're a child."
The two locked into a tense staring battle, eyes narrowing, jaws tight.
Then Hiral laughed.
A low, warm sound that cut through the tension like sunlight on steel.
"And this," he said with a weary smile, "is why I can leave reassured. My top commanders, bickering like brats, keeping each other sharp without even realizing it."
Both Seran and Tirin sighed at once, their anger dissolving into shared exasperation.
They turned back to him together, faces heavy with the same weight.
"Just… come back whole," Seran muttered, his voice softer than he intended.
Hiral's smile widened, calm and confident. "I will."
But Seran's eyes narrowed again.
He scowled, pointing an accusing finger. "That's not the I will smile. That's the I'll try smile. Don't think I can't tell the difference."
Without missing a beat, Hiral reached over and smacked him lightly on the head. "You're reading way too much into my smiles, Seran."
Then he turned, cloak brushing against the earth, and walked away.
Neither Tirin nor Seran said a word as they watched him leave.
His footsteps were near soundless, his figure dissolving into the dim horizon like a ghost carrying the weight of inevitability.
For a long time, neither moved.
Finally, Seran muttered, "He's not coming back whole."
Tirin didn't answer. He only clenched his fist at his side, eyes locked on the vanishing silhouette of their general, his silence carrying the same fear.
****
The disguise fit Hiral like a second skin as Lavi, the southern merchant—sun-darkened skin, fashionable light clothes, disarming smile, and always fragrant with floral cologne.
He had practiced the cadence of the southern tongue until every vowel sang with a melodic drawl, and every gesture carried the lazy openness of a trader long used to bargaining in noisy ports.
By the time he reached the capital of Ro, the pieces were already in place—contacts cultivated, whispers planted, debts collected. Now came one of the dangerous steps: presenting himself to the Prime Minister.
The mansion stood apart from the others in its district, its gates half-swallowed by wild ivy, its front yard a tangle of green.
At first glance, it looked abandoned, almost haunted. But Hiral's trained eyes picked out the careful curation.
Deadly herbs grew side by side with curatives, their arrangement far too deliberate to be natural. A man who lived behind such walls valued deterrence, misdirection, and control.
"A fortress built of poison and appearances," Hiral thought as he adjusted the merchant's plain cloak over his shoulders. "Meticulous. Calculating. Dangerous."
The Prime Minister greeted him with the sort of detachment that revealed nothing. A thin smile, a nod that neither welcomed nor rejected.
Without pleasantries, he gestured toward the interior.
"Dinner," he said simply.
Lavi—Hiral—bowed with theatrical gratitude, his accent lilting like a song. "An honor most undeserved. May fortune bless the house that offers bread to a weary traveler."
The Prime Minister's dining hall was austere, more shadows than light, more stone than warmth. They sat across from each other at a long table where only two places were set, the silence between them sharper than any blade.
"Thank you, Your Excellency, for permitting me an audience," Hiral began, the merchant's smile warm, deferential.
The Prime Minister gave only a low hum, his fingers folding around a cup of wine.
So Hiral struck.
"I come not merely to trade silks or spices. I come with something that has plagued your nobles these past months—the burning itch."
His accent turned the words into a soft tune, but his eyes gleamed. "A cream, perfected in the South, which I alone monopolize. One touch, and the torment vanishes."
At that, the Prime Minister's gaze lifted, sharp as flint. Interest, yes—but wary, calculating.
"I would sell it," Hiral continued smoothly, "at a price so low your nobles would weep with gratitude."
He leaned forward, smile widening. "But only if Your Excellency will also purchase weapons."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
The Prime Minister's stare sharpened to something cold enough to cut. If gazes could kill, Lavi the merchant would already be sprawled across the table.
"What do you mean," the Prime Minister asked at last, each word precise, "by such an… offer?"
Hiral's smile softened, his tone casual, almost careless.
"I mean only what I hear whispered in your streets. The people grow restless. Civil war simmers on the horizon. They doubt the King's reasons for declaring war against the Eastern Alliance. They see their sons taken, their purses emptied by tax upon tax, while their noble lords grow fat hoarding grain and timber, stockpiling wealth to sell at triple price once peace returns."
The Prime Minister's grip on his cup tightened until the knuckles blanched. His eyes darkened, colder than the grave.
"And so," Hiral continued, lowering his voice, "soon you will stand at a crossroads. Will you side with the crown—or the people? All signs point to the latter. You are far too observant, too deliberate, to let yourself be shackled to a crumbling throne."
The silence thickened, stained with tension.
The candles sputtered in their holders, as though the very air recoiled from the weight pressing into the room.
The Prime Minister set his cup down with deliberate calm, though the wood creaked faintly under his fingers.
"You presume much," he said, his voice even, but carrying an edge of steel.
Hiral only smiled, the southern merchant's charm never faltering. But behind his eyes, calculation whirled—because the tightening grip, the coldness, told him he had struck a chord.
The Prime Minister was already leaning toward the path Hiral needed him to take.
Hiral rose from his seat with the same ease as if the evening had been nothing more than a cordial meal.
He sighed, artfully weaving his role, before he bowed low with a southern flourish.
"I would not dare to press Your Excellency. Decisions such as these require the weight of time. For now, I will leave you only this."
He set a modest bundle, wrapped in plain cloth, upon the table.
With a warm smile and another melodic thanks in his southern accent, he excused himself, riding his carriage away from the overgrown shadows of the Prime Minister's estate.
The silence lingered long after he left.
At length, the Prime Minister leaned forward, fingers brushing the bundle as though it might yet conceal a blade.
Carefully, he loosened the wrappings. Inside rested a small ceramic jar, unmarked, unadorned.
He uncorked the lid and found a cream of faint herbal scent—strange, but not unpleasant.
His gaze narrowed.
"This is the supposed cure?" he murmured.
The butler, who had hovered silently through the dinner, inclined his head. The Prime Minister exhaled slowly, then held out the jar.
"Test it. Thoroughly. If it holds to the merchant's claims, deliver a portion to Her Majesty. The Queen has suffered more than any under the ridicule of this… burning itch scandal. If it eases her shame, even once, then it is worth examining."
The butler bowed and departed swiftly, the jar secure in his hands.
The Prime Minister remained alone in the shadowed hall, staring at the remnants of dinner as if they might whisper secrets.
His fingers lingered against the fabric of the bundle's cloth before he finally withdrew.
A long sigh left him, heavy with something deeper than weariness.
Across the city, behind locked shutters and bolted doors, Hiral returned to his safe house.
The southern mask slipped away the moment he entered.
Straight-backed, sharp-eyed once more, he shed the accent like a discarded cloak.
A coded knock brought one of his shadows bearing word: The Prime Minister tests the cream.
Hiral's lips curved into a smile—not the merchant's warm grin, but the cool satisfaction of a man seeing threads knot together.
"Good," he murmured. "Once he confirms it, the Queen herself will whisper the cure's name. The nobles will scramble. And with that opening, discord will occur enough to create a crack in the foundation of the nation ."
He sat at the table, fingers tapping in thoughtful rhythm as he began arranging the next pieces.
Lists of names, nobles and royals alike, each marked with their weakness: debt, scandal, ambition, shame. He would collect them all, link by link, until the chain of Ro's nobility lay in his hands.
When at last he turned his attention to the military, his smile thinned into something almost pitying.
On parchment, Ro's legions gleamed with strength—thousands of trained soldiers, dozens of decorated commanders.
But Hiral knew the truth.
Those left in the capital were figureheads: noble-born commanders who wore their armor as ornaments, more versed in bribery than battle.
Their "power" was the sort that shattered under the first true strike.
He exhaled softly, tapping his fingers once more.
The image of Alexis rose in his mind—poised, straining, carrying Ro's armies across the fields with sheer will and calculation. Against such hollow resistance, Alexis shone even brighter.
"He'll probably curse me once again when everything is done. But, he can't possibly blame me if the crown fits him more than he thought, especially when it's his people who will be the ones to crown him..."
Hiral mused as his plan proceeded as he expected. The candle beside him flickered as though the wind itself leaned in to listen.
The wind of change had begun to howl.