The wind was a blade of ice against Erika's exposed skin, but the chill in his veins ran deeper. Pinned to the ground like a trussed animal, he was utterly helpless before the four shadowy figures whose low, overlapping laughter seemed to suck the warmth from the very air.
"Who… who are you?!" His voice cracked, shrill with terror. "What do you want?!"
Only that chilling, multi-toned laughter answered, echoing in the desolate silence.
One of the cloaked figures moved. His boots crunched deliberately on the dry grass, each step a tolling bell in Erika's ears. Then, a hard-soled boot pressed against the side of his face, grinding his cheek into the cold, gritty soil. The bite of dirt and stone against his skin was nothing compared to the wave of humiliating fear that followed.
"Let me go! Loren! Where is Loren de Witt?!" He thrashed his head, his words mangled by the pressure on his face. "Do you have any idea who he is?! If anything happens to us, the Sanctum, the de Witt family will hunt you down!"
He was grasping at straws, throwing out the only names that carried any weight, praying for a sliver of leverage.
The figures remained unmoved. The boot on his head pressed down harder, sending spots dancing behind his eyes.
Then, another one knelt. Erika caught a faint scent from the black robes—dust, and something else, cold and herbaceous. A gloved hand, rough and impersonal, clamped around his bound wrists.
His heart stuttered.
He felt it then—the cold, sharp point of a blade resting lightly against the skin of his wrist.
"No… please…" he whimpered, his whole body tensing for the expected, searing pain.
But the blade didn't plunge. Instead, it began to move with excruciating slowness, tracing a light, precise line.
A distinct sensation of skin parting.
He could feel it—the warmth of liquid welling from the cut , a sticky, trickling sensation that spoke of life seeping away. The power of suggestion and raw terror amplified the feeling until he was certain his wrist was bleeding, his vitality dripping into the dirt.
"Ah—!" A short, sharp cry escaped him. His body grew cold, trembling with the phantom pain and imagined blood loss.
Help… someone, help!He screamed the words in his mind, throwing all his will into the Mind-voice, trying to project his desperation to any Cleric who might be within range. It was his last, desperate hope.
A deeper, more profound despair washed over him. He couldn't focus. The mental faculties he could usually muster, however clumsily, were frozen solid, locked away behind a thick, syrupy barrier in his mind. Was it the lingering effect of that cloying, spiked drink? Or was this sheer, mind-numbing terror itself the most potent shackle?
No response… The Mind-voice… it's not working.The realization was the final stone sealing his tomb.
The four figures remained silent sentinels, their low, infernal snickers the only sound, seeming to drink in his futile struggle and crumbling resolve.
Just as Erika's mind was about to shatter completely, one of them spoke, his voice a distorted, rasping thing, like stone grinding on stone.
"You... lack sincerity."
Another voice, sharper, like shards of glass, followed, driving the words deep into Erika's heart.
"You... have no value."
No sincerity?No value?
The bizarre accusations forced a sliver of clarity through the blinding fear. What did they want? Sincerity? Value? This wasn't just a simple kidnapping and execution? They wanted something from him?
He forced himself to think, despite the tremors wracking his body. His mind raced, scrambling to make sense of the absurd and lethal situation.
I'm a nobody. A novice. The only thing unusual is this primitive Mark… and my… connection to Instructor Wolfgang? But if Wolfgang wanted me dead, why this elaborate scheme?
Going for a drink with Loren? That's a breach of rules, not a death sentence, certainly not something that would warrant this outside the Sanctum's walls. We're at the heart of the Auric Creed!
Could it be… Loren's enemies? They saw me with him, thought I was an associate, someone who might know things…
It was the most plausible theory. A fragile lifeline. If they wanted information or leverage, he still had value. He might… survive this. Maybe.
He swallowed, his throat thick with the taste of dirt. Gathering every shred of his strength, he tried to sound calm, though his voice emerged thin and broken.
"I… I don't know what you want… or what you mean by 'sincerity' and 'value'..."He paused, acutely aware of the boot on his head and the phantom flow of blood at his wrist. He gritted his teeth.
"Until I see my friend, Loren de Witt, and confirm he is safe… I know nothing. I will say nothing."
It was his only bargaining chip, his only way to test their true motives. He was putting Loren front and center, a shield and a probe at once.
A brief silence fell over the wilderness.
Only the moaning wind answered.
The cloaked figures' laughter, for a moment, seemed to hitch. Then it redoubled, more derisive than before, a cacophony of scorn that ripped through the quiet night.
"Loren? That coddled little lordling?" the raspy-voiced one sneered, grinding his boot-tip into Erika's cheek. "He proved far more… reasonable than you! To save his own skin, he sang. Told us everything he could, and a few things he probably shouldn't have."
Another voice chimed in, dripping with feline cruelty. "You? You're just… leftover entertainment. A way for us to verify his little story."
Leftover entertainment.The term shattered Erika's last flicker of hope. Loren had broken? Told them about their outing, maybe even Sanctum gossip? Then what value did he, a mere add-on, possibly have?
The despair returned, colder and more suffocating than ever.
Yet, the raspy voice shifted again, adopting a tone of false, begrudging offer."Still… boy. If you could show more… 'sincerity' than that whelp. If you could tell us something of greater… value. About your Instructor, for instance. Cleric Wolfgang. His little secrets. Or other… discreet matters within the Sanctum walls…"
He let the sentence hang, savoring the way Erika's body went rigid.
"...We might just be merciful enough to let you and your friend Loren share a final resting place. A proper grave together, wouldn't that be better than being left out here for the carrion birds and wild dogs?"
Instructor Wolfgang!
The name hit Erika like a physical blow.
Images flashed, unbidden, through his mind—
Wolfgang demonstrating the Mind-Blade with absolute, controlled power.The seemingly cruel, yet precisely calibrated "running" tasks when Erika was on the verge of collapse.The fathomless depth in his eyes that might, just might, have held a flicker of expectation when Erika was humiliated and alone.The heavy weight of "I owe you."The warning over dinner: "A weak foundation renders everything else meaningless."
The man was formidable, ruthless, inscrutable. But he was teaching him. In his own brutal way, he had pulled Erika from the abyss and was pointing him toward a path to power, however narrow and treacherous. He was the only twisted semblance of an "anchor" Erika had in this cold, merciless city.
And himself?A borderland refugee with a suspicious Mark, an insect waiting to be crushed. His own existence was insignificant; survival was struggle enough.
To drag Instructor Wolfgang into this…
No. Absolutely not.
An instinctive, final refusal erupted from the ashes of his despair. He could die. He could be wiped away like a stain. But he would not pull the one person who offered a shred of hope down into the darkness with him. That would be a betrayal his soul could never abide.
The internal war reached its peak.Fear shrieked for surrender.The will to live roared at him to seize any chance.But something deeper, a bedrock of principle he hadn't even known he possessed, solidified, hard and unyielding.
He wrenched his head up, despite the boot pinning it. With every ounce of his strength, he fixed his gaze on the darkness beneath those hoods. His eyes, once wide with terror, now blazed with a desperate, hopeless fire—a final, unyielding resolve.
He stared them down.And then, he answered with action.
He shut his mouth. Tight. Clenching his jaw so hard it ached. Silence was his final, feeble fortress.
Their snarling laughter intensified.
"Oh? So you've chosen to be a stubborn little rock?" the sharp-voiced one leaned down, his cold breath a ghostly pressure through the hood.
"Boy," the raspy voice turned deadly serious, "you are making a very, very poor choice. One that will see you bidding farewell to this brief, tedious life in the most painful way imaginable."
The four figures stepped forward in unison. Their collective presence became a physical weight, crushing the air from Erika's lungs.
"Now," the four voices seemed to merge into one, a final, grim ultimatum, "we ask you one last time… Will you. Tell us. Everything?"
Erika closed his eyes.
He could hear the frantic hammering of his heart, the blood roaring in his ears, the icy shadow of death descending. Anna's pure, sorrow-tinged smile flashed behind his lids. The smoke of his village hearth. The bottomless depths of Wolfgang's gaze…
It all dissolved into a void.An empty, yet unshakeable, darkness.
His jaw remained locked. Not a sound. He even tilted his chin up a fraction, a gesture of defiance that sent fresh pain flaring through his pinned face—a posture of acceptance.
"Stubborn fool!"
A cold shout rang out.
The cloaked figure holding his wrist moved. He yanked his hand back. Erika heard the whistle of metal cutting the air!
From the corner of his eye, he saw it—a glint of cold steel, stark in the pallid moonlight. A dagger, held in a reverse grip, its point aimed with lethal finality at his unprotected throat!
Time stretched, thin and taut.
Erika's pupils contracted to pinpricks. The colossal fear of death engulfed him. He could almost feel the cold edge slicing skin, severing windpipe, tearing artery—
It's over.
The thought was a blank slate.
But the anticipated pain did not come.
The blade stopped.A hair's breadth from his skin.
The cold metal rested against his Adam's apple, its chill raising every hair on his body.
Then, he heard a sigh. Utterly different from before. Laced with something complex, and utterly inscrutable.
The boot lifted from his head.