"…"
"…"
A deafening silence permeated the tent as General Jiyan of Jinzhou found himself pinned to the ground, a man clad in a black turtleneck, Kurain, loomed above him.
Kuriana's fist remained curled tightly, hovering mere inches away from the General's face, as though the strike had been halted at the final possible instant.
The two remained locked in that position for several long moments, tension hanging between them like a blade suspended by a thread.
Then Kuriana moved first.
He released Jiyan and stepped away.
A faint dizziness seemed to pass through him as he steadied himself before moving toward a kettle of warm water nearby.
Pouring himself a cup, he took a slow drink to quench his thirst before finally asking, without turning back: "Why are you here, General?"
"To ask about the contract termination you sent," Jiyan answered as he rose to his feet, dusting loose grains of dirt from his uniform.
Kuriana took another sip before replying flatly, "What more is there to ask about? As I already stated, I appear to have sustained an injury and wish to terminate the contract."
He set the cup aside. "You may even choose not to pay me a single credit for this."
"I am not here to ask about withholding your credits, nor am I here to force you back onto the frontlines. I wanted to know whether you were feeling alright." Jiyan's voice remained calm and measured.
Kuriana answered without hesitation. "I am not."
"…"
Jiyan silently processed the answer before asking carefully, "Is something wrong with you?"
Shoowsh.
An empty mug suddenly tore across the tent toward him.
Jiyan avoided it with the slightest tilt of his head, the object hurtling past before crashing violently into the canvas behind him.
Kuriana let out a low snarl, annoyance twisting through his voice. "Again with the same question. I already told you—I am not alright!"
Kurian let out a long breath before sitting on his bed. "If you have nothing important to discuss, leave. I might recover enough to cancel the termination. I merely stated that I might have to terminate it."
Jiyan did not move. Instead, he calmly pulled a chair forward and sat down across from him.
Kurian frowned. "Are you sure sitting here is the right choice? Your soldiers are still out on the front lines."
"This tent is the front line," Jiyan replied with a sigh.
Then, in a measured tone, he added, "Shall I prepare an automobile for you to return to safety? You know, if you stay in this tent too long, I might have to send you some frilled dresses and accessories as well."
Kurian scoffed. "You dare use my own tactics against me, Jiyan?"
For a moment, his expression shifted—something older flickering behind his eyes as he recalled the past...
A time when this same man, not even a major then, had been crying after sustaining fractured ribs.
"How many ribs?" Kurian had once asked.
Jiyan had raised two fingers.
Kurian had merely stared and replied, "That's it? Only two?"
"Listen," he had snickered, before revealing grotesque scars etched across his body. "At one point, nearly a quarter of my bones were fractured. But I did not die. I became a legendary mercenary. You, too, would become a major one day if you hone your heart."
Jiyan immediately stopped groaning at that remark, his expression tightening as he fell silent.
Kurian, meanwhile, allowed a faint grin to surface—subtle, but clearly satisfied with the reaction.
"Now then," Kurian said, turning slightly toward the older officer nearby, "Major Yhan… Squad C ran away from the frontlines, correct?"
"Right," Yhan confirmed.
Kurian rubbed his chin. "How far is the nearest clothing shop from here?"
—
At the base of Squad C, a package arrived.
Inside were elaborately designed women's clothes—excessively frilled, adorned with accessories, almost ornamental in nature.
Furthermore, alongside it, there was a note: "If you are going to run and hide behind safety like a frightened princess instead of facing the Tacet Discords like the infantry you are, you should wear these."
Recalling those old memories, Kurian let out a tired sigh before telling Jiyan, "If I take more than seven hours of rest, I will personally wear a princess dress and walk out of here. Now leave me be. Let me rest for a while."
Jiyan gave a firm nod and turned toward the exit. Before leaving, he added quietly, "Look after yourself, Sir Kurian."
Kurian lazily waved him off.
Then, the moment he was alone, he placed both hands over his face and groaned, his body already reacting as though even breathing had become an effort.
"I cannot believe I allow myself to reminisce when destruction is approaching from every direction on the frontlines…" he muttered. Then, more quietly, "Reminiscence, huh?"
His hands slid down slowly, covering his nose and mouth for a moment before he opened his eyes again, then closed them as a fragmented image surfaced in his mind—the glitched face of the woman he called his "wife."
'Did I have a wife?' he wondered.
That question had haunted him for nearly two decades.
At times, Kurian felt as though he stood before a Schrödinger's cat of his own memory—one reality where he had a wife, another where he clearly did not, and neither was collapsing into certainty.
Pa—
He clapped his own cheeks, the sting snapping through his skin and grounding him.
"Get a grip on yourself, Freddie," he muttered under his breath. "Eden would be… sad."
Whispering her name brought a strange sensation—warm, yet distant, as though it belonged to a hallucination rather than a memory, a delusion formed somewhere within the fractures of his psyche. He was clearly in dissociation.
"Hm… since death is nearing," Kurian murmured, "it shouldn't hurt to ask a few questions at least."
He reached for his terminal, his gaze settling on a single ID: "The Bizzaro Savant."
He stared at the ID for a long moment.
Then he pressed a palm over his face, slowly dragging it downward as he rubbed his features, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration.
"Maybe fighting the Court of Savants was a bad idea after all…" he whispered. "Perhaps this is karma. I really do not want to meet that eccentric fellow. But... Haah."
***
"My name is Camellya." A short young woman stood before Rover, white hair streaked with black, tied into twin tails. Her eyes were a striking dark gray, marked with red, diamond-shaped pupils.
She wore a short, ruffled dress dominated by white, accented with red, gold, and black details that gave her an almost ornamental yet dangerous elegance.
She giggled lightly, her voice dissolving into the ambience as she spoke. "Try not to let me catch you so easily next time~!"
"And she's gone…" Rover let out a small breath, a headache already creeping in. Encounters like this only seemed to deepen the strange fog of her amnesia.
After wrapping up her meeting with Magistrate Jinhsi, Rover had reunited with Yangyang and Chixia, who relayed a warning from Baizhi regarding rising Tacet Field activity.
Rover offered a brief account of her meeting, deliberately omitting Jué's disappearance. In response, Yangyang and Chixia shared local legends concerning Jinzhou's leadership.
As they continued their inquiries around the city, the story gradually took shape. According to residents and storytellers, Jinzhou's young Magistrate Jinhsi and the cautious Midnight Rangers General Jiyan had both been chosen by the divine Sentinel Jué after the catastrophic "Battle Beneath the Crescent."
During that event, the previous General, Geshu Lin, had vanished in black flames after ordering a disastrous last stand amid an unnatural Retroact Rain.
With this information in hand, the group decided to seek out the mysterious organization known as the Black Shores. However, tracking them down with only a photograph of the "Black Bloom" would not be easy.
They consulted Jinzhou's local florist, Grandma Lin, who directed them to a young foreign plant-type Resonator named Verina at Mt. Pingting.
Verina studied the image and deduced that the black flower was a rare Remnant plant formed through a specific resonance energy. Using her abilities, she successfully cultivated physical replicas for the group to use as a lure.
But just then, Yangyang sensed a disturbance in the local environmental streams, and Rover also noticed scattered black petals drifting through the air. She immediately instructed the others to return to the city with Verina.
Rover followed the trail alone.
At a vantage point overlooking the area, she discovered lurking Fractsidus members before engaging in combat, only to realize that additional unseen enemies were still tracking her from the cliffs above.
Acting quickly, she set a plan in motion to draw them out.
And there, after waiting for a while, she had encountered Camellya, who launched an attack before casually introducing herself as a member of the Black Shores, and leaving just as mysteriously as she had appeared.
Rover replayed the events in her mind, the entire sequence feeling increasingly disorienting—like a swarm of strange individuals appearing one after another, the way rainbugs emerged after rainfall.
'Why do they keep showing up like this…?' She groaned inwardly.
"Thethys, huh?" she muttered under her breath.
She recalled how Camellya had casually mentioned it—that Rover was exactly like what the Civilization Simulation Sand Table: Tethys had already predicted and relayed to the Black Shores.
Beep—Beep—
Just then, her terminal flared to life—Yangyang's call.
Rover accepted it immediately. After a brief exchange of information about the encounter she had just experienced, Yangyang relayed a message: Chixia had found someone suspicious.
That caught Rover's interest.
"I'll be there soon," she replied.
"Sure, we're in the shopping district. See you then."
The call ended.
Rover exhaled softly and turned back toward Jinzhou once again, making her way toward the location to meet this so-called "suspicious" individual.
To be continued...
***
A/N: I failed to keep up with the expectations, and I will be honest—I did procrastinate on writing. I had only two chapters ready for the new work and planned to finish the third later, but I forgot that my Project Defense for my college final year was on Wednesday, and neither my presentation nor proposal was ready.
I had to work on that, so I couldn't focus on my other writing and missed the chapter releases.
I've released the novel Under the Blessed Sky (or Ni-Shree-Kham, in Sanskrit terminology), and there are two chapters so far. I will be releasing the next chapters tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday, along with a new chapter for the fanfic. That's all. I apologize again for the inconvenience.