The service tunnels beneath the palace were older than Elias had expected.
They were passages for servants and maintenance workers, remnants of an older structure, buried beneath layers of newer construction.
Occasionally, Elias spotted fragments of faded carvings beneath the newer masonry, almost completely smooth by time.
Elias moved like a ghost through the shadows, his presence completely erased by his Flow Suppression. Leading the charge was Todd—while the others scrambled to keep pace, their boots echoing sharply against the arched corridors.
"Faster! Move!" the burly, broad-shouldered woman jaw barked, her hand resting heavily on the crude club at her waist. They reached the first blockade and Todd crouched beside a narrow panel embedded in the wall, her fingers a blur as she worked through a series of mechanisms.
"Come on."
The buff woman glanced behind them.
"How long?"
"Thirty seconds." Todd responded.
"We don't have thirty seconds."
"Then stop asking me how long."
The woman clicked her tongue.
Elias remained hidden around a corner. He remembered Todd from the Museum of Ages—the way she had moved, the way she had spoken to her mother. But now, watching her work, he realized he had underestimated her.
'I guess she's a different person when she's not fussing over cute things or her mother isnt teasing her.'
He watched Todd's hands. Something clicked.
"Done." Todd stood.
They moved. Elias waited a bit to create distance before following. Whenever they encountered guards, the revolutionists acted quickly.
A guard stepped around a corner.
A cloth covered his mouth.
A fist struck his stomach.
He collapsed.
Another guard reached for his weapon.
A revolutionist kicked the weapon aside before striking him across the jaw.
Eventually the tunnel widened and a set of enormous doors appeared ahead. Beyond them lay an underground storeroom.
The chamber was enormous. Shelves stretched along the walls on which several items were being kept. Fabrics were neatly folded beside boxes that contained old artifacts. There were books as well, some thick some slim stacked neatly here and there. The room also held toys and even a miniature of the king holding the hands of what appeared to be a young child with dark hair and golden eyes.
Elias studied these, paying particular interest to the stack of books. He considered extracting one of the volumes in order to find out its contents but decided against it. He turned his attention back to the revolutionists making a mental not to skim through one on his return journey.
Meanwhile, as Todd worked to unlock another clasp one revolutionist stared at a jeweled sword.
"That's worth a fortune." he said reaching out to touch it.
"Are you out of your mind? We aren't common thieves! We are fighting for the structural equality of the people! Material things like jewels should be the least of our concerns!"
"Oh, come off it!" The man retorted drawing the sword and observing its blade.
"Taking one of these trinkets would bring me closer to the kind of comfort those bastards take for granted every single day.You can't actually blame me for wanting a taste can you?"
The buff woman turned, her scarred jaw tight.
"Shut up, both of you."
She looked at Todd as the revolutionist with the sword sheathed it and put it away. "Aren't you done?"
"I'm on the ninth link of the resonance lock. Give me ten seconds." Todd responded.
The buff woman turned to the remaining Revolutionists.
"Remember the plan. The Twelfth Prince—Raileigh Zeppelin—wasn't seen during the promenade or the previous day's ceremony. We have intel that he won't be actively participating in the Hydrangea festival and woud instead be in his own private sector of the palace. Our goal is to capture him and use him as a hostage."
Crouching behind a stack of rotting wooden crates near the entrance, Elias listened intently, his brow furrowing.
'Desperate times call for desperate measures, I suppose,' he mused inwardly, a cold edge to his thoughts.
'Kidnapping a royal child to blackmail the throne? It's a massive gamble. But in the theater of war, sentimentality is a luxury no one can afford I guess.'
One of the Revolutionists, a nervous-looking man with twitching eyes, spoke up.
"I... I heard the boy is an Awakened. They say he carries a very unique, highly volatile Trait. What if he fights back?"
The buff woman scoffed, swatting the air dismissively.
"Soft-hearted fool. He's just a kid and I bet those are just rumors spread to give the young'in a bit of a reputation. Besides, I am a fully realized Acolyte. If the little urchin tries anything, I'll break his arms myself and drag him out by his hair."
Elias's eyes narrowed.
Utilizing his Flow Perception, Elias subtly peered at their signatures. The buff woman, the cowardly man and the rest of the crew burned with the distinct, albeit ragged, spiritual radiance of Acolytes—with the sole exception of the man who had raised concerns. Elias could see that this group was way too weak to be carrying out an operation like this, and they didn't even know it.
CLICK.
The heavy lock gave way with a satisfying, pneumatic hiss.
"Done," Todd said, standing up and dusting off her knees.
The revolutionists didn't waste a second. With whispered curses and a surge of adrenaline, they rushed past her, scrambling up the marble staircase behind the door toward the upper levels.
Moments later, they emerged into an open-air central courtyard bathed in the harsh, glaring light of the late afternoon sun.
Elias moved silently behind them, slipping through the shadows of the doorway. He pressed his back against the thick trunk of an ancient, gnarled weeping willow that dominated one corner of the courtyard, scanning the perimeter for an alternative exit that would lead him deeper into the main palace.
As he observed the group, his eyes took in the architectural layout of Prince Raileigh's sector. This courtyard and its surrounding structures radiated a stark, minimalist elegance. The stone paths were impeccably swept, wild-flowers were allowed to grow in deliberate, unmanicured patches along the stone walls, and a quiet, almost melancholy serenity hung in the air.
The revolutionists fanned out, weapons drawn. Todd lingered near the top of the staircase, her expression unreadable.
"Where is he?" the buff woman demanded glancing at Todd. "You said he'd be here!"
Instead of an answer, the air above them split with a sharp crack.
A whip shot down from the dense, shadowing branches of the very weeping willow Elias was hiding behind. It moved like a striking viper, wrapping tightly around the cowardly mans throat with brutal precision.
Before the terrified man could even scream, a dark figure dropped silently from the canopy. With a single, fluid pull of the whip, the man several feet into the air, dangling him by his neck. He clawed frantically at the leather biting into his windpipe, his face turning a dangerous shade of purple as his legs kicked uselessly against the empty air.
"Chad," Todd said, her voice calm. "Don't kill him."
"Fine," he spat, releasing the whip. With a brutal jerk of his wrist, he slackened the whip just as the revolutionist's eyes rolled back into his head, sending the gasping, choking man crashing hard onto the stone paving stones where he lay coughing up blood.
The remaining revolutionists stumbled back in absolute horror, weapons trembling in their hands. The buff woman's eyes darting between Chad and Todd.
"You..." The buff breathed, her voice shaking with sudden, blinding realization.
"You set us up!"
Todd stood tall, her hands resting casually in her pockets. She met the woman's furious gaze without a trace of fear.
"So?"
"Traitorous bitch!" The woman roared, channeling her Flow into her muscles. She charged forward, swinging her heavy club in a horizontal arc aimed directly at Todd's skull—a blow with enough force to shatter stone.
Todd didn't even flinch. As the club came whistling through the air, Todd pivoted on her heel, her body snapping upward in a lightning-fast, inverted roundhouse kick.
CRACK.
Her heel connected dead-center with the wooden shaft of the club, splintering the dense wood into a shower of jagged shards. The sheer kinetic impact sent a shockwave up her arms, knocking her off balance.
"A mere Acolyte," Todd whispered coldly, her voice dripping with disdain as she closed the distance, "cannot hope to defeat a Votary."
With a second kick to the woman's chest, Todd launched the burly woman backward. She slammed into a marble pillar, coughed up a spray of dark blood, and slumped unconscious to the ground.
In less than three seconds, the entire rebel cell was neutralized. Chad and Todd moved with ruthless, practiced efficiency, subduing the remaining conscious members with swift, precise strikes before they could even raise their weapons.
' Two Votaries? I have to get out of here.'
Elias silently, gathered a pressurized pocket of air beneath the soles of his boots and rose to one of the branches of the tree intendeding to scale the courtyard walls.
"Was this plan really necessary, though?" Chad asked, wiping a speck of dust from his sleeve as he glanced toward the weeping willow.
"Luring the Dukker boy all the way here feels like an unnecessary complication."
Elias froze. Every muscle in his body locked up.
'They were hunting...me.'
"It's all according to Lord Raileigh's plan." Todd replied
Chad and Todd raised their heads, turning their eyes directly toward the weeping willow tree where Elias stood.
Elias didn't hesitate. He instinctively reached into his spiritual domain to manifest his twin obsidian dagger but before Elias could even channel his velocity, the ground beneath the weeping willow completely caved inward. The stone paving stones collapsed into a massive sinkhole with a deafening roar of grinding earth and splitting masonry.
Whoosh—
Elias plunged downward into darkness, tumbling head over heels into a subterranean caverna hundred meters below. He hit the jagged stone floor with a sickening, bone-fracturing impact that knocked every ounce of air from his lungs. Pain flared white-hot across his ribs and left leg, a sharp, agonizing reminder of human fragility.
The cavern was vast and damp, supported by massive, soot-stained stone pillars that held up the ceiling. The only source of natural light cut down like a harsh theatrical spotlight from the jagged hole in the ceiling far above.
Groaning, Elias tried to push himself up onto his elbows, his vision swimming with dark spots.
Thud. Thud.
Two figures dropped gracefully from the rim of the hole, landing lightly on either side of him.
Todd and Chad.
Before Elias could muster the Flow to defend himself, Todd lunged forward landing a kick on his neck. Chad's whip cracked through the air. Elias barely managed to raise his arm to block—but the force shattered his forearm, sending him flying backward. He crashed into a pillar, gasping for breath. He didn't even get a split second before the lunged again.
The sheer difference in their combat tiers pressed down on Elias like a physical mountain, making his thoughts thick and hazy with excruciating pain.
'I need to change,' he thought frantically, his instincts screaming at him.
'I need to enter my Yako form. I need my true power to survive this.'
He hesitated for a fraction of a second—a fatal, agonizing micro-second of doubt.
'If I use the Yako form here... if they see Agent Orange... what if they connect me to the mask?'
That tiny window of hesitation was all Chad needed.
With blinding speed, Chad whipped his leather cord through the air. The braided leather cracked like a sonic boom, slamming into Elias's side with enough force to shatter his remaining ribs and fling his battered body across the stone floor.
Gasping for air, blood spilling freely from his lips, Elias forced his fregenerating hands against the ground. He tried to summon a vortex of wind to propel himself vertically out of the pit, his fingers glowing with red energy.
Seeing the wind gather and the boy begin to rise, Todd moved like lightning. She sprinted up the side of a massive stone support pillar, ran vertically along the curved stone, and pushed off into a mid-air spin, generating devastating rotational momentum.
She landed heel-first directly onto Elias's head.
CRACK.
The impact drove Elias's face violently into the stone floor, sending a spiderweb of fractures radiating through the rock. The world went blindingly white, then plunged into a roaring, deafening static.
Todd stepped lightly off his head, her boots clicking against the stone.
Chad took a step forward, his voice rising in sudden panic.
"Whoa, whoa! Todd, stop! Are you trying to kill him? Lord Raileigh specifically said we needed him alive!"
Todd scoffed, brushing a lock of hair from her face as she looked down at the unmoving, bloodied form of the boy.
Despite the agony wracking his nervous system, Elias's body stubbornly fought back. His, bones knitting together with a sickening, cartilaginous crunch. With his last remaining ounce of consciousness, he summoned an artifact from his bead artifact and threw it in the air.
''Hmm?''
FLASHBANG.
A blinding burst of localized photonic energy erupted in the dim cavern, temporarily searing their vision.
Elias scrambled blindly toward the shadows, desperate to drag himself toward a dark crevice in the cavern wall.
"Going somewhere?" a calm, melodic voice murmured softly right beside his ear.
Elias froze.
From the absolute center of Elias's own shadow cast against the cavern wall, a figure detached itself. It was a young boy—roughly Elias's age—with ink-black hair that fell neatly around his face and striking, luminous golden eyes that seemed to swallow the dim light of the cavern.
Prince Raileigh Zeppelin.
Elias instinctively tried to summon his Obsidian Dagger to strike, but as the weapon materialized in his grip, it abruptly flickered, dissolved, and instantly reappeared in the young prince's hand.
Before Elias could draw another breath, Raileigh stepped forward with terrifying, effortless grace and drove the obsidian blade straight down, burying it deep into Elias's chest.
A choked gasp of blood tore from Elias's throat.
At that exact moment, Chad whipped his leather cord forward, looping it expertly around Elias's neck in a tight, merciless garrote. With a brutal pull, Chad yanked Elias backwardto their feet, choking off the air in his windpipe.
As the edges of Elias's vision began to grey out, blurring into a heavy, suffocating abyss, the angry, muffled sounds of Chad and Todd arguing over the protocol of the mission echoed faintly in the background.
Elias forced his heavy, failing eyelids open one last time. His gaze locked onto the young prince standing before him. Raileigh stared down at him with an expression of absolute anticipation? For some reason that look felt familiar, as if Elias knew him...but from where?
'Who... who is this guy...?' Elias thought, then, the darkness consumed him, and everything went completely black.