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[Ding! Acknowledged. Placement required: apex node at mountain's centroid, near hollow boundary. Physical embedding increases field coherence. Recommend highest terrace: Miryam's perch satisfies geometry.]

Kai felt his mouth twitch. "Of course it does."

He went up alone. The top air was clean, thin, and honest. Miryam's spot was exactly where the system's map wanted: the flat patch where she napped in the sun, tumbled stones arranged into a half-circle by small hands, a smooth pebble with her scratches — tiny counts only a child would make and only a parent would care to keep.

He took the two 9★ cores from the Soul-Cube. They were wrong and beautiful — cold light under stone, each the size of a fist with a weight the hand could feel and the mind didn't like to measure.

"Here," he said.

[Ding! Procedure: Set cores three paces apart on the exact midline. Rotate to align poles (markers appear now).]

Lines of faint light crawled out of the rock and drew a narrow figure-eight. He set one core in each loop. The stone hummed, then sang on a pitch too low for anything but the ribs to hear.

[Ding! Initiating Monarch Ward … 12% … 41% … 73% … 100%.]

A dome no eye could quite focus on swelled from the mountain's skin and settled. It wasn't a wall you could touch; it was a decision in the air. Kai leaned into it and felt the push the way you feel a river decide it doesn't want you crossing here. It tasted of iron and cold water and lightning waiting to be asked.

[Ding! Monarch Ward activated.

Parameters: No ingress/egress without Monarch Mark or Brood Imprint.

Impact resistance: 7★ class sustained assault for 96 hours. Reflection: 30% of directed aura burst.]

The second thing came quieter.

[Ding! Initiating Mirage Mantle … 18% … 58% … 100%.]

The mountain's color thickened and then bled into what lay around it. From the west, it became a long, low dune with nothing important under it. From the north, it was scrub and a darker line of brush that had no reason to stay green. From the east — a broken scarp. From overhead, a seam where hot air lifts off bare rock: nothing a hawk or a witch's glass would love to look at.

Kai squinted, stepped back, and lost the line of a ledge he knew intimately. When he moved forward again with the right intent, the path slid back into place under his feet.

"Good," he said.

[Ding! Note — Barrier and Mantle sync with Monarch's Mark. Your wives, concubines, and brood will pass cleanly. Surrendered prisoners cannot pass without escort unless manually taken but holding hands or marked by the host.]

"Keep them inside," he said. "All of them. No accidents."

He went down through the terraces and met the people he would leave in charge. He didn't hide the truth.

"It will take three to four days," he said, gathering them in the main hall — Luna to his right, Akayoroi to his left, Naaro, Lirien, Azhara, Skyweaver, Silvershadow, Shadeclaw, Vexor, Shale, Needle, Wolf, Alka perched above on a beam.

"I will be in a shell again. I will not move. I will not speak. The barrier above us resists up to seven-star hands. The mantle makes us look like nothing to anyone not already loving this mountain. There is still risk. We act like risk is certain, and we are busy until I stand up."

He pointed and the work took shape.

"Luna, Akayoroi — co-command. If there is a tie, you break it. If there is a question, you answer it together. If I had to choose only one voice to keep this house standing, I would fail — so I will not choose. You two."

Luna's mouth was a straight line; her eyes were warm and hard. "Understood," she said. Akayoroi nodded, antennae dipped. "We will hold it," she said.

"Naaro — nursery and wounded. No one else touches a bandage without your say. Rotate the new medics we made through under your hand until they stop making dumb mistakes."

"I'll keep them alive," Naaro said.

"Lirien — forge. Break the enemy plates down, fit collars and grips for the two thousand. I want a quiet harness that doesn't rattle when a heart runs."

"I'll make it hum," Lirien grinned. "Not a ring."

"Azhara — east watch and inner knives. If something slips the ward, you cut it and don't write a song about it."

Azhara's eyes smiled though her mouth didn't. "I'll sharpen it now."

"Skyweaver — high eyes only. Do not scratch the Mantle. Drift the edge and listen; don't show your shadow unless you must."

Skyweaver lifted her good wing and let it fall. "I'll be the wind," she said.

"Silvershadow — parole block. They eat, they sit, they wait. You and Shadeclaw split day and night. If anyone tests the rope, you don't shout first."

Silvershadow inclined his head. Shadeclaw thumped his shield once against his shin: "Owned."

"Vexor, Shale — drill the new specialisms. Two hours dark, two hours light, then food. Needle — cord signals; make them muscle, not thought. Wolf — runners on the inside lines only; no one leaves the Ward to be clever. Alka — rest your wings, then sleep on the high perch. If the Ward ripples you wake me anyway — shell or not."

They each gave their answer, short and serious.

He looked past them to the surrendered thousand of Yavri's line. They sat straight along the east shelf, bowls in hands, shoulders square even when they were tired. Yavri herself watched without trying to listen, hands on her knees, spine like a rule.

"Good." He wanted her to understand he would not hide his strength from her.

The heat in his chest rose again, restless. He vented a thin line of aura; the air thickened, then smoothed.

Luna stepped a little closer, just enough to be felt, not seen. "Three days," she said quietly.

"Three," he said.

Akayoroi touched his wrist, two fingers; it was approval, not worry. "We will make the hours useful."

Kai nodded, turned away from the ring of faces that were his, and walked toward the inner hall where the stone turned warmer with each step. He paused once to reach down and let Miryam's hand squeeze his thumb in her sleep as she dozed on a folded blanket under Luna's eye. It was all the blessing he needed.

He stood at the threshold of the chamber where he would vanish and looked back one more time. The Wrath Crown flickered and did not rise. The mountain hummed to itself like a heart set to a job it understands.

Inside his head he gave the only order left that mattered.

"Let's start then," Kai told the system. "I am ready to rank up now."