Dew gathered like cold sweat on the leaves, and from the ridge, the land below Durnholde Pass looked like the aftermath of a fever dream — smoke still rising, blackened trees bent into question marks.

Noah stood at the command deck of the Atonement, one gloved hand resting on the railing, his other tracing faint circles over the brass surface of a rune projector.

His face was expressionless, yet his thoughts moved like storm clouds.

"Projection array ready," reported Lieutenant Carrow from the lower console. "We can deploy at your signal."

Noah nodded, eyes still fixed on the map. "Deploy in Sector 9 through 12. I want the illusion of a full advance — cavalry, infantry, even supply caravans. Make it convincing.

Their scouts should pick up movement within the hour."

He said it evenly, but his pulse thrummed with quiet precision.

He wanted a strategy of misdirection, born from necessity.

With Durnholde lost and Wolf's last words still echoing through his head.

"Go all out in this fuckass war!"

Noah needed to divert Draven's next move.

The idea was simple...

... make the Central believe the Northern Army was mobilizing south to retake the pass, when in reality, the bulk of his surviving divisions were retreating west to secure the river crossings.

He'd spent nights perfecting it.

Mana projectors hidden along the ridgelines would cast realistic illusions: phantom soldiers marching under Northern banners, airships veiled in mist, cannon muzzles glowing with simulated mana light.

From a distance even through mana lenses it would look real.

The illusion would pulse with heat signatures, footstep tremors, and faint magical resonance, all mimicking a living army.

It wasn't just a trick of sight it was a performance.

Noah's eyes flicked to the reflection of the forest below.

He watched as phantasmal figures began to emerge through the morning haze... lines of spectral infantry, ghostly banners snapping in the cold wind, rune-projected silhouettes trudging forward in perfect formation.

They looked alive.

Even Noah felt the creeping urge to believe it himself.

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

Carrow said, pride flickering in his voice.

"They'll never see through that."

---

Hours later, reports came in from scouts along the eastern front.

"Enemy's forming a defensive line," the officer said.

"Looks like they've bought it, sir.

Central'ss not mobilizing their heavy units — no counterattack yet."

The crew broke into quiet relief. The deception seemed to be working.

But Noah didn't celebrate. He stood apart from the officers, hand pressed against his chin.

Something was off.

He'd studied their command style before — the man didn't hesitate.

If Draven played a part in commanding at all he was the type who bit when provoked, not waited.

Every skirmish, every maneuver during the early campaigns proved it...

The same happened when he played the game after Draven took over the military while still at the academy.

Draven always moved to crush misdirection, to test his enemy's confidence. If he saw a chance to strike, he'd take it.

So why not now?

"Has he sent any scouts forward?" Noah asked quietly.

"None detected, sir," came the reply. "He's holding and fortifying"

Fortifying? Against a phantom army?

Noah's brows furrowed. "That's wrong."

He turned back to the tactical map. Every rune projected a false position, a shimmer of blue light indicating his imaginary divisions. To any observer, it looked like a Northern resurgence — a rallying of vengeance after Durnholde. But the absence of a counter-response twisted in Noah's mind like a knife.

He should've attacked.

Noah's thoughts began to fracture into threads of deduction.

Maybe Draven saw through the illusion. Maybe he knew the "offensive" was a ruse. Then the question became why he wasn't reacting.

There were only two reasons a commander ignored bait: either he didn't believe it, or he wanted you to believe that he did.

Noah's gaze hardened.

"He's toying with us," he muttered.

"He's not countering because he wants me to think the illusion worked."

Carrow blinked, caught off guard. "Sir?"

"Their letting the bluff stand," Noah continued, his voice low, analytical.

"... creating the illusion of being deceived. Which means their preparing something else — quietly, somewhere we're not looking."

The realization felt cold. A thread of sweat rolled down the back of his neck.

He remembered the way Draven fought at the Ridge — silent movements, low mana signatures, his army vanishing from the map before striking behind friendly lines.

Draven wasn't an impulsive brute. He was a strategist who just looked like one.

"Sir, you think they have discovered our retreat?"

Noah didn't respond immediately. He turned to the viewport, eyes scanning the forest floor where the mirage battalions still marched. Every step they took seemed to mock him.

"No...I don't think so..." he finally said.

"They haven't discovered it. They're waiting for me to reveal it myself."

It was a game of patience. A war of perception. And Noah for the first time in months couldn't read the board.

He had always trusted his ability to outthink his enemies. The Phantom Offensive was meant to prove that — to remind the world that he could still dictate the tempo of war. But now, watching those empty projections wander through the haze, he felt something unfamiliar claw at the edge of his thoughts. Doubt.

He activated the communication channel again, sending encrypted orders to the scouts. "Pull back the observation teams. Reduce mana output in the decoy zones. I want new eyes along the southern valley. If he's moving troops through there, I want to know before nightfall."

The officers scattered to obey, but Noah remained still.

From above, the forest looked tranquil — eerie, even. His phantom army continued to march, unaware of its own hollowness. Below, somewhere beneath that illusion, the real Northern soldiers trudged through mud and fog, retreating toward the river crossings. He thought of them — flesh and blood, exhausted, carrying the memory of Wolf's last stand. He had bought them time with his life. Noah was buying them more with a lie.

And yet…

What if Draven was letting him?

He leaned forward over the command table, pressing his palms flat against the glass map.

"If he knows this is false," he murmured, "then every minute I believe it's working gives him control of my timeline."

Noah shut his eyes. The hum of the airship filled the silence.

Draven's not attacking.

The thought hit him like cold water.

...Of course.

Draven had captured Northern encryption frequencies before. If he'd cracked the new cipher, he could be hearing every word transmitted from the airships — including this very moment.

Noah's gaze sharpened. "Cut external transmissions. Now."

"Sir?"

"Do it!"

The officers scrambled. Within seconds, the bridge went quiet — the lines severed, the hum of mana transmissions replaced by a sterile hush. Noah exhaled slowly, the tension in his shoulders visible.

He turned his head toward the window again. The phantoms continued to move, their bodies flickering with residual light.

Noah felt his stomach twist with something close to admiration.

"He's not reacting because he wants me to waste the next move," he murmured to himself.

"He's countering my deception and using it to predict my real one."

He straightened, eyes dark. "He's inside my head."

The officers around him exchanged glances, uncertain whether to speak.

Noah reached forward and deactivated the primary rune projector. One by one, the illusions vanished — fading into mist, collapsing like dying embers. The ghost army dissolved into silence, leaving only the empty landscape below.

For a long moment, Noah simply stood there, watching the emptiness. Then he smiled — not out of amusement, but acknowledgment.

"Well played, protagonist" he whispered under his breath.

"But the game's not over yet."

The Atonement drifted slowly through the clouds, carrying a commander whose greatest weapon had always been his mind — and now, for the first time, he realized someone else was already several moves ahead.

And in that realization, Noah didn't feel fear. He felt resolve.

If Draven wanted to play with illusions, he would learn what it meant to face the man who created them.