CHAPTER 785: THE FOOL CONSORT’S PLAN (2)

"Yes," he said.

Not a full lie.

Just... not the entire truth.

You don’t need to carry that part, he told himself. You already have enough.

Elowen studied him for a long second.

The tent went quiet.

Even Serelith didn’t break the silence with a joke this time.

Then came the real discussion.

Because Silvarion already knew this day would come.

And they had already prepared.

Vyrelda straightened, pushing fully away from the pole. "The contingency," she said. "We move to it, then?"

Serelith’s smirk returned, sharper this time. "Of course we do. We worked too hard on this to let it sit on a shelf."

Cerys glanced between them, eyes narrowing. She knew pieces of the plan. Enough to dislike it. Not enough to stop it.

Lira stayed quiet, but she listened closely now, hands finally easing away from her skirt.

Mikhailis rolled his shoulders once, as if settling a cloak over them.

"I’m to pretend to accept," he said simply. "I take their offer on the surface. I wear the ring. I walk into the Ashen River dungeon as their ’chosen researcher.’"

"And ours," Elowen added gently.

"And yours," he agreed.

He continued, tone more practical now.

"I go in with both sets of intel. Technomancer diagrams, their prediction maps, their warnings. And the Arcane Order’s notes. The old records. The dungeon’s history. I compare what matches, what doesn’t."

Serelith nodded, eyes shining. "And you test the traps," she said. "Carefully, of course. We need you alive."

He gave her a look. "I appreciate your consideration."

She smiled sweetly. "Someone has to keep breaking magical systems in interesting ways. I would hate to go back to boring anomalies."

Vyrelda folded her arms again, nodding along. "And then comes the important piece," she said. "You fail."

He inclined his head.

"I make a mess," he said. "A very loud, very public, very clear

failure. Enough that anyone scrying, watching, or tracking my mana thinks the dungeon itself rejected me in a way that makes future attempts look suicidal."

"Visible injuries. Sudden spike of panic. Rapid retreat. Perfect," Serelith listed, counting on her fingers. "We can do that."

"And during that time..." Mikhailis added, voice lowering slightly, "the ants move in."

The word seemed to darken the air around them for a heartbeat.

Cerys was the first to react.

Her teeth sank into her lower lip before she caught herself. She gritted them instead, jaw tightening.

"You’re walking into an S-ranked dungeon alone," she said, the word alone sharp enough to cut.

"It’s fine," he said, shrugging lightly. "I’m used to walking into stupid decisions alone."

The humor was there, but his eyes were tired.

"You’re not funny," she snapped.

Her voice came out harsher than she probably intended, but she didn’t take it back.

He gave her a half-smile anyway.

"Good," he said softly. "I’d be worried if you laughed at that."

Serelith tapped her chin with one finger, the nail clicking softly against her skin.

"The resonance-tracking..." she mused. "That is our main enemy here. If their constructs are monitoring you from the moment you step inside, then any fake reaction will show in the patterns."

"Can you hide it?" Vyrelda asked. "Or alter it?"

Serelith’s eyes brightened in that dangerous way they did when someone handed her a puzzle she actually wanted to solve.

"I can scramble it," she said. "Not completely, or they’ll know something is wrong. But I can bend it. Nudge your emotional ’profile’ in a safe direction."

She looked at Mikhailis.

"When you panic," she said cheerfully, "I can make it look like you panicked in the right way. And when you get angry, I can smooth it so it looks like stubborn frustration, not decisive betrayal."

"That is the most comforting yet horrifying thing I’ve heard today," he said.

"Thank you," she replied, pleased.

Vyrelda nodded slowly. "If Technomancers believe the dungeon is unreachable for now, they’ll adjust their plans," she said. "They’ll stop throwing soldiers into it. They’ll reassign units. They might even pull back some of their front-line constructs to reinforce other regions."

She turned to Elowen.

"That buys us time," she said. "Time we desperately need. Weeks. Maybe months. Enough for us to fortify and for Mikhailis’s little monsters to burrow."

Lira finally spoke.

Her voice was barely above a whisper, but in the quiet tent, it carried clearly.

"If you don’t come back..." she asked, eyes on the ground, "what do we tell the queen?"

There was a silence after that.

Not just because of the words.

Because of who said them.

Mikhailis turned his head slightly to look at her.

Lira’s shoulders were straight, posture still refined, still every inch the perfect maid Elowen had assigned to him. But her fingers were trembling now where they rested against her skirt. Her eyes were fixed on the floor, like looking at him might break something she worked hard to keep in place.

He felt something twist in his chest.

I hate this question, he thought. But it’s fair.

He forced a tired smile onto his face.

"That I was an idiot who thought ants and arrogance were enough," he said.

It was a joke.

It wasn’t just a joke.

Lira’s lips wobbled, then pressed tightly together. Her shoulders shook once, barely, before she stopped it.

Cerys let out a sharp breath. "Still not funny," she muttered.

Vyrelda didn’t disagree.

Serelith’s expression softened for a moment, which was rare. "You know," she said lightly, "if you die, I will be very annoyed. I have plans for your mana channel."

"Good to know I’m valued," Mikhailis replied.

Elowen hadn’t spoken during all of this.

She had listened.

Watched.

Measured.

Now, finally, she moved.

She rose from the cushions with slow, controlled grace, her robe whispering against the floor as she stepped closer to him. The lamplight caught the faint shadows beneath her eyes, the small dryness at the corner of her lips.

She stopped directly in front of him.

Her hands lifted, fingers delicate but steady, and she cupped his face gently.

Her palms were warm.

Her thumbs rested just below his eyes, as if to hold his gaze in place.

"Mikhailis," she asked softly, "were you tempted?"

The question was simple.

It hit him harder than any dungeon trap.

He could feel the others’ attention sharpen again.

No one dared to interrupt.

He could lie.

It would be easy.

But Elowen’s fingers were trembling just slightly against his skin. That tiny tremor was worse than any shouted accusation.

He swallowed.

He held her gaze.

"Yes," he said.

The word sat in the air quietly.

Her breath hitched.

Her fingers tightened for a heartbeat, pressing a little harder into his cheeks, not enough to hurt, just enough to show that the answer had landed exactly where she feared it would.

Behind her, Serelith’s brows rose, but she looked... satisfied, in a way. There was respect there.

Vyrelda’s eyes lowered, then rose again, as if she had expected nothing less.

Cerys exhaled sharply, some tension leaving her shoulders in a strange mix of frustration and relief.

Lira closed her eyes briefly, once, then opened them again, gaze still fixed downward.

He could have stopped there.

He didn’t.

"But I’ve never chosen charts over people," he whispered, voice low and rough, just for her. "I won’t start now."

He meant it.

Every word.

He had chosen knowledge over comfort many times. Over his own safety. Over sanity, arguably. But not over the people he had decided to care about.

Not over her.

Not over the lives depending on their choices.

Her eyes softened.

The golden light in them seemed to lose some of its sharpness, turning warmer. The lines at the corner of her mouth eased. Her thumbs moved, brushing gently over his skin in small, soothing motions that he suspected were more for her than for him.

"Then go," she said softly.

The first time, it sounded like an order.

Then she added, quieter, breath warm against his lips, "but return."

That sounded less like a queen and more like a woman who had finally let herself rely on someone and hated it.

He leaned his forehead against hers.

For a brief moment, the tent, the war, the dungeon—everything fell away.

There was only the soft press of skin against skin. The faint smell of her hair. The warmth of her breath. The weight of her hands still holding his face as if afraid he would vanish if she let go.

He closed his eyes.

"I will," he said.

And for once, he didn’t try to decorate the promise with jokes or cleverness.

He just meant it.