Skymint’s POV

  I sat in the carriage across from Luceran, his face carved in indifference, as if even silence refused to acknowledge me. My mind still lingered on the arena, the ruin of the pyramid, the abrupt severing of life. Llanova’s death had been too sudden. One more body claimed by this cruel world. To anyone else, perhaps, he was just another casualty. To me, it was shattering.

  And Arie—she was no longer the girl I knew. She had become the shadow I despised. Reckless. Unforgiving. The one who ended Llanova without thought for consequence, as if violence were the only language left to her. I wanted to stay away from her, yet the truth of Ellie coiled itself around me like chains. To leave her would mean to abandon that secret. To abandon the haunting knowledge of what she carried inside.

  I couldn’t return to my village either. There, I was not a boy but a fugitive.

  Jamaico was gone. Buried beneath stone and silence. I had no one left to fight for, and vengeance was never in me. I had been too soft for that. Rescue felt like a mockery; when they pulled me from that place, I had already assumed death would claim me first. My body still lived, but my soul… hollowed, stolen, left to ache with numbness.

  Now everything bled into meaninglessness. I wished Elion had simply let me remain where I stood. Let the grief in my chest collapse with me.

  “Hey, are you just gonna ignore me?” Luceran’s voice cut through my thoughts, far too loud for my ears. “I know you’re sad and all, but I would appreciate it if you acknowledge me.”

  I forced the words out, fragile, heavy: “You are here.”

  “Nice words,” he said, matching my brevity with his own.

  And, mercifully, he fell silent again, returning to his papyrus and stylus. His hand moved with strange fervor, sketching symbols I couldn’t decipher, writing or doodling, I didn’t know. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised. I barely knew him.

  Memory intruded. My last conversation with Sir Caron, pulled from the chaos of battle against Jamaico, resurfaced like a wound reopening.

  “It might be our final breath, so I’m gonna ask this: what was your reason for saving her?” he demanded.

  “How did you know?” I asked, staggering back as sand and light twisted into lethal shapes.

  “I asked him for answers as soon as I knew she was imprisoned. You know rumors spread fast.” His whip cracked in his fist, even as his spear found the storm again. He had refused to let it go this time.

  If Jamaico had ever truly used his power, sand and light bound together without pride or delusion, we would not have lasted a heartbeat. But his arrogance blinded him. His worship of the Sun God left him drunk on certainty.

  “I didn’t want to be the first one to witness her death,” I confessed, words ragged as I darted past the raining shards of light.

  And when I got close to him again, I asked, “Why do you ask?”

  “Because I saved her too once. I was tasked to kill her but I could not,” he said, regret lacing his voice. “Even then, I became a fugitive—an exiled knight of Glacia.”

  I could have known more, but Jamaico stopped toying with us and began a real battle. He hurled us again and again, searing us with light, blinding us with sand. My body bore no wounds, its hardness resisted pain, while Sir Caron’s golden armor guarded him in kind. I’d have to find him in Finnian later, learn more about that task he had long buried in silence.

  My back pressed against the wooden wall. The satchel beneath me carried what remained of half a hundred thousand leaf bills—less now, after the bounty chase.

  Through the window behind Luceran, I spotted three Wolfmen cloaked in deep red. Wolfmen traders. Felipe’s servants. The same ones who had announced my bounty to the Freshans. A pulse of anger—no, curiosity—cut through my chest. If they were here, something larger was stirring. Something I wasn’t meant to see.

  “Plant Prince,” I said, tugging my vest free to reach for the satchel.

  He lifted his head. “So what?... Polarman Prince?”

  “Would you accept leaf bills?” I whispered. “I really need to get out of here. Now.”

  He glanced at the leather pouch in my claws. “You’re kidding. I’m a royal. Of course I’m wealthy already. And I don’t care about money as long as I’m happy.”

  “Then I can jump now?” I asked, eyes flicking toward the drifting sands outside.

  “If helping you would bring me happiness rather than distress, I would allow it,” he said with a calm smile. “My answer is no.”

  Then he reached into his bag and drew out a familiar black bucket hat—the one Llanova had given me long ago.

  “You left your hat back in my kingdom,” he said. “I’m afraid you’ll lose your head out in the sunlight.”

  “Thanks a lot,” I murmured, pulling it over my white hair. “I thought I’d lost it forever.”

  “Where do you plan to go after all this?” he asked. “We’re still a long way to Fresha, so no pressure.”

  The thought of stepping into the Sunstar Kingdom as I was—bare-furred, marked, known—felt like walking willingly into a trap. There would be posters, no doubt. My face inked on every wall. Hunters ready to claim the bounty and deliver me to Felipe like an offering.

  I remembered my sister’s warning: And if you get caught, you won’t just be a prisoner—you’ll be a weapon they use against her.

  And I would never be a prisoner again. Not under Jamaico. Not under anyone.

  “To the Finnian Kingdom,” I said, meaning it. “I’ll hide there for as long as I need. Y’all sail to Fresha while I go on my own.”

  “Finnian might be large,” he said softly, “but you’d be all alone and lonely. You’d spend every day looking over your shoulder. That kind of fear... it’s worse than death.”

  “I’m not afraid of that,” I replied, forcing belief into my voice. “There are worse things to fear. Like your mystery Gloom Forest.”

  He stopped doodling then, turning the papyrus toward me. Birds covered the page, large and small. My breath hitched. They were feeding on their own young, flesh stretched between beaks, the ground below marked with intricate trails of blood.

  "Mutated tunas!" I exclaimed. "I didn’t know there were cannibal birds."

  "Before you say what project I’m working on—they were real," Luceran replied, voice steady but edged with a strange pride. "Not crows or ravens, but doves."

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  "Robbery doves? There were lots of them?" I asked, leaning forward.

  He nodded, the corner of his mouth twitching. "I’m ashamed you just realized there were many. Earlier, I observed them eating their squabs, and I figured out, the Mysterious Bear was able to use Puppeteer’s Magic on the doves by using their offspring as the target’s asset. It works on animals, but no record on humans yet."

  "Hold on, how does Puppeteer’s Magic work again? I might’ve forgotten… a lot’s happened." My tone slipped into something between curiosity and embarrassment.

  He groaned softly. "You wouldn’t even realize you’re talking to an inner magic user," he said, irritation slipping through. "Anyway, they can cast spells on their target by acquiring something personal, an object, a piece of them, anything they’ve owned. And somehow, that extends to living things. This world would be truly cursed if it ever worked on humans."

  He was right. I could almost see it, Puppeteer’s Magic users abducting a target’s child just to use them as a vessel. Forcing a parent to strike down their own blood under someone else’s control. My stomach churned at the thought.

  "But—" I hesitated. "Aren’t Dreamer’s Magic users capable of anything already?" I asked, remembering Ellie, how easily she had bent the world to her will.

  "Of course, dimwit. I never said otherwise," he said bitterly. "But in exchange for their freedom of casting spells, they earn sleep debts unlike others. You wouldn’t want to fall asleep in the middle of conquering the world, would you?"

  He leaned back with a sigh, then added darkly, "Aside from stealing food and coin, it seems the Mysterious Bear is observing someone in particular. And I’m quite sure you have an idea who that might be."

  His gaze sharpened.

  "Is it—"

  "Shhh." He pressed a finger to my lips, silencing the question before it left me.

  The air turned heavier. We rode in silence, the creak of the carriage and the faint rustle of sand against the wheels filling the void between us.

  By the time we reached the outer village of Glacia, the world had shifted again. The carriage came to a slow halt, and Luceran’s hand moved quickly across his papyrus.

  He turned it toward me: My plants sensed birds nearby.

  The coachman opened the door, and sunlight poured in—bright, invasive. I jumped down first, the satchel brushing my shoulder, the air sharp with salt.

  From a distance, a pillar of dark gray smoke rose where the ocean met mud, dense and suffocating. My instincts screamed. I tossed my satchel and hat back into the carriage, bracing myself.

  Other carriages stopped too, horses snorting in alarm. Through the chaos, I caught Arie—or was it Ellie?—watching me. Her eyes met mine from the guarded carriage, Carrie asleep beside her like a porcelain doll untouched by the noise outside.

  Then it came.

  A fireball tore through the smoky sky and struck the mud with a deafening blast. The impact left a smoking crater, the stench of scorched earth filling the air. As the smoke thinned, a silhouette emerged—immense, unyielding.

  And when the haze cleared, I saw him. A towering figure clad in full iron armor, his pauldron jagged and cruel, catching the light like a blade poised to strike.

  He rested a hand on his hip, the gesture casual, almost amused.

  "Well," he drawled, voice thick with malice, "what are Freshans doing on my territory? Would’ve been smarter if you went to the Port of Sunstar. But that would’ve spoiled the fun of burning—since you’re all about to be toasted anyway."

  The air tasted of smoke and salt, a bitter tang that crawled under my fur and settled behind my teeth. Felipe stood like a wound in the landscape—iron-clad and smirking, flames licking the seams of his armor as if he drew heat from somewhere older than war. Across from him, King Callum's patience had shredded; the Plant King's posture was all coiled roots and warning.

  "What have you done to our boats?" King Callum asked.

  "The intruders you mean? Of course, I burned them," Felipe smirked. "They were prohibited from residing in my territory. I can let you go if you swim back to your kingdoms."

  "Don't play games with us, Felipe. You looked for them and killed them," King Callum hissed.

  Felipe's smile widened, too sharp. "It's either they were terrible hiders, or it happened that you sent them blindly without knowing the new rules. Any individuals caught within the Great Glacia Ocean that are hostile to the Wolf King shall die."

  He breathed heat into his armor; the metal glowed like a dying sun. "You've bothered me for a long time, Mr. Windcore."

  King Callum's face tightened. "I was only seeking you from answers regarding my sister. But you were too stubborn to tell the truth." He stepped forward and tendrils of thorns erupted from his back, snapping like accusation. "Come, and you will die, Viciouso."

  "Pitiful Mr. Windcore. Throughout the years you've never scratched a plant on me, and now you're threatening me?" Felipe said, his crimson cape stirring as though amused by the wind.

  "I've got an army and fruit masters with me," the Plant King hissed. "So you better get out of the way."

  Luceran rolled his eyes beside me, an expression that felt both comfortingly human and horribly out of place amid the threat. The soldiers shifted, bronze shields catching light and the smell of wet mud rising where the flames lashed the earth.

  "Spill it up. Where's my sister? What have you done to her?" King Callum demanded.

  "I'm not afraid a tiny bit." Felipe stated, cool as blood. "I'm also looking for someone worthy. Much more."

  "You're all talk and stalk... that's why humans are vile." Felipe's contempt unfurled into flame, a burst that threw heat against the Plant King.

  Shields rose. Mud hissed as flame met earth; Wade's waters steamed in clouds at his command. King Callum lunged, roots snaking from the ground, and when they struck Felipe's armor they smoldered into ash. Berard flung rocks—solid conviction—and Felipe answered with a breath that turned them to glass. Each strike reminded me how quickly the world could be reduced to sound and scorch.

  "Attack! Don't just stand there like cowards!" King Callum roared.

  The Freshan soldiers surged, spears aimed at the Wolf King. Luceran's hands moved in smooth arcs, small, precise gestures, and where the soldiers' spears touched, vines writhed as if they had pulse. The plants didn't strike back; they steadied, healed, held. Luceran's specialty was not vengeance but mending, an odd mercy in a skirmish that otherwise wanted only to break things.

  "What are you doing?" I asked Luceran, my voice rough with something I couldn't name.

  "I've attached my plants to their armors beforehand. Between poison and healing, my specialty is the latter."

  A soldier burned and then steadied; a wound fizzed and sealed. It was subtle, almost contemptuous, life preserved so it could keep fighting. Wade rolled his shoulders, sweeping torrents of water until the steam hid the edges of the conflict, and the clash of elements stung my senses like a memory of storms.

  I looked toward the carriage where Ellie sat—still there, still silent—and felt a small, private relief. For now, she hadn't slipped away into plots and flames to seek her own strange justice.

  "We changed plans. Travel them to the Port of Sunstar," Berard said, voice low so Felipe couldn't catch the intent.

  "That's way too far... Just go directly to the Port of Glacia!" King Callum insisted.

  The guards shifted; the carriages creaked and came to life. Berard's frown was a map of worry lines. I should have gone with them, should have watched Felipe's back to make sure he didn't tail them like a shadow. Instead my feet stayed rooted, weighted by the small, insistent fear that whatever followed Felipe would not be simple to outrun.

  “They can’t go yet!” Felipe roared, his voice a low snarl before his body ignited, collapsing into a sphere of fire that streaked toward the retreating carriages.

  Wade met him halfway—his palms outstretched, torrents of water streaming in spirals from his hands. Steam hissed where the two elements collided. Behind him, a wall of rock burst from the ground, cracking beneath the heat but holding long enough to slow Felipe’s advance. When the flames broke apart, he reformed, solid once more, embers coiling around his armor like living serpents.

  “I’m gonna need to plant a fireplant,” Luceran muttered, rummaging through his pocket until his fingers brushed a seed. He held it out to me. “Skymint, can you do it? Your passive ability will protect you from the flames. Just don’t let him touch you.”

  “Okay, so where do I plant it?” I asked, wary of the glint in his eyes.

  “Shove it in his mouth.”

  I stared. “You’re kidding.”

  “I’m serious,” he said flatly, pressing the seed into my palm. Its warmth pulsed faintly, as if alive. I started to move, but before I could take a step—

  The ground froze solid. Ice crawled up our legs, locking us in place. My breath hitched. Another fruit master.

  Felipe leapt onto a fallen soldier’s head, crushing it beneath his boot with a wet crunch. He didn’t stop, each step another burst of crimson against the pale ice until he was satisfied, until silence returned like an aftershock.

  Felipe vaulted onto a fallen soldier, his armored boot cracking through the man’s skull, squashing brains beneath his weight. Blood splattered up his greaves as he stepped to the next, and the next—each crunch and squelch a sick rhythm he followed until the pale ice was a burst of crimson and his rage appeased.

  Then she appeared.

  From the corner of the battlefield, a girl emerged—tall, her lilac hair shimmering like dusk light over snow. Her eyes, cold and glacial, mirrored Arie’s but sharper, prouder. She moved with quiet authority, the air around her heavy with frost.

  Dorsey Glaciouso. The eldest princess of Glacia.

  I summoned a spire of ice beneath my feet, trying to fracture the frozen ground, but it didn’t yield—it was denser than mine, older, colder. Reversed freezing wouldn’t work. Her control eclipsed mine completely. She wasn’t just powerful. She was refined. A Class 4 fruit master.

  “We’re screwed,” Luceran shouted behind me, frustration cutting through the cold. “Plants are useless against ice!”

  I grimaced, my breath misting in the frigid air. “And so against fire.”