I could see what Sarah had meant about not having seen the boy’s looks around these parts — Asian, she’d called him. These kinds of features were uncommon on the continent, although I knew of some peoples in the archipelago that looked remarkably similar.

Thick chains kept the boy fastened to the walls of his cell, although he hardly looked fit enough to escape even without them — he was woefully malnourished, and I could see the shape of his spine even through the baggy clothes.

The familiar surge of rage was almost like an old friend, by now. I had to clamp it down hard to stop myself from unleashing a torrent of Force at the walls — it was still a few hours until I could weave magic safely. But the boy…

Against my better judgment, I wove a nearly translucent thread of Mind, suppressing a wince as a wave of pain wracked my body, shaping it into a gentle soothing spell. It would calm his pain and grant him a dreamless sleep for a few hours — the most I could do at the moment.

Come evening, I would free him. But until then, I needed to find some answers.

Kirin-of-Iron — I had finally gotten his full name again when I asked a guardsman of his whereabouts — was buried neck-deep in papers when I finally found him. It was the old duke’s office, and by the clouds of dust of cloud that floated through the air, it had been definitely underutilized.

I rapped my knuckles on the door as I entered, catching Kirin’s attention, and the man rose swiftly from behind the desk, bowing deeply.

“Your Lordship,” he murmured, and I could still hear a certain resignation in his voice.

“Kirin-of-Iron,” I acknowledged with a nod, and motioned for him to sit as I made my way to another chair next to a sitting table.

“Is there anything I could help you with, Lord?” Kirin asked with some apprehension. It would take some time to win him over.

“I’m curious about some of the late duke’s affairs. Do you know anything of his projects down in the cellars?” I kept my question vague, trying to discern how much the old bastard had shared with his retainers. I doubted I would get much out of Kirin, as he did not seem like the type who would have followed the duke had he known of his… proclivities.

“The cellars?” He blinked, tilting his head. “I’m afraid I know nothing of the — Actually…” he rose hurriedly, almost stumbling over a stack of documents as he made his way across the room. He sifted through another pile of papers and ledgers, carefully going over each until he seemed to find what he was looking for a couple of minutes later.

He brought forth a recent, paper-bound ledger. “As I was going through Duke Illvere’s affairs, I found a disturbing set of purchases,” he said as he presented me with the opened ledger, pointing towards the entries near the center of the page. “I don’t know if it’s related to what you found, but…” he shrugged, “I know nothing else.”

I couldn’t help but raise my eyebrows as I glanced at the yellowed pages. Say what you will about the man’s moral character, but the duke had been very meticulous about his accounting.

The first couple of entries described torture implements — I had indeed noticed them down in the cellar, but what I found of interest were the alchemical ingredients that followed, with the same date of purchase.

While I had only dabbled in alchemy, I recognized most of the plants and materials listed and what linked them together — they all shared a common use in mind-affecting compounds.

I closed my eyes, stomping down on the anger. It would not do to cause a scene before Kirin, not if I hoped to ever sway the man.

“Lord? May I inquire as to what you found in the cellar?”

“A dungeon,” I replied evenly, forcing myself to be calm. “There was a single prisoner — a child. And… most of these,” I waved to the ledger, clenching my other hand hard enough to pierce the skin.

“Monster,” he whispered, and it took me a moment to realize he wasn’t talking about me. “I had no idea he had been this kind of person. He’d kept it all hidden…” his voice trembled as he covered his face with his hands.

Kirin looked me straight in the eyes as he continued.

“I was unknowingly complicit in all this. I will accept any punishment you see fit,” he murmured, lowering his head in supplication.

I blinked in confusion. “I will do no such thing. You were conned, and your only fault is that you trusted someone who likely had never given you any reason to distrust,” he nodded in confirmation as I spoke, “and anyway, your own behavior has been nothing short of exemplary.”

“Thank you,” he whispered, and I realized it was for the words of support, not for the lack of punishment.

“In any case, do you know anyone else who could have been included in the duke’s hidden life?”

“The spymaster and the mage,” he answered promptly, seemingly glad for the change in subject. “They were the closest thing he had to an inner circle. But the mage is dead and…”

“And the spymaster tried to kill me barely an hour ago.”

He blinked, surprised. “Did you…?”

I shook my head. “She got away, unfortunately. Slippery little thing.” I avoided mentioning my diminished state. It would not do to appear weak.

Sighing, I rose from my seat. “That was all I needed. If you manage to find anything else, send a messenger to find me.”

He bowed as I left, the wights I had left at the door falling into step beside me as I made my way through the palace. From what I remembered, the building had a gymnasium — and there was nothing more I needed right now than to punch away my anger.

The Sun was just descending past the horizon when I finally felt whole enough to deal with the imprisoned Hero. I wasn’t going to even try waking him up and talking to him before peering into his soul. If my suspicions were right, I would find the same kind of chains and shackles I had found in Sarah’s, and I was not willing to risk the gods spying on our conversation through them — not to mention they seemed to be able to exert some control over the Heroes’ minds through them.

As I approached the young Hero, Sarah following anxiously behind me, I was already drawing in threads of Soul, preparing the spellwork that would allow me to manipulate the boy’s core. Diving in, I found exactly what I had expected — chains upon chains, snaking around all the natural constructs of the Soul, ensnaring all there was to their will.

Fixing all this would take quite a bit of time, so I wasted none in getting to work. It was delicate, tedious work, but I was already glad that unlike the mana well and the construct I had found in my conduit, the chains were made of Soul mana — had they been crafted from Origin mana, I would likely not have been able to dislodge them at all. It made me wonder why this distinction existed at all. Did they have different crafters, perhaps? Or was there some limitation to Origin mana?

I pushed the thoughts away and concentrated on my work. Slowly, but steadily, the Hero’s soul was becoming clearer and more luminous. I had no idea how much time I spent there, entranced in my work, and I nearly made a mistake when a voice broke me out of my trance.

“Hello? Is anyone there?” a boyish voice asked, with more than a slight tremble. “I can’t see… Did you take my eyes away this time?”

This time? Had they been carving the boy up down here?

“Hello, young one,” I tried, as soothingly as I could manage, “you’re safe now. Your captors are gone, and I’m working to free you.”

“Oh,” he whispered, his voice small.

“What is your name?”

“I’m… Shiro. Yes, my name is Shiro. Who are you? Where are we? Where did the dungeon go?” With newfound courage, he spat out question after question.

“Hello, Shiro. My name is Julian, and I’m a mage.” I paused, thinking about how to answer his other questions. “You can’t see anything because we are inside your soul right now.” Directly would do.

“What?”

Okay, maybe directly wouldn’t do.

“You have a soul inside you, and I’m currently trying to fix it.”

“...What? How’s my soul broken? What are you doing there?”

“You’re from another world, right? When you came here, the gods shackled your soul so they could control you. I’m slowly removing the chains, which should free you from their control. Do you feel any different?”

“I… think so? There was a haze, before — I couldn’t think. Even when they strapped me to the table…”

He fell silent after that, and I continued my work with quiet focus. After some time — Hours? Days? I had no frame of reference — when I could see the end in sight, I hit a snag.

The chains were coiled and fused around the points that anchored the soul to the body. This had not been a problem with Sarah — she had died, and her soul was free from the body. But young Shiro was still alive, and I could not see a way to fully remove the chains without cutting the soul free of the body, effectively killing him.

“Did something happen? I can feel your worry,” Shiro said, breaking me out of my contemplation.

“I’ve run into a bit of a problem.”

“Can you fix it?”

“Maybe, but none of the solutions are clean — you’ll have to pick which one you prefer.”

“Okay, hit me. How bad can it be?”

“Maybe I can show you.” I used a spare thread of Soul to weave a little spell in the shape of some glasses, imbued with the intent to see, then levitated them in the direction his voice came from.

“Hey, I can see now! All this stuff is my soul?”

“Most of it. Follow me and I’ll show you the problem.”

I led him to the anchors, where the sky blue lines of his natural Soul merged with the gold-tinged navy blue of the chains. “Your soul was completely bound by these chains,” I said as I pointed to the constructs. “They’re gone now, but these bits are completely fused — I cannot remove them without removing the anchors.”

“And that would be bad?”

“Not necessarily. You would briefly die, but I can bring you back — you would, however, become an undead.”

He didn’t instantly dismiss the idea, which surprised me. Shiro pondered for a few seconds, then asked, “What happens if they stay?”

“I don’t know. It might be enough for the gods to take control over you, or it might not. I have no precedent on which to draw.”

“And if… if you remove them, you can be certain I’ll be free?”

“Yes.” Or as certain as one could be in matters of the soul, anyway.

“What about the undead thing? Will I become a zombie?”

“A Revenant. You won’t decay, or age for that matter, and damage to your body won’t really matter. You’ll be sustained by the mana well you have in your soul here.”

“That… doesn’t actually sound too bad.”

I shrugged. “I wouldn’t know, but you’d be the second Hero I do this to. Sarah doesn’t seem to mind it.”

He perked up when he heard the name. Recognition, or some Hero connection…?

“A girl?”

Ah yes, teenagers.

I rolled my eyes. “Yes, a girl. You’ll meet her once you wake. So, which option will it be?”

The prospect of meeting a girl — and that she was already a Revenant, probably — seemed to erase all doubts. “Remove it,” he asserted with a nod.

“Very well.”

And so, I shaped a handful of threads into a knife and hacked away at the anchors. Mere moments later, the soul was detached from the body. Here lies Shiro, gone before his time, I thought with dark amusement.

Waving the gallows humor away, I gripped tightly at the soul, which was already starting to float away into the Near-Beyond, and proceeded to clean up the few remaining chain constructs.

Once I could confirm the boy was free from godly interference, I reattached his soul to his body — normally a complex operation, yet one that was already starting to become second nature to me — and then willed myself to return to the outside world.

I blinked twice, disoriented, and Sarah gripped my shoulder to help me steady.

“How long?” I croaked, my voice rough after some time of disuse.

“Five days,” she said, expecting the question. “But there’s more.”

I braced myself for the bad news. “What happened?”

“Nothing yet — but there’s an army incoming. Captain Thuli thinks they’ll be arriving in three, maybe four days.”

I nodded, taking in the new information. Not unexpected, all things considered.

It was at that point that the newcomer decided to join the fray. Shiro shot up in a whirlwind of limbs, stumbling onto his feet with graceless fervor.

“I... I was told there would be a girl?”