The courtyard still smelled of blood.

  The lightning assassin remained frozen where Dravien had left him, suspended in a sheath of condensed darkness that bound his limbs and sealed his mouth. Even now the man’s eyes trembled within their sockets, conscious, aware, trapped inside a prison formed not from chains but from will.

  Argus felt none of it through his own muscles.

  That was the worst part.

  He watched his own body from within, aware of each movement yet detached from its origin. His fingers flexed slightly at his sides, not because he commanded them, but because another presence found the gesture appropriate. His breathing remained even, posture straight, shoulders relaxed in a way that Argus knew he would never allow while standing before a mithril ranked assassin. It was like being sealed behind glass while someone else handled the fragile machinery of his flesh.

  “You were terrifying,” Argus said inwardly, unable to keep the tension from his thoughts.

  Fear seeped through him upon another thought, what if Dravien refused to give back control? What could he possibly do if Dravien attacked his family?

  But surely he wouldn’t, right? Afterall the Demon lord had said that he wanted to observe humans and was content with Argus controlling the body until otherwise necessary. He still found the whole thing ridiculous, of course he would. The reincarnation was ridiculous but the reason for Lord Dravien’s reincarnation was even more laughable. He wanted to examine the humans? The same race that had slain him, though Lord Dravien assured him that he wouldn't act against the human kingdoms argus couldn't help but remain apprehensive.

  As if on cue, Dravien’s voice returned. Don’t worry, I’m not planning on taking up control, at least for the foreseeable future. And you have no need to worry, my objective remains the same.

  The words did little to rest his unease, but he stored them away as he observed his brother. Vaeron was staring at his unbelievable act, eyes full of tension, fear and little relief. He felt his own body still bearing a smile, the red glint in his eyes had not faded. While the oppressive mana that radiated from his pressed against the environment like a beast uncaged.

  He thought he must look quite intimidating. “Lord Dravien, would you mind not smiling? You see a silver rank like me should not be smiling upon facing the prospect of possibly getting killed by an adamantium rank. It is out of character”. Though he supposed among the other things that happened, this was surprisingly mundane.

  I didn’t realize that I was smiling, the prospect of facing my first significant challenge in this world excited me.

  Of course it would.

  “That was excessive,” Argus said lightly his voice seemingly echoing in his mind, his gaze lingered on the splintered remains of the first assassin in the adjoining chamber. “Wouldn’t it have been better to dispose of him in a more… discrete manner?”

  Dravien tilted his head as if considering the comment seriously. “Excessive?”

  “You terrified him before you even killed him,” Argus continued, “then you overwhelmed the battlefield through raw mana. And you’re still doing it, I think Vaeron is finding it hard to breath.”

  Argus felt Dravien’s lips curve faintly. Humans are easily frightened, though I must admit I didn’t realize that I was releasing Mana even now.

  “And can you stop smiling?”

  The red in Dravien’s eyes dimmed slowly as his control reasserted itself, though the aura did not fully recede. Vaeron stood several paces away, staring openly at him.

  “We are fortunate that only he witnessed that exchange. Convincing one confused sibling will be difficult enough. An entire household would be impossible.” Argus said.

  Dravien’s expression smoothed, the faint grin fading at last. You’re worrying too much.

  “Maybe, I am” Argus replied evenly.

  The air shifted.

  At first it was subtle, a low tremor beneath the floor that felt like distant thunder rolling beneath stone foundations. Then the pressure surged violently outward.

  The explosion that followed tore through the rear of the mansion with such force that the walls themselves seemed to buckle before disintegrating. A concussive wave ripped through corridors, flinging doors from hinges and scattering debris in all directions. Heat flooded the air, thick with burning wood and fractured mana.

  Dravien’s head snapped toward the source instantly.

  In the heat of the moment Argus had forgotten the possibility of other assassins.

  Dravien was already moving.

  Vaeron stumbled once before regaining balance, heart racing as smoke poured down the hallway in choking waves. Shattered glass crunched beneath their boots as they reached the rear corridor and burst into the open courtyard.

  The gardens were gone.

  Where once there had been trimmed hedges and carefully tended earth now stood a crater of broken stone and splintered trees. Flames licked upward from scattered debris while currents of unstable mana twisted violently across the air.

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  Four figures stood amid the destruction.

  Two cloaked in deep crimson accents, blood magic swirling faintly around their wrists. One whose palms burned with controlled orange flame. And another whose very stance bent the wind subtly around him.

  Opposite them stood Argus’s mother and the elven woman who had once greeted him warmly in the courtyard days ago.

  They were losing.

  Because they lacked strength, and because they were being systematically suppressed.

  Metal circlets etched with layered violet runes glowed faintly on the attackers’ brows. Each time lightning formed around his mother’s hands or wind gathered at the elf’s fingertips, the mana flickered unnaturally before destabilizing. Spells formed slower. Constructs trembled. Elemental control was being disrupted at its foundation.

  Vaeron felt it instantly as well.

  “They’re using relics,” he muttered, disbelief and fury tightening his voice.

  A blood spear launched across the battlefield, forcing his mother to twist sideways while deflecting an incoming arc of flame. The elf attempted to form a cutting gale, but the wind thinned before fully condensing, allowing the flame caster to press closer than she should have been able to.

  Then his mother saw them. Her gaze locked on Argus and for the first time in recent years, actual emotion showed on her face

  “Run!” she shouted.

  It was not a command born of authority.

  It was fear, fear for Argus and Vaeron.

  Now her expression stripped itself of restraint. No calculation lingered there. No measured distance. Only desperate, unmistakable care.

  Argus didn’t know whether Dravien saw it or not but regardless the The Demon Lord entered the battlefield.

  It did not quiet, yet something shifted as he entered it. The mana in the air reacted to him differently than it did to the others. It did not resist him. It did not destabilize.

  It parted.

  A blood spear formed in the hand of one of the assassins and launched toward the elf’s heart while her attention was divided between flame and wind.

  Dravien intercepted it mid-flight, one second standing beside Vaeron and the next helping the elf.

  His fingers closed around the construct as if it were solid steel rather than shaped blood. The surface trembled under his grip before liquefying harmlessly and dripping between his knuckles.

  The elf collapsed behind him from mana exhaustion, unconscious but alive.

  Dravien examined the blood in his palm thoughtfully before looking at its caster.

  “Why don’t we fight in your desired element? You may learn a thing or two if you survive” he said, voice cold and mirthless carrying easily over the roar of the elements

  The blood on the ground responded before the assassin could.

  It rose slowly, spiraling upward around Dravien’s wrist in smooth crimson ribbons.

  The blood wielder frowned sharply.

  His relic pulsed.

  It should have interfered.

  He cast again, forcing a disruption wave outward.

  Nothing happened.

  Confusion flickered across his face, quickly replaced by unease.

  Dravien moved his fingers slightly.

  The assassin stiffened.

  A dull ache formed beneath his ribs.

  Then it sharpened.

  “You are manipulating external matter,” Dravien said evenly, as if offering instruction. “You neglect the source.”

  The assassin staggered.

  But his realization dawned too late.

  Dravien closed his hand gently.

  The pressure inside the man’s body surged inward, compressing organs that had never been meant to be controlled. There was no theatrical display, no exaggerated explosion. The body convulsed once before collapsing inward violently, bursting outward in a contained red bloom that left nothing but blood spattered across broken stone.

  The second blood wielder attacked immediately, desperation overriding discipline. A curved shortsword appeared in his hands.

  Dravien stepped inside the arc of the strike and formed a thin edge from hardened blood, the movement was done inside the spave of a second. He drew the thin blade cleanly across the man’s throat. The assassin dropped without ceremony.

  Behind them, the flame and wind users faltered.

  Dravien’s gaze shifted to the relic pulsing faintly on the remaining blood wielder’s brow. A narrow thread of blood shot upward from the ground and pierced the metal casing with surgical precision. The runes flickered violently before shattering into fragments.

  The oppressive distortion in the air vanished.

  Lightning stabilized instantly in his mother’s hands no longer faltering like earlier. It stabbed the heart of the flame elemental, unprepared for the sudden concentrated attack. His eyes went wide with confusion a second before his expression went slack.

  The wind user, who had been pressing her moments earlier, saw his allies dead and his relic destroyed. His eyes narrowed on Argus before looking at Vaeron and his mother.

  There is no way he would continue fighting now. His partners are dead, his relic destroyed. As if on cue the assassin raised his hand.

  He raised his hands slowly. “Please, don’t kill me, please”. Desperation and panic lined his voice while a thin strand of unease crept up on Argus

  “Why should we?”, his mother demanded. Fury and tension lined her words.

  “B-because I will tell you everything about us, everything. I will be more useful to you alive”. The assassin pleaded.

  “We can get the same information tortured, out of you. I don’t forgive anyone who attacks my family”. She said preparing for a strike.

  “No wait, I am being blackmailed into working. Please just give me a chance, you may even kill me afterwords. Just please hear me out!”

  She stopped, hesitation clear in her body. “Maybe I can hear you out, but first we will have to bind you.” She shifted her attention to Vaeron. “Vaeron go get the suppression devices”.

  Vaeron quickly went running off.

  The assassin’s face showed relief mixed with a little bit of something else. Was it satisfaction? Argus noticed he had one hand clenched firmly on top of his forearm. It looked like an injury if not for the faint magical pulses coming off it. He panicked as he realized what the assassin’s intention was.

  “Thank you so much, I am forever in your—

  Even as he spoke, wind compressed invisibly at his fingertips, gathering into a narrow spear.

  He wanted to scream out for his mother but his body wasn’t under his control.

  The assassin flicked his thumb, Argus saw the small spear clearly now. It was embedded in enough mana to kill her easily.

  It shot from his hand but instead of his mother, it flew towards Argus.

  The spear crossed the distance in less than a blink, aiming straight for his head.

  Before it reached him Dravien caught it between two fingers and studied the spinning construct with faint amusement.

  Then casually he flicked his fingers lauching it back.

  The compressed wind pierced the assassin’s skull cleanly. The body fell before it fully understood it had died.

  Silence settled across the courtyard in uneven layers.

  Smoke drifted upward.

  Flames thinned.

  Dravien’s mother lowered her lightning slowly, her breathing uneven.

  Her gaze moved from the corpses to her son.

  There was no anger there.

  Only fear, it consumed her features until it was all that remained while confusion slowly melded into her. Her body shivered, sweat crawling down her head as she stood, favoring her right leg.

  She looked at him as not her child, but someone else. The sight hurt Argus more than her previous attitudes. At least she had recognized him as her son, but now Argus wasn’t sure whether she would ever look at him the same way.

  His heart ached, as fear and sorrow overwhelmed him.

  Dravien, however, met her gaze calmly, blood drying across his sleeves.

  For the first time since in his life, she did not see a son.

  She saw something else. Something that didn’t make sense and something she didn’t understand.