“And then she just left me like that.”
Damian acts like a man with a broken heart, recounting the end of his brief relationship with Nichole.
Inside an enclosed room lit by two torches mounted on the walls, Cedric and Liam listen to the “heartbreaking” tale. Cedric looks enthusiastic, while Liam wears a bored expression, not caring in the slightest.
“Damn it, I didn’t expect you’d actually manage to sleep with her.” Cedric responds, speaking exactly what’s on his wild mind.
“It’s just the fate of a man like me.” Damian strikes a mock-resigned pose. “She seems like your type—slim and aggressive!”
“B*stard! If sacrificing a human could let me turn back time, I’d offer your head.”
“Haha! Go ahead and try, kid!” Damian mocks him.
Once again, Liam is stuck sitting quietly on a wooden chair, caught between two playboys eagerly talking about women.
Fortunately, Damian soon shifts the topic.
“Oi, Liam. What kind of trouble did you cause this time? Why are Cranoa mages after you?”
Liam frowns in confusion at the baseless accusation.
“Do you think that in the three years since graduating from the academy, I’ve been plotting a war against Cranoa?”
“If it were you, anything could happen.” The remark sounds like praise wrapped in sarcasm.
Liam has no interest in continuing the pointless debate. Meanwhile, Cedric joins in analyzing the situation.
“After assassins, then Cranoa mages. What’s next, a horde of monsters?”
“Aha. Exactly!” Damian snaps his fingers at once. “Next, you’ll be passing through the border forest—the nesting ground of monster packs.”
Cedric’s face loses all enthusiasm right away. “Seriously? Hey, Prince, I want a raise.”
Liam lets out a heavy sigh. The two shallow-minded men in the room truly test his patience.
Their commotion ends when they hear the sound of chains moving. The leader of the Cranoa mage group—captured and dragged away by Liam from Nichole’s house—is now shackled to the wall of the detention room. He has just regained consciousness.
Damian smiles dangerously. “Our VIP guest is awake.”
He steps closer with a chilling grin. “How was your sleep? Comfortable? I deliberately didn’t wake you—after all, that might be the last good sleep you ever get.”
The newly awakened mage leader immediately grows anxious as he realizes he’s been captured and restrained. Now he’s facing fierce-looking military personnel who seem ready to execute him.
“Y-you… who are you?! How dare you—!”
The Cranoa mage tries to conjure a sphere of dark power in the palm of his shackled right hand.
JAB!
A small, sharp knife strikes first, piercing straight through that palm.
“AAAAAAGH!!” The mage screams in agony—but no one feels any pity for him.
“Try to use dark power one more time, and you’ll lose both of your arms.” The military commander’s threat is not one to be ignored.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
The Cranoa mage now wears a terrified expression, struggling to endure the pain.
“You’re proven to have attempted to assassinate the Third Prince of Argoust. That’s a major crime. Who gave you the order?”
The mage looks confused when he hears the words, “attempted… assassination…?”
“He’s still alive, you idiot!”
Damian shifts his stance slightly, allowing the mage to clearly see Liam, who has been hidden behind Damian’s large frame all this time. The mage’s mouth falls wide open, stunned—he had been absolutely certain that Liam was dead.
“H-how… how is he still alive?!”
“At least hire subordinates smarter than you,” Damian grumbles.
“You tricked me!!”
“He’s the one getting angry now,” Cedric says in disbelief.
Liam tired of waiting. “Damian, can you make him talk faster?”
Damian bows politely toward him. “Of course, Your Highness.”
But in the next instant, his demeanor shifts drastically—he straightens up, plants his hands on his hips, and wears an arrogantly fierce expression. “Hah! Do you think this is Argoust? How dare you order me around!”
What a weirdo, Liam and Cedric think in unison.
Damian’s grim expression turns back to the Cranoa mage.
“Hey, you. I’ll get bored too if this drags on with pointless talk. You’d better start talking, because…”
Damian moves both of his palms. Shadows of small objects begin to materialize, floating in front of the Cranoa mage, making his eyes widen in overwhelming fear that surges instantly.
“I have hundreds of nails ready to be driven into your body.” Damian smiles dangerously as he conjures hundreds of sharp-tipped iron spikes, poised to be embedded all over the mage’s body.
“AAAAAAAAAGGH!!”
The Cranoa mage’s scream echoes far louder than before. Cedric shudders, goosebumps rising all over his body. He can’t help but admit Damian’s words back at the restaurant were true—he’s lucky he met Liam first instead of this terrifying military man.
“What is that man’s power?” Cedric asks.
Liam remains seated calmly, watching the interrogation with an expressionless face.
“Metal mastery. The highest form of earth-element control—and it’s extremely rare for an earth mage to reach that level, even after decades of training.”
In other words, Damian Zelnoir is a genius battlemage who manages to achieve metal mastery at a young age. Cedric has now encountered two of Lutzer Swan’s disciples, both wielding terrifying power.
“Don’t tell me the Verlyn Academy is full of people like them.”
That thought begins to shake Cedric’s intention to burn down the academy.
“I’ll talk! I’ll talk!!” The Cranoa mage finally breaks, his voice already hoarse from nonstop screaming. Blood pours from several parts of his body where the nails are embedded.
Damian looks disappointed instead. “Huh? That’s only the eighth nail. There are still 392 left.”
“E-enough! Jorey Alcain! My leader’s name is Jorey Alcain! He’s the one who gave me the order!” the Cranoa mage gasps out, struggling for breath.
Damian frowns in confusion. “Who is Jorey Alcain?” He glances at Liam behind him. “Do you recognize that name?”
Liam shrugs—he doesn’t know it either.
“He’s also a Cranoa mage—an envoy directly sent by His Majesty Zephyer Ortes for a mission,” the mage hastily adds, speaking more before another threat comes.
“Zephyer Ortes, the King of Cranoa.” Liam knows that name—so does Cedric.
“What mission did he bring?” Damian asks.
“I don’t know—”
Damian narrows his eyes. Three nails pierce into the Cranoa mage’s body. He screams in agony once more. Damian looks fed up.
“Do you think I’m some trainee here? You’re clearly lying!”
“The Crown Prince of Argoust! Lord Jorey wants to cooperate with the Crown Prince of Argoust!”
Only then does that information change the expressions on Liam’s and Damian’s faces, bringing a tense atmosphere to the room.
“What kind of cooperation?”
“I swear, I really don’t know. That’s a secret among Cranoa’s higher-ups.” This time, the mage doesn’t seem to be lying.
Damian dispels all the nails and walks over to Liam.
“What kind of cooperation do you think it is?” Damian asks, his face serious.
“I’m thinking about it too,” Liam replies.
“This can’t be dismissed as a trivial matter. If the Crown Prince of Argoust agrees to cooperate with the Cranoa mages, it would represent Argoust taking Cranoa’s side—taking Demanthes’ side.”
Liam lets out a heavy sigh. “Oh, Theofan. His foolishness this time will bring disaster upon Argoust. Once I return to Argoust, I’ll investigate this matter immediately.”
“Yes, you must act quickly. Most of Argoust’s mage soldiers were once students at the Verlyn Academy as well. I don’t want to end up fighting former academy comrades.” Damian emphasizes the point strongly.
Liam understands. None of them want such a disaster to ever become reality.
Liam rises and steps toward the Cranoa mage, who is already exhausted from the interrogation.
“Jorey Alcain—what does he look like?”
The restrained mage seems to have completely given up on lying.
“His eyes are sharp and crimson… part of his left cheek is covered in scales like a snake’s skin, and… he’s a vampire.”
Liam’s eyes widen in shock. One of the memories etched in his mind shows a figure exactly like that.
“The one who bestowed the full-moon curse.”
