Shin knew exactly what he was doing. He and his newfound friend, Yuri, kept a close eye on the fox-kin to ensure she was well taken care of.
Invitations from Guild Master Davis arrived frequently, requesting a meeting, but Shin, with careful thought, refused each one. However, the messages never stopped.
Every morning, a new summons arrived, and every evening, another reminder followed. The persistence was infuriating. It was as if they expected him to abandon his patient just to satisfy their curiosity.
One afternoon, as he returned from a hunt, another messenger awaited him at the Guild entrance. The boy, barely more than a page, handed him a neatly folded parchment with the Guild Master's seal pressed into the wax.
"Another one?" Shin muttered, exhaling sharply. He barely looked at it before stuffing it into his pocket, unopened.
The messenger hesitated. "Sir, Guild Master Davis was insistent. He requests your presence at once."
Shin clenched his jaw. "And my answer is the same as before. Until she wakes up, I have nothing to report."
"But sir—"
"Enough," Shin snapped, rubbing his temples. "How many times do I have to say it? I'm not going anywhere."
The boy paled, nodded quickly, and scurried away, leaving Shin standing in the entrance, scowling. He could feel the pressure mounting, the expectation that he would eventually cave in. But he wouldn't. Not yet.
As he turned away, his mind worked through the Guild Master's insistence. Davis was no fool. He knew something. The man had been pulling strings behind the scenes, keeping Shin alive when the Crown wanted him dead.
That protection wasn't without a price. But what did the Guild Master want? Information? Leverage? Perhaps both. The Guild Master wouldn't risk sheltering him unless he saw an advantage in doing so. Shin needed to be careful.
Grumbling under his breath, he made his way inside, determined to ignore the next summons for as long as possible.
In the meantime, he meticulously documented everything, writing the events in detail before compiling them into parchment and storing them safely in his orb. He knew that when the time came, he needed to present the facts accurately to the Guild Master.
While waiting, Shin took on small jobs, slaying monster mobs outside the city, collecting rare materials from dangerous locations, and completing tasks most found tedious. He did it not just for money but to slowly rebuild his reputation.
His failure to protect the Lichtenstein family had been a public humiliation. Many knew of his involvement, and though the Crown wanted his head, Guild Master Davis insisted on meeting with him first.
The Guild Master knew the truth, that it was his order that sealed the Lichtensteins' fate. The Crown, however, remained ignorant.
During the nights, Yuri took responsibility for keeping the fox-kin clean and changing her clothes. Laverna, however, was not merely sleeping; she was trapped within a labyrinth of dreams, memories, and hallucinations, caught between life and death.
Shadows plagued Laverna's mind. At times, she found herself wandering through endless corridors of her past, reliving moments of captivity, hearing the screams of those she had failed to save.
Other times, she stood in the ruins of her childhood home, watching as the ghosts of her family reached out for her, only to vanish the moment she tried to touch them. Voices whispered, some familiar, some foreign, and all of them called her name.
The warmth of her mother's embrace teased her senses, only to be replaced by the cold grip of chains pulling her back into the abyss. It was in these moments that she would shiver and whimper in her sleep, her body wracked with tension even as she lay unconscious.
Some nights, she felt herself drowning, unable to breathe as the weight of unseen hands dragged her beneath dark waters. She fought, clawed at the surface, only for the water to twist into chains, yanking her back into her nightmares.
There were moments she could feel something... warmth, a soft touch wiping away the sweat on her brow, the scent of something familiar but unplaceable. It wasn't cold. It wasn't cruel. It lingered, almost protective, but her mind refused to believe in comfort.
One evening, as Yuri gently wiped the girl down, her gaze landed on something peculiar. Centered low on the fox-kin's abdomen, below the navel, just above the pelvis, a crest pulsed faintly. The strange marking was unlike anything she had seen before, but one thing was certain: it was magic.
There was something about it that felt binding, something ancient, yet its full meaning remained elusive. Her immediate suspicion fell on Shin. Confronting him, she demanded an explanation.
"Shin, what exactly did you do to her?" Yuri's voice cut through the room like a blade, sharp and accusing. Her eyes burned with fury as she stormed toward him, fists clenched. "You owe me an explanation, and I won't take silence for an answer."
Shin, who had been sharpening his blade, froze mid-motion. His grip tightened around the hilt before he let out a slow breath, lowering the whetstone and transforming his katana back to an orb. "I see… so that's where it was," he muttered, rubbing his forehead as if trying to ward off an impending headache.
Yuri's nostrils flared. "So you DID do something to her." She took another step forward, her presence radiating an almost protective aggression. "Out with it, Shin. What the hell did you do?"
Shin shifted uncomfortably, his gaze flicking to the side. "It's complicated," he muttered.
"Complicated?!" Yuri's voice rose. "She's unconscious, vulnerable, and she has a magical mark on her body! Do you have any idea how bad that looks? If you did something to her without her consent—"
"I didn't," Shin interrupted, his voice low but firm. "I wouldn't."
Yuri inhaled sharply, forcing herself to reel in her anger. She was still furious, but she needed answers. "Then explain. Now."
Realizing there was no avoiding it, he exhaled sharply. "Please, don't tell a soul."
She nodded, though her expression remained unreadable. There was still distrust in her eyes, but beneath it, a desperate need to understand.
Taking a deep breath, Shin hesitated. "I'm sharing my mana with her through... uh…" He trailed off, suddenly finding the floor very interesting. He could already feel Yuri's intense stare drilling into him.
"Through what?" she pressed, her arms still crossed, her patience thinning.
Shin swallowed hard, feeling the heat creeping up his neck. He fumbled over his words, trying to find a better way to phrase it, but ultimately, he gave up and blurted out in quick succession, "We're sharing mana through a slave crest."
The words hung in the air like a thunderclap.
Silence.
Yuri's expression shattered, eyes widening in horror. "You… WHAT?!"
Shin held up a hand before she could lash out further. "It was the only way to save her," he said, his voice steady despite the tension in the air. "She was on the brink. Without a stable flow of mana, her body would've shut down."
Yuri's hands balled into fists at her sides. "So you branded her like a slave?! How could you make that decision for her?"
"Because there was no other choice," Shin answered without hesitation. "It was either this or let her die. And I chose to keep her alive."
Yuri seethed, her breath ragged. Her first instinct was to keep yelling, to condemn him for daring to do such a thing. But then, as the initial fury settled, her mind kicked into gear.
She stared at him hard, searching his face for any sign of deceit.
"You could've found another way," she accused, though the sharpness had dulled. "You should've—"
"There was no time," Shin cut in. "Believe me, if I had any other option, I would've taken it. But right now, she's alive, and that's what matters."
Yuri exhaled sharply, pinching the bridge of her nose. "And what happens now? Are you just going to keep it on her? Control her like some tool?"
Shin shook his head. "Once she fully recovers, I'll remove it. Until then, it's keeping her tethered to life."
Yuri narrowed her eyes, still brimming with skepticism, but she found herself wavering. Her heart told her to keep fighting, to keep resisting, but her logic whispered that maybe—just maybe—Shin was telling the truth.
But before she could say another word, Laverna stirred, her eyelids fluttering as though caught between wakefulness and a dream. A sharp gasp escaped her lips, her body tensing, fingers weakly clawing at the sheets.
Her breathing came in ragged, uneven bursts, and then, with half-lidded, panicked eyes, she choked out a single word:
"No—!"