Chapter 58: The Grand Duke Goes Underground (3)

My sword cut through the darkness wearing a child’s mask.

That sounded poetic, but unfortunately, it was also literal.

The golden arc of aura tore across the old chamber with enough force to split the damp air. The creature shrieked as the blade met its body, not with the resistance of flesh, nor the brittle crack of bone, but with something far more unpleasant.

It felt like cutting through wet parchment stuffed with unidentifiable things.

It felt disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.

Whoever designed this thing deserved condemnation for the offensive texture alone.

The creature’s upper body split from shoulder to waist, spilling not blood but black water. It splattered across the stone floor, hissing the moment it touched my aura. Several voices burst from the liquid, layered and overlapping until the chamber seemed filled with children calling from the bottom of a well.

It was utterly unsettling.

"Mother."

"Brother."

"It hurts."

"Where is the door?"

"Do not answer."

That last voice sounded too clear, with obvious awareness.

My eyes narrowed.

The creature staggered backward, though staggered was not the right word. Its limbs twisted as if pulled by invisible strings, and the porcelain mask cracked further. Beneath the broken surface, I saw nothing but a depthless dark, and within that dark, a hundred pale specks opened like eyes.

The shadows behind me tightened their formation around Perrin.

Good. At least my people had sense.

"Your Excellency," one of them said, voice restrained. "The exits remain sealed."

"I noticed."

"The water is rising."

"I also noticed that."

The black water had already covered the soles of my boots. It crawled along the carved channels on the floor, filling each line of the old ward with deliberate purpose. As it spread, the symbols carved into the chamber began to glow one by one.

Not bright.

Not holy.

Not even magical in the ordinary sense.

It was the dim, sickly gleam of something pretending to remember what light looked like.

How distasteful.

If one intended to perform sinister rituals, the least one could do was maintain visual standards. Ambience mattered a lot. Even villainy required aesthetics. In fact, it should be a requirement.

The creature lifted its remaining hand and pointed at me.

"Wish-bearer."

I sighed.

"I am becoming increasingly offended by that title."

"Blood that opens. Blood that feeds. Blood that grants."

Ah.

Is that why it reacted to me?

Not just because of the Konstantin bloodline alone, then. Something in my current existence, perhaps the vow Abi had forced upon me, perhaps the Jinn name he bestowed, perhaps that absurd title Aashadhar, perhaps even that blood seal that caused me to begot an unexpected son, which had brushed against whatever ancient mechanism this thing belonged to.

I contemplated if I should be pissed.

I had freed one ancient being and now every underground basin with social problems thought it could speak to me.

This was why helping people was dangerous.

It created referrals. And an endless list of inconveniences.

The creature jerked forward.

This time, I did not wait for it to reach me. I stepped to the side and cut upward, severing its elongated hand at the wrist. The detached fingers writhed as they fell into the water. Each one split open at the tip, revealing tiny mouths.

I stared.

For a breath, I genuinely regretted having eyes.

Then the mouths began to sing.

A thin melody rose, sharper than before, and the ward on the floor pulsed in response. The black water surged toward Perrin and the shadows protecting him.

"Move," I ordered.

The two shadows dragged the unconscious man away from the nearest channel. The water followed, bending like a hound that had caught a scent.

I clicked my tongue.

Of course it would not be easy.

When was anything ever easy since I left Sonomi?

I lifted my left hand and released a thin thread of aura into the floor. It darted through the glowing channels like a golden needle, cutting across the ward lines without breaking them entirely.

The trick was delicate. Too much force and the entire chamber might collapse. Too little and the ward would continue feeding whatever creature was connected to the basin.

As an archeologist in my previous life, I had once spent countless hours reconstructing pottery fragments from ruins. As a swordmaster in this life, I could split a moving target in half at a distance.

The combination was unexpectedly useful.

Mother would probably call it a wasted talent.

Father would likely applaud and ask if I found a treasure.

I missed them very slightly at that moment. Only slightly.

The aura thread sliced through a junction mark near the second ring.

The water recoiled and the creature screamed. It was grating to the ears but it meant something good.

Pain meant it was connected. A connected enemy could be traced. A traced enemy could be found. And a found enemy could be ruined with the corresponding appropriate elegance.

The porcelain mask turned toward the cut ward line. Its broken head tilted, and for the first time, its movements lost that eerie fluidity.

"You cut."

"Yes. I do that quite often."

"Bad child."

I stilled.

The shadows also froze.

A sudden, ugly pressure settled over the chamber.

The creature’s voice had changed. It no longer sounded like many voices braided together. It sounded singular now.

Thin. Old. Soft in a way that made the skin crawl. Like an elder scolding a child. Or a priest correcting a sinner.

It felt like a hand closing over the back of a neck.

"Bad child," it repeated. "Children who cut the roots must be fed to the mouth."

My smile vanished.

I had heard many distasteful things in my life.

I’ve seen nobles boasting of wealth they barely possessed. Mages claiming superiority while relying on Sonomi devices to preserve their laboratories. Courtiers pretending patriotism while auctioning influence to the highest bidder.

This, however, was of a different class.

There were things one simply did not say. Certainly not in front of me. Especially after Spiro, after the ledgers, and after dozens of children had been dragged into tunnels where stones learned their names. Even villainy needs class.

My aura sharpened.

The black water nearest my boots evaporated.

"I see," I said calmly.

One of my shadows, who had served House Konstantin long enough to recognize danger when it wore my politest tone, took a cautious step back.

Wise man.

"Then allow me to educate you on something important."

The creature opened its cracked mask wider.

I vanished from where I stood.

The chamber split with light.

I appeared in front of the basin and drove my sword straight through the creature’s chest. The impact threw its distorted body backward, pinning it against the stone basin. Black water burst outward, but before it could scatter, my aura compressed around it in a cage of golden threads. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

The creature convulsed.

And the voices wailed.

I leaned closer.

"Do not call me child."

The mask shattered. Behind it was not a face. It was a hole.

A tunnel in miniature, descending into something far below the chamber. For a fraction of a second, I saw shapes moving down there. Rows of pale hands. Hanging talismans. A door made of black stone. And a symbol carved so deeply into its surface that it seemed more like a wound than a mark.

A circle. A line. And three cuts.

Then an eye opened beyond the door.

It didn’t seem physical, at least not entirely.

It felt like something vast and sleepy shifted its attention toward me.

Ah. That was bad.

Very bad.

The kind of bad that made sensible people retire early and devote themselves to gardening.

Unfortunately, I had no talent for gardening.

The eye looked at me.

The ring on my finger burned. Not the ring itself, perhaps, but the spatial mechanism inside it. More specifically, the vial of Vita’s Tears hidden within.

The creature pinned beneath my blade whispered with delight.

"Life. I feel life."

The black water surged upward.

This time, it did not go for Perrin.

It went straight for me.

The chamber roared. Water erupted from every channel, every crack, every ancient seam in the stone. It rose like a curtain, towering over me with countless tiny mouths forming along its surface.

The shadows shouted.

I heard one of them call my title.

I ignored them.

The water crashed down.

A violet light suddenly flashed.

For a moment, I thought Abi had disobeyed me and followed after all. It would have been typical. Annoying, yes, but typical. I was already prepared to scold him for his theatrical timing.

But the light did not come from Abi.

It came from my chest.

No. From the soul vow.

A thin violet line bloomed from somewhere within me and wrapped around my sword arm. It did not seize control or move me like a puppet. Instead, it settled over my aura like a second skin, strange and ancient and fiercely amused.

Abi’s voice rang in my head.

"Brother, you touched something filthy."

I nearly laughed.

Nearly.

Even from the estate, the damned Jinn still found a way to complain.

"I am aware," I thought back, though I had no idea whether the vow carried words both ways.

It apparently did.

"Do not let it bite your soul. I dislike sharing genealogy."

How touching.

Possessive, but touching.

The violet line tightened around my aura.

The black water hit and stopped.

Not against a wall but against pressure.

The kind of pressure I had first felt inside Abi’s pocket dimension. It was vast, immeasurable and unconcerned with the rules most beings accepted as absolute.

The water recoiled, with the mouths screaming.

I understood at once.