The Villain Professor's Second Chance-Chapter 733: Shadows at Ironleaf (2)

"Only if necessary," he reminded. "Noise is currency. Spend it when profit outweighs cost."

She gave a thin smile—half admiration, half frustration at his constant calculus—and melted into the treeline.

Draven knelt, boots sinking into damp earth. He unslung a small chisel of night-black iron and traced a looping rune across the sole of one boot, the tip leaving gentle sparks that died soundlessly. The rune's curve absorbed ambient vibration; once sealed, every footfall would register no louder than falling dust. He repeated the pattern on the other boot, then pressed both soles firmly into soil to ground the magic. A hush settled, eerie even to him; cicada buzz muted, branch creaks dulled, as though his presence swallowed sound.

Next came the wraiths. He angled a wrist and let a single drop of necromantic essence bead at his gauntlet's lip. The indigo fluid steamed on contact with air, coiling upward into a spiral. In that vapour he whispered an old military cadence—three clipped syllables used in the Third Dusk War to awaken sleeper spies. The vapour trembled, split, and birthed two shadow forms: lean, long-limbed, faces blank save for suggestion of eye hollows. They hovered at calf level, ready.

"You'll handle the perimeter," he told them, voice quiet but edged. The wraiths inclined intangible heads, then dissolved until only a shimmer betrayed their movement along the contour of the wall.

He rose and faced the Goblin King. "Draw them eastward. Give them chaos, but hold nothing permanently. We need confusion, not siege."

"Understood, Master." The monarch's helm tilted, and green fire flared hotter in the sockets. He hefted the cleaver as though it weighed no more than a branch.

"Go," Draven said.

The undead giant bounded away, each step unnaturally silent until he left the ward of Draven's runes. Then the forest shook. Trees groaned, birds exploded from branches, and in the next breath a thunderclap of splintering timber rang out as the Goblin King slammed through Ironleaf's eastern barricade. Screams followed—sharp human shrieks, snarls of the brimstone hounds, the clangor of alarm bells.

Draven's mouth flattened in satisfaction. Eyes on the fortress's west flank, he dashed forward, covering ground in rapid, low strides. At the service grate vines parted for him, as if the weeds sensed promise of release. He slipped a thin dirk between iron bars, popped a rusted catch, then eased the grate inward. Cold air breathed from the tunnel beyond—rank with mold and slave sweat. He disappeared inside, sliding the grate silently closed.

Darkness should have slowed him, yet his pupils adjusted instantly, absorbing stray rune-glow seeping through ceiling vents. The tunnel curved, walls reinforced with ironwood ribs. He tracked the faint boom of combat beyond—each impact a point on an internal map showing him exactly where the Goblin King had pushed the defenders.

A lone torch sputtered ahead. Two guards flanked it, blades drawn, eyes darting toward the chaos outside. Draven advanced, steps muffled to nothing. At two sword-lengths he launched: right hand clamped one guard's mouth, left blade slipped between vertebrae. The man sagged without sound. Before his partner turned, Draven pivoted; a shallow cut parted the second guard's hamstring. The man buckled, throat convulsing for a scream that never gained breath—Draven's forearm closed windpipe fast as a trap. He eased both bodies down, wiping blade on a cloak.

The wraiths drifted past, talon-fingers beckoning him onward.

A stairway spiraled upward, terminating at a narrow door. He pressed ear to oak. Muffled voices—three, maybe four, speaking Low Valari with mercenary accents. Dice clattered; men inside gambled, unaware the world outside unraveled. Draven's eyes half-closed, calculating echo chamber within, floor-board creaks, line of sight from threshold. He flicked two ring-knives from his belt, touched each to the runes on his gauntlet to charge them with silence, then nudged the door.

Hinges failed to squeal—he'd marked their pins with null-rune dust earlier this week during reconnaissance. The gap widened; firelight spilled over his boots. He ghosted in. Dice froze mid-bounce as their owners sensed movement. Too late. One ring-knife spun, edge-first, catching nearest man at carotid. Second knife placed itself neatly in another's right eye. Draven flowed after the blades: a thrust under rib here, a pommel crack against temple there. Four exhalations later, the room quieted save for dice settling on stained wood.

He crossed to a slat window that overlooked the slave yard. Rows of cages lined a trench, each cage humming with suppression sigils that pulsed a dirty yellow. Elves inside crouched listlessly. Chains ran from cage rows into the low stone annex known as the Chain Sigil Chamber. Good—layout matched the records he'd stolen.

He descended, keeping to untouched corridors. Twice he spotted squads racing eastward—crossbows, spears, a mage with smoldering gauntlets. He flattened against alcoves, shadows masking the brief flicker of rune-glow at his eyes. When footsteps faded, he continued.

At last the annex door loomed—black basalt inscribed with nine concentric runic rings. Some villainous artificer had taken pride in intimidation. Draven's fingers probed each ring, feeling for a slight warmth where mana current flowed. He found it, then pressed a sigil on his palm to the coolest point—the circuit breaker. Heat rushed under skin as his rune leeched energy from the lock. Metal whined. The rings rotated with sluggish protest, then clicked open.

Inside, blue-green luminance bathed everything in watery light. Chains as thick as a man's arm hung from rafter hooks, weight enough to bow ironwood beams. Every link gleamed with etched runes—glyphs of subjugation, pain, submission. The magic vibrated like a hive of hornets.

Draven strode beneath the hanging forest of iron, boots silent on stone. Each chain anchored into the floor through a sigil plate, dozens converging into a single weave that threaded into the far wall—an umbilicus feeding suppression back to the cages. He crouched, tracing a selected plate with two fingers. Junction unstable, he noted; the artisan had misaligned the ward-compass by a fraction of a degree. Imperfection became opportunity.

From his coat he drew twin stilettos, slim and blackened to swallow light. Along their flat sides glimmered necro-null lines—enchantments designed not to break magic but to absorb it, turning the sigil's force inward until it shattered. He placed one blade at the junction's heart. The metal quivered, hungry. A low shimmer crawled from link to link as the rune network sensed intrusion. He placed the second blade three plates away, completing a triangulation.

A breath. He tapped both hilts simultaneously. A deep chord reverberated, like a bell toll struck underwater. The chains between the blades lit, then darkened as sigils winked out, one after another, eaten by void energy. Links frosted, cracked, and snapped. The sound was curiously gentle—like icicles falling.

A tremor rippled through the annex. Distant, muffled gasps echoed from the trench outside: elves feeling shackles loosen. Not a full break—only a sliver, as planned. Enough to seed rumors of failing wards, bait for future negotiation.

Draven retrieved the blades, sheathing them before residual charge could scorch leather. Already crystal filaments of shattered sigil dust settled across the floor, sparkling like false snow.

A roar thundered from the keep's eastern flank—the Goblin King, reveling in carnage. Perfect timing: defenders' eyes would be elsewhere.

Draven slipped from the chamber into a torch-lit corridor that smelled of lamp oil and fear. A trio of slavers barreled toward him, armor half-buckled, faces ruddy with exertion.

"Out of the way, wretch!" the lead man barked, seeing only a lone cloaked figure.

Draven's reply was silence. He pivoted, sidestepping the first man's shoulder charge. His right blade whispered from sheath, tracing a clean curve across the slaver's exposed throat. Blood fountained, spraying the stone.

The second slaver drew a serrated cutlass. Draven advanced, parrying with minimal motion—steel kissed steel, rang once. He rolled his wrist, disengaging, and stabbed under the man's jaw. The cutlass clattered from limp fingers.

The third, a stout overseer clutching a rune-rod, hesitated just long enough for a wraith to materialize behind him. Shadow claws pierced mail, rooting him in place while Draven stepped in and slid a dagger between ribs. A shudder, then stillness.

Necromantic whispers curled from Draven's lips—soft, coaxing. The dying men's souls faltered, tangled in the magic, then sank into oblivion. Bodies collapsed, armor rattling like dice in a cup, then fell silent.

Draven left the chamber, blades drawn, stalking silently toward the central barracks where the slave masters scrambled to organize resistance. He dispatched them efficiently—a slash through one throat, a precise strike into another's heart. Necromantic whispers paralyzed their souls, their bodies crumbling under the weight of dark magic.