Niu sat down in a daze. The entire world seemed to be crumbling around her. She could barely even register she was sitting inside the town physician’s office.

Her memories of the last hour or so were vague, as if everything happened many, many years ago, or else as if it all just exploded in her face moments ago.

Gen had been attacked; that horrible fact she could remember much too vividly. The very thought nearly made her puke. She also remembered herself running back to the village. But starting there everything seemed to happen too slowly and too quickly at the same time.

She eventually somehow managed to get someone’s help. They found Gen barely holding onto his life. Someone ran to town ahead while they applied some basic treatment, and eventually carried him off to town, since they were better equipped to take care of him there despite the village being closer.

Niu couldn’t even remember the people involved in this, although she surely knew most of them. She herself just followed them, as if she was a simple observer of some event that had nothing to do with her. Except, that was wrong. It had too much to do with her, so she was overwhelmed. Since she was no longer crying, she must have run out of liquids in her body at some point.

She simply sat there, both head and heart throbbing in pain. Many people were shouting or running about into and out of the office. She hadn’t seen Gen ever since he was carried inside.

“…alright?”

Niu suddenly noticed someone was talking to her. Her head jumped to meet the gaze of Mr. Saburn.

“Niu?” he asked again, his expression wrought with worry.

She just nodded, not looking him in the eyes. Had he been there before, or had he just arrived? She had no idea. Still, his presence there did come as a relief to temporarily dim her sensory and emotional overload.

“I heard about what happened,” he spoke grimly. “It’s…” he stopped for a moment, then shook his head, “no, there’s no need to talk too much about that. I am sure you’re still in shock.”

Once again, Niu just nodded lazily. Even if she had her notebook, she didn’t feel like conversing right now.

“You don’t need to worry, though,” Saburn continued. “Genro’s going to be fine, the doctor said. Apparently, he even managed to stop his bleeding by using a makeshift bandage. Both of you were… very brave.”

Niu knew that she should feel relief. Even after something so horrible happened, Gen was going to make it out alright—most likely. However, even if that was true, it did nothing to erase what already happened. Also, Niu could feel something lurking there. Something still left unsaid.

Saburn sighed softly. “However, they are not quite certain how things will be, err, moving forward.” Niu gulped; she knew something was coming. “His broken leg will probably heal up just fine. But his arm…” Saburn’s face scrunched up in pain.

Niu had only taken brief glances at it, but Gen’s right arm was in a horrible state, having suffered most of the wolf’s wrath.

“…They’re probably going to have to cut it off,” Saburn finished.

Something cracked inside Niu’s heart.

Yet again she was being crushed by the immense guilt and sense of helplessness. In a way, that was even worse than him dying. The very thought was so unbearable that she started crying again. Ah, so some liquids still remained.

Saburn patted her shoulder for a while. At length he spoke again. “You should probably go home. I’ll have someone escort you back to the village.”

Go home? What for?

“Your parents will be worried, I’m sure,” he continued.

That was a lie; they would never be worried. Maybe they’d even be disappointed to hear that Niu wasn’t the victim of this incident. The only thing they’d be missing would be the money they received for letting Niu go to school.

Niu sank into the vicious whirlpool inside her mind yet again.

Gen, help me… please!

Niu begged in her heart, again and again. She needed someone to help her, just as it was during that awful day. She knew how horrible she was, asking Gen to be hurt for her sake again—she wasn’t worthy of any of it and yet he kept being friends with her. Even so she was still selfish to this day.

Yet nothing changed. She was still being taken away.

Of course. Gen was obviously not going to be able to save her, both physically and emotionally. She should’ve known that. This didn’t mean that she gave up, however. If she was going to be so selfish, she intended on seeing it through to the very end.

Roah… save me! She begged in her heart. Seele… TriX… please!

By now she could sense the way her ability activated. It most likely used the channel of communication to dispatch these messages. The fact she could seemingly connect to people who were far away was probably extraordinary, but that didn’t matter at all at the moment.

She repeated this process once more. But, as expected, nothing happened still.

The fairies were walking so leisurely it seemed like they weren’t even worried about getting caught. Was it completely hopeless, then? Were they taking such a secret underground path that no one would be even able to find?

If so, then Niu’s efforts were meaningless in the first place. Whether anyone received her messages or not, they wouldn’t know how to help her. There were no landmarks or ways to tell where she was headed. Why did she realize this only now?

Niu turned increasingly desperate. So desperate, in fact, that she next sent her message to an unexpected recipient.

Just let me go… please…

Boum twitched and stopped in place. It was hard judging by the faint light, but they seemed to be looking down at her limp form. Apparently they realized where that message came from.

“…Did you just talk me?” Boum asked silently.

Yes.

“This is incredible,” they continued, awestruck. “I thought that you…”

Let me go… I beg you…

Boum froze again until a few of the other fairies started talking and they engaged in a short conversation.

Boum chuckled. “Don’t worry. We will take good care of you.”

No…

Boum made no further response. In fact, they took out something—now she could see it was some sort of thorny flower—and pricked her skin again. Niu’s mind grew muddled, and the voice in her head was muffled.

It took a couple of months for Gen to come back to school.

Niu smiled very awkwardly as the entire class greeted him back. Truth be told, she went to visit him only once after what happened. He was nice to her and seemed to accept his condition, but seeing him like that crushed her and she couldn’t bring herself to come again.

She was still happy that he was alive and that he came back to school. He still had a cast on his leg and used a crutch but seemed otherwise healthy—except, of course, for the obvious empty space where his arm should have been.

Seeing that made her feel as if her heart was similarly ripped off. It took everything she had to feign calmness while she started sweating all over. Luckily, Gen’s seat was situated at such an angle that she didn’t have to look at him during the lessons.

“Now, settle down. You can talk to Genro after class,” said Mrs. Tammy, stopping the chatter around.

Niu tried focusing on the lesson, but found it increasingly difficult. When break came, she actually just rushed out of the class without even looking at Gen. She breathed slowly and deeply, glancing ever so often to see if Gen was coming out. At least he couldn’t run around with his classmates in his current condition.

“Is something wrong?”

She was startled by a voice coming from behind. Glaring at her was the gloomy visage of Roah. Thinking about it, he wasn’t there for first period. He probably came late, as he often did.

Niu shook her head, straining a smile. This, however, only caused Roah to narrow his eye.

“…Well, I guess there’s no reason for you to open up to me,” he said in a tone as if he was speaking more to himself than to her. “See you in the special class.” Without waiting for any response, he simply walked toward the school.

A chill momentarily assaulted Niu; she’d always felt as if Roah’s lone eye could somehow read her mind. Realistically, though, she was simply being that obvious. She thought she was fairly good at hiding her feelings, but she had been rather rattled by seeing Gen.

Thinking about it, did Roah understand Gen’s situation better? She didn’t know what happened to Roah's covered eye—she never spoke to him much, and that definitely wouldn’t rise up as a subject—but now she became more conscious of it.

While she was thinking the town’s bell rang thrice, indicating the end of the break. She rushed back into class.

Lessons continued like that for all day long. She avoided looking at Gen or interacting with him, though she saw Shaya talking to him quite a bit. On the other hand, he didn’t come to greet her either.

And so the day’s final lesson arrived. Just like she did the entire day, Niu immediately leapt out of class and ran toward the (former) supplies room used for her special lesson with Mr. Saburn. They were making progress on real channeling, so at least there was that to occupy her mind. Gen wouldn’t be there, either, which was also a plus.

Or so she thought.

“Good afternoon, Niu, Roah,” Saburn greeted them as he rolled inside, smiling as always. “Before we begin, I have an announcement to make—starting today, we will be having a new student in our special course. You may enter,” he said, turning to the side.

The boy entered the class as instructed. “Hi,” said Gen, waving his hand.

“Code 001! Code 002! Code 003! Damn, this is hopeless.”

Roah was in as much of a predicament as the others. He had been just returning to the table along with Seele when there was a sudden movement nearby and the area was covered in smoke.

Coughing, he had felt something large grab hold of him and rush away. His limbs had been restrained with strength he’d never felt before, not allowing him any movement. Even with all the chaos around he had managed to realize that a laborer was carrying him and that it wasn’t TriX.

Then there had been a bit of a panic as that laborer dashed toward the nearest window and jumped out of it. A sense of weightlessness was soon replaced with a heavy thud that had shaken his body to the core. The laborer had seemed unaffected and continued running.

Roah had recalled the likely culprit, having seen it during the Feast. While TriX looked humanoid, this particular laborer walked on two sets of legs and its body was stooped, much like some beast. That was probably what allowed it to dash so quickly away from the tree.

The presence of fairies was thin around the ground of Kalden, and it would probably take a bit of time for news of the attack to spread. Based on the fact he had been restrained Roah could more or less guess the goal of the attack, and he wasn’t going down without a fight.

Roah had actually taken along with him a few tools just in case something like this happened. Unfortunately, they were out of reach while he was being held like that, so he had to try something else.

“Code 005! Code 100! Code 101! Drop me!” he tried ordering but clicked his tongue, “…there are too many numbers to consider…”

It was relatively recently that Roah had discovered all laborers were governed by such codes. He even retroactively realized the very first instance where Seele had demonstrated this in front of them, back when he didn’t know the language well.

He thought he’d just try to give it a shot, but that was doomed to fail. There were too many different combinations and no guarantee as to the number of digits or even that this particular laborer worked this way. Though there was likely a standard system in place.

Just as Roah started to think of his next move, there were words in his head.

Roah… save me!

He was so shocked his mouth hung open. What he “heard” was not a “voice”, but it was something similar to it. Someone had just spoken directly to his mind. Even crazier than that was the fact that he knew who it was.

“Niu…?” he mumbled aloud. He tried craning his head, but there was only the background of trees and leaves flowing by quickly.

Roah… please…

How come he could tell it was Niu, anyway? That fact nearly baffled him more than the actual action itself. Then everything clicked inside him.

The rare phenomenon called compensation usually worked like this: it covered up for whatever was missing in a person. For Roah, it strengthened his single remaining eye. For Gen, it supplied him with a replacement arm. Niu had so far exhibited no such ability, but it made sense that it would give her the ability to communicate.

The timing was perhaps not that strange either. Roah himself took about a year to receive his compensation, while for Gen it only took about a month. He knew Niu was self-conscious about this, but perhaps she was simply a late bloomer.

Roah then started thinking. Consequently, he started laughing.

This was simply too good. Too damn good. The solution to so many of his troubles was lying under his nose all this time without his knowledge. It wasn’t direct, but everything immediately connected in his mind. How lucky was he to find the perfect answer like that?

However, right now the important thing was their current predicament. If he or Niu were taken away or killed it wouldn’t amount to anything. Regarding Niu he could probably do nothing but hope for the best, as much as it pained him. Instead, he focused on himself—what could he do?

“…What are you doing here?” asked Roah. His voice was calm but there was no mistaking the intense gaze that focused on Gen. Niu had actually never seen the two of them interact, but based on Gen’s expression at this remark perhaps they had some sort of bad history.

“Mr. Saburn has finally discovered my talent,” Gen explained, sounding excited. “I can channel too, now!”

Niu sat in a daze, wide-eyed. She had heard about this before from Mr. Saburn—obviously, since that was the reason for her and Roah being in the class in the first place. However, she never imagined that even Gen would be the same.

Because of her.

A wave of nausea and vertigo assaulted her and it took everything she had to remain calm.

“I hope you’ll help me catch up on the material,” Gen said to Niu as he sat in the one chair next to her. She nodded mechanically, barely registering her own actions.

Saburn nodded, rolled to the teacher’s desk and started the lesson as if everything was normal.

Niu was too conscious of Gen besides her to pay any attention to class. His figure was now perpetually in the corner of her eyes and he was as vocal in the special lesson as he was during normal class. Niu’s heart and mind ached.

“…explain to us why icons can be combined together, then?” she faintly heard Mr. Saburn’s voice. She was staring directly at him but seeing or hearing nothing, so she didn’t even realize he was addressing her until he directly said her name. “Niu?”

She snapped out of her reverie abashedly. Her mouth flapped open a few times, though of course she couldn’t say anything. Eventually she shook her head.

“…Please pay more attention in class, Niu,” Saburn said, scolding her. “What about you, Roah?”

“Our mind learns to recognize patterns, even complex ones, with sufficient exposure,” the boy replied, sounding bored. “Just like writing letters.”

“While that is true,” said Saburn, “it is the same way for lone icons that have complex functions. Just like how in ancient times our language was written with meaning-based symbols. Well, that’s a subject for your History classes, though. What about you, Gen? Have any idea?”

Niu’s faded attention pricked again as she heard the boy’s name.

“Err,” Gen was clearly flustered, this being his first class in the subject. “Because some things… make sense together?”

Saburn’s smile widened. “Great, Gen.”

“But that’s clearly what I was—“ Roah interjected.

“Roah, don’t interrupt,” Saburn scolded him and the boy closed his mouth, glaring at Gen who seemed smug about this result. “You were both correct but also wrong. The thing is that…”

Niu zoned out of the explanation again. Strangely, something about this situation eased her anxiety. Seeing Gen smile like that despite what happened to him was encouraging, perhaps. It didn’t serve to take her awful feelings away, but it might have lightened up the load ever so slightly.

Eventually the lesson ended.

“Should I escort you home?” Gen immediately came to ask Niu. She gazed at him, her body slightly shaking, and unsure how to react. She actually intended to run away once again, but Gen had gotten the jump on her.

I… Gen, I… I can’t, she thought.

“It’s fine, Niu,” he told her. His smile seemed to slightly change its essence as he did. “Please, I just want to… I want everything to be the same as it was."

Nothing would ever be the same as it was. Niu knew that, and she was sure that Gen knew that as well. However, she also knew fully well that she couldn’t keep living like this.

Niu took a deep breath, and then nodded with tears in her eyes.

Gen was breathing hard as he ran through the dark tunnel. He stopped with a start as he came to the end of it, or rather to a crossroads. There were two new tunnels extending in front of him—to the right and to the left.

He clicked his tongue in anger. Of course there was an entire system like this under Kalden—what else? If everything just went in a straight line, they would risk their pursuers simply catching up to them.

Was he really going to need to bet like this in order to rescue Shaya?

“Shaya? Shaya!” he shouted in another vain attempt. He knew that even in the best case it would alert the enemies to his location, but he was desperate anyway.

Surprisingly, though, he heard a distant yet clear echo.

“…en!”

Gen widened his eyes. Unless he was mistaken that was someone calling his name. He broke into a run, dashing into the right tunnel; he was pretty sure that voice came from there. Soon he could see a figure walking toward him, a relatively tall silhouette only barely visible in the limited lighting.

“Gen!” Shaya called again.

Her dress was in shambles and she was covered in scratches and bruises all over, but otherwise seemed fine. The moment she saw him she ran as hard as she could, finally throwing her body around him.

“Thank the Gods…” she mumbled quietly.

Gen was paralyzed for a moment, but then stroked her hair. “Yes… thank them,” he said as well, relief flooding his body. They stayed like that for a moment, and then separated. “Wait… what about those fairies?” There didn’t seem to be anyone behind Shaya.

“O-oh, I… it’s a long story,” she replied, her eyes darting all over the place. “Never mind that now! We have to… we need to go back and help the others!”

“…Right. I think I, err, heard Niu just before.” Seeing Shaya’s understandable confusion at this he added, “never mind that, let’s go back, yeah!”

They weren’t exactly safe themselves, either, but Gen clenched his fist. Even if they ran into other fairies, he would pound them and protect Shaya. He wasn’t about to give up so easily. He pulled her along.

“Slow down a bit,” she said quietly after a short while.

“O-oh. Sorry,” he apologized, letting go of her hand. He was so focused on getting out of there that he almost forgot about his very goal.

Suddenly shadows approached from ahead in the tunnel. Gen tensed up and readied to employ his ethereal arm just as a small group of fairies emerged. The fact that they wielded what looked to be chain-vines and kept charging at them indicated their goal.

“Stay behind me!” Gen yelled as he went on the offensive.

He evaded the chain launched by a fairy and punched them in the face. Without even watching them collapse he turned his arm to shield himself from another chain, but this allowed the third fairy to sneak nearby—until something bright appeared on their body and they raised a blood-curdling scream. They fell to the ground, raising faint smoke.

“What was…?” Gen stood there, wide-eyed. This nearly allowed the remaining fairy to grab him, except that they were suddenly flung forcefully against the nearby wall.

“A-are you okay?” asked Shaya, stepping ahead.

“Shaya, what…?” he looked at her questioningly and then behind her. Who had been helping them just now?

“Oh… umm. I’m sorry,” she said, her strained smile barely visible in the dark. “I’ve been hiding something from you. But I won't do it any longer.”

After Gen asked it of Niu, everything went back to… well, not quite normal, but close to normal enough. As she often did with many other things, Niu simply learned to bottle her feelings and keep going.

If there was one good thing that came out of that nightmare, it was that she ended up spending a lot more time with Gen as a result. She wondered if that his way of showing her that everything was alright between them, but never had the courage to ask.

Looking back, it was also probably a consequence of the class’s general attitude. She’d seen herself how people started talking about Gen behind his back—referring to him as a defect, now, as some of them did to Niu as well. Despite him having been so well-liked before, most of the students now turned their backs on him… These moments were also hard to bear.

He was quite a bit less involved with the rest of class than he’d used to be and it ironically pained her. Niu always thought of him an honest person who wore his heart on the sleeve, and yet she never heard him complain even once.

Still, Niu found some limited satisfaction in the new state of affairs. She hung out a lot with Gen and Shaya, and even Roah tagged along at times (to Gen’s obvious annoyance). There was the fire incident, but generally she found the gloomy boy less and less disturbing as time passed. She even thought that he might be a bit similar to her, after a certain event—but that was another story.

Even with all of the imperfections and so many things that Niu wished she could change, either in the future or in the past, life was once again sunny and bright. She… adapted.

If only it stayed that way.

Niu just closed her eyes and waited. She wasn’t strong like Gen or smart like Roah; she wasn’t even as kind as Shaya. She knew when there was nothing she could do. So she decided to yield herself to the flow.

If the Stroba wanted her, then let them have her. She was tired of resisting, of crying, of caring. Even if she discovered a new power, that power was not enough to bring true change. She was powerless.

The sounds of shouting woke her up from her self-pity. It was difficult seeing what was happening, but there were the unmistakable sounds of battle. Boum suddenly let her go and she fell to the ground. Her body aching, she squinted to try and see the action ahead.

There were cries of pain and at times dark liquid would splash on the ground. Niu shuddered and tried rising to her feet. Even if some forces from Kalden were fighting against the invaders, she didn’t want to stay anywhere near them.

Just as she tried getting up something shot at her. She thought it was a chain, but it was actually a vine that wrapped itself around her neck. Her breathing stopped… and then the vine slackened its grasp. She coughed.

“…So it was you,” said the familiar voice of Aisbroom. Their looming figure appeared nearby, the vine extending from their hand. After glancing at Niu they turned their head and shouted something. She could hear the sounds of hurried footsteps on the hard ground.

Aisbroom extended a hand to her. She was at first confused, but after a small hesitation reached her shaking hand as well. Aisbroom pulled and helped her stand up.

She felt a little dizzy and more than a little scared. Glancing around, she saw a few bodies strewn around and shuddered.

Had they killed all of them? Including Boum? Although they were enemies who tried capturing her, although she was scared to death while it was happening, she couldn’t feel happy at that.

Could she have somehow prevented this result? Could she have transmitted something to Boum to make them let her go and end this peacefully? Or thinking even further back—could she have done something, anything at all, to prevent this situation from happening in the first place?

Everything would have fine were she able to answer a firm “no” to herself. However, she felt that it wasn’t true. If she hadn't been scared of her own powers, for example, she might have asked for help at a much earlier stage. And there were undoubtedly countless other avenues of action that she wasn’t rational or calm enough to think about.

Niu was no stranger to regrets and thoughts about changing the past. Those were a constant part of her life. Now that the crisis was seemingly over and the numbing, mysterious substances coursing through her body were fading, she felt completely overwhelmed.

“…I will have some people take you back,” Aisbroom told her and immediately vanished into the darkness. She didn’t even have time to respond before a couple of armed fairies stood around her and pointed to the direction Niu had come from.

Wrapped up in her worries and insecurities, the walk back felt like it took many hours.

I really could have used Shaya's help right about now, Roah thought grimly.

With his heat stones out of reach there wasn't much he could do. Focus as he might, his efforts at iconless channeling weren't enough to even put a dent on the laborer carrying him, never mind making it stop.

He also shouted for help a couple of times, but the laborer, for now, simply rushed past any of the scarce fairies on the ground. It really was stupid, but the fact it chose to travel on ground instead of above or below it seemed to have made a huge difference. It was different during the wave, but in normal times only very few fairies did anything on the surface. Even the poorest of citizens all lived at some elevation.

But there was no sense bemoaning this when instead Roah should think of a plan. Only at times like this he wished he had something like Gen’s compensation, since his own was useless during such situations…

Or was it, actually?

An idea struck him. This might be dangerous, but it might also be his one and only chance. He chuckled to himself; he knew he was the only one stupid enough to even attempt this sort of technique.

Although his limbs were bound securely, with barely even any space to wriggle, his head was free to look around as he wished. Even the darkness of the forest didn’t hamper the superiority of his eyesight too much. He turned both head and eye toward his left pants pocket. The white cloth was made of soft and not very thick material; not quite transparent, but if one strained their eyes, perhaps they would be able to see through it.

Roah, of course, could strain his eyes beyond the capability of ordinary people. The contents of his pocket became crystal clear to him.

He mentally sighed in relief. This part of his ability he hadn’t experimented much with—he couldn’t see through walls, for example, no matter how hard he tried—but the conditions were suitable. Now came the other problem: the stone was not in any condition to be activated.

He was fortunate enough that the heat stone hadn’t fallen out of his pocket in all this mess, but its icon was mostly facing away from him. Even if he could complete it in his mind’s eye, it wouldn’t work as well as when he had visual. That was one of the major weaknesses of modern channeling, according to Professor Saburn.

Grunting, Roah tried to move his body. He was being held very tightly so it was difficult. He desperately rubbed against the soft-yet-hard metallic body holding him in attempt to shift the position of the stone ever so slightly—

And finally succeeded.

Eye focusing on the now fully visible icon and gritting his teeth, he began channeling. There was a jolt of searing pain that struck his thigh and a spark of flame. He tried diverting the channel of heat so it’d affect only the opposite side, but since the stone had been created to radiate heat equally from all directions the effect was minimal.

It did, however, cause enough damage to make the laborer carrying him flinch. Just enough for Roah to wriggle his aching body free and fall to the ground. His leg still hurt a lot but he put the searing pain aside as he commanded his body to rise.

The moment the laborer recovered and attempted to grab him again Roah had already managed to pull out another small, misshapen stone from his pocket. It had been inscribed, by his own hands, with an extremely simplistic icon, but related to his best channel.

A flash of blinding light erupted from the stone. Laborers had no eyes per se, but he knew from TriX that they still relied on light to see. This allowed Roah to momentarily stun his opponent.

He broke into a mad dash, but only mere moments passed before he heard movement on the grass. Taking another stone from his pocket, he activated the icon just as he threw it backward; this was obviously not as effective an attack as the first time, but still managed to buy a few more precious seconds.

He ran and ran, and blinded it again, and ducked behind a tree, desperately struggling against the superior being, barely avoiding capture again while withstanding the still-painful burn.

He knew he was only buying time, but that was good enough, as victory arrived soon after. Just as the laborer managed to grab him again, there was a sound and a large pole pierced its side. Following that came an arrow that pierced its head and the slash of a sword.

This wasn’t enough to bring a laborer down, of course, so it tried running away with Roah again, but by now it was surrounded by fairies on all sides.

Roah was successfully rescued.

Saying that Acrus was displeased would be an understatement.

Not even an hour passed into the attack and everything had already been settled. Acrus at least waited for a while before declaring it safe enough to send Aisbroom away, but apparently even that was too little.

Were the Stroba simply this bad? Or were Acrus’s own forces that good?

Perhaps the fault lay with the faeries, after all.

A mere hour passed before the first two faeries returned—apparently having beaten their captors by themselves, incredulously enough. The boy and girl had been found a bit battered yet otherwise unharmed in one of the tunnels, and were escorted back to the surface.

The second report came from Aisbroom in the flesh. There was not even a trace of any smugness or gloating in either their voice or expression as they announced the safe retrieval of the other faerie girl, yet Acrus was just as annoyed, perhaps more.

When the report that confirmed the final faerie’s safety arrived, Acrus nearly exploded.

Yes, it was a win-win situation no matter the result—it would sway public opinion against the Stroba even more than it already was. On the other hand, perhaps it also strengthened the position of the faeries too much.

Acrus had meticulously and carefully both relaxed security and let some information leak without anyone getting suspicious, but was even that not enough? They truly had overestimated the Stroba if they were unable to get away with even a single faerie. Acrus couldn’t even blame Aisbroom for this.

Acrus, too, had been careless. They should have anticipated this worst-case scenario and perhaps order a small “accident” if it was needed. Now, however, it was too late for that. There was no fear, but mere annoyance. Acrus had still hesitated between using their new pawns and expending them, and so paid for it.

That made then wonder—did they have no choice but directly get rid of them?

It always hides inside all bliss:

The ghastly call of the abyss