Hayla thought hard as she glanced down at Miles, lying on the ground. If he had such powers, and he did something to her, she might not remember it. And the memories she had, she couldn’t necessarily trust. That was the crux of someone messing with your mind, and it was a threat one had to be aware of in this world where Charmers existed.

If he were more capable than even the most dangerous Charmers... Hayla thought worriedly.

“Are you serious!?” Reurig asked angrily. “That’s your concern? Whether they might be able to charm people? We’re standing five meters from a dead cat ten! A! Category! Ten! This will change everything!”

“Silence, Fighter!” Grom commanded.

“Screw you!” Reurig yelled back. “I can’t believe you want to make them out to be a threat! While you’ve been hiding, we fought this thing. And we won, thanks to them! Nothing changes that! Finally, for the first time—”

“Would someone please shut him up!?” Grom shouted.

Two guards closed in immediately and tackled Reurig to the ground, putting a spear to his throat. He struggled briefly, but when he glanced up, he saw Hertar standing above him.

“It’s Reurig, right? The deserter. If we could trust what we saw here today, you would be correct. However, how do we know that’s even a category ten? It could be an eight for all we know. How do we know it wasn’t affected by the boy? After all, there’s another beast here he tamed. And how do we know he didn’t make you fight with half your strength to make it seem like it was stronger? I understand that you want to believe it, but we must look at it from all sides, and there is irrefutable evidence that there’s more to it. You must understand our need to be diligent in this case.”

“My problem isn’t you trying to be diligent!” Reurig said. “It’s that you’re already thinking about how to get rid of him with the least resistance! It’s always the same!”

“What?” Hayla said, bewildered. “No, Reurig. Nobody said anything about—”

“Actually,” Hertar interrupted, “that might be our only choice. Given these new developments, it would be too dangerous to even lock them away. A tiny slip up and they could lay waste to all of Alarna, regardless of what we do. Not to mention, if you can’t shed how he influenced you, we must try to break this curse another way. And you can’t be engaged to a criminal either. You must not forget your duties, Hayla.”

At a loss for words, she stared at her uncle blankly. He was planning to execute Miles and Riala. It was unthinkable. What irked her the most, however, was that a part of her agreed that this was a sensible plan. Regardless of whether Arax had always been around or not, she was now gone. The town wouldn’t need this level of protection anymore, and the mana barrier would do the rest. By disposing of these two, they would eliminate all potential risks and free Hayla up to return to her regular life. Everything could go back to normal. Her uncle enjoyed clean solutions, and so did she. That’s why she was surprised by herself when two certain words escaped her lips without thinking.

“I refuse.”

“I’m sorry, Hayla. But this is not up to you,” Hertar said. “I suppose we better get this over with quickly. Guards!”

Two more guards stepped up, standing above Miles and Riala. They readied their spears and waited for the king’s command.

“No!” Hayla screamed as she threw herself in their direction, covering Miles and Riala protectively. She glared up at the guards and back at Hertar. “You will listen to me! I chose him on purpose! And I had very good reasons for it! Let me explain my thoughts on the matter!”

“I can’t, Hayla. Move aside.”

“What’s wrong with you? You always trusted my judgment, and now you won’t even hear me out? All these claims are suspicions at best! Berla, say something as well!”

Her cousin seemed uncertain. While one of her hands was clearly twitching, ready to grab a hidden dagger, her face told a different story. She didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what she could do.

“I... They’re not going to listen to me anyway...” she said under her breath.

“You girls...” Berlotte said affectionately. “Everything will be okay. Trust us.”

“Trust you?” Hayla was exasperated. “You’re the ones acting weird! You’re not even addressing what I’m saying!”

“We’re not going to get anywhere like this,” Hertar lamented and gestured at another guard. “Seize her.”

He jumped into action and attempted to forcefully remove Hayla from the scene, grabbing her from behind, but she struggled with all her might. She couldn’t just give up. She chose this path, and she believed more than ever that this man—Miles, Lilly, Tomar, or whatever he chose to call himself—would ring in a new age. He, the young girl he was teaching, as well as the others.

She didn’t care what Miles might or might not have done, or whether they had accepted casualties to rid the world of Arax. In a way, the fact that Hertar wanted to end their lives as soon as possible was telling. They were strong. Possibly the strongest humans in this world. Even if she stripped all her feelings away, her original plan to position herself at the side of this man was still a sound one. Any version of Hayla, influenced or not, would jump at this chance. And the fact that she did like him, even if it might’ve been involuntary, made her choice all the more simple. Now she just needed to figure out a way to do the impossible and stop them from burying her future before it could begin.

She kept grappling with the guard, mustering even the last ounce of strength in her body, but she was quickly losing. She just wasn’t a match for a Fighter. She was startled when her wrist was suddenly grabbed—the one belonging to the hand she was desperately holding onto Miles with. However, instead of yanking her away from him, she was pulled closer. Her gaze met Miles’. He was suddenly awake and glanced around for but a moment, before he pulled Hayla closer yet, pressing her against himself, while using his other arm to attack the guard. Hayla peered behind herself in shock, seeing drops of water fly and the guard getting knocked back, rolling over the ground. He barely missed Hati, who evaded him by sidestepping casually.

The immediate threat dealt with, Miles rolled over, switching places with Hayla and jumped to his feet. He took the scene in properly now, simultaneously holding up one arm to keep their enemies at bay and offering one to help Hayla to her feet.

“Tomar!” Hati said, happily wagging his tail.

“Your majesty!” a guard shouted in warning.

The encirclement broke apart as the guards scrambled to protect the Rulers instead, ushering them back and creating a wall between them and the group. A model reaction for what they were taught to do, regardless of whether it was truly the best option.

Hayla accepted Miles' gallant gesture and was hefted up. She stood close to her fiance, enamored by the apprehension in the eyes of the Fighters, as well as her people. Something truly clicked for her at that moment. The power Rulers pretended to have was laughable. Any influence you might have meant nothing in the face of actual strength. This was true for beasts... but also people.

Stepping closer towards Miles, their shoulders touching, Hayla’s heart started beating faster. Her family listening to her would’ve been preferable, but it was by no means necessary. She had everything she needed.

I’ll show them, she thought. A new chapter in the history books starts right here.

***

I was face to face with Hayla the moment I woke up, while a guard tried to pull her off of me. Two more stood at the ready next to me and Riala. Hayla appeared to be protecting us, but she was fighting a losing battle. Acting on my best guess for what was going on, I gave the guard a good push without injuring him, got Hayla out of the way, and stood up.

I started aiming at the guards closest to us, who backed away quickly and joined their companions in protecting the Rulers, who all grouped together behind the wall of Fighters. A ludicrous tactic given our powers, seeing how easy it would be to shoot holes through the lot of them. Had they all ignored the Rulers and attacked us directly, I would’ve had a tough time defending myself without hurting Hayla and the others.

For us this was good of course. Not knowing what exactly was going on though, I wanted to reduce any risks as much as possible and helped Hayla to her feet. After all, her lying on the ground unmoving would mean I had to protect her if anything happened.

A quick glance at the still unconscious Riala told me that she was as fine as she could be. She was wrapped up in Berla’s jacket, so she had presumably stopped the fire. Riala was breathing and her mana output looked relatively healthy. Hati and Reurig seemed fine as well, and even though Berla appeared to be in distress, she at least didn’t have any visible injuries. My eyes wandered over the main square and eventually rested on the body of a seemingly dead, humanoid wolf.

There she is...

There was no sign of any mana left in or around her, indicating that she was gone. Riala had actually done it. This calamity seemed almost invincible, but she was dead now.

Checking the position of the sun though, not a lot of time could have passed since then—most likely minutes at most. This opened up a couple of questions, like why I was wide awake and felt fantastic. That shouldn’t have been the case after using up all of my mana. I also realized I was using my arm normally, even though Arax broke it. Unfortunately, no immediate explanations came to mind.

My attention was instead drawn to King Hertar Alarna, marching through the wall of guards. He stopped when there was only one line of Fighters and a little bit of room left between us. He glared at me, but even more so at his niece at my side.

“Hayla! Please come to your senses!” Hertar said. “They’re a danger to everyone! You must see how he’s manipulating you!”

Oh, now I’m manipulating her?

“It doesn’t matter,” Hayla said.

“What? Listen to me, we—”

“Why would I listen to you if you don’t give me the same courtesy? I don’t understand why you’re lying, and I’m frustrated that you wouldn’t consider all sides of the argument before deciding to execute my fiance! Under these circumstances, I will not abide by your rule anymore!”

Perhaps to underline her point, Hayla wrapped herself around my arm, looking at Hertar defiantly. I felt a little bad, since I was still looking for a way to break the engagement, but I wasn’t sure this would be a good time to bring that up. And having her in our camp would at the very least make them more careful in their dealings with us, since Hayla was currently the last Varant who could take over for Hertar.

The others joined us and Reurig picked up Riala, so we’d be ready to move immediately if necessary. Meanwhile, Berla looked at me with a frown. I thought this might be about Hayla, but her gaze was entirely fixed on me. Frowning in turn, I cocked my head as if to ask, “What’s wrong?”, but no response came. Instead, Grom spoke up from behind the king.

“Let her run to her doom if she desires it,” he said, peeking over Hertar’s shoulder. “It pains me to say this, but we might have lost her.”

It pains you? I thought as I suppressed a chuckle and the Rulers started bickering among themselves. Being the next in line after Hayla, Grom would surely not be heartbroken over her potentially being out of the picture. Though the question of what exactly was going to happen now was still open.

Our situation had improved marginally. There weren’t a lot of guards, and not only were they wary of us, they had also all ditched their bows for some reason. Though they might’ve thought they had to fight beasts, in which case the bows would’ve been useless.

On our side we were currently down one magic user, but knocking out a couple of scared guards who were grouped up like this wouldn’t be much of an issue. We had prepared enough scripts to accomplish this even without seriously hurting anyone.

We would be able to stomp down the leaders of this faction revolting against us. Whether this actually made sense was open for debate though. Standing amidst death and destruction, citizens were slowly starting to gather around us. They kept a presumed safe distance and remained silent, but their faces said it all: They weren’t happy.

Arax’s death didn’t seem to have changed anything. This made sense though. If you believed the stories Grom was spinning, this, too, could be part of my plan. And even if not, it wouldn’t suddenly exonerate me. It also surely didn’t help that it was mainly our attacks that had caused this chaos around us, regardless of what it was for.

The bottom line was that nobody here seemed to trust us anymore. If we tried to take back control, we would have to use force. It would change our role considerably, and it would also increase our risk. We failed to learn of this revolt ahead of time. Would we fare any better next time, when we would have the entire town against us?

I thought for a moment, but I always came back to my original thoughts, from when I stood in front of all these people. It would make more sense to cut our losses. We still had problems to solve, and trying to manage Alarna at the same time evidently wasn’t working out too well. It really was a freeing thing to consider. Just ditching a huge chunk of our responsibilities.

“Let’s leave,” Hayla suddenly whispered to me.

I hadn’t expected to hear her suggest this. I was surprised, but also intrigued. “Where should we go?” I asked out of curiosity, just to hear her response.

“Wait, leave?” Berla interjected. “We can’t just flee! What about the town?”

“What about it?” Hayla said.

I understood where she was coming from, but I found myself asking the same question. Yea... What about it?