They moved as a group.

Stone gave way to narrower streets. The air changed first, carrying the stale mix of waste, damp wood, and old iron. The farther they went, the more the buildings leaned inward, windows barred, doors reinforced from the outside. Chains hung unused from posts. Some were still warm.

Here, not even the dwarven cannon fire reached; there was nothing noteworthy about collapsing. They were more focused on flushing out the remaining defenders from the outer areas, where they were stationed, and the locations they were more knowledgeable of.

Quinlan felt it before anyone said a word.

Ayame's steps shortened by a fraction. Her hand stayed on her sword, but the easy looseness she carried after battle was gone. Her shoulders set and posture straightened into something older, harder. She had spent a full year in a slave house. That year, when she went from a pampered Duke's daughter to a girl chained to the basement of a filthy slave house, it marked her mind. Even now, with freedom carved into her bones, those memories resurfaced.

Seraphiel slowed beside Sylvaris.

The elf's fingers curled into her mother's sleeve. Her gaze dropped, avoiding the iron placards bolted to walls, the numbered hooks, the painted symbols marking ownership and price. She had been sold as a sex slave. No clauses. No protections. No rights. A living object, reduced to a line on a ledger.

She had been lucky. Bought by Quinlan instead of someone who would have used that complete control without restraint.

Luck did not erase memory.

Those days mattered. Days spent knowing that at any moment, she could be dragged out and sold, which, in her mind, would've equated a life worse than a death sentence. Days when the thought of being bought by someone cruel sat in her mind from morning to night.

She was only a hundred years old, which for an elf meant that she had just become an adult. She would've been sentenced to a thousand years of cruel misery. And if her master decided that she was to level up, her sentence would've gone on for nine thousand nine hundred years instead.

That kind of fear did not fade just because the ending turned merciful.

Sylvaris noticed it immediately.

The Moon Elf's expression did not falter as Sera's had. Instead, something sharpened behind her eyes. Despite being auctioned off as a sex slave with similarly zero clauses to her daughter, the mother's distress had never been about herself.

She could endure pain, humiliation, loss. What broke her was the thought of her daughter being sold as a sex slave. That was why she crossed the border. Why she threw away position, safety, everything she had built. A mother's wrath lived quietly in her chest, steady and cold.

Kitsara's ears twitched.

Her discomfort was quieter, restrained. She was foxkin, but also the princess of the dogkin people. While she was never a slave, besides after the love of her life [Subjugated] her - she knew exactly what places like this did to beastkin, her people.

Blossom showed a similarly mild reaction to the foxkin.

Her grip around Quinlan's shoulders remained warm. Her tail still swayed. She had been a slave once. But she had healed, found her sister. Found her mother. Found a lifelong partner who showered the girl in so much love and adoration that her brain was simply unable to properly remember her days as a slave.

Quinlan noticed all of it.

His hands slipped away first.

The grip he had casually kept on Serika's and Kitsara's perfect butts eased, fingers lifting cleanly. He leaned in just enough to press a brief kiss into Kitsara's lush white hair, right between her ears.

He said nothing, but the gesture conveyed all he wanted it to.

The foxkin's ears flicked. Her posture loosened at once. She straightened with her chin lifted and her usual, bright smile returning to her gorgeous face. Her tail gave a small sway as she nodded and stepped forward again, steadier.

Then Quinlan moved.

He closed the distance in two strides and wrapped an arm around Seraphiel's waist, pulling her gently against his side. His other arm slid around Ayame, firm and grounding.

"It's okay. No one will hurt you now."

Seraphiel's shoulders eased as soon as she felt him there. Her fingers unclenched from her mother's sleeve, resting instead against his chestplate. She drew a slow breath, then another.

"I know…" she murmured. "It's just a bit hard even after all these months."

Ayame nodded once.

Her hand settled on the hilt of her katana. "We trained. We fought. We bled, so we are never in a position like that again."

She said it aloud, but her eyes stayed forward, fixed on the street ahead, as if the words were meant to lock her own determination in place.

Sylvaris watched it all.

The motherly wrath in her gaze did not vanish, but it shifted. When she looked at Quinlan, the cold edge softened, turning quieter. Measured. She saw how her daughter's breathing steadied. How Seraphiel stood straighter simply from being held by her chosen partner.

The past was not forgotten. It never would be. Those responsible would answer for it, one way or another.

But in that moment, Sylvaris saw something else.

The mother already knew it… But she had to ascertain it in her brain once again.

Her daughter had truly found her place. Her family she loved with all her heart, and a man who held her as if she were precious beyond measure, which was exactly how Sylvaris thought of this wonderful girl.

Watching Quinlan hold her now, steady and protective, stirred a memory she had carried since the day Seraphiel was born. It was how she had once hoped her child would be held with the same protectiveness and appreciation as she held her after giving the girl birth.

And now, the woman knew without a shadow of a doubt that her hope materialized, becoming reality. Her vision blurred for a brief moment, and she did not look away.

Then Quinlan's gaze shifted.

The warmth in his eyes drained in an instant as they found hers. They held the same desire for revenge as hers did until a moment ago. He gave her a single, controlled nod.

They will pay.

He did not speak the words. He did not need to.

Sylvaris felt it all the same. The final weight of it. The certainty. The understanding that mirrored her own thoughts too closely to be a coincidence.

The moisture at the corner of her eyes vanished. Her expression settled, hardening. She inclined her head in return, just as slightly.

That was enough.

With this silent agreement formed between mother and son-in-law, husband and mother-in-law, the group continued forward, deeper into the narrow streets, which soon opened up into a wider pocket of space.

Low buildings clustered together in uneven rows, their upper levels connected by planks and hanging walkways. Iron bars covered every ground-floor window. Lanterns burned behind shutters, their light dull and yellow. The markings here were no longer scattered. Ownership sigils, price codes, and capacity numbers were carved directly into wood, layered over one another from years of use.

This was it.

The slave quarters in full.

Quinlan slowed and finally stopped. He turned his head just enough to catch the eyes of the women closest to him.

"Take up positions," he said calmly. "It's time to enact the plan."

No further explanation followed.

They nodded as one.

Blossom slipped away first, her presence fading as she vaulted soundlessly toward the rooftops. Sylvaris turned and began summoning her silver constructs. Serika vanished down a side alley. And just like this, they vanished.

Quinlan resumed walking.

Only three remained at his side now.

Seraphiel walked close on his right. Kitsara moved half a step ahead, posture relaxed on the surface, senses stretched wide beneath it. And while the last one should've been Ayame… A new person volunteered to take on her role.

It was a short, purple-haired girl with the eyes of a child that was no longer blinded by the innocence of youth.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Quinlan asked.

Felicity nodded resolutely. "Yes… It should have more effect if it's me who does it."

"Maybe so, but…"

"I need to see."

That was all she said, and Quinlan accepted it. As her temporary guardian, logic dictates that he shouldn't have. But Quinlan decided to respect the Third Princess's desire to see reality for what it was. In his eyes, if he already allowed her to take on dangerous adventures and fight life-or-death battles, seeing this extreme cruelty might as well be permitted.

They stopped before the nearest establishment.

The building was squat and reinforced, its door plated with iron bands. A placard hung beside it, etched with numbers and symbols that meant nothing to anyone who had not lived inside this system.

Quinlan reached out.

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