Time soon passed.

The fires of the Slaver Fortress had burned low, leaving only glowing embers and the smell of ash in the morning air.

Damien sat on a throne, not a metaphorical one, but the actual velvet and iron chair Vargus, the Slaver King, had used to overlook his yard.

Now, Vargus was dead, buried under the rubble of his own ambition, and Damien sat in his place, counting gold.

"Final tally?" Damien asked, tossing a heavy gold coin into the air.

"Three million gold coins in liquid assets," a voice answered smoothly.

"Another five million in weapons, armor, and magical artifacts. And… a ledger containing the names of every noble in the Dragon Empire who purchased slaves from this facility."

The speaker was the chubby merchant Damien had rescued.

He had cleaned himself up, found a silk robe from Vargus's wardrobe, and was currently tapping away at a calculator artifact with terrifying speed.

Barnaby. The man who, in the original novel, would have become the Empire's greatest smuggler before being executed by the protagonist for price-gouging during the demon war.

"A list of nobles," Damien mused, catching the coin.

"That's worth more than the gold. It's leverage. Keep it safe, Barnaby."

"Of course, My King," Barnaby bowed low, his eyes gleaming with greed, not for money, but for the opportunity Damien represented.

Standing in the shadows behind Barnaby was the Old Man.

He hadn't bothered to change his rags. He just stood there, blending so perfectly into the darkness that even Lyra had trouble spotting him.

Cipher. A retired spy who had been sold into slavery by a corrupt official. In the original story, he died in the cages. Now, he was Damien's eyes.

"And the network?" Damien asked, turning to the Old Man.

"Vargus had contacts in twelve major cities," Cipher rasped, his voice dry.

"Messengers. Bribed guards. Smugglers. I have the codes. I can take over the network by week's end. They won't even know Vargus is dead; they'll just think management has… changed."

"Excellent."

Damien stood up. He walked down the steps to where his core team was waiting.

Isabelle was cleaning soot off her uniform, looking annoyed at the stains.

Lyra was inspecting her mana bow strings.

And Leona, the lion-beast girl, was strapping on a massive set of plate armor they had looted from the armory.

She wielded a greatsword that looked too heavy for a normal human, but she swung it like a twig.

"It fits," Leona grunted, testing the armor's joints. She looked at Damien with fierce loyalty. "It is strong. Like you."

Damien smiled. He checked his System.

[DP: 600. Status: Dual-Core (Stabilized). Influence: The Black Thread (Established).]

"Barnaby, Cipher," Damien addressed his new shadow commanders.

"I am leaving you here. Gravestone is now our base of operations. Use the gold. Buy the town if you have to. But keep it quiet."

He tossed the Void Gem containing the majority of the loot to Barnaby. It was a massive amount of trust, but Damien wasn't worried.

He raised his hand. The Contract Gem pulsed.

"I don't need to remind you what happens if you betray me."

Barnaby and Cipher both knelt instantly, clutching their chests where the invisible link bound them.

"Our lives are yours," Cipher said. "We will weave the web while you are gone."

"Good. When I return from the North, I expect to know the color of the Second Prince's underwear."

With a final nod, Damien turned to his traveling party.

"Isabelle, Lyra, Leona. Pack up. We're leaving."

"To the Elven Empire?" Lyra asked, hope rising in her voice.

"To the Elven Empire," Damien confirmed. "But first… we have a trail to follow."

.......................

[Two Days Later - The Northern Road]

The landscape had changed drastically. The lush forests of the central empire gave way to craggy, grey mountains and pine trees dusted with snow. The air was biting cold.

The team moved fast. They had purchased a sturdy, reinforced carriage in Gravestone, pulled by four frost-resistant horses.

Leona drove the carriage, enjoying the cold wind, while the others sat inside.

The atmosphere was tense.

Lyra sat opposite Damien, her eyes fixed on the map spread out on the table between them.

"We're moving too slow," Lyra muttered. "If the attack is timed with the Queen's labor… we might already be too late."

"We aren't too late," Damien said calmly, reading the Midnight Tome. He was trying to refine his shadow control to match his new aura output.

"The Queen isn't due for another week. We'll make it."

"How can you be so sure?" Lyra snapped.

"You seem to know everything, Voss. The dungeon, the Queen's pregnancy, the Guild Head's secrets. Are you a seer?"

Damien looked up. He saw the suspicion in her eyes. It was natural. He knew too much.

"I'm not a seer, Lyra. I'm a pessimist. I plan for the worst-case scenario, and I gather information to prevent it."

He leaned forward.

"Speaking of worst-case scenarios… tell me about your heart."

Lyra flinched. "My heart?"

"The Dark Elf Curse," Damien said bluntly. "When an elf is consumed by hatred and despair, their mana corrupts. Their skin turns obsidian, their magic turns to void, and they lose their connection to nature."

However, although he said this, Damien knew this wasn't a hundred per cent true, as she would need to delve into abyss magic to complete the transformation and become the first dark elf.

But for the current Lyra, she didn't need to know that, and sure enough, hearing his words, she went silent.

"I… I felt it," she suddenly whispered, her voice shaking.

"When I saw my squad in those cages… when I saw Kael branding them… I felt something snap. If you hadn't arrived… if you hadn't killed them…"

"You would have turned," Damien finished for her.

He wasn't just guessing. In the novel, Lyra of a Thousand Miles turned into a Dark Elf precisely because her squad was tortured to death while she watched helplessly from the shadows. Damien had just deleted her tragic backstory.

"Hatred is a powerful fuel, Lyra," Damien said softly. "But it burns the engine. Don't let it consume you. You have your squad back. You have a mission."

He pointed to Leona, whose silhouette was visible through the driver's window, and Isabelle, who was dozing on his shoulder.

"And you have us. The Black Thread isn't just a weapon. It's a shield."

Lyra looked at him for a long time. The cold tension in her shoulders slowly relaxed.

"You're a strange human, Damien Voss," she sighed. "You talk like a tyrant, act like a warlord, but you save people like a hero."

"I'm not a hero," Damien smirked, closing his book. "Heroes have rules. I don't."

Suddenly, the carriage jerked to a violent halt.

NEIGH!

The horses screamed in panic. Leona roared from the driver's seat.

"Ambush!"

Damien's eyes snapped open, the blue shifting to a mix of gold and black instantly. He kicked the carriage door open and leapt out, Isabelle and Lyra right behind him.

They were on a narrow mountain pass. The road ahead was blocked—not by fallen rocks, but by wreckage.

It was a massacre.

A merchant caravan lay in ruins. Wagons were overturned and burning with a strange, pale blue fire. Bodies littered the snow—merchants, guards, and… something else.

Damien walked over to one of the corpses. It wasn't human. It was a beast-man, similar to Leona, but twisted. Its veins were black, and its eyes were wide open in terror.

"This wasn't bandits," Leona growled, sniffing the air. She pointed her greatsword at the burning blue fire. "That smells like… sulfur. And rot."

Lyra knelt by a dead guard. She pulled a strange, jagged dagger out of the man's chest.

"Damien," Lyra called out, her face pale. "Look at this."

Damien took the dagger. It was made of a dark, bone-like metal. But what caught his eye was the symbol etched into the hilt.

A crescent moon eclipsed by a jagged, bleeding sun.

The symbol of the Twilight Association.

"They were here," Damien said, his voice turning icy.

"Who?" Isabelle asked, sensing his mood shift.

"The Twilight Association. The cult that hunts 'abominations'," Damien explained. He looked at the twisted beast-man corpse.

"They aren't just moving troops. They are hunting. They're clearing the path to the Elven Border."

He looked North. The tracks in the snow were fresh. A large force, dozens, maybe hundreds, had passed through here only hours ago.

"They are ahead of us," Damien realised. "Garrick wasn't lying. The attack has already begun. They are moving to siege the Elven Capital."

He crushed the bone dagger in his hand, his Golden Dragon Aura flaring and turning the fragments to dust.

"Leona! Get the carriage moving. Full speed. We don't stop for sleep. We don't stop for food."

Damien climbed back onto the carriage, his gaze fixed on the northern horizon where storm clouds were gathering.

"We have a war to catch."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.