“What plan?” Gorint Malloh asked skeptically. “I don’t have time for anything overly tricky.”

“Stay here with him for now,” Rieren said. “I need to check something. I will return shortly. Do not leave till I go.”

“Where are you headed?”

“Just outside. I shan’t be long. Do not move till I return.”

Malloh clearly had more questions, but Rieren didn’t give him the time to ask. The success of her plan depended on how well they could time everything. That meant ensuring they made the right preparations and set the required traps.

Before she left, though, she first hurried around the nearby corridors and rooms. There were many expensive paraphernalia all over an Archnoble’s estate. Rieren only had to sell a few paintings and furniture, before she had enough Credits to purchase what she was looking for. It felt a tiny bit wrong to steal, but then, this was an Archnoble’s residence.

After all, she was doing this for the benefit of others. Rieren’s generosity didn’t extend so far as to use her own Credits for it.

“What are those?” Gorint Malloh asked.

Rieren broke the large glass balls she had brought from the System Shop. “Prisoner’s Confetti. They prevent anyone from channelling Essence. This will ensure that our captive here remains docile while I’m gone.”

Gorint Malloh didn’t look pleased about that. He winced a bit as the white confetti within the balls fell around him. Then again, he didn’t exactly react positively to any changes at all. At least, Rieren had never seen him actually smile at anything.

“Remember,” she said. “Do not move. Do not act, until I return.”

“It would be much easier if you would tell me what for.”

“For the other former Clanmaster to show up.”

“What?”

“One question before I go—do you know how far away Yonvig is confronting Mercion?”

Malloh frowned, likely at her use of the names without any honorifics. “They are halfway up the mountainside. I can’t say if they have moved by now, however.”

Rieren nodded, then hurried away. A quick jaunt through a few corridors to a nearby room granted her a window she could exit the building through. She didn’t have time to wend through its maze and find the proper exit.

Once she was outside, Rieren leaped straight upwards to land on the roof. She kept her Essence channelling to a minimum so as not to alert anyone who might be watching. Creeping to the edge of the roof, she tried to take the measure of the land before her. Keeping her profile low would ensure no one would see her against that night sky’s expanse.

It was calm. Peaceful. There was no sign of anyone else anywhere nearby. Rieren quested out with her senses, but she found no one channelling Essence in the vicinity.

Gorint Malloh had said halfway up the mountainside. Rieren could see the general area clearly. She caught no sight of anyone approaching, however. It was tempting to wait until someone did arrive but she had promised her unwitting companion that she would return. Rieren quickly went back the way she had come.

When she arrived at the corridor where the former Clanmaster was trapped down, she found that Gorint Malloh had called over the little glowing Spirit Beast. It was staring at everything. He hadn’t pulled off the message from its back yet.

But he had tied up the former Clanmaster. Their captive was secured better to prevent him from acting out. Interestingly, Malloh had wrapped up his severed stump as well, though it was soaked in blood. It was only stymying the blood loss for now. He would need proper healing if he was to live. Not that the former Clanmaster looked particularly concerned about it.

“What was that about?” Gorint Malloh asked.

“I wished to see if the Stannerig Clanmaster was coming here or not,” Rieren said.

“Why would he come to the location where he knew his daughter is about to be murdered?”

“What would happen if he learned nothing about what was going on?”

“What do you mean?”

Rieren grinned down at their captive. The Prison Balls’ effects would run out soon enough, but it would be no great a matter to purchase and use some more. “We can keep him tied here for a while. We can wait, letting no word of what has happened escape… for hours and hours. Who do you think will come here first to find out what has happened?”

Malloh thought for only a moment. “You are assuming the other former Clanmaster will arrive? What is to prevent him from sending a minion to scout around?”

Rieren smiled. “Have you considered the true ends of their plan?”

“Of course. They intend to—” His eyes widened. “You would dare?”

Rieren started collecting more paraphernalia from the area to sell. “You have been looking at it as something terrible to prevent, or perhaps, mitigate the damage now that the chain of events has been set in motion. But instead of having such a negative outlook about it all, I say we should treat this as the opportunity it is.”

Once Rieren had obtained some more Credits, she purchased some more of the Prison Balls. Crushing them spread out the confetti over the fallen former Clanmaster made him struggle some more, but Mercion quietened him in short order.

“Going by the lack of any protests,” Rieren said as she cajoled the little Spirit Beast messenger closer. “I will assume you are on board with my plan.”

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Gorint Malloh looked as unhappy as ever. But he wasn’t frowning or displayed any anger. Big improvement for him. “You are playing with dangerous fire here.”

“’Tis the way of being a cultivator.”

Rieren unfurled the scroll on the little messenger’s back. It read much as she expected it to.

They have moved,

Ordorian

Short and simple. Rieren was tempted to rewrite it entirely and write something more enticing, but she decided on just a simple addition, taking a little time to copy the handwriting correctly.

They have moved. We must speak now. Come to the estate,

Ordorian

It felt a little… inadequate. But whenever Rieren had written any letter, she had always felt that the page limited how much she wished to say. Exercises in conciseness always left her more than a little frustrated. She ignored it now, however.

Short was what she needed. Communications such as these had to hold onto a certain amount of vagueness so that if they fell into the wrong hands, they couldn’t be used as incriminating evidence. In fact, she was certain the handwriting resembled nothing of Mercion’s real penmanship. Then she tied the message back onto the Spirit Beast’s back.

“Find Yonvig, the former Clanmaster of the Stannerig clan,” she whispered down. “He is not far from here. Go, hurry.”

The Spirit Beast followed her commands with great alacrity. It scampered back the way it had come, likely heading to a window just as she had done. A quick chirp confirmed that it had changed its form to something birdlike and was off.

“Your turn, Malloh,” Rieren said.

He stared at her. “What now?”

“You need to call the Clanmistress. Personally. Timing is of the essence. I suggest you stop gawking and follow my commands.”

His eyes flared at her tone, but the insistence in it had impressed the importance of hurrying. He understood that he did have to be fast, that the rest of Rieren’s plan hinged on his efforts. Their window of success was a short one. Everything depended on when everyone involved in this incident arrived.

“Am I to leave you with one you would have been killed by a dozen times over had I not been here?”

“Fear not.” Rieren clacked two more Prison balls together. They were quite flimsy, cracking even with that minute contact. “I have everything in hand.”

Gorint Malloh stared down at the former Clanmaster in clear warning. Then he looked up at her with skepticism. But only for a moment. The next, he was gone, hurrying off much the same way the little Spirt Beast messenger had done.

One thing Malloh hadn’t mentioned was that, as soon as he disappeared, the effect of his powers would vaporize as well. The mirrors around the former Clanmaster’s head vanished. He could finally speak again. Rieren did her best not to groan at the prospect of hearing his prattling on and on.

The gruff man cleared his throat. “Testing, testing.” His eyes sharpened in triumph. “I can speak again! How utterly delightful.”

“Not delightful for me,” Rieren said. “Could you really not speak before?”

“If you must know, runt, I could. It was only that my voice was constantly bouncing back into my own ears so talking seemed pointless.”

“Unless you have something worthwhile to say, it is still pointless. The only difference is that I must suffer your blathering a little while.”

He growled at her. “Release me from my binds, and I will end your suffering for you.”

She wondered if he could break out of his binds. He was certainly powerful enough to do so if they had been normal ropes. But something told her Malloh had been smart enough to purchase some special ones from the System Shop that could keep even powerful people tied down.

“There is a better way to go over this,” Rieren said. “Answer my questions, and I will consider ending this amicably.”

“Are you threatening me, runt?”

“I am telling you. If you wish to take it as a threat, that is your priority. A simple transaction. You give me what I want, I give you what you want, to a reasonable extent.”

The former Clanmaster made a showing of considering it. “What would be your questions, runt?”

“Well, the first is simple. What in the Abyss is your name?”

He blinked. Then laughed gruffly. “I am Mavolen Stannerig. I am curious what yours is as well. Malloh called your Arianaele, and I recall hearing some inkling of it before, though I can’t recall exactly where from.”

“From the last timeline. My true name is Rieren Vallorne.”

“A southerner?” He tutted. “I imagine you came here with the rest of your little Sect runts.”

Rieren shrugged. She wasn’t here to answer questions. She was here to ask them. “What have you done with the woman you captured?”

“I told my attendants to take her away. What is she to you?”

“A dear friend. How many of you are in on this silly little plot to murder the Clanmistress?”

His lips, all cut up thanks to the shattered glass from Gorint Malloh’s skill, curved upwards like a hook catching a fish. “Oh, enough. There are many who believe the transfer of power was illegitimate and untimely. Many who have been through thick and thin with the true Clanmasters. They will—”

“Ah, I see. The older ones. And anyone else they can reasonably control and influence, of course. That makes sense.”

Mavolen frowned at the interruption. “You should leave while you can, runt. I will not spare you when I am finally free from this little trap—”

Rieren interrupted him once again, though not with words this time. Instead, she crushed some of the Prison Balls right on his face. He spluttered and coughed as a not insignificant amount of the confetti entered his mouth and got stuck in his airways.

While Mavolen twisted and jerked, trying to expel the confetti from within himself, Rieren observed him critically. No, he was still tightly bound. He wasn’t secretly trying to free himself by cutting them while keeping her distracted with their little conversation. There was no hidden knife or a one of Malloh’s shards or anything like that upon his person.

Maybe he had depended on his superior power as a cultivator so long, he had lost sight of other potential routes.

That also explained why he and his kind had done little to nothing to progress in their class, and had no inkling of how to choose the right skills and perks, ensuring they had the right build. The system ushered in by the apocalypse was foreign to them. A nuisance to be borne.

He hadn’t been one of those favoured by the gods and granted the system to enhance his strength in the last timeline. As such, he hadn’t bothered with it in this one either, despite having access.

“Just wait till I’m free, runt,” he said, growling at Rieren, eyes bugging a little in anger. “I won’t kill you. I’ll keep you alive, tear off bits of your skin patch by patch and skewer you with little lightning bolts until you can sing me a lullaby with your screams. I will break your mind into a thousand shards and—”

Rieren stomped his nose in. Mavolen gurgled out a scream, though it was a bit muffled with all the blood dripping around his mouth. He coughed again, spluttering out dark red droplets everywhere.

“Now, now, what is all this fuss?”

Rieren’s heart jumped into her mouth. Her sword was already out, aimed at the familiar man at the distant end of the corridor. He had snuck in while she had been distracted.

Yonvig had arrived.

“Don’t just stand there,” Mavolen ground out from around Rieren’s boot. “Send this imbecile flying off the mountain, already.”

Yonvig looked down at his fellow conspirator with the briefest glance. One that held no small amount of disdain. Rieren’s lip curled. He was disgusted by a man he himself had allowed into his home to kill his own daughter?

Though, the Clanmistress had never been here. Yonvig couldn’t have known, could he? Had he set his fellow former Clanmaster up?

“It seems you have a certain advantage here,” Yonvig said. “Arianaele. Perhaps you would be so kind as to… not take advantage of it?”

There were only three more steps for Rieren’s plan to succeed. Two of those were entirely up to Rieren. She decided to get them underway.

“Perhaps,” she said. “But answer me this, honoured former Clanmaster Yonvig. What has happened to Lord Mercion?”

“The Ordorian brat? He will live… perhaps. Though, he is rather weak.”

Ah. That settled it for Rieren.

“Will you—”

She cut him off with a swipe of her sword. A quick repositioning had the blade aimed at her feet, and before anyone could react, she stabbed it down.

Right into the body trapped under her boot.