Chương 271: Chapter : 271

Before she had gone to her room, she had paused outside Ken's door. She had stood there for a long moment, her silver-white hair catching the moonlight from the hallway window. Then she had simply nodded once, as if confirming something to herself, and walked away. The hallway had swallowed her footsteps in silence. But Ken Eliot was not asleep. He sat on the edge of his mattress in the dark, his hands resting on his knees, his dark eyes staring at the floor. The room was pitch black. The curtains were drawn.

The only light came from the faint glow of the moon slipping through a gap in the fabric. He had been sitting like this for twenty minutes. Still. Silent. Completely motionless. It was a posture that none of his teammates had ever seen him hold, because Ken never sat still when anyone was watching. He fidgeted. He yawned. He flopped. He lounged. But when he was alone, in the dark, Ken Eliot was a different person entirely. A faint green light bloomed on the floor in front of him.

A summoning circle, intricate and precise, materialized from nothing, its glowing runes spiraling outward like the petals of a luminescent flower. The light was soft and cold, casting long shadows across the walls. The air in the room dropped several degrees. The temperature change was immediate and palpable, as if someone had opened a window onto a winter night. The green runes hummed with quiet, contained power that made the hairs on the back of Ken's neck stand at attention.

From the center of the circle, a figure rose. Karna. He was tall. Taller than any normal man had a right to be. His frame was lean and elegant, wrapped in dark armor that seemed to absorb the moonlight rather than reflect it. His face was breathtakingly handsome, with sharp, aristocratic features and eyes that glowed a faint, unsettling gold. His long dark hair cascaded over his shoulders like a waterfall of ink. He stood with the effortless, lethal grace of a predator who had never once been prey.

Every line of his body communicated danger, precision, and absolute obedience to one person alone. Karna bowed. Deeply. The bow of a warrior greeting a sovereign.

"My lord," he said. His voice was smooth, deep, and quiet. The kind of voice that could deliver a death sentence and make it sound like a lullaby.

"Report," Ken said. His own voice was different now. No lazy drawl. No theatrical exaggeration. Just a single, clipped word that carried the weight of genuine authority. Karna straightened and folded his hands behind his back. His golden eyes met Ken's in the darkness. For a moment, the two of them looked less like a summoner and his spirit, and more like a general and his most trusted lieutenant.

"The assault on ZulFarah was successful," Karna began.

"The immediate Black Magician presence along the eastern border has been eradicated. Their forward operating bases have been destroyed. Their supply lines have been severed. Seventeen dark ritual sites have been purified." This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

"Casualties on their side?" Ken asked.

"Significant. Thirty-two confirmed kills among their combat mages. Forty-one captured and delivered to the Imperial border garrison. The remainder have scattered into the desert wastes. Their organizational structure has been effectively dismantled."

"Our losses?"

"None," Karna said, and there was the faintest trace of pride in his voice.

"I did not permit them to land a single meaningful strike. The engagement lasted approximately eighteen minutes."

"Eighteen minutes," Ken repeated. A ghost of a smile crossed his face.

"You are getting slower."

"I was being thorough, my lord. Thoroughness requires time." Ken's ghost of a smile faded as quickly as it had appeared. He ran his thumb along the edge of his mattress, a small, unconscious gesture that Karna had learned to recognize as a sign that his master's mind was shifting gears.

"Tell me about their new investment," Ken said.

"The Albino Desert. Who is running the operation?" Karna's golden eyes flickered.

"A coalition of three mid-level dark mage families. The Vorath, the Shenzi, and the Mallowryn. They have pooled their remaining resources and secured funding from an anonymous benefactor whose identity I have been unable to confirm."

"Anonymous," Ken repeated flatly.

"That is never good."

"It suggests a wealthy patron who wishes to remain disconnected from the operation. Someone with significant political capital and a vested interest in the Sovereign's resurrection." Ken filed that information away without comment. The anonymous benefactor was a problem for another day. Or possibly another year. The seals on the Great Black Soul Sovereign were not going to break overnight. The Albino Desert was a harsh, unforgiving expanse of white sand and volatile magical currents.

It was the kind of place that killed the unprepared and swallowed the careless. The fact that the dark faction was willing to operate there spoke volumes about their desperation.

"Good. Temporary?"

"Temporary," Karna confirmed.

"The damage was significant, but not permanent. The dark faction has already begun redirecting their investments into a different sector. They are nothing if not persistent." Ken nodded slowly. He had expected as much. Black Magicians were like roaches. You could burn the nest, but there was always another one hiding in the walls.

"Where?" Ken asked. Karna's expression shifted. Just barely. Just enough for someone who had spent years reading the micro-expressions of a spirit who prided himself on showing none. A flicker of something that might have been unease crossed his perfect features before vanishing.

"The Albino Desert," Karna said. The name landed in the dark room like a stone dropped into still water.

"The dark faction is aggressively targeting the region. They are attempting to decode the ancient seals." Ken's eyes narrowed.

"The Great Black Soul Sovereign."

"Yes, my lord. The seals that hold the Sovereign in eternal slumber are impenetrable by conventional means. But the dark faction believes that with enough time and resources, they can break them." Karna paused, his golden eyes flickering with something that might have been concern.

"If they succeed, the consequences would be catastrophic. The Sovereign's power is beyond anything currently walking the mortal plane. It would make the Core of Luminus look like a candle."

"How long?" Ken asked.

"Years, at their current pace. Possibly decades. The seals are extraordinarily complex, designed by ancient civilizations whose understanding of magical binding far exceeds our own. But they are making progress."

"Slow, grinding, relentless progress," Ken repeated, more to himself than to Karna. He stared at the floor, his jaw tight. The Great Black Soul Sovereign. The name alone was enough to make most soldiers reach for their weapons. But Ken did not reach for anything. He just sat and thought.

"Sit down," Ken said, gesturing to the floor across from him. It was an unusual command. Karna typically stood during reports. But the spirit obeyed without hesitation, lowering himself to the floor with fluid grace and folding his long legs beneath him.