Chương 211: Chapter 69: The Sword that Surpassed the Blacksmith

Selena turned, her heart hammering against her ribs like a caged bird. Acendrar was still illuminating the area, but its radius did not reach as far as where Einar had been dragged. She walked decisively toward that spot, every step measured, every sense alert. Upon reaching the place, she found the other soldier lying on the ground. He did not show the effects of having been bitten. He was alive, trembling with uncontrollable fear, a puddle of urine expanding beneath him.

She looked at him, and in his eyes, she saw only pure, animal terror. She approached him without saying a word, scanning the darkness beyond the circle of light, but saw no movement, no threads, nor the glint of eight enormous eyes. From atop the wall, a soldier shouted, his voice now firm, without a trace of the initial panic: —My colonel! They flee if they lose one of the group! It's their pattern. Don't worry! Go back to the camp with Tiberio! Selena nodded, even if they couldn't see her make the gesture.

She grabbed the trembling man, placed him over one of her shoulders with an effort that made her muscles creak, as he was heavy and even more so with his armor on, and began walking back toward the gate, which opened before her. The light from Acendrar, constant as the moon but much brighter, preceded her, bathing the path and the interior of the camp with an unnatural clarity that left no shadows where it fell. Upon entering, all eyes turned toward her.

Dozens of faces, pale and tense, looked at her from the shadows of the barracks, from the battlements, from the doorways. They were the looks of those who have seen something that defies the known. Some looked at her like a witch from stories meant to frighten children, with fear and repulsion. Others, like a hero emerged from a legend told by the zingari, their eyes wide with wonder and a desperate hope.

Others simply blinked, doubting their own sanity, wondering if the white light and green fire had been a collective dream induced by panic. Selena left Tiberio in the field infirmary, a cabin built of noble titarde wood with the smells of alcohol, antiseptics, medicines, the scent of healing. She took her time examining his pupils, stripping him of the tanned leather armor, checking his legs and arms, his torso and back.

There was no trace of damage from the venom, but his body was covered in bruises, scrapes, an ankle sprain, and a shock so profound that he had not yet recovered his speech. While she did her work as a qualified doctor, the fifteen minutes of light remaining from Acendrar's effect came to an end. The ring stopped glowing, its promise fulfilled; only then did a deeper and more intimate darkness fall over the camp, broken only by torches and lamps.

The contrast was brutal, as if the world had reclaimed its true face, somber and dangerous. She returned to her room in silence, her sight impaired by the side effect, her eyes magnifying the shadows; she passed by men and women who lowered their gaze or held it with a new intensity. Fjora followed close behind as an escort, her silent presence an anchor in the middle of a sea of altered perceptions. Selena collapsed onto her bed, without even removing the crimson suit stained with dirt and smoke.

The accumulated fatigue kept her on the bed for several hours reflecting, staring at the roof, sighing softly. Until finally, her body and mind yielded to the primal. She slept, but it was a restless nightmare, chased by thousands of red legs and green fire. The days sped by, but the camp no longer had the light and curious atmosphere that had reigned since the arrival of the new colonel. Every day the rumors had grown faster than any official order. Selena, as she did every day, went to eat in the mess hall.

She took her seat at the table beside Fjora; gazes fell upon her, but no words reached her. Until, upon leaving the room, she heard them in the distance; she could not contain her curiosity after days. —You must wait for me a second —she said, looking the Nordic warrior in the eyes— I want to know what they are saying… The warrior did not protest at all. In her face was a deep understanding, and nodding, she confirmed it all; she retired to Selena's cabin, and the marchioness could see a smile on her lips.

Quickly using her knowledge of stealth, she walked through the midday shadows, her steps making almost no noise, and from one of the corners she finally sharpened her hearing, listening to them. —My captain Cornelio, the men won't stop talking about all of it, about what happened and how she saved Tiberio… A marked shhhh was heard, followed by a woman's voice. Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon. —Speak quietly, Octavio; colonel Solendra might find out.

—Surely, she already knows, she must know… —it was a man with the tone of an experienced soldier— the men talk about the green flame and how it purged the evil; it's a simple, descriptive, and almost respectful title. The man sighed deeply, almost with regret. Selena peeked out; that voice belonged to Captain Cornelio, and his face was full of resignation.

—To me and to those of us who know the book of the sacred cycle, we know it is more of a gift from Aelthra —he leaned in, resting a fist against his face— just as it was for the nameless saint in the sacred gospel; only the lady of compassion is capable of bestowing such power. Selena walked away, leaving them behind, quickening her pace until she reached her cabin. Only then did she ponder the words she had heard.

To them, the goddess of nature, of sap and growth, had granted her a fragment of her power to face the beasts of the night. It was not dark, fearsome arcane magic; it was a divine blessing, a celestial intervention. Now, after having heard it, she did not know whether to laugh or cry. She had revealed a fraction of her true nature to save lives and her own, and the soldiers, in their need to fit the inexplicable into their worldview, had wrapped it in the mantle of the sacred.

It was a new mask, imposed by the perception of others, heavier perhaps than the colonel's uniform. The river, as Valerian had said, kept flowing. Now it dragged her not only as a logistical tool, but as a symbol, a living talisman for the men and women who guarded the monsters that would one day hammer the world. The days passed slower now, a tense and icy truce that Selena took advantage of to immerse herself in her studies while Lieutenant Colonel Aurele kept a calculated distance.

He did not overwhelm her with questions or surprise inspections; instead, his presence was like that of a hawk perched on a distant branch, watching without interfering. Soon Selena understood why: Aurele was an Aelthria, the third son of one of the four great ducal houses, for whom a military rank had been bought out of tradition and convenience. A noble of such lineage knew not only the court protocols, but also its best-kept secrets. The echo was not foreign to him.

What he might not know, or only suspect, was that Selena was a resonant, and even less an initiate of the Cabal. Although his gaze was now somber, the weight with which he held his chin upon seeing her pass betrayed a concern that went beyond logistics.

It was not just the Hammerer Project that troubled him, but the long shadow of House Solendra: the richest in the kingdom, rivaling even the royal coffers, and now with an heiress who not only bore the title of marchioness, but exuded an aura of power that no uniform could conceal. Selena, as she had done with the gazes of the soldiers who now called her "The Gift of Aelthra", ignored the lieutenant colonel's as well.

Every gesture of forced respect, every eloquent silence, were just more links in the chain she wore. Later, through terse reports and leaked conversations among the camp veterans, she learned the truth about the spider attack. It had been a bad year for the forest: a plague of lesser beetles had decimated the Black Veils' usual prey, and hunger had made them bold, desperate.

It was not common for them to attack humans; the risk of losing individuals was high, and their intelligence, comparable to that of an earth dog, made them calculate costs well, but necessity had turned them into tactical hunters, into shadows with red legs that knew how to lay ambushes and sacrifice one to distract while others attacked. Creatures of biological terror, yes, but also of a cold, animal logic that Selena could almost respect.

At least they did not deceive themselves with philosophies of the "greater good." As for her work, she maintained the charade. She submitted detailed reports on the "viability of underground tunnels for the discreet transport of specimens," filling pages with calculations of ventilation, geological stability, and excavation costs that she knew were impossible to approve, since all the work would have to be done with pickaxe and shovel.

Everything remained on paper, in folders accumulating on her desk like a bureaucratic wall. She sent her missives to the fort using the aqualmuss, birds with dark green plumage and silent flight, whose nests, woven only with moss, were almost invisible among the eternal canopy. They were efficient, fast creatures, an ironic contrast to the stagnated Selena, who moved pieces on a chessboard she had no wish to win.

She had spent the four months of autumn and nearly three more months in the camp when winter established its domain. Snow crowned the peak of the volcano like a dirty wool cap, but in the valley, the heat stolen from the bowels of the earth kept the ground free of frost, transforming it into a perpetual, sticky, cold mud.

Selena made full use of all the time she spent in camp to immerse herself in the Veritasilba, tracing pictograms in the margins of her notes, and she also took advantage of it to refine Denadi Stili until turning it into something of her own. Following Master Remo's advice, she did not merely flow through the opponent's movement. Now, combining her knowledge of medicine, she learned to read the body's map, its anatomy, to anticipate the tension in a tendon, the weakness in a joint.

The sword, like the empty hand, had become lethal weapons with the flow of time, precise, economical movements and strikes that caused many of the soldiers to sigh when they found themselves defeated. Fjora, her faithful instructor, noticed it before anyone else, having taught her for two and a half years, forty months of hard effort. She smiled deeply with pride and resignation whenever they crossed swords in their bouts; it was the pride of a woman who sees her purpose fulfilled.

Every time she was knocked down, Selena's hand welcomed her to lift her up; the Nordic woman was no longer capable of beating her. The Khelganor warrior nodded every time she fell, the satisfaction in her deep blue eyes giving her a unique demeanor; she knew it: she had finished forging a sword that now surpassed the blacksmith.