Time seemed to freeze in its tracks.

  The anticipated horror—the slit throat, the spray of blood, the swift flight of life—never came. The cold blade tip simply rested against his skin, radiating the promise of death, yet advancing not a single millimeter.

  Erika gasped, his heart a frantic, pounding drum against his ribs, threatening to shatter them. Bewildered, disoriented by this impossible reprieve, he stared up at the cloaked figure. The darkness beneath the hood remained impenetrable.

  Then, the boot lifted completely from his head.

  The suffocating grip on his wrists vanished. Another cloaked figure stepped forward and, with an efficient, clinical motion, sliced through the coarse ropes binding him.

  The sudden release was worse than the binding. Erika’s limbs, starved of blood, turned to lead, prickling with violent numbness. His knees instantly buckled. He collapsed forward, his palms slamming into the freezing dirt. His stomach heaved violently, a dry, agonizing retch tearing through his throat as the adrenaline rapidly and punishingly abandoned his system.

  His trembling hands scrambled to feel his own wrists under the pale moonlight.

  No wound.

  No flowing blood.

  Not even a scratch. The skin was unbroken, bearing only the deep, angry welts left by the ropes.

  The distinct sensation of skin parting, the sticky warmth of blood… all of it, a sheer illusion? A trick of the mind and the cloying toxins of the Whispering Gate?

  His thoughts were a tangled, chaotic wreck. He was still suffocating in the phantom shadow of his own death.

  "Go. Drag the other one over. Bind him."

  The rasping voice of the lead cloaked figure broke through Erika’s ringing ears. It brooked no argument.

  Erika forced his head up, following the gesture. Squinting through his blurred vision, he made out a figure slumped against a withered tree some distance away, similarly bound, a heavy sack over its head. Loren?

  He stared warily at the four figures, his body rigid with residual terror. What was this? A new, more twisted game?

  "Haven't you figured it out yet, boy?"

  Seeing Erika's shell-shocked hesitation, the lead figure seemed to lose patience. With a derisive snort, he reached up and yanked back the heavy hood.

  Moonlight fell unimpeded, illuminating sharp cheekbones, a thin, pressed mouth, a strong nose, and those eyes—deep-set and hawklike, holding a glint of something unreadable, complex.

  Wolfgang.

  Erika's breath hitched. His eyes widened, his jaw slack, but no sound emerged. The shock was a physical blow, short-circuiting his already exhausted brain.

  As if reading his mind, the other three figures chuckled almost in unison. The sound was no longer the forced, menacing snarl from before. It was relaxed, casual, tinged with their own brand of amusement. They pushed back their hoods.

  The short Cleric, Kaelen, his face split by a familiar, impish grin, winked playfully.

  The tall priestess, Lun Qin, her expression as cool as ever, though the usual sharpness in her eyes had softened into something resembling approval.

  And the last, revealing old Morrison's face, flushed with excitement, his eyes gleaming behind his spectacles as he stared at Erika like a perfectly calibrated set of data.

  Wolfgang. Kaelen. Lun Qin. Morrison.

  The "kidnappers." The "interrogators." It had been them all along.

  Erika remained on his hands and knees, a statue struck by lightning. All the terror, the despair, the desperate resolve to protect his Instructor… it all collapsed into a farce of absurd proportions.

  "Go. Drag the other one over. Bind him," Wolfgang repeated, his voice returning to its normal, authoritative cadence.

  Erika looked down at the rough rope, now tossed onto the dirt before him. He looked at the slumped figure under the tree. A torrent of questions rose in his throat, but they were stifled by ingrained habit, by the subconscious obedience forged in the crucible of Wolfgang's brutal training.

  He swallowed hard, fighting the nausea. Gripping the rope, he hauled himself up on unsteady legs and staggered toward the withered tree.

  Up close, he could hear Loren mumbling incoherently through the sack, his body twitching fitfully, trapped in whatever manufactured nightmare the adults had concocted for him. Seeing the noble boy—who had so recently flaunted his taste and superiority—reduced to this pitiful state… Erika felt a complicated twist in his gut.

  Without hesitation, he followed orders. He efficiently bound Loren's hands and feet, making the knots tighter and more secure than those that had held himself. Then, grabbing the taller boy by the shoulders, he hauled him upright and dragged him back toward the group with considerable effort.

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  As he did, the low conversation of the four Instructors drifted over. It was a world away from their earlier malevolence.

  "…Told you he had it in him," Wolfgang’s voice was low, carrying a faint thread of vindication.

  "Fine, fine, you win. I'll settle the dinner bill later," Kaelen retorted, his tone laced with familiar mockery.

  "Don't celebrate yet. My 'promising student' still needs to perform," Morrison cut in, buzzing with anticipation. "The comparative data will be fascinating!"

  Wolfgang turned to Erika, who had just deposited Loren onto the cold ground. Reverting to the raspy, terrifying voice of the "kidnapper," he commanded, "Erika. Well done. Now, lie down behind us. Play dead when the time comes."

  By now, Erika was certain this was another test. Its purpose was unclear, but at least it wasn't a genuine execution. He nodded silently, moving to a patch of shadow a few paces behind the four figures. He lay down, closed his eyes, and regulated his breathing, trying to mimic a corpse.

  But he cracked his eyelids open the merest slit. His ears were acutely tuned to the scene unfolding before him.

  He saw the silhouette of Kaelen approach the unconscious Loren. A faint ripple of energy—subtle but perceptible to Erika's sharpened senses—swept the air. Kaelen had placed a gloved hand on Loren's forehead, breaking the spell.

  A few seconds passed.

  "Ugh… nngh…"

  A pained groan escaped Loren. His body began to thrash violently. He was waking up.

  The real show was just beginning. And Erika, this time, was a silent observer hidden in the shadows.

  The scene unfolding before him was nothing like Erika had anticipated. He had expected the noble, given his usual arrogant certainty of control, to at least maintain a facade of calm. Perhaps attempt to negotiate, or haughtily threaten them with his family's influence.

  But no.

  Wolfgang ripped the sack from Loren's head. The moonlight fell upon features that were handsome, but now contorted with sheer, ugly panic. The return of sight brought no comfort; it was a bucket of ice water, shocking him from his groggy nightmare into the full, stark horror of four cloaked specters surrounding him in the desolate emptiness.

  A wet, ragged gasp escaped him, like a fish drowning in air. His usually immaculate pale gold hair was plastered to his damp forehead. Through his cracked eyelids, Erika could see Loren’s wide eyes darting wildly, holding nothing but pure, undiluted terror.

  A tremor started in his limbs, rapidly escalating into violent, uncontrollable shaking. He jerked uselessly against the ropes Erika had tied.

  "I… I don't know you!" he shrieked. The words were distorted, sharp and cracking, entirely stripped of aristocratic poise.

  He frantically tried to build a last defense. "I… I have nothing you want! Money? Information? The de Witts will find you! They will—"

  The cloaked figures didn't respond immediately. Only that low, malicious chuckle rose again, grating against the silent expanse. It was a lash against Loren's frayed nerves.

  One of the figures slowly raised a hand. Not pointing at Loren, but past him—toward Erika's still, "lifeless" form lying in the dirt.

  A simple gesture, heavy with chilling implication.

  Loren's gaze followed the pointing finger. He saw Erika lying dead in the moonlight. The connection was instantaneous. The image of his own impending execution flooded his mind, shattering his fragile threats.

  "No… No! Don't!" he wailed, his body thrashing wildly as he tried to curl away from the accusing finger. "I'll talk! Ask me anything! I'll tell you! Just don't kill me! Please, I'm begging you!"

  Every carefully constructed layer of class and pride was torn away by raw survival instinct, leaving behind a cowering, naked core of fear.

  Erika lay on the ground, watching through narrowed eyes. His feelings were a tangled knot—a strange pity for Loren's breakdown, mixed with a deepening curiosity. What were they looking for by comparing his own earlier performance to this ungraceful unraveling?

  Suddenly, a twisted spark of noble pride seemed to briefly short-circuit Loren’s panic. He tried to muster a last shred of defiance, perhaps thinking he could outsmart them by acting tough. His voice still trembled, but he forced a cold, calculating edge into it.

  "In that case… I… I see no need to cooperate either. I don't know you. And… I won't know you."

  He thought it a masterstroke—non-committal, neutral, playing hard to get.

  The response was a chorus of exaggerated, derisive laughter! The four figures laughed as if he'd told the world's funniest joke, the sound brutally shredding the last of Loren's self-deception.

  As the laughter subsided, Kaelen stepped forward. The moonlight caught the glint of a small, wicked blade in his hand.

  "Let's be clear," Kaelen said, almost cheerfully. "You're far 'smarter' than the one lying back there. You know how to weigh a situation, calculate the odds. You think your little family name means anything out here."

  He shifted the knife, its point resting lightly against Loren's bound arm. The cold touch made Loren flinch violently. "But we have no patience for smart little puzzles."

  "From now on," Kaelen's voice dropped into a venomous hiss, clear to both Loren and the listening Erika. "Every ten seconds, we'll add a new… 'mark' to your collection. Let's see how many intervals that clever, noble mind can endure."

  Before Loren could even process the threat, the blade bit down.

  "Ah—!" A sharp scream of genuine agony tore from his throat.

  Erika’s nostrils flared. Through the cold air, the unmistakable, metallic scent of real, fresh blood hit him. It wasn't an illusion this time. Kaelen had actually cut him.

  The first ten-second count began, silent and brutal.

  "Time's up," Morrison announced, his tone buzzing with clinical, detached excitement.

  A second cut. Close to the first.

  "No! Stop! What do you want to know?! I'll talk! I'll tell you!" Loren broke completely, his voice cracking with ugly sobs. His momentary "wisdom" and "principles" were a joke against the reality of tearing flesh.

  The cloaked figures ignored him. They were silent, precise instruments of the countdown.

  A third cut. A fourth.

  Loren's pleas dissolved into chaotic weeping. Tears and mucus streaked his face. All elegance was dead. "Please! Have mercy! I'll tell you everything! De Witt secrets! The Sanctum's— Ah!"

  A fifth cut.

  His begging twisted into venomous curses, hurling the foulest words a noble could muster, damning them to eternal suffering.

  A sixth cut.

  The curses faded into weak, breathless whimpers, pathetic accusations of their barbarism.

  Yet, through the tears and the begging, the precise, cold bloodletting continued. The stinging pain, the wetness soaking his sleeve, the relentless ten-second count—it systematically stripped Loren, layer by layer, of all reason and all pretense. Until only the raw, primal fear of pain and the shuddering horror of death remained.

  He writhed in his bonds like a fish gasping on a riverbank, his voice reduced to a hoarse, hopeless whimper.

  Erika lay perfectly still in the shadows. He didn't need to hear anymore to understand. Through this extreme, bloody method, Wolfgang and the others were ruthlessly exposing the shockingly brittle core hidden beneath Loren's polished, aristocratic exterior.

  And compared to the blood seeping into the dirt right now... Erika realized his own test, utterly devoid of physical harm, had been a twisted form of absolute mercy.