Leon and his party blazed their way down the halls of the research facility, no longer interrupted by Apati. Leon had refused the man’s offer, but given his own feelings, and the informal alliance he had with the tree sprite accompanying him, that was the only offer he could give right then. Nestor’s offer still held some appeal, though. Make it look like he was killing the man, but in actuality, take him as a prisoner, then squeeze him for everything that he knew of the work that went on here in the research facility.

As they ran, Leon didn’t let on even a little bit about what on his mind, and his party moved on in silence, Apati’s attempted extortion and Leon’s refusal making it look like the expedition was already a failure. It wasn’t until they heard the sounds of battle further down the halls that they were able to pick themselves up a little bit.

They found Helen, Anshu, and Valeria fighting against three labor golems. Leon was grateful for something to take his frustration out on and threw himself with great vigor into the fight. In moments, all three labor golems were lying in pieces at his feet, their internals shattered beyond repair.

Helen reunited with her sister, Anshu was respectful enough to everyone else, and Leon embraced Valeria, taking a moment just for them. They pressed their lips against each other, shared one meaningful look, but didn’t say a word. They didn’t need words for what they wanted to say, and when they got moving again, they were on the same page with each other. Leon gave another quick run-down of their situation, and the party got moving again.

He eventually found the lift that led right to the control room at the bottom of the facility, but just in front of the hole he’d cut through the door were four labor golems, all of them in pieces. Two showed signs of having been crushed and gnawed on by something quite large, while the other two had been dismantled by clean cuts.

The sight calmed Leon considerably, for in this carnage, he could sense Maia’s power. His river nymph lover had come through here, and from what he could sense from their connection, had traveled into the lift shaft.

Leon launched himself through the hole in the door, the rest of the party close behind him, and looked up. He was able to see a water dragon a few floors up, trying to chew through the bottom of the broken lift stuck above them.

Maia… Leon whispered through their connection, and the water dragon metaphorically froze as Maia’s head and shoulders materialized sticking out of its hide.

Leon! she ecstatically exclaimed. She ejected herself from the water dragon and literally fell into his arms. Their embrace was a little more passionate than Leon and Valeria’s, but that was only because Valeria had been a more conscious of everyone else and their missing comrades. With everyone else having been accounted for but the Princess, Leon let himself indulge a bit more with his river nymph mate.

However, the stares of the Evergolden mages weren’t easily ignored, and after a few seconds of hovering there in the air, his arms around his mate, Leon let go. Maia was more reluctant, but Leon’s bitter smile was enough to convince her to put their situation first.

“Do you know where the Princess is?” Leon asked. He nodded to the hole in the door and added, “Looks like she got a couple of those golems out there…”

She went down, Maia said. We agreed to look for an exit—and for everyone else—and she decided to look down, first.

Leon lightly frowned. It was easy enough to know that they were underground, and going down was hardly the most logical course of action in looking for an escape. It wasn’t totally illogical, though, since a path to an exit could be anywhere, but since the lift shaft was easy enough for him to cut through with his fire scalpel, he would’ve assumed Sunlight wouldn’t have had too much trouble with the lift, had Cassandra cared to try.

With a steadily growing pit of uncertainty and apprehension growing in his stomach, Leon did the only thing he could do right then: lead the expedition downward, toward the control room at the bottom.

Upon reaching the bottom, he found the same door that he’d had to use a maintenance code to access having been bisected—undoubtedly by Sunlight—allowing easy access to the other side. And the battle that was taking place on the other side.

More than two dozen golems were arrayed against Cassandra, along with three Lance-like weapons hovering in the air close to the door, though these were smaller than he was used to seeing. At the far end of the hall, covering the final door leading to the control room, was a powerful shield of translucent white light.

Busy cutting her way through these golems was Cassandra, the evidence that the golems used to be more numerous strewn in pieces all over the floor.

“To Her Highness!” shouted the sixth-tier Evergolden mage, and the three remaining members of the Evergolden squad that had accompanied the Princess into the Prota Forest charged.

Leon couldn’t very well allow them to charge on their own, so they had barely taken a single step before he was following and ordering his retinue to do the same.

Careful, Leon! Nestor shouted as Leon ripped into the first golem in his way. Those two in the back are war golems!

Leon spared the two Nestor called out a look. They didn’t seem too different from the labor golems, both being quite large with almost exaggerated masculine shapes, but what was clear was that their heavily-armored exteriors were covered in elaborate lightning and wing-shaped decorations. These weren’t just war golems, they were built to impress and intimidate.

Still, with Leon, Maia, and Cassandra, plus the combined efforts of everyone else, they cut through the labor golems like carving a cake. Only then did the war golems charge.

They moved surprisingly quickly for constructs more than twice Leon’s height and made of steel, and as they charged, they each clenched their left fist, and Leon sensed an enchantment activate.

He barely had time to himself react, let alone warning the rest of his people, and a moment later, a wave of lightning erupted from both golems.

Leon was almost comically unaffected by this power, but everyone else was hurled back. Fortunately, everyone was still heavily armored, and this attack didn’t penetrate their defenses. Still, it interrupted their counter charge, and the war golems capitalized as much as they could. Leon knew that his blood prevented them from targeting him, so he wasn’t surprised to see both focus on Cassandra.

One lunged for the Princess while the other halted a few paces away and clenched its right fist. Cassandra dodged the fist, but the second golem let loose with a directed lightning bolt that hit her so hard it smashed her against the wall. By Leon’s reckoning, it was an attack that an average seventh-tier would’ve had to put all their readily-available magic into to create, but they could’ve matched it. As a result, Cassandra wasn’t hurt that much.

The golem that had lunged, on the other hand, was immediately swept up by Maia’s water dragon, which wrapped around it and squeezed, preventing it from moving.

Leon, at the same time, lunged past, and slammed into the other war golem. On contact, he exploded in fire, and he opened himself up to the black flame as much as he could. Most of his fire was still the usual color, but a few licks of black could be seen within, and he could feel his blood resonating in its expression.

When the fire died out a few seconds later, the second war golem had been rendered slag on the ground. The first, almost completely immobilized by Maia, was run through by Cassandra, who hadn’t even tried to spare it for study, directing cutting it, and Maia’s water dragon, in half.

Maia looked affronted, but Cassandra hardly seemed to care, turning to Leon as he picked himself back up and shouting, “It’s about time you showed up!” Unlike her usual challenging attitude, this was pure anger. Leon, however, had only enough time to look at her with a mix of surprise, anger, and offense before a bolt of golden lightning shot past him from behind—one of the small Lances had fired.

Leon watched as Cassandra, who the bolt had been aimed at, tried to dodge, her eyes wide in surprise and shock, her aura spiking as she tried to conjure something to protect herself. The bolt, which would’ve hit her in the chest if she hadn’t moved, instead struck her right arm and exploded in a shower of sparks.

Cassandra screamed as she fell, her right arm from just a bit below her shoulder simply gone, disintegrated by the lightning bolt. Sunlight, which had been clasped in her right hand, clattered to the floor.

Leon spun back around, cursed himself for his complacency, and swung his blade, sending a wave of wind magic against the Lances, knocking them back. He was then on the closest one in a heartbeat, cleaving right through it with ease. Next to him, Maia’s water dragon lunged and devoured a second Lance, crushing it within its body. The final Lance was destroyed when Cassandra, looking like she was barely able to remain upright, hit the final one with an intense ray of light, splitting it in half. With all the active threats dealt with, she collapsed.

“Your Highness!” the sixth-tier Evergolden mage screamed as she ran forward and pressed an expensive-looking healing spell against Cassandra’s burned stump, and Leon ran over to aid in Cassandra’s healing with the tau pearl.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t much either of them could do. They could ensure that Cassandra didn’t die of shock or blood loss, and they could repair the damaged flesh that remained, but they couldn’t regrow her arm without more powerful magic.

As they worked, the rest of the group secured the hall, and Valeria went to examine the shield of light covering the door.

“I don’t think we’re going to get through this that easily!” she called out.

Leon glanced up, not needing to spare too much attention with the tau pearl active. He didn’t immediately respond, but his mood had worsened considerably. Whatever their disagreements, he didn’t like seeing Cassandra go down like this. She was beautiful, strong, and confident, and he liked that about her. Her arrogance, sense of entitlement, and disregard for others were less attractive qualities that he’d become fairly familiar with during this expedition, but still, seeing her unconscious, less her sword arm, had turned his boiling anger quite cold.

He was going to get through that shield, and Apati was not going to be able to stop him.

A moment later, all that he could do had been done. The tree sprite had come forward looking like it wanted to help but had been waved away by the worried Evergolden mages, so, when Leon started walking toward the door, the sprite, Maia, and the rest of Leon’s retinue followed him.

“Leon,” Apati said as his ball of emerald light appeared again, “this is your last chance. I admit, you’ve pressed me right up against the wall, but I’m not done yet. Turn back around, or more of your people are going to die.”

Leon didn’t dignify that with a response.

“I’ve closed the loopholes that we used to get in,” Apati pointed out. “No using maintenance codes to access this control room. You’re going to have to break in, and that’s not going to—”

Before the dead man could finish, Leon retrieved a spell from his soul realm. The spell was simple, composed of only a single rune—a single ancient rune: ‘open’.

Recognizing the shield as not particularly dangerous, simply in his way, Leon slammed the spell into the shield, silencing Apati immediately.

Leon was angry. He was furious. He was feeling every synonym of those words, and then some.

But he was focused—focused on one thing: getting that damned shield out of his way. In this furious focus, the image of what he wanted crystal-clear in his mind, the open rune functioned perfectly, and in less than a second, it punched a hole right through the shield of light.

Leon was through in a second, but it snapped shut behind him, separating him from everyone else.

Valeria, looking panicked, began banging on the shield. Maia sent questions through their connection. The tree sprite stared at him, its alien face completely inscrutable.

Leon simply waved at them, his cold anger bringing him to a strange sense of calm. Then, he walked through the door and into the control room.

“Please!” Apati shouted as Leon walked in and began descending the stairs leading to the platform with the control consoles. “Please! Please! I’ll give you everything! Don’t kill me! Please!”

With every entreaty, he sounded more and more desperate. But his words swayed Leon not at all. He calmly walked down the stairs, then paused as he stepped onto the control platform. He confirmed that Apati was still right where he’d left him: plugged into the platform’s enchantments.

Nestor, he whispered, ignoring Apati’s continued pleas for mercy, how do I shut off that shield?

Do you remember where those consoles were that controlled the wards? Nestor asked.

Leon responded affirmatively.

Go over there, Nestor continued. I’ll walk you through what you need to do.

Leon did as instructed, and in the minute or so it took him to lower the shield, Apati had gone silent.

A moment after it was done, Leon began walking ominously toward Apati’s emerald, which had already started to crack a bit. It wasn’t like Nestor’s ruby, which had been specifically tailored to imprison a magic body, and so was starting to fail under the strain of containing Apati’s remains. Leon could’ve done nothing at all, and Apati probably would’ve been dead in a matter of a day or two, by his estimation.

But he wasn’t going to get that long. Leon’s retainers, along with the tree sprite and the rest of the Evergolden contingent—carrying a barely-conscious Cassandra—spilled into the control room.

There were a few gasps of amazement, but everyone was far too focused on getting down to Leon and the control platform.

“I’ll admit, Apati,” Leon said as they arrived, “the temptation to keep you alive was strong. But this is it for you.”

Leon ripped the dead man’s emerald right out of the control console it was plugged into, and he thought he heard Apati start to weep.

He stared at the gem in his hand for a long moment. It would’ve been so easy to simply destroy the gem—flood it with so much lightning that it was rendered little more than dust. But instead, Leon had a better idea.

Before he went through with it, though, he had just one question left for the man.

“Why?” he asked. “Why betray me like this? Was it not enough that I was going to take you out of here? You’d already concocted a good enough cover story, and, if you were telling the truth, you had everything I’d come here for. You could’ve ingratiated yourself to me so much that I would’ve given you quite the high position within my retinue. Why lose it all to try and force me to kill some tree sprites?”

The question hung in the air, everyone silent as they waited for the dead man’s reply. It almost seemed like none would come, but then Apati simply said, “It killed me.”

Leon frowned, then nodded in understanding, remembering the cerebral root that Apati had been attached to when he’d found the man, and the skull that it had sprouted from—undoubtedly Apati’s own skull. He supposed in a similar situation, he might’ve tried something similar.

But here they were.

Leon looked to the eighth-tier tree sprite and said, “A shame the job wasn’t finished. Care to fix that for us?” He held out the emerald, and the tree sprite walked forward, its wooden face impassive, its massive black eyes locked firmly on the emerald containing Apati, the ‘Pain-Bringer’.

Without the slightest sign of hesitation, it took the emerald, and in a flash of white light, shattered it.

Apati screamed. Once. Loudly.

His scream was cut off, and no more was heard for a long time as everyone stood there, staring at the tree sprite, not saying a word.

“Was… was that it?” Alix asked. “Is that **heel dead?”

The tree sprite didn’t look at her—instead turning to Leon—but spoke once more through a chunk of amber.

“Yes,” it said.

Leon slowly nodded, unsure of exactly how to proceed. The facility was in his control now, it seemed, but there was still some business left to conclude now that Apati was out of the picture.

“So… what now?” he asked the tree sprite. “Should we just go back to killing each other? Or can we give peace a chance?”

The tree sprite, in what was becoming clear was its usual manner, paused a moment, and with nothing else occupying his attention, Leon studied its aura and guessed that it was communicating with something.

‘Probably the ninth-tier sprite,’ he surmised.

Eventually, it repeated, “Yes.”

It continued to stand there and stare at him, though, so after an awkward moment, Leon asked, “Are there any conditions? Can we loot this place? Are you going to… watch us the whole time…?”

Again, the tree sprite paused. “Your presence is requested,” it eventually replied. “You will move unharmed through this forest. Please come back to our grove immediately.”

Leon glanced around at the control room. “Think we could get a few minutes here, at least? Turn everything off, you know?”

The tree sprite answered immediately this time. “Acceptable,” it said.

Leon, working in silence, with all the rest of their party watching him head about shutting down all the wards, none saying a word, all filled with tension. Once finished, he said to the tree sprite, “All right. Let’s get this thing done.”