The room remained too tall to be called merely an office.
The wide windows took up almost the entire front wall, open to the gray sea breathing beyond the stone walls.
From there, it was possible to see ships coming and going in a constant rhythm, sails raised, cargo being carried, men running between orders and chains.
The port never slept.
Even in times of war… especially in them.
There, the empire still breathed.
Still fed.
Still stood.
The man before the window watched everything in silence.
There was nothing of a warrior about him.
The body was ordinary.
No battle marks.
No physical weight of someone shaped by war.
And yet, there was something uncomfortable in his stillness.
A posture too relaxed for someone in that position.
Hands resting behind his back.
Dark eyes, serene… too attentive.
Like someone who wasn't watching ships.
But outcomes.
He dressed well.
Expensive fabrics.
Simple cuts.
No ostentation.
Nothing that screamed power.
Because some people didn't need that.
The voice came calm.
Almost nostalgic.
"Thirteen years have already passed…"
The assistant remained silent, beside the desk, waiting.
The man kept his eyes on the horizon.
"When this place was still nothing but damp wood and poorly written promises…"
A brief pause.
"Few believed it would survive the first winter."
Outside, the distant sound of chains being pulled.
"Today, half of the empire's sea routes pass through here."
A small smile appeared.
Subtle.
Without warmth.
"Curious how men always underestimate what grows in silence."
He turned his face slightly.
Not enough to fully face the other.
"Did we receive a response from the Central Kingdom?"
The assistant lowered his head immediately.
"Not yet, my lord."
Silence.
No irritation.
No surprise.
Only acceptance.
As if he had expected exactly that.
"I see."
The reply came low.
Simple.
Quick footsteps echoed from outside.
Heavy.
Urgent.
The door opened with contained force, and a knight entered, kneeling immediately before even catching his breath.
The armor still carried road dust.
The face, tension.
The voice came out firm, despite the haste.
"Lord Ivan."
Only then did the name fill the room.
"News from the front lines."
The man did not turn immediately.
He kept looking at the port.
"Speak."
The knight took one breath.
"Our positions in the east continue to give way."
"The forward lines were broken at dawn."
"Fortifications fell before the second bell."
The kneeling man's jaw tightened.
"They are being decimated, my lord."
The silence that followed was worse than any reaction.
Ivan watched a ship leaving the dock.
Slow.
Steady.
As if the world were not collapsing somewhere else.
Then he asked:
"And the White Crow?"
Now he turned.
Slowly.
His eyes finally fell on the knight.
Calm.
But not kind.
"Have you managed to locate him?"
The knight held his posture, though the answer weighed.
"No, my lord."
"None of the survivors were able to identify him."
"Only the same account…"
A short pause.
"Every attempt to advance fails before it even begins."
Ivan descended the steps near the window with the same calm of someone descending to dinner.
No haste.
No visible tension.
And that made everything worse.
"It's been two months."
The voice was low.
Controlled.
"Two months since we entered the war…"
He stopped in front of the knight.
His gaze lowered over him.
Not as judgment.
As recognition.
"And, because of him… nothing we've tried has worked."
The silence barely had time to settle.
New footsteps echoed through the hall.
Firm.
Without hesitation.
They stopped right behind the kneeling knight.
Ivan lifted his eyes.
The figure standing at the entrance didn't need to announce her presence.
Black hair, long, slightly wavy, fell over her shoulders with almost irritating precision.
Pale skin created a severe contrast with the dark garments and the armor fitted to her body — black, elegant, with refined details that avoided excess and, precisely because of that, imposed more.
At the center of the chestplate, the symbol.
A black fish.
Simple.
In profile.
Elongated.
Without adornments.
Only the dark silhouette and the one inevitable detail—
a clear, silvery circular eye, watching as if it were still alive.
Ivan watched her for a moment.
Long enough.
Then he sighed, almost tired.
"Elara…"
The voice came low.
Heavier than irritated.
"Where do you think you're going dressed like that?"
She stepped forward a few paces.
Straight posture.
Chin raised.
No childish defiance.
Only decision.
"I will depart for the front lines."
The kneeling knight lowered his head even more.
As if wishing to disappear.
Ivan remained still.
His gaze on her.
Cold.
Direct.
"No."
The answer came immediate.
Without raising his voice.
And, exactly because of that, more absolute.
Elara did not step back.
"We don't have time for this anymore."
The voice was firm.
Controlled.
But there was life in it.
Conviction.
"This is my duty."
A short pause.
"As heir of Tricórdio."
Ivan descended one more step.
"That is foolishness."
Now there was something harder in his tone.
Not anger.
Refusal.
"The enemy anticipated all of our offensives."
"Every advance."
"Every route."
"Every attempt at response."
He stopped in front of her.
Close enough for the line between authority and concern to become dangerous.
"And that's not all."
His dark eyes narrowed.
"Their army has the awakened — forces our men cannot even comprehend."
"Hired mercenaries and port knights mean little against that."
Silence.
His voice dropped even lower.
"The Central Kingdom will not send reinforcements."
"They have already made their choice."
A pause.
"They will leave us to bear this ruin alone."
"You will withdraw before that."
Elara took a deep breath.
Once.
Like someone steadying her own blood before speaking.
When she raised her eyes again—
there was no hesitation.
"My name is Elara Varkhan Nanshera."
Each word came out clean.
Without tremor.
Without haste.
"And I will fight."
Her eyes did not leave his.
"As my brothers fought."
"As my sisters fell on the field."
Her voice did not rise.
But it weighed.
"I will do the same."
The silence that followed was short.
Violent.
Ivan stepped forward.
And, for the first time, the calm failed.
"No."
The voice cut through the room.
Firm.
Hard.
"I will not send my daughter to her death."
She held her father's gaze without looking away.
There was no defiance.
Only decision.
"I do not walk toward death."
The voice came serene.
Firm.
"I go to meet the White Crow."
A brief pause.
"And I will try to force an understanding."
Ivan's eyes remained on her.
Unmoving.
"I already sent Darion and Caelan."
Silence settled for a moment.
He tilted his head slightly.
Almost a gesture of contained patience.
"And you truly believe those two will be enough to contain the enemy's advance?"
Elara did not hesitate.
"I believe they will be enough for the Black Wolf of the North to halt his march."
Her gaze remained intact.
"And for the White Crow, at last… to find rest upon this field."
Silence.
Neither of them stepped back.
The tension did not need a voice to exist.
Then she turned.
Without haste.
Her steps firm on the stone.
Already near the door, she spoke one last time.
"And do not forget, father…"
She stopped.
Just enough.
Without turning her face.
"The blood of Nanshe runs in your veins."
A brief pause.
Lower.
Deeper.
"As it runs in mine."
The door opened.
Light cut across the hall for an instant.
she left.
The sound of her steps faded down the corridors.
Ivan did not move.
He remained looking at the emptiness she left behind.
As if she were still there.
As if there were still time to stop her.
But some decisions did not return.
They only moved forward.
The knight remained kneeling.
In silence.
Waiting.
Ivan breathed once.
Slow.
Controlled.
When he spoke, his voice had returned to the serene tone from before.
Perhaps colder.
"Go with her."
The knight's eyes lifted immediately.
"Yes, my lord."
"Do not allow her to advance alone."
A pause.
"And if the field demands blood…"
Ivan's eyes did not leave the window.
The port.
The ships.
The horizon already announcing war.
"make sure it is not hers."
"As you command, my lord."
The knight rose.
Fist closed over his chest.
And left without further words.
The door closed.
This time—
the silence remained whole.
Ivan turned back to the window.
The ships still lay at the dock.
Merchants.
Soldiers.
Men who still sustained the illusion of normality while war approached.
His fingers touched the wood of the window lightly.
Without force.
Almost distracted.
And then, in a low voice—
as if speaking less to the world and more to himself—
he said:
"Thirteen years."
The silence listened.
"Thirteen years to wrench this place from oblivion."
His eyes remained on the horizon.
"To turn sea and stone into power."
A brief pause.
"To force even the Central Kingdom to turn its eyes to this port."
His jaw tightened.
Barely.
But enough.
"And now…"
Another pause.
Longer.
"a few days of war are enough to reduce everything to ashes."
Silence.
The wind crossed the open window.
Cold.
Constant.
Ivan did not move.
He only kept looking ahead.
As if searching the horizon for some answer he already knew did not exist.
Lower this time—
almost a thought escaping—
he said:
"I plead with the sea…"
A pause.
Heavy.
"that the blood of one more of my children… will not be claimed by war."
The wind high on the walls came heavy with salt.
But, that morning—
the prevailing smell was blood.
The fortress that protected the entrance to the port no longer looked like a defense.
It looked like a body being slowly torn apart.
Screams echoed among the stones.
Orders.
Metal against metal.
Men falling.
Arrows cutting through the air like inevitable answers.
Down below, the field advanced in chaos.
And among it—
marched the army of the North.
Black armor.
Heavy.
Without shine.
As if war itself had learned to wear steel.
Above them, the banner whipped under the aggressive coastal wind.
A black wolf.
Raised against the gray sky.
Not as a symbol.
As a sentence.
The defensive lines had already given way twice.
The third would not take long.
Port soldiers tried to reorganize formation between broken barricades and still-warm bodies.
Knights shouted orders that already arrived too late.
Nothing held.
Nothing remained.
Because someone, on the other side, had already decided where each piece would fall.
And then—
an arrow pierced the neck of a soldier in black armor the instant he raised his sword.
The body fell to its knees.
Then to the side.
The advance faltered for a second.
Brief.
But enough.
Another arrow.
This time into the visor of a knight of the North.
Precise.
Clean.
Cruel.
The men lifted their eyes.
Trying to find the origin.
At the top of one of the broken wall structures, almost hidden between stone and shadow—
he was there.
Dark garments.
Light.
Without crest.
Without identification.
As if the body itself had been made to disappear.
White hair tied back.
The bow already drawn before the last death touched the ground.
Cold eyes.
Unmoving.
Caelan carried no haste.
Only precision.
Another arrow.
Another black soldier fell.
Another space opened in the enemy's advance.
Each shot did not only kill men—
it broke formation.
Interrupted momentum.
Forced hesitation.
And, on the field below—
that hesitation was immediately punished.
A figure cut through the fight as if it did not belong to that reality.
Too fast.
Too silent.
The long blade reflected brief flashes of light between blood and steel.
A katana.
Clean.
Lethal.
Darion appeared and disappeared among the soldiers of the North like a flaw in perception.
One step.
One cut.
Another step.
Another body.
No movement wasted.
No force beyond what was necessary.
A man's throat opened before he understood he had been reached.
Another had his spear deflected and his chest pierced in the same motion.
A third tried to react—
too late.
Blood traced an arc over the stone.
Darion did not stop.
Did not look back.
There was no combat in his face.
Only execution.
Above—
Caelan loosed another arrow.
And saw.
Further back.
Beyond the main line of advance—
the movement was changing.
The black troops were beginning to reorganize.
More disciplined.
More careful.
Elite guards.
Protection of someone important.
He narrowed his eyes.
Then jumped from the stone structure.
Silent.
Light.
Like a shadow descending to kill another.
The instant he touched the ground—
Darion was already beside him.
No surprise.
No question.
Only understanding.
The two looked in the same direction.
In the distance—
new men advanced surrounding a figure that still could not be seen clearly.
Caelan spun an arrow between his fingers.
His voice came low.
Cold.
"They are not defending ground… they are preserving someone."
Darion cleaned the blade with a short motion.
Eyes fixed ahead.
"Men do not form walls by chance."
Caelan set another arrow.
"Then we already know where the war truly is."
Darion raised the katana.
No haste.
No hesitation.
"And we will reach him before she is forced to step onto this."
Neither of them needed to say the name.
Elara was already on her way.
And that alone made time shorter.