Location:Kael'thoren barracks → Kael'thoren ridge
Date/Time:Late Ashbloom, 9940 AZI
Realm:Demon Realm (Upper Realm)
The basins had been in place for months.
Every mess hall. Every barracks common room. Every entrance to every building where guards gathered, ate, or reported for duty. Stone basins filled with clear water, replenished each morning. Demons washed their hands before meals, before rituals, before council. The basins were invisible. Part of the architecture.
No one knew the water had been treated.
Vaelith's reagent — diluted to trace concentration — sat in every basin. On genuine demons, the treated water felt like nothing. On a devil, it produced a rash. Small. Red. Barely noticeable.
The monitoring teams watched. Months of clean washes. Thousands of genuine demons.
Then the border patrol rotated in.
Forty guards cycling back from the northern frontier. Standard rotation. Six months beyond the basin network. Six months of unwashed hands.
