"Estimate."
Marin stared at Arik and hesitated for a moment. "I need a stronger tea for this." He mumbled, and a new tab appeared in his view. "The older ones look around his childhood and match some of the dubious reports, but there is new…" After typing a prompt command, the ether channel map returned with two windows: one for Liam's entire body and another for his right cheek. "Damage. Right cheek that matches the report about Felix slapping Liam a month ago."
"So he didn't hit me that hard?" Liam asked, genuinely focused on the technical part of the issue. "The bruising was from my ether channels?"
The room went very quiet.
Arik's blood did not simply freeze this time.
It became something colder.
Marin looked at Liam for one long second, then at the isolated scan of his right cheek. The hologram showed the ordinary tissue trauma first, faint and almost unremarkable now after a month of healing. Then Marin expanded the channel layer beneath it.
