[First Era – Year 6 of the Divinity War; Hopron, secret laboratory]

  The flickering light of lanterns bathed the laboratory in a soft, eerie glow. The air hummed with the low murmur of sealed entanglements and the scratch of quills on parchment. Tall shelves lined with strange apparatus and containers held the bizarre experiments of the researchers who worked here — all of them brilliant minds, each one focused on their own secretive project.

  Moraithe adjusted the collar of his cloak, his sharp eyes scanning the room. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with a presence and a mystic grin that commanded attention without needing to raise his voice. By his side, Saffrael moved with the fluid grace of a shadow, the scent of winterblossoms followed her. Her sapphire eyes scanned each of the researchers as they passed by. Her stardust freckled beauty, coupled with her intelligence, often made her seem enigmatic. Together, they were a perfect pair—sharp, strategic, and now, on a covert mission.

  Their task was clear—identify the betrayer.

  “I don't like it,” Saffrael whispered under her breath as they passed a workbench cluttered with glowing crystal fragments. “The Severed have gotten too close to some of our secrets.”

  Moraithe's jaw tightened. “We'll find out who. Stay alert.” He reached for Saffrael’s hand.

  She turned and quirked an eyebrow at him. “Do I need to pour a lake on your head?”

  He stammered, his cheeks heating at his blunder, realizing he’d been too forward.

  Saffrael hit him playfully on the arm. “Let's focus on this for now.”

  They approached the first suspect. Shran, hunched over a table in the far corner of the lab. The space around him was cluttered with ancient tomes, fragile and yellowed with age, and his face was set with intense concentration. He barely looked up when they approached, his gaze fixed on the pages before him.

  “Ah, Shran,” Moraithe began, his voice purposefully light. “What are you working on? Anything interesting?”

  Shran's sharp eyes flicked up to meet Moraithe's, and a cold, calculating expression crossed his face. He quickly closed one of the books with a snap, his fingers lingering just a moment too long on the fragile cover. “Nothing of concern,” he said, his voice clipped and guarded. “Just some research. Old texts. They have … historical value.”

  Moraithe studied him closely. “Old texts? Interesting. What exactly are you looking for?”

  For the briefest moment, Moraithe saw the flicker of something like suspicion pass through Shran's eyes. He sat back, closing his arms protectively around the books on his desk as if guarding them from prying eyes.

  “I'd appreciate it if you'd keep your distance, Moraithe,” Shran said, his voice tightening. “These are private matters. Research that doesn't concern you.”

  Saffrael raised an eyebrow.

  Moraithe took a slow step forward, his eyes narrowing. “We heard you were working on some kind of scrying device, something about entangling dragonflies. Is that what this is?”

  Shran stiffened, and for a moment, there was an unsettling silence. His lips pressed into a thin line, and he reached for one of the books with deliberate slowness, as if to put distance between himself and their questions.

  “Why don't you leave me to my work?” he said, his voice suddenly icy, his tone unyielding.

  He didn't want them anywhere near his research. There was something off about his entire demeanor now—too defensive, too guarded.

  Saffrael took a subtle step back, glancing at Moraithe. Her voice was quieter, but still cutting. “We're only trying to help.”

  Shran didn't respond. He was already focused back on his books, not acknowledging them further. But as Moraithe and Saffrael turned to leave, Moraithe couldn't shake the feeling that Shran was hiding something far deeper than just old records.

  They found Karthiim's workstation in a chamber containing several other researchers, a tall, brooding man whose dark eyes glinted with the sort of ambition that made people uneasy. He was examining a rev crystal, its edges flickering with strange, otherworldly light. The crystal seemed to pulse like a heartbeat, its aura reverberating throughout the room.

  “Ah, Moraithe, Saffrael,” Karthiim greeted them with a nod, his voice tinged with an odd sense of both welcome and distance. “Come to see my work, I assume?”

  “I hear it's one of the more promising projects,” Moraithe said, stepping closer. “A gateway into a shared warehouse. So this is the famous rev crystal.”

  Karthiim's eyes gleamed as he held up the crystal, his fingers tracing its intricate carvings. “I hope not too famous. We don't want the Severed to learn of it, after all.”

  “It's a rather simple idea, isn't it?” Saffrael asked, her voice as smooth as silk, but her eyes sharp.

  Karthiim smirked, his lips curling into something like a sneer. “Most of the best ideas are. The greatest difficulty has been security. Logistically, it is quite powerful, but it opens us up to quite the vulnerability.”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Is this a true revenescent, or something artificial?”

  “Neither would impact the security of the design.” He made a dismissive gesture, clearly unimpressed by their questions.

  Moraithe narrowed his eyes. There was something … off about him.

  As they turned to leave, they were met by Barthum, the kind, mousy researcher who always seemed to have a perpetual smile plastered to his face. He looked up from a cluttered table filled with entropy crystals—smooth, faceted stones with a faint shimmer.

  “Moraithe, Saffrael! I was hoping you'd drop by.” Barthum's voice was always soothing, the kind of voice you trusted without question. “Come tell me what you think of these entropy crystals. They are meant to store entropy as other crystals store anger and fear. Of course, I've still got a long way to go, even though they're already pushing for production.”

  “That sounds promising,” Saffrael said, her smile genuine. “I've heard many good things about your work, Barthum.”

  Barthum's eyes sparkled with excitement. “Come look. Tell me if you have any thoughts.”

  Moraithe examined the crystal. There seemed to be strange patterns within them as if mimicking something familiar. “Why does it seem so …”

  His thoughts started to drift back to his visit to the First Star, but he shook away the memory before he could get lost in reverie. The pattern was so familiar. “Is it a prison of light?”

  Barthum's eye bulged. “What did you say?”

  “It reminds me of an all-consuming light from my past.”

  “Brilliant!” Barthum threw his arms around him in a sudden embrace. “You are a genius.” He turned to his papers and began scribbling. “This could increase the yield by fifty, no …” He scribbled down a quick calculation. “A hundred and eighty-five times!”

  Barthum beamed. “You have just changed the entire war.” And within moments he had been completely consumed by his work. Saffrael turned to him and angled her head in a suggestion that they leave. Moraithe gave her a mystic grin, nodded, and they left Barthum to his project.

  Down a long corridor, Marsh was working on battle golems, his workshop a mess of massive jars containing half-formed bodies and sleek, fanged, bristling figures lying on tables, with vacant eyes. Battle golems were an idea that had been floated for years.

  Golems were made in the exact same way as Moraithe and Saffrael had made their own bodies, twice, only lacking a soul. And without a soul, they lacked power on the battlefield. Without a soul, they could not feel anger, exude fear, cast an entanglement, nor hold a revenescent. They had no self-assurance, nor could they contain gratitude. Hence, they lacked sufficient power for battle.

  Marsh, however, was convinced that his work was close to completion. Golem soldiers that could move, fight, and protect — but still, they were nowhere near the strength of real soldiers. Even the greatest golems couldn't stand up to the powers wielded by the Severed.

  As they approached his workspace, Marsh bent over a scroll, his brow furrowed, lips muttering under his breath. He was obviously inscribing a long list of conditions and instructions. Such scrolls were typically read aloud while the reader entangled his thoughts with its brain.

  “Looks different from a standard golem,” Saffrael observed, her voice cutting through the noise like a blade.

  Marsh jumped, clearly startled by her presence. His hands instinctively moved to cover the scroll, as though trying to hide something. His eyes darted between Moraithe and Saffrael, a flicker of guilt in his expression.

  “I… I'm working on it,” Marsh muttered quickly. “These forms, they're almost there. I just need to … tweak a few things.”

  Saffrael raised an eyebrow, sensing something off. “They're not strong enough to withstand a powerful enemy, though, are they?”

  Marsh's face flushed. “Not typically. But there are uses no one has considered. The small-minded think of a battlefield only as great powers attacking one another. In your mind, it is all self-assurance and entanglements, but the only reason no one has considered quantity as its own sort of power is the vast cost of time and effort to create a body. No one even considered making them self-replicating, like what they did when creating plants. That was brilliant, but why did they stop there? We could have a vast army creating itself. An entire—”

  Moraithe leaned forward, examining the golems. “Do the instructions replicate with them?”

  “I’ve created something I call instincts. It will pass along knowledge, desires, and instructions.” He suddenly appeared afraid, as if he’d said too much.

  “Can you show us?” Moraithe stepped forward with interest.

  The golem creator tensed, his fingers twitching as he carefully ran them over the limp form. “There's nothing to show. Not yet. I don't want your help. Now out!”

  Moraithe exchanged a glance with Saffrael, and they left.

  They moved on, searching for Creth's workspace. They found him standing in front of another golem, this one holding a giant axe. Creth crouched below it, clutching his head. His project was an air shield, a type of entanglement he'd been perfecting for months. Creth was known for his quiet demeanor, and though his work was always meticulous, it had been a while since he'd made any notable breakthroughs.

  As they approached him, Creth straightened up, giving them a friendly, if strained, smile. His eyes flickered nervously toward the stack of old letters sitting in a neat pile on the corner of his desk. He rushed to his chair and quickly swept them out of sight, but not before Moraithe noticed the words “urgent” and “confidential” written upon them.

  “What's this?” Moraithe asked, his tone casual but probing.

  “Just some old correspondence,” Creth replied quickly, his voice too light. “Nothing to worry about. They're just … from some past experiments, I keep everything organized, you know?” Lumps bulged out of his face, chaotically dancing in and out. His nose began to melt.

  Saffrael's eyes widened. “Looks like you've got a bit of chaos sickness. Too many entanglements?”

  Creth's smile wavered, and he adjusted his glasses nervously. “That is the nature of research, of course. I hear Barthum has something that could help.”

  Moraithe nodded. “Yes, his entropy crystals have garnered quite a bit of interest.”

  “But he's a bit stingy with his research.”

  Moraithe caught the faintest flicker of a lie in his eyes. “Stingy. I've never seen him as anything but friendly.”

  “I—” Creth faltered, glancing down at his cluttered desk. “Let's just say… I don't like to be in anyone's debt.”

  Saffrael stepped closer, her voice lowering in a way that only added to the tension. “Are you in debt?”

  “Why would you think that?” he replied, a little too defensively. “Let me show you the air shield.” He leaped up and strode to the golem, an obvious distraction. “I've been improving the conditional bindings to deal with other types of—”

  Saffrael held up a hand. “I don't want to push you any further. You already have chaos sickness. Perhaps you can show us another time.”

  They left to consider their next move. Creth wasn't the only researcher hiding something. There were too many secrets in this place, too many anomalies.

  “We're getting closer,” Moraithe muttered as they walked away. “But we need more information.”

  Saffrael nodded, her expression grim. “Keep watching. One of them is the mole. And when we find out who, we may have one last trick for the Severed.”

  With that, they retreated into the shadows of the laboratory once more, suspicions swirling in their thoughts, and the truth still just out of reach.