Aqui está a tradução para o inglês, mantendo tom literário, ritmo e intensidade narrativa. Não adaptei conteúdo, apenas verti com cuidado estilístico:
The rustling of the undergrowth tickled Leonia's nose, pulling her out of her stupor with a faint yet persistent irritation. She vaguely remembered passing out in the archduke's sitting room—by her own free will—sinking into a soft sofa she had leaned against. A sofa that most certainly did not have a gritty, crumbling texture.
When she lifted her face, cold, damp soil clung to her skin. The sensation made her hold her breath for a moment. Distressed, she tried to raise a hand to brush it away.
Or rather… she thought about doing so.
Thanks to her training in poison ingestion, Leo had not been as affected by the Lozebil and Tormekajil pills. The oleander biscuits, on the other hand, had been a far more effective choice to leave her just as disoriented as the other participants.
Well, at least it hadn't been a dart this time.
And, depending on the amount ingested, the victim could sleep for months—or perhaps for all eternity. Lozebil was an excellent drug for anesthetizing the body for over two hours, leaving the unfortunate consumer with severe motor impairment. It was especially effective on Demerians, in whom the effects proved stronger and longer-lasting, ideal for lengthy surgeries. Tormekajil, meanwhile, made the individual lose consciousness with ease and also acted as a sedative—an elegant alternative to chloroform, for those who valued sophistication even in kidnappings.
The woman forced her eyes to stay focused on what lay ahead. A quick assessment of her body revealed no serious injuries—only the unpleasant numbness spreading through her limbs.
By her calculations, she had left Montreal two days and a few hours earlier. Judging by the position of the sun in the sky, it was probably around half past one in the afternoon.
Today is July 17th.
Very well.
The test to become an Inquisitor had begun.
She needed to move fast.
On her second failed attempt to move, she tried to pull her arm while pushing herself up. When she applied more force, an unsurprising realization hit her: her hands were not merely numb, but firmly bound behind her back with thick ropes, finished with a knot only someone particularly dedicated—or sadistic—would tie.
All signs indicated that every selected candidate was undergoing the same test and had awakened the same way she had.
More than convenient.
Had she remained unconscious any longer, she would certainly have become food for predators. Or vultures.
Grumbling, she drew strength from her core just to roll her body over. Having her face pressed into the dirt was humiliating, and her honor had already been dragged through the mud enough in recent days. There was no need to do the same to her beautiful face.
After some effort, she managed to turn over. The next problem was obvious: her arms and legs were still bound.
Curse whoever came up with this idea.
She knelt, settling into the most comfortable position she could manage, trying to reach the ropes binding her ankles behind her. The knot was elaborate. It would take precious minutes to undo.
As soon as her legs were free, she ran her fingers clumsily along the rope, trying to identify the type of knot. Judging by its thickness and resistance, it resembled the kind used on large ships—fiber prepared to withstand pressure and resist cuts.
Looking around, she knew she couldn't attempt friction against the jagurim trees (the purple ones). They secreted a substance that caused wounds and itching upon contact with skin—one of the least dangerous trees in that place.
So, welcome to the Forest of Old Bones.
A place where even breathing was dangerous. The gas-laden air caused hallucinations capable of hastening one's death, as if the entire forest were alive and deeply offended by her presence. It was no coincidence that the Immaculate Mountains were located in that region.
According to the books she had read, some adolescents, upon turning eighteen, performed a rite of passage there: surviving an entire night and emerging alive was proof enough that they had reached adulthood.
The forest's defining feature was its giant trees, tall enough to blot out the sky. Dark trunks, violet leaves and fruits that glowed at night, creating an exotic—and deceptive—beauty that lured unwary prey. Unlike other forests, there was no scent of wet earth. The air was dense, smelling of beetroot, iron, and something burnt. A strange combination that, according to local researchers and hunters, caused hallucinations when inhaled for too long.
Standing up, unsteady, Leo took a deep breath, trying to acclimate to the smell without letting it overwhelm her senses—the longer she inhaled it, the more vulnerable she became. Her body was still slack, her balance precarious. Ignoring everything that hindered her, she focused on finding a way to free herself: a thick trunk for friction, a sharp object abandoned by some unlucky soul.
It didn't take long for her to find a black angico tree. Leaning against it, she rubbed her bound hands against the trunk with as much force as she could muster, even knowing it would leave deep scratches.
What were scratches compared to everything she was going through?
Nothing.
She took a deep breath and kept going.
Wait a moment…
She stopped rubbing the thick ropes.
A heavy rustling echoed through the bushes to her right.
Swallowing hard, Leo restrained herself from making any movement that might give her away. Controlling her breathing as much as she could, she closed her eyes to listen again.
Either the creature was hearing her thoughts… or she had been careless for too long—an error not even a beginner would make.
From what she could tell, the colossal was trying not to give away its position, which meant it was waiting for her to act first. Assessing whether she was a threat.
Both the colossal and the audrean were thinking the same way, like two sides of the same coin. The only difference was that Leo had absolutely no interest in eating whatever that creature was.
She searched around for something useful: a sharp branch, a medium-sized stone—anything that could distract or injure the predator. The second option was laughable, given her current condition.
The rustling returned, more violent this time. To the right.
Were they in pairs?
Shit.
Braced against the tree, she took six diagonal steps to the left, making as little noise as possible. There was no way to distract two colossals at once. And there wasn't even a damn stone nearby.
It was her first time dealing with colossals. And running seemed, at the same time, the most sensible and the stupidest option available.
An irritated grinding of teeth echoed. A massive paw entered her field of vision.
Great—was it a mammal type?
No. That didn't matter now.
Run.
That creature was about to lunge at her.
Bending her knees slightly for momentum, she started running down the path—one just as unknown as the creatures around her.
To have any chance of surviving this, she would either have to kill them or lure them somewhere where she had the advantage—and at the moment, the first option was far beyond the audrean's capabilities.
Leo was convinced this was the dumbest plan she had ever had. Still, thanks to her daily morning training, running had never been a problem—especially as a woman standing one meter seventy tall, probably the fastest among the candidates.
She could easily run more than four laps around Montreal. But this wasn't the same, considering the creature could certainly outpace her—still, it would have to do.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of which colossal it was, and that it was matching her pace—or simply playing with its new prey.
Her heart hammered in her chest. Sweat streamed down her face. The forest seemed to conspire against her, every obstacle making everything insanely fucked.
"Carmelius Monteiro, you bastard…"
A fallen trunk ahead.
A jump.
Her body was tiring, but this was no time to stop—not when she hadn't even thought of a better plan than running in blind desperation.
Come on, think… think!
Crouching, she managed to dodge another branch that nearly struck her face.
Falling was not an option—weren't the countless scratches she had already earned during that escape enough?
So focused on the forest's tricks—dodging and leaping over trunks, holes, and stones—Leo hadn't even noticed that one of the colossals had vanished from her field of vision.
When she realized her mistake, she stopped for a single frantic second to search for the other.
She only needed to see a patch of the predator's fur to recognize it from one of the library books—specifically Colossal Bestiary for the Unwary, page 234.
Priants: mammalian colossals resembling tigers with entirely black scales, the size of a horse, glowing eyes, and wings like those of a bat—though they were terrible fliers, much like chickens. They were known to be extremely territorial and to attack intruders.
Their natural enemy? The Vraxx.
Their weakness? Water.
Completely useless information right now.
Two voices argued in her mind: the fascinated student wanted to stop and admire her favorite creature, while her present, logical side worried about where she might find a body of water to lure it to.
And, stating the obvious, she was in the Forest of Old Bones—which meant that any river there was unlikely to host anything less dangerous than a Priant.
Leo ran on, doing her utmost not to lose sight of the two colossals.
They say desperation can be one's worst enemy. In that forest of immense oaks, fallen trunks, and treacherous foliage that turned into natural traps, a single distraction—exactly as she had predicted—was enough for everything to go wrong.
It happened when the side of her head slammed into a long, rigid branch, and the impact hurled her violently to the ground.
"Fuck…" she stifled a groan of pain as she rolled onto her side. Her blurred vision made her mind race faster than her body, calculating how many seconds of life she had left before the creatures found and devoured her.
Maybe she wasn't as good as she claimed.
Maybe the confident words she repeated to herself were just a convenient way to keep from breaking down.
No. Not yet.
Whatever it took, she couldn't die there. That would only prove what Carmelius wanted so badly—that she wasn't strong enough.
And that was a truth Leonia Bellius would never accept.
When she opened her eyes, she forced herself to focus on anything but the forest's smell—heavy, metallic, numbing—or the warm blood running down her face, a dangerous invitation to the keen noses of the creatures hunting her.
I'm not going to die here today.
As if the goddess heard her stubborn plea, an almost colorless, translucent object glimmered near her face. It looked sharp.
Perfect.
Reaching for it, Leonia silently thanked the unfortunate drunk who had once passed through that forest, lost his bottle—and unknowingly saved her life.
And perhaps that audrean was still alive.
Shaking her head, she forced herself to stand. She needed time—little, but enough to cut the ropes. Veering off the main path, she bolted to the left without granting her body a single second to recover.
As she gained distance, she heard a loud hiss behind her. One of the creatures was groaning in pain, as if it had been struck by something.
Leo didn't look back. Not yet.
While she ran, the hissing cry echoed again from one of the creatures following her, writhing in pain—as if wounded.
A wounded animal or a bleeding colossal was not her problem right now—not when she could barely defend herself. If she wanted even to understand what this first test truly was, she needed to stay alive.
Farther ahead, to the right, she spotted an open space. A stream.
Her only chance.
Pressing herself against a tree trunk, she gripped the shard of glass in her left hand and pressed it against the ropes. The motion was clumsy, rushed, almost pathetic—but it was all she had.
"Come on… come on…"
Moments later—frantic—divided between scanning the trees, counting her seconds, and sawing through the ropes with the glass, the bindings finally gave way and slipped from her wrists.
With her hands free, she lightly cracked her wrists, trying to dispel the awful numbness still gripping her arms.
Leo snapped her wrists harder, forcing the blood to circulate while the numbness burned deep within her muscles. Her fingers trembled, too slow for what was coming next.
Then the Priant appeared before her.
It didn't leap right away. It simply appeared—occupying space, imposing its presence. Its massive body shifted with a deep growl that vibrated in her chest like a belated warning. There was something hypnotic about the creature—the dark fur blended with black scales, the glowing red eyes dilated and alert, evaluating her every movement.
Leo drew in a careful breath.
Priants only attacked in packs or when there was an imminent threat to their family.
She understood that feeling. If someone touched what she cherished, she would react the same way.
The creature's red eyes burned with fury.
It was the first time she truly faced one head-on. This wasn't training. It wasn't an illustration in a book. There was no margin for error. The cold, jagged glass pressed into her palm, threatening to cut her own skin before ever touching the enemy.
Slowly, she began to move diagonally to the left, keeping her gaze locked on the animal's. One step. Then another. Every movement calculated, every muscle ready.
The leap came without warning.
The ground shook beneath its paws as the creature launched itself forward with brutal force, spreading its wings just enough to gain momentum. Too big. Too heavy. Too fast.
Leo dodged on instinct.
Two sharp steps to the left. Her foot slipped on wet mud mixed with slick moss. The Priant lost its balance—hovering for a moment on the brink of its own death—but redirected the force of its body and leap toward the only other being willing to fight for survival: Leo.
She didn't want to do this.
But she had to.
She had trained for it.
The colossal body slammed into her, throwing her backward. Leo felt the air ripped from her lungs as she fell, rolling along the uneven bank. Before she could rise, the weight came down on her again.
A precise bite would have torn her head off. With what little strength she had left, she shoved it aside—but it was already too late.
Its fangs sank into her arm.
The pain was immediate. Brutal.
Leonia screamed.
She felt bone grind under the pressure, flesh crushed, the heat of her own blood spilling out, tears burning in her eyes. The world shrank to one thing: pain.
But no—not there. She would not lose her arm. She would get out whole.
With her left hand free, she reacted. She didn't think. She just attacked.
She drove the glass into the scales along the side of the Priant's neck.
Once.
On the second strike, the colossal leapt back, recoiling with a furious hiss.
She struck again.
Twice.
Three times.
The glass found gaps between the scales and sank into hot flesh. Blood—hers and the creature's—ran down her face. The Priant staggered back, thrashing; its wings flared wildly, spraying mud everywhere.
The animal's anguished hiss was one of the worst sounds she had ever heard.
How could she hurt something that was fighting—just like her—with the same desperate intent to survive?
She knew only one of them would remain alive.
And with what little mercy she had left, instead of stabbing it again, she shoved it toward the lake.
The Priant panicked. It tried to swim, tried to cry out in its own way, tried anything to save itself.
Leonia watched in silence as the body sank, swallowed by the dark water.
She didn't like the sound.
The sound of taking a life.
With difficulty, she lowered her head and pressed her nearly ruined arm against her chest, in an instinctive gesture of respect—not for death, but for the struggle.
For the creature that, like her, only wanted to keep living.