Despite their best efforts to shield the people, war crept in like smoke under a door. It was not the grand, ceremonial wars of bards and banners.
It was urban. Relentless. Asymmetric.
The enemy used knowledge — his own knowledge, twisted — to strike. Runic engines were sabotaged. Aetherion Riders were mimicked with explosive cores. Diplomats were kidnapped and returned with tongues removed.
Sharath, for all his genius, was not untouched.
He personally rushed to evacuate an orphanage near the coast during the Third Coastal Incursion. In the chaos, he pulled three children from burning beams, his hands scarred — not by magic, but by wood and guilt.
Later, he knelt beside a makeshift medic tent as he held the hand of a boy with half a leg, who looked up and asked:
"Lord Sharath... why do they hate us for building?"
That night, Sharath did not speak. He only wrote.
A single line:
"If knives are the language of diplomacy now... then let thunder be our answer."