Plip… plip
Tears fell without stopping.
Ant knelt beside what remained of Leona's body, sobbing.
Giggs crouched next to him, silent, eyes rimmed with red.
Before all this happened, they had both known there was a chance of a bad outcome, but neither of them had voiced it. They had only dreamed together of the bright future that would follow success.
Now the worst had happened.
Along with his disbelief, Giggs felt a creeping chill spread through him as if he were slowly sinking into a bottomless well of cold.
"It's all your fault…" Ant murmured.
He slowly lifted his head, fixing his gaze on Giggs, speaking each word with deliberate weight:
"It's all your fault, Giggs."
"…" Giggs said nothing.
"It's all your fault!" Ant suddenly screamed, hysterical, shoving Giggs hard.
"We never should've gambled, never should've taken this risk!
"Now everything's ruined!"
Caught off guard, Giggs was knocked to the ground. Anger flared inside him. He sprang to his feet, grabbed Ant by the collar, and growled through clenched teeth:
"Damn it, this wasn't just my decision! It was an idea we came up with together, remember?!
"You agreed, I agreed, and Leona agreed!"
He panted heavily, his chest heaving like a bellows, then let go of Ant's collar with a cough.
"This outcome isn't my fault… It's not my fault…
"…And it's not yours, Ant. It's not our fault…"
Giggs glanced back at the stone house, and in his mind appeared the face of that second-rank apprentice named Somlai.
Was that so-called two-and-a-half percent success rate for extraordinary modifications true?
A sudden urge to curse in hatred welled up inside him, but when he looked at the stone house, fear rose instead, fear that Somlai might overhear.
After a long silence, Giggs let out a weary, defeated sigh.
"Let's go, Ant. We need to find another way."
There was no reply. Giggs turned his head.
All that remained in sight was Leona's scattered remains on the ground. Ant was gone.
…
…
Outside the Black Ring Assembly Hall.
Ant stared blankly up at the sprawling building.
He didn't know why he had come here.
He didn't even know how his feet had brought him here.
He only wanted to get away to leave…
The image of crimson flesh still echoed in his mind. Ant shook his head desperately, trying to drive it all away.
"What's wrong, Ant?"
A familiar voice spoke beside his ear. He looked up to see two familiar figures, Dor and Ellison.
Ant froze for a moment. He didn't even stop to wonder why Dor was with Ellison.
He simply let tears fall and rasped hoarsely to Dor:
"Leona's dead, Dor."
The young man with the gentle expression raised his brows slightly, then turned to Ellison.
"Ellison, why don't you wait for me over there? I'd like to have a word with this junior if that's all right."
Whether it was his imagination or not, Ant felt Dor had changed since they first met. There was something indescribable about him.
Those brown eyes of his… seemed to carry a faint green tint.
"Don't cause trouble, Dor. You promised to take me," Ellison began darkly.
"Relax," Dor cut him off with a calm smile. "It won't delay anything. On the contrary, Ellison, this might even bring us some benefit.
"Remember those few items I mentioned? You could use this time to go to the Locust Market and buy them."
"You mean… go buy them alone now?" Ellison blinked in surprise, then shook his head quickly. "I can't do that. I've never been to those markets…"
"They're not as scary as you think." Dor frowned slightly, showing a trace of impatience. "The market here isn't much different from the regular ones you walk through in the cabin district. Just go. The only thing you need to remember is when you see someone in a wizard's robe, lower your head and walk around them."
"But…" Ellison still hesitated.
People from the shanty district rarely wandered into the stone-house district for no reason, much less ventured into those extraordinary markets that catered to fearsome wizards.
Even Ellison, despite being an official member of a small gang and having a few burly underlings, was no exception.
It wasn't a matter of whether he could go, but whether he would.
The extraordinary existed side by side with these ordinary folk, yet an invisible, towering wall separated them.
And truth be told, heaven help him, Ellison couldn't even fully read.
"There's no such thing as 'but.' If you want to get" Dor glanced at Ant, paused briefly, then turned his gaze back to Ellison. "If you want what you've been after, then you have to do something. Go, Ellison. Prove to me you deserve it."
A flicker of struggle crossed Ellison's face.
But soon, he thought of the strange power Dor had shown him, of that brief, intoxicating sense of fullness he had once tasted.
A faint, almost imperceptible green tint passed through his eyes. In the end, he nodded, took a deep breath, and walked toward the Locust Market.
When did Dor… start to hold a subtle position of authority even over Ellison, the Iron Claw Gang's overseer?
Standing off to the side, Ant suddenly found himself wondering.
"All right, now let's talk."
At that moment, Dor turned back to him with a gentle smile.
Dor's words brought Ant's grief surging back to the surface. He pushed aside his doubts and began haltingly pouring out everything to Dor.
Right now, Ant needed an outlet.
After a while, when he had said all there was to say, he wiped the tears from his eyes. The weight in his chest eased just a little.
"Thank you, Do..." He lifted his head to thank Dor for listening… only to see a faintly mocking smile on his lips.
"Foolish. Utterly foolish."
A sharp pang shot through Ant's heart, and his face flushed crimson.
"…Just as foolish as I once was," Dor added suddenly with a sigh.
Only those discarded preparatory apprentices could truly understand what the others had been through.
For nine years on the mountain, those boys and girls had lived without the slightest pressure to survive.
They stayed in spacious, comfortable houses within the ever-temperate wizard formations, ate delicious food, and had servants to attend to their every need. They had never known cold or hunger.
And then, without warning, they were driven out, stripped of everything.
The bewilderment and fear were suffocating.
But the world did not kindly grant them time to adjust; they were thrown straight into the chaos of Emeraldwood City.
For nine years, they had only ever visited the city for a single day each month, carefree outings that left nothing but fond memories for the boys and girls in Hossens Academy uniforms.
Later, as the end approached, they began to hear whispers of the harshness waiting below.
They formed a hazy notion of the cruelty outside…
But they didn't yet know you could be cheated out of rent money, that you could be robbed right in your own home, or that even if you did nothing, if you merely looked tempting, someone might pounce and take a bite.
The world gave no warning, no time to prepare for those brutal truths.
A few, like Elena back then, readied themselves in advance.
But far more, like Ant and his two friends, only learned and grew after being slammed hard into the ground.
Looking at Ant's reddened eyes and dazed face, Dor sighed softly.
"Ant, do you know something?
"You, me, your friends… all of us have to gamble. We must gamble.
"But there's one thing you need to understand: we cannot be gamblers.
"When you decide to take a gamble, the first thing you should think about isn't what you'll gain if you succeed, but what you'll lose if you fail.
"I've lived in Emeraldwood City for two years and learned only two things.
"That's one of them."
Ant stood silently, expression clouded.
Don't be a gambler…
Most gamblers are like that, their narrow vision fixed only on the beauty of success.
But in the end… that beauty is nothing more than a one-sided fantasy.
"Come with me, Ant. I'll take you somewhere," Dor suddenly said.
He patted Ant on the shoulder, then turned and walked ahead, as if not at all concerned that Ant might not follow.
Ant stood there for a moment.
After a brief silence, almost without realizing it, he took a step forward and followed.
Dor smiled faintly.
Walking side by side to Dor's left, Ant suddenly asked:
"What's the second thing?"
"What?"
"Considering the consequences of failure first, that's the first thing.
"What's the second thing you learned, Dor… senior?"
Dor let out a soft chuckle and didn't answer.
"You'll find out in time, Ant."
The two of them continued forward and met up with Ellison outside the Locust Market.
Then they headed south toward the direction of the Emerald Shadow Forest.
…
Elsewhere, Giggs was silently making his way back to the shanties.
He looked at Liona's tightly shut hut beside his own, clenching and unclenching his right fist.
Aside from the clothes and the bag of dismembered remains, Liona had left nothing behind. Giggs remembered he should have had two lesser magic stones and some coins on him, but there had been nothing in the clothes… most likely taken by Somlai.
Giggs then walked over to Lynn's hut.
He was about to knock when he noticed the door was locked from the outside.
Not in?
He let out a sigh and turned away.
At that same moment, Lynn was at the Black Alley Market, speaking with Bajin Tor.
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