The Imperial Citadel of Aethelgard was the beating heart of a continent. Carved from the peak of a mountain by ancient magic, its halls were usually filled with the calm, measured hum of an empire at peace.
Today, that hum had been replaced by the frantic, discordant symphony of panic.
Grand Marshal Kaelen Dros stood before the Onyx Throne, his armor still coated in the dust of the common road—a shocking breach of protocol that no one dared to comment on. Before him sat Emperor Theron IV. Flanking the throne was the Imperial High Council: the Arch-Mage of the Spire, the High Treasurer, the Grand Spymaster, and the High Priest of the Unblinking Eye.
Every single one of them was as pale as a corpse.
"Say that again, Marshal," the Emperor commanded, his voice a low, dangerous whisper that did little to hide the tremor of fear beneath it. "Say it slowly."
Dros took a deep, shuddering breath. He was a man who had stared down behemoths and routed armies of demons. Reporting this felt a thousand times harder.
"The entity, Master Lyno, rejected the Imperial proposal," Dros began, his voice flat and stripped of all emotion. "He did not speak. He does not need to. His actions conveyed his intent with... absolute clarity."
He recounted the events with brutal, military precision: the oppressive nature of the staircase, the perfect tactical deployment of his followers, the silent, instantaneous destruction of the Imperial carriage in response to his own "profane" interruption, and finally... the pat.
When he described the head pat, the High Treasurer, a man whose heart was made of solid gold and abacus beads, made a soft choking sound.
"He... patted her?" the Arch-Mage clarified, his voice cracking. As a master of symbols and gestures, he understood the catastrophic meaning. "Not a handshake? Not a kiss on the hand? A pat. Like a child."
"It was a statement of dominion," Dros affirmed, his jaw tight. "An act of claiming ownership. He demonstrated that he has the power to destroy our most sacred symbols at a whim, and then he declared that our most sacred bloodline now belongs to him. It was the most brutally efficient and humiliating political maneuver I have ever witnessed."
The Spymaster, a woman who existed as a whisper in the shadows, spoke for the first time. "My agents confirm the sequence of events. We... lost contact with the Shadow's Kiss forty-seven minutes before your arrival, Marshal. We assumed she had failed. To hear she has been... turned... it defies all our operational parameters."
The High Priest, a man of faith and omens, was visibly shaking, his holy vestments rustling. "The Oraculum is broken. The divinations are silent, as if reality itself is holding its breath around that... bookshop. All signs point to a fundamental shift in the cosmic hierarchy. The Eye... is blinking."
This last statement sent a fresh wave of horror through the chamber. The Unblinking Eye never blinked.
The Emperor leaned forward, his knuckles white as he gripped the arms of his throne. "What is his demand? His desire? Why take the Princess if not for marriage? What does he want?"
This was the question that had been tormenting Dros the entire journey back. He had analyzed every detail, every micro-expression.
"Based on all available data," Dros said slowly, "my conclusion is... he wants nothing."
The council stared at him, dumbfounded.
"Nothing?" the Treasurer squeaked. "That's impossible! Everyone wants something! Gold, power, land, glory!"
"This being does not operate on our scale," Dros countered, his voice gaining a hard, zealous edge born of pure terror. "You are thinking like mortals. We tried to offer him a princess. It's like offering a mountain a pretty pebble. He has no need for our gold, he can obliterate it. He has no need for our power, he commands absolute obedience from those who defy him. He doesn't want to rule the Empire."
He paused, letting the terrifying implication land.
"He believes the Empire, and everything in it, is already his. He is not conquering us. He is simply... tidying his property."
The silence in the throne room was so absolute it felt like the end of the world.
"The head pat..." the Emperor whispered, his face ashen. "It wasn't a claim. It was an acknowledgement. Like a man patting a dog he has owned for years. He believes he has owned us all along."
The scale of their cosmic insignificance was crushing. They weren't being threatened. They were being... managed.
The Emperor stood up, his regal robes suddenly seeming like a child's costume. He began to pace. "A council is convened! This changes everything. We are no longer dealing with a foreign power or an internal threat. We are dealing with a landlord. A cosmic landlord who has just reminded us the rent is due."
"What is the rent?" the Spymaster asked, her voice tight.
"Appeasement," the Emperor declared, his eyes wild with a desperate new strategy. "Total, absolute, proactive appeasement. He was disturbed by the Marshal. He was offered a deal he found insulting. His serenity was compromised. We must ensure it is never compromised again."
He spun to face the council, his voice ringing with Imperial command once more, but now it was laced with the frantic energy of a man trying to placate a slumbering volcano.
"Treasurer! Assemble a tribute. Not of gold, he would find it vulgar. Send priceless artifacts, ancient texts, seeds from the Sunken Gardens of Y'ha-nthlei! Things of beauty and contemplation! Present it not as a payment, but as 'an offering to adorn the Master's sanctum.'"
"Spymaster! Pull back all agents. Any attempt to observe him is an act of aggression. Your new mission is to form a perimeter, leagues wide, around that city. Not to contain him, but to intercept and eliminate anything, mortal or otherwise, that might travel there and risk annoying him."
"Arch-Mage! Your mages are to focus their entire energy on one thing: maintaining a shield of absolute tranquility over the province. Weather control, ambient magic suppression, everything! If a sparrow farts too loudly within five miles of that bookstore, I want you to know about it!"
"High Priest! You will declare the city of Oakhaven a 'Sacredly Quarantined Zone.' No pilgrimages, no worshippers. He is not a god to be bothered with prayers. He is a truth to be left in peace!"
"And Marshal Dros," the Emperor finished, pointing a trembling finger at him. "You and the Crimson Vanguard will be his silent, unseen honor guard. From a distance. A very, very great distance. You will be the sword that protects his solitude."
It was an imperial strategy born not of strength, but of utter, soul-shattering fear. They would not try to control Lyno. They would build a gilded cage of absolute peace around him, praying to every god they knew that he would be content to stay inside it.
The most powerful empire on the continent had just reorganized its entire state apparatus with a single, overriding goal:
To ensure a perpetually terrified bookstore clerk from Oakhaven gets to enjoy his tea in peace.
And in that dusty room, Lyno, completely unaware of the continental panic he had caused, had finally burrowed deep enough under his covers to fall into a fitful, stress-induced sleep, dreaming of a world where people didn't randomly show up to yell at him or bow to him.