**The Eve of the Seven Kingdoms Cultural Exchange Gala.**
The Stellar Ascendancy Academy underwent a metamorphosis.
Gleaming halls were draped with silks representing the colors of all seven kingdoms—the silver and blue of the Dominion, the crimson and black of Ashfall, the verdant green of the Sylvan Weald, the gold and white of the Aurelian Construct, the cerulean and gray of the Azure Marches, the iron and bronze of the Iron Crag, and the amber and ochre of the Ember Dunes.
It was a beautiful mask over simmering tensions.
For Ken, the gala wasn't a social event.
It was a tactical arena with seven distinct factions, observable objectives, and layered deceptions.
His mission was clear:
**Protect Seraphine. Discredit Carrow. Maintain cover.**
He stood in his assigned chamber, adjusting the formal, understated gray and silver robes of a minor royal prince.
In his mind, he ran the final checks on **Operation: Rusted Hound.**
*Objective: Publicly demonstrate Inquisitor Carrow's incompetence and corruption.*
*Method: Force him to overreach in his suspicion of Seraphine, then expose the falsity of his evidence.*
*Key Tools:*
*1. A forged data-slab containing "evidence" of Seraphine's "suspicious communications."*
*2. A manipulated guest list ensuring the witness pool included influential, neutral parties.*
*3. Selene's confirmed, though unpredictable, cooperation as a disruptive element.*
*Critical Vulnerability: Seraphine herself. Her pride and temper were variables he could not fully control.*
A soft chime at his door.
It was Seraphine, dressed in a simple but sharp dress uniform. Her expression was tense.
"They've assigned me to perimeter security detail. Not guest protection. *Perimeter.* They're keeping me away from the dignitaries."
Carrow's doing.
Isolating the suspected asset.
"It's preferable," Ken said calmly. "You have legitimate reason to move through service corridors. You will be at Coordinate Gamma-7 at 21:15. A package will be delivered to you there."
Her eyes narrowed.
"What package?"
"Evidence. False evidence, planted by Carrow's agents in your locker. You will discover it and, following protocol, bring it directly to the security command center—where Headmaster Theron, the Ashfall ambassador, and the Azure March's lead merchant will be reviewing a separate 'security anomaly' I've arranged."
"You want me to walk into a trap with fake evidence?"
"I want you to spring the trap in a room full of witnesses who will see Carrow's eagerness to condemn you, and then see that evidence crumble."
Ken met her gaze.
"You must be the picture of confused, upright loyalty. Can you do that?"
She took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders.
The soldier in her understood the plan.
"I can. What's the crumble?"
"A data corruption virus in the slab. Once scanned in the command center's main terminal, it will reveal itself as a crude forgery, traceable to an Inquisition-owned cipher."
He handed her a small, transparent film.
"Apply this to your eyes. It will counteract the low-level photonic inducer Carrow will use to try and make you appear nervous on bio-scans."
She took it, a flicker of that old analytical respect in her eyes.
"You think of everything."
"I try."
He paused.
"Selene may intervene. Do not trust her narrative, but do not openly oppose her. She is a storm—predict its path, use its wind, but do not stand in its center."
Seraphine nodded and left.
A soldier marching to her position.
---
**The Gala. Main Concourse. 20:00.**
The grand hall was a spectacle of controlled opulence.
Students from each kingdom showcased their talents—Aurelian acolytes demonstrating light-rune calligraphy, Sylvan apprentices with living flower sculptures, Iron Crag smiths showcasing jeweled weaponry.
Ken moved through the crowd, a ghost in plain sight.
His **Eye of Truth** continuously scanned.
*Ashfall Delegation:* Heir Brant Ignis stood surrounded by his clansmen, but his eyes kept darting toward the Dominion nobles, his posture tense. *Political anxiety. Useful.*
*Azure Marches:* He spotted Corinne Seaborn near a refreshment table, not drinking, but observing financial exchanges with a shark's smile. *Neutral observer. Potential transactional ally.*
*Aurelian Construct:* Their delegation radiated disdain, keeping to themselves. Heir Aurelia Luminar's gaze swept the room as if looking for stains. *Hostile. Unlikely to aid Carrow but would revel in Dominion embarrassment.*
*Ember Dunes:* Only one representative, the quiet Lysander Thorne, stood by a historical display, seemingly lost in thought. Ken's power sensed the deep, still waters of memory around him. *Wild card.*
And there, near the head table, was Inquisitor Carrow, dressed in severe formal gray.
He sipped water, his eyes constantly tracking the perimeter doors.
Waiting.
---
**21:10. Service Corridor Gamma-7.**
Seraphine found the package exactly where Ken said it would be: a sealed evidence bag tucked behind a coolant pipe.
Inside, a data-slab labeled *"Rae, S. - Encrypted Comms Analysis."*
Her heart hammered, but Ken's training held.
She didn't open it.
She followed protocol.
---
**21:17. Security Command Center.**
The room was a hive of quiet activity.
Headmaster Theron stood beside a holographic map, discussing a minor sensor glitch near the docking bays with Ambassador Brant and Merchant-Prince Marlowe from the Azure Marches.
As Ken had calculated, Carrow entered moments after Seraphine, his face a mask of grim duty.
"Cadet Rae," Carrow's voice cut through the room. "You have something to report?"
Seraphine saluted, holding out the evidence bag.
"Sir. I found this in my assigned locker. It bears Inquisition seals, but I did not place it there."
Carrow took it, a flicker of triumph in his eyes.
"Your locker? How convenient."
He didn't wait for full permission, inserting the slab into a terminal.
The data flashed on the main screen.
Lines of encrypted text, decryption tags, and—damningly—a symbol matching the Phantom's crude circle.
"Astonishing," Carrow said, his voice swelling for his audience. "Communications logs. Cryptographic patterns matching known heresies. Cadet Rae, you will submit to immediate—"
"One moment, Inquisitor."
Headmaster Theron's quiet voice silenced him.
"Master Thorne. Your people are renowned for memory and pattern recognition. Does the decryption cipher on line seven seem... consistent to you?"
All eyes turned to Lysander Thorne of the Ember Dunes, who had been silently observing from a corner.
He stepped forward, his gaze fixed on the screen.
"No," he said simply. "It is a child's forgery. The cipher uses a modern Dominion military encryption overlay, but references a syntactic root that has been obsolete for three centuries. It is like writing a love letter with siege engine blueprints. The one who made this knew current codes, but not the history of what they mimic."
He blinked, as if returning from a trance.
"It is a fake."
A ripple went through the room.
Ambassador Brant grunted.
"So the Inquisition plants evidence on its own cadets now? Charming."
Merchant-Prince Marlowe chuckled darkly.
"Incompetence or corruption? Either devalues the stock of your authority, Inquisitor."
Carrow's face went from triumph to ashen rage.
"This— This is a trick! The Dunesman is biased! The girl—"
"Enough."
Theron's word was final.
"The evidence is compromised. The investigation into Cadet Rae is concluded. Inquisitor Carrow, your... zeal has blinded your judgment. You are relieved of your academy oversight duties. Report to the Capitol for reassignment."
It was a public execution of his authority.
Carrow stood, trembling, his career in ruins before three foreign witnesses. His eyes, burning with hatred, found Seraphine's calm face, then swept the room as if searching for the true architect.
His gaze passed over Prince Ken, standing innocuously near the door, and moved on.
But someone else's gaze did not.
Princess Selene, who had entered unseen, leaned against the doorway behind Ken.
He felt her presence like a cold draft.
"Clean," she murmured, her voice only for him. "Efficient. A scalpel, not a sword. But you left one thread loose."
Before he could process her words, Carrow, in his humiliated fury, lunged not at Seraphine, but at the terminal, pulling a sidearm from his robe.
"If the evidence is fake, then the *true* heretic is here! Scanning the data signature now! I'll find you!"
He jammed the data-slab back in, overriding protocols, initiating a deep, invasive scan for residual quantum signatures—the Phantom's calling card.
Ken's blood went cold.
This was an uncalculated variable. A berserk move.
The slab had been in *his* possession, briefly, while planting it. The scan was crude, but if it picked up even a femtoscopic trace of his unique quantum resonance...
The terminal screen flashed, analyzing.
Selene sighed, a sound of mild disappointment.
"The loose thread."
She raised her own data-pad and tapped a single command.
On the main screen, the scan results flashed.
**> SIGNATURE DETECTED.**
**> MATCH: 99.7%.**
**> SOURCE: INQUISITION LAB - EVIDENCE LOCKER #3.**
**> TIME-STAMP: 20:45 TONIGHT.**
The room froze.
The signature wasn't from the slab's creator, but from the Inquisition's own evidence locker.
Carrow had just proven his own facility was contaminated with the Phantom's energy signature—meaning the Phantom had been inside Inquisition secure storage, or, more damningly, that an Inquisitor *was* the Phantom.
Carrow's face was a mask of utter horror.
The fabricated evidence was one thing.
This was catastrophic.
It implied the rot was within the Inquisition itself.
Selene had not just helped Ken's plan.
She had taken his scalpel and used it to behead the entire investigation. She had framed Carrow's own department.
"Fascinating," Theron said, his voice like grinding stones. "It appears our security breach is deeper than anyone imagined. Inquisitor Carrow, you will now be escorted to a holding cell. Not as an investigator, but as a person of interest."
Guards moved in.
Carrow was led away, broken, his strangled protests ignored.
The witnesses dispersed, murmuring about Dominion corruption.
Seraphine was officially cleared.
The operation was a staggering success.
---
Ken turned to find Selene, but she was already gone, leaving only the faint scent of jasmine and a single, final message on his pad:
*A queen does not merely counter a move. She rewrites the game. The hound is put down. The field is cleared. My favor is now called: you will attend the royal family's private luncheon tomorrow. Do not be late. -S*
She had used his plan, escalated it, and now called in her debt.
The cost of her help was coming due.
Ken looked at Seraphine, who gave him a slight, weary nod of thanks.
He had protected his asset.
He had destroyed his enemy.
But as he stood in the command center, surrounded by the echoing silence of Carrow's downfall, he felt no victory.
He felt the board tilting beneath him, controlled by a player whose motives were still a blur of smiling malice and inexplicable aid.
The Phantom had won the battle.
But the Queen had just reminded him who truly controlled the palace.
---
**[End of Chapter 11]**