The carriage rattled on, the persistent crunch of its wheels against the cracked soil a rhythm of doom. The driver's movements had become stiff, unnaturally constrained, and his hunched shoulders telegraphed guilt with every nervous tremor. Kael's eyes narrowed, confirming the mechanical input that continued to echo in his mind:
[DANGER ALERT: The carriage driver intends to abandon you before reaching the frontier. Threat probability: High.]
Adrian's instincts sharpened. In the U.S. Army, he had seen men desert convoys, leaving invaluable supplies to rot in the desert heat. Betrayal was a logistical nightmare, an expected variable in any hostile environment. Here, in Kael's frail body and without the support of modern communication or a supply cache, it carried lethal consequences.
He leaned back, feigning the indifference of a bored young noble, while his mind raced through variables. The land itself was the first and most critical variable.
Kael's gaze drifted to the horizon. Dust swirled perpetually in the distance, choking the landscape. The local legends whispered of curses: that the soil itself rejected human hands, that spirits of the dead poisoned the air. Priests spoke of divine punishment; the nobles of the capital dismissed it as superstition unique to the unwashed masses.
But Adrian recognized the signs. He had seen it before in historical texts, in photographs of the American Dust Bowl: overworked soil, stripped of vital nutrients (particularly nitrogen and organic matter), left compacted and exposed to wind erosion and drought. It was a man-made ecological disaster. Not cursed. Mismanaged.
This realization was a fundamental shift in the tactical landscape. The land wasn't an invincible enemy; it was a resource that had been catastrophically misused. And broken resources could be analyzed, engineered, and fixed.
A flicker of light caught his eye. One of the knights riding alongside the carriage raised a hand, muttering words that shimmered faintly in the air. A brief, controlled spark of magic—a small flame conjured to light the path as the low sun dipped further into the haze.
Kael's lips tightened. Magic. Reserved for high nobility, wielded sparingly by military mages. His brothers had flaunted it, weaving elemental spells as easily as breathing. Kael Veynar had none. Adrian Cole, a man who relied on thermodynamics, ballistics, and structural integrity, possessed zero magical affinity. This was one of the central reasons for his exile.
But Adrian had something else: knowledge. Logistics. Agricultural science. And now, a system that whispered of danger before it materialized.
The carriage jolted again. The driver muttered under his breath, eyes darting to the darkening horizon. Kael strained to hear the words—a prayer to the "Ashen Curse," a plea for protection.
So that was his excuse. Abandon the weak lord, claim terror of the land, and vanish back toward the capital. A clean crime, justified by local folklore.
The driver intended to stop soon, wait for the cover of darkness, and slip away, leaving the Baron and the few knights to fight over the meager supplies until the inevitable end. This was a logistical timeline Kael had to interrupt immediately.
Kael's fingers tightened around the Baron's Writ. His heart beat with the same calm, analytical rhythm he felt during complex mission planning.
The nobles thought exile was death. The driver thought betrayal was easy. The people thought the land was cursed.
They were all wrong.
Adrian Cole had survived deserts, famines, and wars by understanding the mechanics of failure. He would survive this frontier by replacing superstition with science and aristocratic inefficiency with military discipline. The first task was to secure his command and preempt the desertion.