Quietly, from the simple shadows in his own room, Grievous appeared. The faint glow of the moon filtered through the cracked wooden window, casting pale silver light across the cluttered space. His movements were deliberate, almost ghostlike.
He took off the armour, his eyes caught the dark crimson drops smeared on the surface. They glistened faintly, as if still wet.
He looked calmly at the blood. It was not the first time he had dealt with such stains.
'It seems I should use a protection spell when I do similar things,' he thought, his fingers tracing the edges of the armour.
With a steady hand, he removed the mask, holding it delicately by one eye. It was heavy, carved with intricate runes that pulsed faintly with residual magic. He lifted it before his face, a short distance away, and whispered to the hollow shell, "What is your origin?"
Silence answered him, thick and impenetrable. The room was silent, the shadows seeming to lean closer.
Grievous let out a slight sigh. He inserted the mask into the space ring embedded on his hand. The ring shimmered faintly as it sealed the mask away.
Calmly, he shed the armour and dressed in his normal clothes, simple and functional. The fabric was rough but clean, a stark contrast to the bloodied armour he had just worn.
He moved his left foot back and forth, the subtle motion betraying a restless mind. Then, he stopped, bent down, and picked up a crutch leaning against the corner.
"We're going to need this for the play," he said quietly, the words hanging oddly in the air.
He began to move out of the room, his steps measured and light. As he walked, his mind spun with calculations and plans.
'Currently, I am at the early first rank as a magician,' he thought, 'so the way to move forward is to simply expand the size of the already existing pillar.'
The concept was simple in theory, but impossible in practice for most normal people.
'As it's mentioned about the technique, I can do this by absorbing the Shen in the air and bringing it into the Shen Basin in the soul, and from there to the link in The Mind Palace.'
He ran his fingers along the wooden banister, feeling its polished smoothness beneath his touch.
'But the biggest problem that prevents most people from developing to higher ranks is that the Shen in the air and normal areas is so light that it is extremely difficult to develop, as a person needs dozens of years to move to the next rank.'
He paused at the doorway leading down the dim hallway, his gaze drifting to the flickering candlelight that struggled against the darkness.
'The solutions to this problem are two.'
He glanced upward, towards the ceiling, as if searching for answers hidden in the shadows.
'Either I go to an area with a high density of Shen, which comes with its risks. Or to absorb Shen from something rich with it, such as a spiritual spring or a medicinal bath.'
The options were bleak, yet not impossible.
He hummed a little, the sound low and thoughtful, as he quietly approached the child's place in the servants' quarters.
'Even my family does not have many of these resources, which are left to the master of the family and the heir, and even they are very few,' he considered, eyes narrowing slightly. 'As even the head of the family is just a magician of the late second rank.'
The cold stone floors echoed softly under his footsteps, each step as if reminding him of the distance between him and true power.
'So in simple terms, my current development is almost impossible.'
He stopped briefly, his gaze settling on a faded tapestry hanging crookedly on the wall. The threads were worn and frayed, much like his own thoughts.
'But there is a simple way to solve this problem.'
A simple smile touched his lips, ghostlike and fleeting.
'I will simply have that old mage bring me all the treasures I need to make medicinal baths. It's a long-term plan until I get strong enough and go out to search for a true spiritual spring.'
The thought amused him, a rare flicker of humor in his thoughts.
'This is kind of funny, as it reminds me of medical myths from my world about thousand-year-old ginseng and alternative medicine.'
He shook his head lightly, as if dispelling a distant memory.
'They were really good days, the days of the height of my power as head of the ruling party in that fake republic.'
Nostalgia curled around his heart, bittersweet and sharp.
As he continued to think about his past, he felt the familiar tug of loneliness. The weight of countless decisions pressed down on him, yet he walked on with quiet purpose.
Finally, he arrived at the servants' dining room. The room was small and sparse, filled with the faint aroma of stale bread and boiled cabbage. A single oil lamp flickered on the wooden table, casting long shadows across the peeling walls.
He entered quietly and found the child, stuffing his mouth with food as if he had not eaten for years. The boy's cheeks were sunken, eyes wide with hunger and fear.
As soon as the child noticed this man entering, and then the crutch in his hand, his body began to tremble violently.
Fear etched deep lines into his pale face. The memory of Grievous killing those people, whether it was the blood, or the screams, all of them flashed behind his eyes like a storm. One of those dead was his mother.
Grievous sighed, the sound heavy with resignation.
He considered the child carefully, weighing options. The easiest path lay before him, simple and cold.
He chose to fake the child's memories.
With a subtle wave of his hand, a faint shimmer rippled through the air around them, the magic weaving falsehoods into the boy's mind.
He made himself the child's father, erasing the jagged edges of the past.
He planted lies, soft and convincing, filling the void with fabricated nonsense.
He stared at the child in front of him, now trembling less but still wary.
'The son of a whore and a usurer,' he thought bitterly. 'With a hellish life where he slept hungry and his mother would not allow him to play or eat unless she wanted to.'
The boy was a skeleton draped in pale, diseased skin, a fragile thing broken by the cruelty of the world and humanity.
'Fortunately for him, none of those sick paedophiles used him.'
Grievous's gaze hardened.
'Let's see what you really mean, boy.'
He crouched down, fixing the child with a steady look.
"Eat slowly," he said softly. "There is more to come."
The boy nodded, eyes still wide but now tinged with a flicker of something new—hope, perhaps, or the faintest trace of trust.
Grievous stood, the crutch tapping lightly on the floor as he turned away.
His mind already racing ahead, planning, abs thinking.
He understood that the road to power was long and twisted, but he would walk it, no matter the cost.
This was his own resolve!