The town of Oakhaven smelled of mud, desperation, and wet sheep. A cold, persistent drizzle, more of a nuisance than a real storm, had turned the unpaved streets into a treacherous mire. The sky, a uniform leaden gray, seemed to press down on the thatched roofs, crushing any glimmer of spirit.

Captain Gideon Fleurmont pulled off his soaked gauntlet. The chilled metal was a poor comfort against the dampness that had settled deep in his bones. He ran a hand over his face, feeling the three-day-old stubble scrape his skin and the accumulated exhaustion like a lead cloak on his shoulders. He stood before an inn that was barely cleaner than the adjacent stable; its sign, “The Twisted Oak,” hung crookedly, dripping dirty water.

He watched the rain fall with a grim look, each drop a reminder of lost time.

“Nothing, Captain.”

The voice of his second-in-command, Marcus, pulled him from his stupor. The young knight emerged from the establishment, his normally bright armor now dull and spattered with mud.

“The innkeeper swears on all the gods he hasn’t seen anyone matching the description. Says the only redhead who’s passed through here in the last month was a dwarf merchant selling ointments for hemorrhoids.”

Gideon clenched his jaw, a muscle twitching in his cheek. It was the same empty answer, the same frustrating denial they had received in the last four towns. One dead end after another.

“Any word from Leo or Roric?”

“Negative, Captain. Leo is checking the smithy for the third time, hoping the drunk blacksmith remembers something new between one belch and the next. Roric is… well, Roric is in the tavern on the other side of the square. Probably complaining into the bottom of a mug of watered-down ale.”

Gideon nodded, a grimace of disgust curving his lips. Roric’s cynicism was useful on the battlefield, but on a mission like this, it was poison to morale. He approached his men, who waited under the precarious shelter of an awning, their shoulders slumped and their armor losing all its shine under the constant rain. They were the very picture of defeat.

“Captain, the men are exhausted,” Marcus said in a low voice, stepping closer. “This rain… it’s as if the heavens themselves are against us. We’ve been chasing ghosts for three days, hunting whispers. Maybe we should return to a larger town, regroup.”

“Fatigue is a luxury we cannot afford, Marcus,” Gideon replied, his voice as sharp as the cold wind, loud enough for the rest to hear. “The honor of House Fleurmont and, more importantly to you all, my own head, are on the line if we return to Fittoa empty-handed. There will be no rest until we find her.”

Roric, the group’s cynical veteran, chose that moment to join them, reeking of cheap ale. He spat brown phlegm into the mud.

“Honor,” he snorted. “Or maybe an ogre ate her in the woods and we’re freezing our asses off for nothing. This whole search is foolishness. We’re chasing a spoiled brat who doesn’t want to get married, while real bandits run wild two towns over.”

“Silence, Roric,” Gideon ordered, his gaze so sharp that even the veteran flinched slightly. “Our duty is not to question, but to obey. Lady Hilda is our responsibility. Remember that.”

He walked away from the group, turning his back to them to stride into the rain, letting the icy water hit his face.

My responsibility, he thought, a bitterness burning his throat. Hilda’s face appeared in his mind, defiant after the argument with her parents. He remembered the order: take her to Fittoa for her wedding to the Boreas family. A simple mission, ruined while he was buying supplies and his men, his stupid, undisciplined men, got drunk. The memory of that brief, humiliating failure was still fresh, seared into his pride. His men’s mistake was, above all, his own.

While the rain drowned the hunters’ spirits, many miles away, in a forest clearing bathed in warm, comforting sun, the only sounds were the singing of birds and Paul’s patient voice.

“Better! Much better! This time you almost didn’t fall flat on your back.”

Hilda stood in the center of the clearing, panting, her face beaded with sweat and her hair stuck to her temples. The sword Paul had given her, once a dead, clumsy weight, now felt almost like an extension of her arm. Heavy, yes, but no longer a foreign object.

“Don’t mock me,” she said, leaning on her knees to catch her breath. Her new leather pants creaked with the movement. “This is harder than memorizing the family trees of a hundred noble houses.” She paused, and a genuine smile broke through on her tired face. “And far more satisfying.”

They were practicing. After the initial success with earth magic, Paul had insisted she couldn’t rely on that alone.

“A mage without a swordsman to protect them is an easy target,” he had explained. “Spells take time. What are you going to do when a goblin with bad breath is a foot from your face? You have to know how to defend yourself when things get up close and personal.”

Today, however, they had returned to magic. After mastering Earth Wall and Rock Bullet, they were focusing on a more offensive spell: Earth Spear.

“It’s useless!” Hilda exclaimed, her frustration boiling over after the fifth consecutive spear crumbled into a pile of dust. “This isn’t a spear, it’s a glorified mud stick! It would shatter against leather armor, assuming I could even get it to hold together!”

“Because you’re trying to build it. You’re thinking of it like a sculptor, shaping it piece by piece,” Paul said, approaching. He stood behind her, so close that Hilda could feel the heat radiating from his back. His hands rested on her waist, a gesture that was both instructive and possessive. “Earth magic isn’t built, it’s commanded.”

His breath was warm near her ear, sending a shiver down her spine.

“Close your eyes. Don’t think about the dirt. Feel the rock beneath your feet, the bedrock, solid, unmovable. Feel the stubbornness of the mountain that refuses to be moved by the wind. Do you feel it?”

She nodded, her breathing becoming slower, deeper.

“Good. Now channel that same stubbornness of yours, that fury that made you flee your escort. Don’t build it, command it to exist!”

She squeezed her eyes shut, pushing away the image of a spear to focus on the pure feeling of defiance, of indomitable will. She recited the incantation, her voice no longer a murmur, but a command.

“Oh, earth, rise and pierce, Earth Spear!”

This time, the result was explosive. A spear of sharp, dense, black rock shot from the ground with the speed of an arrow and slammed into a tree trunk twenty paces away with a violent CRACK! The wood vibrated, and a shower of splinters rained down.

Hilda stared at the spear, embedded deep in the tree, her mouth slightly agape. Then she turned to Paul, her gray eyes shining with childish wonder.

“How… how did you know that? The manual said nothing about stubbornness.”

“I have a natural talent for teaching,” he lied with a lazy smile, though inwardly he was just as astonished. His ability to see her aura gave him a unique insight into how her power worked, but the speed at which she learned was all her own. “And you’re an excellent student.”

Later, they took a break. The sun was high in the sky, filtering through the leaves of a large oak tree. They sat in its shade, sharing a piece of hard bread and some surprisingly good cheese that Paul had “acquired” from the last town. The atmosphere was peaceful, almost domestic.

“At home, every meal was a ritual,” Hilda said, looking at the cheese in her hand as if it were an exotic artifact. “Absolute silence. Silverware. Twenty different dishes you’d barely take a bite of, with servants watching your every move.” She paused, tearing off a piece of bread with her fingers. “Eating like this… on the ground, with my hands… it feels forbidden. And wonderful.”

“For me, a hot meal is a luxury,” Paul replied, chewing loudly. “I’ve spent weeks eating berries and dried meat. Once, I had to fight a goblin over a half-cooked rat. Trust me, the cheese tastes a lot better without competition.”

Hilda laughed, a clear, free sound that sent a pair of nearby birds into flight.

“You’re terrible. But… you’re free,” she said, her laughter fading into a more contemplative tone. “What’s the first thing you would do if you were me, if you had that freedom for the first time? No responsibilities, no one chasing you.”

Paul leaned back against the tree trunk, thinking for a moment. His gaze drifted into the distance.

“I’d find the sea. I’ve never seen it, but they say it’s so big you can’t see the other side. An endless horizon. A place with no walls.”

The simplicity of his answer moved her deeply. He hadn’t mentioned treasure, or women, or fights. Just an open space. They sat in silence for a long time, sharing the peace of the clearing, completely oblivious to the hunt that, thanks to a calculating guild master, was now headed in the wrong direction.

The adventurers’ guild in the town of Rikarisu was larger, louder, and smelled even worse than the last one. The stench of stale fried food, cheap beer, and unwashed sweat formed an almost solid atmosphere. When Captain Gideon Fleurmont and his men entered, the usual bustle quieted. Their quality armor, their cloaks bearing the Fleurmont emblem, and their military bearing were as out of place as a bishop in a brothel. They drew looks of mistrust and resentment.

Gideon ignored the stares. His instinct, honed in dozens of campaigns, told him this was the place. He pushed his way through the rickety tables to one where a burly man with a scarred cheek was telling an exaggerated story about a griffin hunt to a group of wide-eyed rookies. It was Borin.

Without a word, Gideon dropped Hilda’s portrait onto the beer-stained table. The noblewoman’s delicately painted face contrasted brutally with the filth of the place.

“I’m looking for this lady. She’s been seen in the company of an adventurer. There’s a generous reward for information leading to her whereabouts.”

Borin glanced at the portrait, and a malicious, slow, cruel smile spread across his face. He recognized the knight who had earned him a reprimand from the guild master.

“Well, well. The little princess,” his voice was a greasy growl. “Yeah, I’ve seen her. Impossible to forget. She came in here like a goddess, in a silk dress probably worth more than this whole sty. Caught everyone’s eye, especially that arrogant dog, Greyrat.”

Gideon gritted his teeth so hard they ached. The man’s dismissive tone was a direct offense.

“Continue.”

“But when she left, Captain…” Borin leaned back in his chair, savoring the moment. “She wasn’t a princess anymore. She was wearing tight leather pants and adventurer’s boots. Hair all a mess. She looked… tamed.”

The implied insult, the image it conjured, made Gideon’s blood boil. He felt a primal urge to grab the man by the throat and slam his face against the table, but he restrained himself. The information was more important than his pride.

“Who is with her?” he asked, his voice an icy whisper.

“Who do you think? The only one arrogant enough to walk around with a treasure like that and think no one’s going to take it from him. She was with the Greyrat renegade. Paul.”

The name confirmed his worst fears. A Greyrat. A member of one of the Four Great Houses, even if he was an outcast. That complicated everything.

Just then, Kaelen, the Guild Master, who had been watching the interaction from the bar, approached with heavy steps.

“That’s enough, Borin. Your gossip is as cheap as the beer you drink and twice as bitter.” He turned to Gideon, his expression a mask of professional neutrality. “Captain, I’m sorry you had to listen to this idiot’s ramblings. But yes, to be honest, they were here. They registered as a party and completed a wolf extermination quest. They’re professionals, I’ll give them that.”

“And after? Where did they go?” Gideon’s voice was a hiss, his patience rapidly running out.

Kaelen pretended to think, scratching his thick, braided beard. He knew he couldn’t deny Borin’s story, as the whole hall had seen them. But he could plant a seed of disinformation, a small lie to give the Greyrat kid a chance. Kaelen had no special affection for Paul, but he despised arrogant nobles who walked into his guild as if they owned the place.

“They haven’t taken another quest here,” he said slowly, as if reconstructing the events. “But adventurers talk. A merchant complained bitterly that Greyrat coaxed information from him about the caravan routes to the north, toward the great merchant city of Creston. Said he was looking for a well-paying escort job, something worthy of his… talents.”

Kaelen paused, looking Gideon straight in the eye.

“If I were a betting man, Captain, I’d say they’re heading there. Creston is a big place, easy to disappear in. And the money’s good for capable escorts.”

Gideon processed the information. It was a solid, logical lead. An adventurer like Greyrat would need money, and a woman like Hilda would require a lifestyle that only money could buy. Creston made sense. It was the first real lead they’d had in days.

“I thank you, Guild Master.”

He dropped a generous purse of coins on Borin’s table. The adventurer snatched it with a pathetic eagerness. Gideon turned and walked out of the guild with a decisive stride, his men at his heels.

“Our mission has changed,” he told Marcus once they were outside, his voice now filled with a cold determination and new purpose. “We are no longer looking for a lost girl. We are rescuing her from a renowned kidnapper. They’re heading for Creston. Ready the men. We leave in an hour.”

Kaelen watched them go from the guild’s doorway. When they disappeared around the bend in the road, he turned and, with a swift motion, snatched the coin purse from a surprised Borin.

“This is for the trouble you cause, you idiot,” he growled, ignoring the man’s protests.

As Borin sputtered indignantly, Kaelen walked to the window and looked toward the southern road—the opposite direction from where he had sent the guards. The direction Paul and Hilda had actually taken, toward the less civilized, more dangerous territories.

Good luck, Greyrat, the guild master thought, a hint of a smile under his beard. You’re going to need it.