The city was quickly replaced by Veridia, The Shattered Plains—a landscape that felt like a permanent, broken scream. Deep, glowing cracks ran through the earth, and the strange, crystal-like plants grew in unsettling geometric shapes—all marks of millennia of uncontrolled magic. The air here wasn't just heavy; it was saturated with Chaos Mana, a constant, low, irritating electrical hum that pressed against Kaelen's skin and throbbed deep in his damaged magic core.
He wore thick gloves to try and shield himself from the ever-present magical static, knowing it was futile. He quickly logged his internal discomfort: Chaos Mana is rising. Fauna are mutating. I am fundamentally compromised. I must move faster.
He found his contact, Lyssa, an artifact runner with hard, suspicious eyes, hiding near an ancient archway ruin.
"You're late, Scholar," she said immediately. "And you look like death came for you and missed."
"My appearance doesn't affect my ability to pay," Kaelen countered, placing a small, perfect gold ingot on a clean stone. "The Shard. I need specifics on the Cygnus Archives' security, not rumors."
Lyssa glanced at the gold, then back at Kaelen, wary of his desperate urgency. "The Shard is real. Deep in the vault. The guards are fierce, yes, and the wards are complex—they run on old, perfect mathematical code only a genius could break. But the real problem is the man in charge: Commander Velos. He doesn't trust magic; he trusts people. He knows every guard, every route. He wins because he understands betrayal, not because he understands spells."
Kaelen felt a rush of cold, clinical excitement. A problem based on human cunning, not magic. A worthy opponent.
"Commander Velos," Kaelen repeated, already analyzing the new threat. "Tell me everything about how he thinks. His methods."
Lyssa finally took the gold. "He's brilliant, Scholar. The kind of man who uses loyalty to build a wall and fear to open the gates. He expects mistakes. You can't outsmart him with a spell. You have to predict who he trusts most, and why."
Kaelen permitted himself a tiny, detached smile. A genius of emotion. That is merely a more complex set of rules to learn.