"What do you mean by that?" Mars asked defensively, looking back up at Lencar. "As far as I remember, Fanzell Kruger was a highly decorated commander of the Diamond Army. He was a good man, an effective tactician, and a strong wind mage. But he became rogue before long. He betrayed the Kingdom and fled. He is a traitor."
Mars recited the words like he was reading them off a piece of paper. There was no heat in his voice, no anger at the betrayal, and no sadness at the loss of a mentor. It was chillingly cold.
Lencar sighed internally. The boy was still so incredibly broken.
"There are some things that you will only truly remember as time goes on, Mars," Lencar said cryptically, adopting the wise, mysterious persona once again. He didn't want to push the boy's fragile psyche any further today. The emotional dam was already leaking; forcing it open completely would just cause another catastrophic breakdown. "Don't dawdle on these missing feelings too much right now. Let the memories come back to you naturally in the dark. For now... just make sure to take care of the bounty on Dominante Code. Call off the dogs. Can you do that?"
Mars looked deeply at Lencar, his pale eyes studying the masked face, searching for a trap or a hidden motive. Finding none that he could decipher, he gave a short, sharp nod.
"Alright," Mars agreed, his tone flat and professional. "I will help you this once. Since she was a citizen of the Diamond Kingdom, and you spared my life, I consider it an even trade."
"Excellent doing business with you, General," Lencar replied smoothly.
Mars turned away again, adjusting his grip on the synthetic grimoire. He looked down the sheer, treacherous cliff face of the Thunder-Crag Peaks. It was a brutal, miserable hike down to the valley, and an even longer journey through hostile Clover Kingdom territory to reach the Diamond border.
Just as Mars took his first heavy step forward, preparing for the long march, Lencar suddenly materialized right in front of him. Mars flinched backward, entirely failing to track Lencar's movement.
"Since you have already decided to help me with my little domestic problem," Lencar said, his voice light and almost cheerful, "I suppose it's only fair that I help in a small thing as well."
Mars looked at him warily, taking a defensive half-step back. "What can you help me with?"
Lencar didn't say a word. He just raised his right hand and casually swiped it through the empty air in front of Mars.
Instantly, the ambient mana warped and folded in on itself. A swirling, oval-shaped spatial portal, composed of deep, shifting shadows and dark mist, tore open in the fabric of reality. Through the swirling darkness, Mars could clearly see the dense, pine-covered forests and the specific, jagged rock formations that marked the landscape near the Kiten border of the Diamond Kingdom. It was a shortcut that bypassed days of perilous travel.
"This portal will take you to a secure, unmonitored location near the Kiten Border," Lencar explained, gesturing gracefully toward the rift. "You can walk right into your home territory without the Clover Magic Knights ever knowing you were here."
Mars stared at the portal, genuinely stunned by the casual display of high-level, long-range spatial magic. He looked back at Lencar, a silent question of 'why' hanging in the air between them.
But Lencar was busy doing something Mars couldn't see.
As Lencar held his hand out to sustain the portal, he subtly curled his fingers and tapped the heavy silver ring on his index finger. He focused his mind, connecting his vast Stage 3 Peak mana directly to the magical matrix of the ring, accessing a very specific, highly classified tool he had stored within its sub-space: The Far-Speaker's Mirror.
It was an advanced magical artifact designed for long-range communication and surveillance. Using the ring as a conduit, Lencar didn't just hold the portal open; he actively, secretly wove a microscopic, incredibly complex tracking and listening mark directly into the threshold of the spatial rift.
He layered the microscopic mark with his stolen, highly refined concealment magic, wrapping the spell in a cloak of shadows and ambient wind. It was a flawless, invisible trap. When Mars passed through the portal, the magical threshold would act like a scanner, silently painting the boy's aura with the invisible tracking mark.
Let's see if those Diamond Kingdom scholars are as smart as they think they are, Lencar thought to himself, a smug, satisfied smirk playing on his lips behind the mask. Most Stage 1 magicians, even Captains, wouldn't be able to detect a concealment spell of this density unless they were specifically looking for it. And they won't be looking for a bug on their own General.
"Go on," Lencar urged, completely hiding his devious actions behind a facade of casual helpfulness.
Mars hesitated for only a second before practicality won out. He stepped toward the portal.
"Oh, and one more thing," Lencar added, causing Mars to pause right at the threshold of the swirling shadows. "You don't need to bother looking for your soldiers or your commanding officer near the Kiten Dungeon."
Mars looked back, his eyes narrowing. "Why?"
"Because they are already gone," Lencar said confidently. "They should have already retreated safely to the Diamond Kingdom border, and they should be actively looking for you right now."
Lencar didn't possess omniscient clairvoyance, but he possessed something just as good: meta-knowledge of the timeline.
He clearly remembered the original plot. Lotus Whomalt, the cowardly, highly pragmatic, but undeniably brilliant smoke mage, had been engaged in a fierce battle with Luck Voltia, Asta, and Noelle Silva. Lencar knew exactly how Lotus operated. The moment Lotus realized he was outmatched by the Clover rookies and fled, and the absolute second he sensed the catastrophic, overwhelming mana clash from Mars's battle disappearing from the dungeon's sensory range, Lotus would have made a strategic, tactical retreat.
Considering the cautious, survival-first nature of Lotus Whomalt, Lencar was willing to bet his entire remaining mana pool that Lotus had already used his smoke magic to grab his grunts, flee the Kiten Dungeon, and bolt straight back to the Diamond Kingdom to report the disastrous failure of the mission and the highly alarming disappearance of their Mars.
Mars didn't question the masked man's intelligence network. He had heard enough impossible things today to accept this as a fact.
With a final, complicated look at the strange, terrifying phantom who had broken him, healed him, and set him free, Mars turned away. Realizing that he could go back to his kingdom immediately and begin to unravel the horrific truth in his own head, the Diamond General stepped decisively into the dark, swirling shadows of the portal.
He didn't feel the microscopic, invisible magical mark latch onto his crystal armor and sink into his aura as he crossed the threshold.
The moment Mars disappeared from view, Lencar snapped his fingers. The spatial portal collapsed inward with a sharp pop, vanishing entirely and leaving the Thunder-Crag plateau completely empty.
Lencar Abarame was finally alone.
He stood there in the freezing mist for a long, quiet moment, staring at the empty space where the portal had been. He let out a massive, groaning breath, his shoulders slumping as the last dregs of his adrenaline completely evaporated. He had pulled it off. He had secured the Chimera Rune, leveled up his soul, saved the timeline, and bugged a high-ranking enemy asset all in one night.