The plan was never meant to be perfect.
Kael had said that from the beginning, his voice low and steady as he traced routes into dust with a finger that shook more than he wanted it to. Perfection drew attention. Perfection invited scrutiny. What they needed was plausibility—a sequence of events that looked like incompetence, exhaustion, coincidence.
They needed the cult to believe the escape failed on its own.
What none of them had planned for was how violently fate would resist being denied.
The night of the transfer arrived without ceremony.
No alarms. No sense of destiny. Just the same cold air, the same rune-lit corridors, the same guards who were already bored before they began their shifts.
Aurelian stood between his parents, wrists shackled loosely enough to pass for routine. He kept his head lowered, shoulders slightly hunched—nothing, just as they had practiced.
Still Blade.
In. Hold. Out.
Lucien walked on his right, chains clinking softly with each step. Elenora was on his left, her movements slow but composed, black hair loose around her shoulders like a shadow that refused to fade.
Kael walked behind them.
Not as an escort.
As an observer.
A man doing his job.
A man betraying monsters.
They reached the junction where the main corridor split—one path leading deeper into the compound, the other toward the old maintenance tunnels Kael had marked as the first opening.
Two guards.
Exactly as planned.
Kael felt his heartbeat in his throat as one of them stepped aside, bored, waving them through without even looking closely.
For half a second—half a second—hope sparked.
Then the runes screamed.
Not an alarm.
Something worse.
A pressure wave rippled through the corridor, so sudden and violent that Aurelian staggered. His scars flared with pain as suppression fields surged, tightening all at once.
Lucien swore under his breath.
Elenora gasped, dropping to one knee.
Kael froze.
"No," he whispered. "No—this wasn't—"
Footsteps thundered from every direction.
Torches flared to life.
Voices rose.
"Seal breach!"
"Containment failure!"
"Secure the royals!"
Voss stepped out of the shadows ahead, slow-clapping, his expression calm and pleased.
"Doctor Kael," he said mildly. "You disappoint me."
Kael's blood went cold.
"They noticed," Lucien muttered. "They always do."
Guards swarmed.
Steel flashed.
The corridor erupted into chaos.
Lucien moved first.
Even with his shattered mana core, even with chains biting into his wrists, his body remembered what it meant to be a swordsman. He tore free from the nearest guard with brutal efficiency, using the man's momentum to slam his head into the stone wall.
Bones cracked.
Elenora shouted something sharp and ancient—words of alchemical intent rather than spell—and the ground beneath two guards turned slick, sending them crashing into each other.
Aurelian stood frozen for a heartbeat.
Not from fear.
From the sudden, overwhelming realization that this was it.
This was the moment everything they had been building toward shattered into violence.
"Run!" Kael shouted.
Aurelian turned—
And saw the blade meant for his back.
Lucien stepped into it.
Steel pierced his side, deep and precise.
Lucien didn't scream.
He grabbed the guard's wrist, twisted, and drove the blade through the man's throat instead.
Blood sprayed across the stone.
Elenora cried out.
Aurelian's vision went red.
Still Blade fractured.
"No!" Aurelian shouted, lunging forward.
Lucien turned toward him, blood soaking through his torn clothes, white hair matted dark.
"Aurelian!" Lucien roared. "Listen to me!"
Another guard struck Lucien from behind.
Lucien fell to one knee.
Elenora moved to him—and a spell detonated at her feet.
She screamed as she was thrown back, slamming into the wall hard enough to crack stone.
Kael ran.
Not away.
Toward them.
He shoved Aurelian aside as a blast of mana tore through the air where the boy had stood.
"Stay down!" Kael barked. "Stay alive!"
Voss watched from a distance, irritation creasing his brow.
"So much effort," he sighed. "For nothing."
Guards converged.
Lucien's breathing grew ragged.
Elenora struggled to rise, blood trickling from her mouth.
Kael stood between them and the cult, arms spread, knowing exactly how this ended.
"I won't let you take him," Kael said.
Voss raised an eyebrow. "You already failed."
A blade flashed.
Kael didn't dodge.
He took it through the chest.
The impact knocked the breath from his lungs, pain blooming white-hot as the world tilted. He fell backward, landing hard beside Aurelian.
Blood filled his mouth.
Aurelian stared at him, horror crashing over everything else.
"Kael—"
Kael grabbed Aurelian's wrist with surprising strength.
"Listen," he rasped. "No time."
Lucien's voice came like gravel. "Now."
Elenora crawled toward Aurelian, her purple eyes blazing despite the blood and pain.
"Aurelian," she whispered urgently. "Look at me."
The world narrowed.
Guards shouting. Steel ringing. Mana surging.
But Aurelian saw only his parents.
Lucien forced himself upright one last time, spine straight, blue eyes burning.
"You carry us," Lucien said. "Do you understand?"
Aurelian shook his head violently. "No—don't—please—"
Lucien smiled.
Not sadly.
Proudly.
"A Valemont does not die without a blade."
Something answered.
Deep inside Aurelian, beneath seals and scars, something stirred violently.
Lucien pressed his bloodied forehead to Aurelian's.
A pulse thundered through Aurelian's chest.
A presence.
A blade.
Not physical.
Spiritual.
A Soul Sword.
Lucien's legacy tore free from his dying soul like a scream made of steel, flooding into Aurelian's core. Knowledge followed—stances, principles, battles fought and lost and won. The Valemont family art in its true form, no longer bound by flesh.
Aurelian screamed as the weight of it crashed into him.
Lucien exhaled once.
And did not inhale again.
"No—!" Aurelian sobbed.
Elenora reached him then, hands shaking as she cupped his face.
"Listen to me," she said fiercely, tears streaming. "My love—my son—"
Her hand pressed against his chest.
Mana flared—not violently, but purely.
Warmth.
Light.
A second presence awakened.
Where Lucien's was sharp and resolute, this one was fluid, expansive, infinite.
A Soul Bow.
Elenora's legacy flowed into him like a song made of light and calculation—alchemy refined to its spiritual essence, trajectories and reactions and intent. A weapon that did not fire arrows, but purpose.
"You were never meant to be hidden forever," she whispered. "White hair. Purple eyes. Remember who you are."
Her power wrapped around the seal—not breaking it, but loosening it, enough for Aurelian to survive what came next.
Elenora smiled through blood.
"You were our miracle," she said softly.
A blade struck her back.
She stiffened.
Then slumped forward into Aurelian's arms.
Gone.
The world screamed.
Something inside Aurelian snapped.
Not rage.
Not madness.
Resolve so absolute it felt like silence.
The Soul Sword and Soul Bow anchored themselves within him, stabilizing the overwhelming flood of knowledge and power. Not awakening him fully—his body would not survive that—but protecting him.
Kael coughed wetly beside him.
"Aurelian," he whispered. "Listen… listen to me."
Aurelian turned, eyes shaking.
Kael smiled weakly. "You… made it."
Kael's hand slipped inside his robe, pressing a cold object into Aurelian's palm—a small crystal etched with layered runes.
"Route," Kael wheezed. "Tunnel… third mark… run…"
Aurelian shook his head. "Come with me."
Kael's eyes softened.
"I already chose… my ending," he said. "Make sure… theirs wasn't for nothing."
Voss stepped closer, impatience clear now.
"Kill the boy," he ordered. "I'm done with this."
Kael looked past Aurelian, meeting Voss's gaze.
Then he whispered one final truth.
"He was never common."
Voss frowned—
Too late.
Kael crushed the crystal.
The corridor collapsed.
Stone screamed as the ceiling gave way, a controlled failure Kael had hidden as his last contingency. Dust and debris exploded outward, knocking guards off their feet.
Aurelian was thrown backward—
Into darkness.
Into falling.
Into a tunnel Kael had marked with his blood.
He ran.
Blind.
Sobbing.
Burning.
His body moved on instinct, the Soul Sword guiding his steps, the Soul Bow calculating every turn, every breath.
Behind him, the compound burned.
Above him, the world waited.
He didn't stop running until his lungs screamed and his legs failed and the darkness opened into night air for the first time in his life.
Aurelian collapsed beneath the stars.
Grey hair bleached white at the roots.
Grey eyes flickered purple, then dimmed again.
He pressed his forehead into the dirt and screamed until his throat bled.
When dawn finally came, it found a boy alone.
Carrying two legacies.
And a promise written in blood:
He would live.
He would remember.
And one day—
The world would learn what they had tried to erase.