There was a long, deliberate silence after Vaelorin mentioned the letters. The flickering runes embedded in the floor pulsed faintly, casting the chamber in alternating bands of violet and shadow. The scent of ancient ash clung to the chamber, mingling with the subtle pressure of layered wards buried deep in the obsidian stone.
Then Vaelorin straightened in his seat.
His voice came steady, but laced with a rare undercurrent of zeal, measured enthusiasm wrapped in command, as though he had already envisioned a future unfolding precisely to plan.
"We have been presented with a rare alignment of opportunities," he said, each syllable reinforced with calculated conviction. "Your accord with Duchess Yvanna has opened doors no Shadowborn agent, no infiltration team could have achieved without open war. With her backing, the Synod may soon possess a permanent base of operations within Argyll."
He gestured lightly to the map in front of him as if presenting a truth so obvious it barely needed to be stated.
"South of the human continent. In the gilded halls of the Dominion itself. Our movements can be cloaked in your diplomatic protections, wrapped in Yvanna’s personal guarantees. We will become invisible to the Circle, unnoticed by the Sanctified Council. Yvanna cannot risk scandal, thus she cannot expose or restrict us. Not without dismantling her own position."
His words hung like ceremonial blades above the chamber. Kel’Mara tilted her head slightly in curiosity, while Seredai’s eyes gleamed with analytical detachment, his fingers tapping softly on the armrest like a mental metronome.
"We could place anchors beneath Cairnhold," Vaelorin continued, voice gaining heat. "Runes for scrying, folds for transport, predictive nexuses for monitoring magical fluctuations across the Argyll coast. We could funnel agents quietly. Even initiate selective recruitment among their lesser magisters. With your accord as cover, the Dominion itself becomes a staging ground, an open gate under gilded pretense."
He leaned forward ever so slightly, robes shifting like oil over glass.
"All this, Raven. Because of what you’ve built. What you’ve offered us. You’ve carved a path none of our own dared attempt, and with it comes influence we can no longer ignore."
The room fell still again, anticipation sharpening the air.
Corvin raised a single eyebrow.
Then, his voice came, flat, cold, unyielding.
"Since when," he asked, "did my personal connections begin to serve the Synod?"
The silence cracked like glass.
He stepped forward once, slow and deliberate, like a blade being unsheathed.
"Let me remind you," he continued, voice calm but edged, "our agreement is simple. I complete ten trials. In exchange, the Synod conceals my origin from the... curious inquiries of certain parties. Nothing more. Nothing less."
His gaze sharpened, the light from the runes briefly catching in his eyes.
"I don’t owe you my contacts. I don’t owe you my favors. I don’t owe you anything beyond the trials and you certainly do not have permission to burrow into my personal life, my affinities, or my political maneuvers."
He turned slightly toward Seredai and Kel’Mara, who now watched him with unreadable expressions.
"This agreement was made in good faith. If that faith continues to be tested, then perhaps it’s best we cancel it outright. Synod is most welcome to declare their former announcment about me was false."
The words lingered like frost across the runes.
Then came the final sentence, murmured with an almost absent tone, but heavy with implication, like a harmless comment made by someone who knew precisely where the blade would fall.
"Of course, discretion is fragile. Sometimes things slip. An intercepted scroll, a murmured name in the wrong place, one never knows what might catch flame."
He let the idea settle, calm and passive.
Not a threat. Merely an observation.
A gentle reminder that shadows cast by others could fall in unexpected directions.
He didn’t need them. Not anymore.
He had grown too powerful to be handled like a pawn, too dangerous to be underestimated, too unpredictable to be controlled.
It was time the Synod understood, he was not theirs.
Vaelorin did not answer immediately. He sat frozen, the usual calculated weight in his gaze now dulled by the abrupt sting of rejection. He had not expected this. Not at all. His fingers tightened against the armrests of his throne, faint sparks dancing at his knuckles.
In a voice less composed than before, he said, "You may rest for a day or two, Raven. The trials must have been taxing."
Corvin gave no response. He turned without a word and vanished into the gloom of the obsidian corridors, footsteps silent.
The chamber remained motionless for a heartbeat.
Fury twisted across his face, usually carved in obsidian calm. His aura flared like oil catching flame, sending a shiver across the warded floor.
"Keep the Gate locked," he snapped to the nearest shadowborn guard as he descended the throne dais. His boots struck the floor with more force than necessary, each step echoing like a curse through the chamber.
Kel’Mara remained seated, jaw tight, a sliver of arcane light drifting along the edge of her mask. Seredai’s fingers tapped the arm of his chair in short, sharp bursts. Silent percussion for the tension radiating off them both.
"He forgets himself," Vaelorin hissed as he reached the threshold. "Let the Planarchs decide if his usefulness still outweighs his arrogance."
He swept from the room, bound for the Council of the Inner Hex, where the shadows were thicker, and decisions permanent. There, beneath layers of warded silence and sovereign oath, he would present Raven’s words and let the greater minds determine their next step. A decision would ripple.
And Vaelorin was not about to let power slip through his fingers.
Meanwhile, Corvin stepped beyond the wards of the Obsidian Gate, shadows folding behind him.
He had no time for their theatrics.
He needed more test subjects.
The Dark Elven Nomad Tribes, scattered across the broken plains east of the Synod’s reach, made ideal hunting ground. Nomadic. Isolated. Overlooked by all major factions. Most importantly, vulnerable.
Within three days, over two hundred dark elves vanished. Not a single trace, not a single scream. Not one soul had seen Corvin. His forces, his perfected underlings, handled the acquisitions.
Silent, efficient and obedient.
Deep beneath the surface of a forgotten basalt ridge, three hundred meters down a new laboratory pulsed with arcane resonance. The entrance did not exist. Only Corvin could navigate the binding sigils and dimensional fold anchoring the chamber’s coordinates.
Teleportation was the only way to get there. In and out, clean and untraceable.
Inside, the laboratory had grown.
It was no longer a workspace, it was a sanctum. Tables etched with fleshbound runes supported dissected remains stabilized in stasis. Fluid tanks lined the walls, filled with reanimated specimens in various stages of modification. Blood filtered lighting illuminated surgical tools, hybrid embryos, and sigils marked in layered ink and bone.
It was a vault of flesh and theory. Bound charts mapped musculature overlays, spore delivery paths, adaptive resistances. Tablets etched with blood data glowed faintly beneath his touch, syncing with predictive simulation spells and cognitive recalibration overlays.
He was no longer just reanimating.
Controlled evolution through Arcane Virology. Targeted strains to enhance cognition, durability, affinity plasticity, mana conductivity and core. Subjects no longer broke apart from the process. They adapted. They thrived under his hand. He experimented with new combinations. Life Magic and Aether overlays, mana conductive cartilage, and aggressive regeneration curves.
So he reached further.
He dispatched squads to Eldrithas, a commercial port city on Thalasien’s westhern coast. It bustled with diplomats, traders, and transient mages of multiple races. The perfect veil.
There, in the shadows of silver towers and sea salt wind, his agents snatched human , high elf, demon and even some aetheris ’volunteers’. Isolated mages. Wandering healers. Discreet targets who would not be missed.
He would conduct some tests on them. First among these was mana and health regeneration. Increasing reflex and process speed, increase casting time and cognetive speed of the brain. His ultimate goal is to upgrade himself and his undead before his next evolution.
The Hexarchy convened the following day.
In the High Chamber of the Inner council of Dark Elves, deep beneath the black pylons of the Synod’s sanctum, the air pulsed with raw containment. Four Archmagi lined the obsidian gallery, their robes bearing the crests of schools long thought forgotten, each face wrapped in half light and cold scrutiny. At the center of the dais stood the twin thrones of the Planarchs elevated, silver veined stone wound with soulsteel threading.
Vaelorin stood before them, hands clasped behind his back, voice even.
He recited Corvin’s words precisely. Every syllable, every pause, every veiled threat.
A low murmur crept through the Archmagi.
Whispers like a rusted blade sliding across flesh.
Some shook their heads in disapproval. Others leaned forward, intrigued.
Then the silence was shattered.
"He is right," said Planarch Selyndros, his voice cold and bright as lightning trapped in crystal. "We agreed to ten trials, not loyalty."
He paused, then continued with sharpened weight.
"But the sheer audacity to speak to us with such tone... that we will not accept."
Across from him, the second Planarch, Dhaelora Varn, clad in robes the color of blood rose from her seat, gaze unblinking.
"Then summon him," she said. "Let him speak in front of us. Bring him to this chamber. The Synod will not lose this useful tool. Nor will we allow a foothold in Argyll to crumble because of personal ego."
"All must serve the Dark Mother. Willingly or otherwise."
Vaelorin bowed his head in affirmation, but the Planarchs were not finished.
A side door whispered open. A silent courier approached, placing a folded parchment scrolls onto the central pedestal.
Reports from the Sentinel Outpost near the Nomad Tribes and Eldrithas.
Selyndros unfurled it.
"Two hundred Dark Elves missing. No signs of struggle, no arcane residue. Locals claim Feralis were seen in the area, but nothing solid."
Eldrithas’ report was more precise.
"Dozens of High Elves, Humans even Aetherborn in Eldrithas. Both of minor noble lineage and commoners recently vanished without witnesses."
Selyndros folded the scrolls slowly.
"There must be some link between these. The precision. The pattern. It does feel like organized crime, not chaotic. Calculated."
Dhaelora’s fingers drummed on the arm of her throne.
"If these Feralis sightings are real, this might be their answer. Something moves in silence. Something directed."
Another Archmagus murmured, "Slavers from the Verranate? Rogue necromancers? Demons?"
"Each one of them is a Possibility,"
The room quieted again.
"Increase the serurity and watch, but do not interfere, Try to find who is responsible" Selyndros ordered. "In the mean time summon this Raven. Let us see what gives him the courage to disobey the Synod. We are the will of the Dark Mother."
The decision solidified.
They would summon Corvin.