Chapter 571

If Arslan decided the job had to be accepted, it was his prerogative as Guildmaster.

That didn’t mean Ludger had to like it. He exhaled slowly through his nose, eyes still narrowed.

“Fine,” Ludger said.

Kaela blinked. “That’s it?”

“That’s it,” Ludger replied, tone flat. “For now.”

He wrote a final line on the page, then looked up again.

“But next time you escort Torvares cargo,” Ludger said, “I want to know what it is, where it’s going, and who is getting it.”

Kaela’s smile returned, a little less playful. “Trying to control your allies now?”

“I’m trying to control my risks,” Ludger corrected.

Kaela studied him for a moment, then nodded once.

“Alright,” she said. “I’ll tell you, if you behave.”

Ludger went back to his writing, but the calm had shifted. Torvares was still a supporter. That didn’t mean Torvares got to move pieces on Ludger’s board without him noticing. And if Arslan was accepting jobs to keep the relationship smooth…

Then Ludger would adjust his own plans accordingly. Because politics didn’t stop being politics just because someone paid on time.

Kaela’s teasing smile faded as her gaze slid past Ludger, out toward the road beyond the rise.

She squinted, then let out a soft, pleased hum.

“Huh,” she said. “Looks like things are about to get interesting.”

Ludger followed her line of sight. At first he saw dust. Then movement. Then the shape of a group cresting the road, thick bodies, heavy packs, the unmistakable stride of northerners moving with purpose instead of wandering.

A lot of them. Heading straight for Lionfang.

Ludger’s posture shifted as he rose to his feet, the paper forgotten for the moment.

Kaela leaned forward slightly, eyes bright with curiosity. “Who’s that lady?”

Ludger’s gaze narrowed as he picked out the figure at the front. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Walking like the road owed her obedience. Even from here, he could practically feel the volume of her personality.

“Kharnek’s wife,” Ludger said.

Kaela’s brows lifted. “Oh.”

Ludger stepped fully away from the tree, already calculating how much chaos this would dump into his town and how fast he’d need to expand housing again.

Then, dry as ever, he added without looking at Kaela, “Another married woman for you to be wary of.”

Kaela blinked. Then she laughed, airy and offended in the way only she could manage.

“I’m never wary of married women,” she said, flipping her hair like it was a weapon. “I don’t have any reason to be.”

Ludger glanced at her, expression flat.

“That’s exactly why you should be,” he said.

Kaela grinned, utterly unbothered, and started walking alongside him toward the road, because of course she did. Interesting things were her favorite hobby. Ahead, the northerners drew closer.

Ludger headed down toward the gate road to meet Sigrid before she reached Lionfang proper.

He wanted to intercept the chaos at the edge, not let it spill into the streets first.

For some reason, no, not for “some reason,” for the most predictable reason in the world, Kaela followed him. Right at his shoulder, like an annoying breeze that had decided it lived here now.

Ludger felt the urge to sigh. He didn’t. He wasn’t giving her that.

Kaela

thrived

on annoyance. The moment you acknowledged it, she treated it like applause.

So Ludger kept his face calm and his pace steady, pretending she wasn’t there even as she practically hummed with curiosity.

They met the northerners just outside the gate line, where the road widened and the guards could watch without being in the middle. The column was larger than Ludger expected, new faces mixed with familiar ones, packs heavy, weapons strapped, eyes scanning Lionfang with a mix of interest and suspicion.

And at the front… Sigrid.

She stopped the moment she saw Ludger, posture firm, eyes cutting straight to him like she was already preparing a list of complaints. Then her gaze slid sideways. To Kaela.

Kaela offered a bright smile, completely unbothered by the fact that the woman looking at her had the aura of a judgmental natural disaster.

Sigrid’s mouth tightened. Her brows knit. And then Ludger noticed something else. A lot of northerners greeted Kaela.

Not respectfully, exactly, more like familiar noise. Nods, grins, a couple crude jokes thrown her way like they’d done it before and expected her to throw something back. Kaela waved like she belonged.

Sigrid’s frown deepened. She didn’t ask who Kaela was. She didn’t need to. She could read a camp the way a butcher read meat.

Her eyes flicked over Kaela’s posture, her ease, the familiarity from the northerners… and the conclusion formed immediately.

Sigrid looked back at Ludger with a sharp, displeased expression. She could tell. This wind witch had wasted time with them too.

Ludger’s tone stayed neutral. “Sigrid.”

Sigrid’s eyes didn’t leave Kaela for a beat longer, then returned to Ludger.

“Vice Guildmaster,” she said.

Her voice was controlled, but the disapproval was loud anyway, because with Sigrid, disapproval didn’t need volume. Kaela leaned closer to Ludger, whispering as if this was a fun game.

“She hates me already,” Kaela said, delighted.

Ludger didn’t whisper back.

He just looked at Sigrid and got straight to business, because if he didn’t, Kaela would start “helping” in ways nobody wanted.

“How many did you bring,” Ludger asked. “And what do you want from Lionfang?”

Sigrid didn’t waste time with greetings.

She jerked her chin toward the northerners behind her, new faces, older faces, all built like they belonged in cold places and bad fights.

“These,” she said, voice flat, “are the ones I chose for the underwater labyrinth.”

Ludger’s gaze swept over them.

Shoulders. Hands. Eyes. The way they stood when nothing was happening, because that told you more than how they stood when someone was watching. A few held themselves too stiff. A few too relaxed. Most had the right kind of stillness: readiness without panic.

He nodded once.

“Good,” Ludger said. “They’ll need training.”

Sigrid didn’t argue. She just narrowed her eyes. “For what, exactly.”

“Underwater fighting,” Ludger replied, as if that was obvious.

Sigrid’s mouth tightened. “And how do you plan to train that without drowning my people.”

Ludger paused.

Then, to Kaela’s visible surprise, he smiled. Not warm. Not friendly. A small, sharp curve of his mouth that meant

I already decided.

“You’ll find out,” Ludger said.

Sigrid stared at him like she didn’t like mysteries.

Ludger turned away and walked a few steps toward a flat clearing near the gate road, packed earth, open space, guards watching from a distance.

He raised a hand. Mana sank into the ground, but not in the usual rough earthen surge. This time it was dense. Controlled. Pressurized.

The soil in front of him darkened as heat climbed through it, not fire heat, but earth heat. The kind you got from deep stone and molten memory. The ground trembled, and a ring of pale material rose up in a clean outline.

Sand. But not loose. Not dry. It lifted as if it had weight and cohesion, swirling in a tight band. Then it changed.

The particles fused under mana pressure, the way frost formed structure under cold, but this was the opposite. The sand collapsed into a single smooth surface, translucent, hard.

Glass.

Sigrid’s brows rose a fraction. Even she couldn’t pretend that wasn’t impressive.

Ludger had improved since the island. Back then, his earth magic had been stone and dirt and brute control.

Since the labyrinth, he’d refined it, learned that what mattered wasn’t just shape, but mana density. The right concentration, the right compression, the right balance between heat and structure.

With enough mana packed into the process, the earth didn’t just move. It transformed.

The glass rose higher, walls thickening as he shaped them. A rectangular tank formed, wide enough for multiple bodies, tall enough to submerge fully, edges reinforced with heavier glass ribs so it wouldn’t crack under pressure.

The corners rounded slightly, because sharp angles were where stress liked to live.

A lip formed at the top for grip. Steps molded into one side for entry and exit.

The whole thing settled into place with a soft, crystalline

hum

that made the hairs on the back of Kaela’s neck lift.

Sigrid stared at it, silent.

Kaela leaned closer, eyes bright. “Oh that’s—”

Ludger ignored her and flicked his fingers.

A thin layer of stone rose around the tank’s base like a cradle, anchoring it so it wouldn’t shift. Drain channels carved outward from beneath it, because Ludger didn’t build anything without thinking about cleanup.

Then he lifted his other hand.

“Now,” Ludger said, tone calm, “we add the problem.”

He began to fill it.

Water flowed in a steady stream, conjured and guided, cold and clean, pouring into the glass basin with a rushing sound that immediately drew every northerner’s attention. The level climbed quickly, smooth surface rising toward the lip, no sediment, no murk.

Crystal clear.

So clear that as the tank filled, they could see straight through it to the other side, boots, grass, stone, the legs of warriors shifting uneasily as they realized exactly what this meant.

It was a solution you could drown in.

Ludger let the water settle, the surface going still as glass met glass, transparent wall, transparent water, a perfect view into a controlled environment that would expose every weakness. He turned back to Sigrid and the chosen northerners, expression calm.

“Welcome,” Ludger said, “to your training.”

Ludger stood beside the glass tank as if it was the most normal thing in the world to keep an ocean in a box.

He looked over the northerners Sigrid had brought, fifty eyes, some eager, some wary, all trying to pretend they weren’t suddenly aware of their own lungs.

“This is how it works,” Ludger said.

He pointed at the water.

“You train against each other underwater,” he continued, voice calm. “Not to win. To learn. Balance, vision, breathing discipline, how to strike without sinking like an idiot.”

A few warriors shifted uncomfortably. Ludger’s gaze didn’t soften.

“Once you stop flailing,” he added, “I’ll make you something closer to the real thing.”

Sigrid’s eyes narrowed. “What real thing?”

“A mimic,” Ludger said. “A runic golem imitation. Something that doesn’t breathe. Something that doesn’t panic. Something that keeps moving and attacks at the same time.”

The northerners looked at him, and Ludger could see the question forming behind their eyes.

How?

How do you make a golem mimic? How do you test underwater combat without killing people? How do you create a glass pool out of dirt like it’s nothing?

None of them asked.

Because none of them understood how he’d done the glass tank either.

And at some point, when a person did something impossible in front of you, you stopped wasting breath asking

how

and started focusing on

what it means for you.

Ludger nodded toward the tank again.

“You’ll start with hands,” he said. “Then weapons. Then shields. Slow at first. Controlled. If I see panic, you stop.”

A couple of warriors opened their mouths like they wanted to argue.

Sigrid silenced them with a look.

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