ButcherPete
patreon
Chapter 67: Unofficial Pact
🕑 Added 2025-06-11 20:47:58 +0000 UTCThe wind that rolled through the high mountain pass smelled like winter, though the calendar still claimed otherwise. It whispered across the peaks with a quiet menace, curling mist over the ridges and coating the breath of the watchers in cold. There was a kind of serenity here, beautiful, even. But Shela did not trust serenity.
Not in Hellnia.
She stood alone at the edge of the high pavilion balcony, eyes fixed on the sky. Overhead, the dream fissure pulsed like a wound in the heavens. A tear in the sky, trembling above the world, where nothing should have been. It swirled with alien hues, strange energies threading through the clouds and casting light that didn’t match any known sun.
The demons below lived beneath it like it was normal.
That unsettled her more than anything.
“Trouble sleeping?” Salitha’s voice drifted from behind, soft but amused.
“No.” Shela replied without turning. “Just thinking.”
The guest quarters were spacious, isolated from the other visitors, subtly warded, neither hostile nor welcoming. Hannya had been deliberate with that balance. Shela didn’t blame her.
She brushed her fingers along the cold balcony railing, feeling the faint vibrations of magic that ran through the structure like veins. The fissure above whispered, not in sound, but in feeling. Like it had things to say, if only one could listen properly.
“What do you think of her?” Salitha asked, stepping beside her.
“She’s dangerous.” Shela said flatly.
“That’s not what I asked.”
“...She recognized me the moment we met. She wants something. Maybe both of us.”
“And if she gets it?”
Shela’s lips tightened. “Then she’ll use it. Correctly.”
Salitha tilted her head, casting her a sidelong glance. “That didn’t sound like a warning.”
It wasn’t.
A shift in the air drew their attention. Faint bells chimed from somewhere deeper in the fortress, their ringing woven into the warding structure itself. A group of acolytes, unknown to them, beginning their daybreak prayers.
“I’m going to train.” Shela murmured, stepping back from the balcony.
“Don’t stray too far,” Salitha called after her. “We’re still guests.”
Shela didn’t reply.
~~~
The training courtyard she found was a half-forgotten square of stone, facing the cliff’s edge where the mountain dropped into clouds. Frost shimmered around her. The dream mist curled around her boots like curious ghosts.
She unbuckled her sword and set it aside with care. Then she knelt, drawing a slow, precise circle in the cold dust with a single finger.
She closed her eyes. Inhaled. Slowed her heartbeat.
[Absolute Zero]
Her truest ability. Not simple frost, not illusionary cold. This was deeper. Stillness so complete it murdered motion. Molecules halted. Time thinned. Silence that killed.
She focused.
A bird landed nearby. Small. Unafraid.
Shela didn’t move.
A breath of frost passed between them.
The bird twitched. Fell over. Dead.
She opened her eyes. Regret settled in her chest like ice.
Control. She was losing it again.
She rose slowly. The cold clung to her skin like guilt. Another few years, she told herself. Just a few more years, and she could use it properly, without slaughtering everything nearby. If she wanted to reach the stronger entities, Neel’s upper tiers, if she wanted to change her fate, her father’s fate, and the demons trapped on the other side. She couldn’t falter.
But truth floated behind her thoughts like fog.
She was scared.
Scared of failure. Of becoming like her father: trapped, caged while the world evolved without him.
~~~
Hannya watched the ice knight.
High above, from a balcony laced with crimson veils and silver cords, she watched.
She reclined with silent poise on a red couch, her veil drawn low, her presence faint but heavy. Below, Shela moved with icy grace. Precise. Sharper than before. Yet Hannya’s eyes, trained and unmerciful, caught the tiny hesitations, corrected steps, the delays, a hidden wince.
Pain, neatly folded into discipline.
‘The imp’s core is working against her.’ She concluded.
“You gonna to need her?” Baku asked, approaching with his usual easy gait. The black lacquered gourd in his hand steamed faintly. He sipped it, unbothered by the mist or the cold.
Hannya didn’t look at him. “I plan to make her want to need me.”
Baku snorted. “You sure you’re not a chaos devil in disguise? Rebirth, maybe?”
Hannya snorted. “I’m just playing my part.” she answered smoothly.
Her gaze remained on Shela, sharp, unreadable, watchful.
Behind them, the faint hum of Noh’s painted zither echoed through the wind. The Painted Devil sat cross-legged on a cushioned seat, watching the exchange in silence, her half-smile saying little but implying much.
Baku glanced back at Noh.
Then Baku’s voice dropped slightly. “Kid, the nobles sent someone. They’ll be here in two days.”
“I know.” Hannya replied.
“Damn, you already heard? Not just a messenger, I’m guessing.” He said, crossing his arms as he gazed down the mountain beside her.
Hannya’s veil shifted as she smiled beneath it, thin and precise.
“Let them come.”
~~~
By the time Shela returned from her training, faint frost still clung to her uniform. The crystalline sheen shimmered faintly under the fortress’s magical light, catching reflections of the dream fissure high above.
She stepped through the ambient veil guarding their guest wing. The chill evaporated from her skin in a sudden flush of warmth, leaving her faintly flushed.
Inside, the lacquered doors parted with a soft groan.
Salitha wasn’t alone.
Two young demonesses stood by her side, servants dressed in formal robes. Their hands gripped silver trays veiled under translucent silk cloth, the kind used for divine offerings. They stood too still. Reverent, but tense.
“We brought a morning tribute for the guests of the Love Faction,” one said, bowing stiffly.
Salitha nodded with composed elegance. “You may leave it here.”
They bowed again, quick and nervous, and exited almost too fast, like remaining even a moment longer might cost them something.
Shela shut the door behind them and crossed her arms. “They always that nervous around you?”
Salitha offered a small, wry smile. “Not around me. No.”
“Then it’s her. Hannya.”
“Yes.” Salitha’s eyes glinted faintly. “She’s created a strange equilibrium here. Fear, but not resentment. Fascination, but not love. A ruler whose people dread offending her... but crave her approval anyway.”
Shela didn’t comment. But she was thinking the same.
The deviless pulled back the silk covering the tribute tray. Beneath lay a careful arrangement of thin-sliced dreamfruit, crystal-boiled root, and a delicate glass vial swirling with pale fog. Everything shimmered with enchantments, restorative, nourishing, narcotic.
Shela could sense it. The food wasn’t poisoned. Just... precise.
Salitha picked up a fruit slice, turning it between her fingers. Then she stopped.
“She’s watching,” she whispered.
Shela didn’t look around. But she felt it too. Not a direct gaze, not like someone peeking through a window. More like being observed by a memory. Every motion weighed. Every choice noted.
“I don’t sense hostility,” Salitha added. “It’s more like… curiosity. She wants to see how we behave when we think no one is watching.”
Shela placed her sword down beside a nearby chair and sat, cross-legged.
“We’re not here to entertain her,” she said. “Make the request. Let her decide.”
Salitha bit into the fruit, voice low. “You forget, Shela. Sometimes... diplomacy is war.”
~~~
Afternoon.
The audience chamber had changed.
Where once it was austere, now it radiated ceremonial gravity. Braziers burned with smokeless blue fire. Dream blue banners stitched in mist-silver thread hung along the curved walls like silent judgments. Rows of dream knights stood sentinel, their armor polished to a mirror sheen.
At the center sat Baku, massive like a mountain, unmoving on a throne of dreamstone and etched obsidian. His dark eyes didn’t miss a single twitch.
To his right, Hannya’s sedan glimmered beneath its silver-crimson canopy, her veiled form hidden in fog. To his left, Noh reclined with the quiet bemusement of a spectator who’d already read the ending.
Shela and Salitha entered.
They weren’t alone. Minor nobles filled the gallery seats, their whispers subdued but sharp. Among them stood a greed devil. draped in golden chains, fingers heavy with jeweled rings. But his jaw trembled.
He knew.
He had overstayed his welcome.
“I’ve heard your proposal,” Hannya’s voice came from behind the veil. Cool. Quiet. Final. “And I must admit, it’s fascinating how far you’ve traveled… just to ask for a loan. In our name.”
The greed devil flinched. “I-I meant no offense. My House only seeks to trade in good faith-”
“Good faith?” The mist rippled. Hannya leaned forward. Her silhouette sharpened behind the veil. “You sent assassins into my borderlands six nights ago. No?”
His face went gray. “That was not sanctioned by my House!”
“Then your house is weak.”
The room stilled.
“Leave.”
He hesitated. Opened his mouth. Thought better of it. Bowed, barely, and turned, retreating with the hunched gait of a man who knew he'd been dismissed by something he shouldn't poke any longer.
Hannya shifted her hidden gaze to the geisha two seats over. Noh turned her head slightly, nodded gracefully, and faced forward.
The devil would not return.
Baku raised his hand stoically and beckoned the next party forward. He was simply an observer for this audience. But his authority was still to be recognized. Thus, he played the part of a traffic controller.
Salitha stepped forward. A hand pressed lightly to her chest.
“Salitha Luxuria,” she said with practiced grace. “Sixth of the Luxuria-”
“In name only. Do not repeat that again.” Hannya interrupted. Her irritation rising at the words.
She had allowed this slight once, but she dared lie to her a second time? She wouldn’t allow it.
The words hit like a lash.
Salitha flinched. Shela’s eyes twitched to the side, but didn’t gloat. She only watched.
Still, Salitha recovered. “We come in peace. Hoping for dialogue-”
And then she did it again.
Charm aura.
Subtle. Spun like silk. A gentle radiance of pheromantic script and cadence. Her voice softened. Her gaze shimmered.
Then… an impact.
Hannya moved.
Not walked. Not stepped. Appeared.
In the blink between heartbeats, the veiled devil stood inches in front of Salitha. Her veil fluttered from the force of arrival.
Before anyone could react-
SLAP
Her hand lashed across Salitha’s face. A clean, arc’d strike. Not out of malice, but like a teacher disciplining a child who’d forgotten the lesson. Salitha staggered.
And in that same breath, Hannya’s other hand rested toward Shela’s hip.
Her delicate hand placed atop the pommel of Shela’s sword.
Shela hadn’t moved. But her fingers had begun to twitch toward the hilt.
Now they stopped.
Tension rippled like a live current across the chamber.
Hannya didn’t raise her voice. Her eyes spinning, locked on the Luxuria.
“You were warned,” she said, her voice velvet and iron. “Twice, if memory serves. Third time is insult. We practice martial-charm here; don't think for a second honeyed words work on this mountain.”
Hannya was done with this green tea bitch doing as she pleased.
Time held its breath.
Salitha, reeling, touched her stinging cheek. Her breath came in shallow gasps, humiliation burning through her reddened skin.
“I…” she began, swallowing down the pride. “Forgive me.”
Hannya didn’t move at first. Then slowly, she released Shela’s sword and stepped back, her form dissolving into mist as she returned to the sedan like she had never moved at all.
The silence was absolute.
Baku raised an eyebrow. ‘A little vicious.’ He thought.
Even Noh stopped strumming her painted zither for a moment. But since the slap was graceful, she let it be.
“Try it again, normally this time.” Hannya spoke from behind the veil, “But lose control again, and I will tear that aura from your soul… and gift it to a dream beast.”
No one doubted she meant it.
Salitha stood only because Shela’s hand braced her shoulder.
The aura was gone, shattered, ruined. A charm technique smeared across the spiritual floor like perfume spilled in blood.
And still, Hannya reclined.
But her presence had changed.
She no longer radiated threat.
She radiated memory.
The message was clear.
The third offense had always been one too many.
Salitha remained still, her head bowed in quiet recovery, the sting on her cheek coloring her expression with faint shame. But she didn’t argue. She didn’t flee.
Shela stepped forward, the motion clean and respectful, neither submissive nor confrontational. The movement was precise, calculated to ease the chamber’s tension without losing face.
She said nothing at first.
Instead, she waited.
Let the silence take root. Let the rhythm of the room adjust to her voice before offering it.
Then.
“We came to offer a pact.”
Whispers surged in the gallery. Not a plea. Not a trade. But a pact. The word cut through the ambient tension with sharpened edges.
A devil deal.
Hannya stirred.
Within her veil of mist and silk, her frame sat straighter. The threads of her canopy caught the dreamlight, casting liquid shimmer across her hidden figure. Though her face remained veiled, as was tradition for a Luxuria devil, her presence had weight, unmistakable and gathered.
“Go on,” she said. And this time, there was interest behind her words.
Shela’s tone remained even. “The capital is shifting. Cracks are forming in the eastern provinces. A power vacuum is building around the outer courts. We want stability… and the right to act.”
The nobles stiffened in their seats.
This was not theater. It was a signal.
Even Noh, ever serene, tilted her head slightly, like a sculptor marking the shape of a stone before the first chisel strike.
“And you believe that pact should include me?” Hannya asked after a pause.
“We believe your authority here is growing too fast to ignore,” Shela answered. “We’d rather work with you than waste resources pretending you’re a regional curiosity.”
A heavy pause followed.
Then laughter.
Soft. Musical. Sharp enough to draw blood.
Hannya’s veil rippled as she reclined, and her silhouette curved gracefully to the side. “Kikiki! Pragmatic,” she mused. “I like that.”
The typical words of a gigastacy. Straightforward and unbothered.
But her tone shifted, velvet laced with ice.
“Though I must ask… Is this an offer from Shela, or from the fractured Love Faction you no longer represent?”
A flash of tension crossed Shela’s gaze, but Salitha spoke before she could.
“Both.” she said clearly.
Bold. Possibly foolish.
The nobles to the side leaned in. What a show they had today!
Hannya stilled. “You speak for them still?”
“I speak for what they should be,” Salitha said. Her voice regained some of its old poise, but not all of it. “Not what they’ve become.”
This time, Hannya’s laughter was softer, but no warmer.
“Kikiki, to be clear,” she said slowly, “I don’t hate the Love Faction. I find them… quaint. But if you intend to anchor a pact with shoulds and nostalgia, I suggest you return to the Capital and try your luck in one of their voting chambers.”
Salitha flinched but held her stance. Shela didn’t react at all.
“You want a pact?” Hannya continued. “Then I want something first.”
Shela lifted her chin. “Name it.”
Dreamlight shimmered faintly against the veil.
“You. Sometime this week. As my guest. Alone.”
The room stilled.
No one dared speak. No one dared move.
It wasn’t a demand for a hostage. Nor was it quite a trap. But it wasn’t safe either.
And Shela didn’t blink. “Agreed.”
Hannya tilted her head, a faint curl of amusement threading through her voice. “Not even going to ask why?”
“I assume you want to talk.”
“I do.”
“Then I’ll listen.”
Another ripple of aura flowed from the sedan, not like before, not aggressive. It reached out, like mist between fingers. An invitation.
The rules of the room changed.
So did the balance of power.
~~~
Later that night, the mountain fortress sank into its nocturnal rhythm. Mist coiled tightly around the ridges, flowing like breath across the high spires and distant cliffs. The dream fissure pulsed above, dimmer now, but still watching.
In a quiet hall set apart from the public wings, three figures sat in quiet conversation.
Baku lounged with a gourd of black lacquer wine in one hand, his other arm draped over the back of a wide chair. Noh rested nearby, the Painted Devil perched gracefully on a long cushion, her fingers absently tracing the rim of a porcelain cup, half-full with amber mist-tea. Hannya sat nearest the window, her veil drawn low as usual, body relaxed but unreadable. From this angle, one could only just make out the curve of her cheek and the glint of her lower lip through the layered silk.
They weren’t talking politics now.
Just… existing.
That’s when the door opened with a subtle chime.
A tall woman entered first, one of the dream knights. Her armor bore an elegant silver gleam, her ponytail bobbed slightly as she moved with quiet discipline. A faint scar curved along her cheek, faded with time but not forgotten. She carried no visible weapon, but the way she stood suggested she'd won more duels than she’d lost.
“Regina,” Baku greeted with a lift of his brow. “You’re working late.”
Regina didn’t smile. She rarely did, but the faintest twitch of her lips betrayed something close to pleasure at being acknowledged.
“I brought him as requested.” she said.
Then she stepped aside. But not without giving Baku a subtle peek.
The man she led in didn’t look like a warrior.
Not at first glance.
His robe was simple. Sand-toned linen, streaked with faint smoke marks. He wore no rings, no sigils. Around his waist hung a pouch of kitchen tools: a cleaver, a carving knife, a flask with a glossy cork. His hands were wrapped in cloth, stained slightly with spice residue.
But Baku sat up.
The way the man moved, quietly, with perfectly measured steps, made the air shift.
He was a chef by appearance. But not just that.
A killer. A trained one.
The years had gentled his bearing but not erased the edge. It was in the way his eyes scanned the room, not nervously, but tactically. He looked at the exits, the spacing between chairs, the subtle strength in Regina’s stance.
Baku grinned. “Kahuhuhu, a soldier pretending to be a cook. Now that’s a rare spice.”
The red demon said nothing.
Hannya tilted her head slightly, her veil shifting with the motion. “What do you see, guest?”
The man’s voice was soft, but not submissive. “Three devils who could kill me before I blink. A scarred knight with something to prove. And a chair left open.”
He nodded toward the vacant seat across from her.
“A test, then?”
Baku chuckled. “No test. Just supper.”
Noh leaned forward, curiosity lighting her painted features. “What’s your name?”
The man paused. Then answered, “Cieron.”
“Cieron,” Hannya repeated, tasting the syllables like wine. “Let’s see what you can cook, then.”
He bowed slightly. “Not food. Not yet.”
He reached into his pouch and drew out something wrapped in cloth, flat, square, and faintly warm.
A sealed container.
He set it on the table between them.
“I brought a story.”
They looked at him.
He looked back.
And somewhere above them, the fissure pulsed again.
Comments
Butch Perterson
👌thanks!
Crowny 66
Kikiki, to* instead of To*
Butch Perterson
lol we’ll find out soon 😂 also another drop coming today!
Prent
Cieron is the messenger from the capital, right? Also I'm not sure if Salitha is actually stupid, or just jumped up on ego.
Butch Perterson
lol it’s ok she’s not written to be hated, it’s just Hannya that doesn’t like her 😂 And yes, things would have been much worse if Shela wasn’t present and we’ll dive deeper into all that soon!
ShadowTycho
HMMMmmm... Still like Salitha, No idea why she would try charm a third time, especially after getting in trouble over the name she was using. She's prolly only alive because Hannya wants to collect Shela and killing friends-that-saved-you-from-child-solider-slavery is gauche. huge party foul that.
