In Asteria, the echo of rebellion had not settled.
Dust still drifted from the fractured wall where Solace's punch had launched the King like a cannonball. The surrounding stone was spiderwebbed from the impact. His robes were torn, crown crooked, breath shaking in his throat.
Below him, the arena floor was littered with dropped weapons, splintered shields, and soldiers Thiago had taken apart in seconds. Arlenna's blades still dripped, the last cut she gave the Prince forcing him to kneel with his hands raised in surrender.
For a moment, just a moment, the arena was silent.
The King's insult, "Crazy Frog," thrown out in anger, had already left the walls of Asteria and spread like wildfire. It became a whisper. Then a chant. Then a belief.
A belief that someone could hit royalty and live.
A belief that someone could defy a kingdom and break chains people thought were permanent.
A belief that the impossible was not impossible anymore.
The air felt different, charged and trembling, full of expectation.
Solace felt none of it.
Her chest heaved. Her knuckles stung. Her eyes were already scanning for the next threat. For her, it was not a revolution. It was survival.
Arlenna flicked the blood from her blades, droplets scattering across the sand as she stared up at the broken wall. Thiago wiped the blood from his wrist and rolled his weapon in his palm like he was just warming up.
They did not look like heroes.
They looked like problems.
And Asteria was about to treat them exactly like that.
From somewhere beyond the broken gates, a horn blew, a deep, sharp sound every local recognized. Solace did not know the name yet, but she would hear it soon enough.
DOPO.
The crowd scattered. The slaves panicked. And Solace knew the fight was not over.
It had not even started yet.
The first guards Thiago tore through were already scattered across the sand, groaning or unconscious.
Another sharp horn blared. Not the arena horn.
A DOPO horn meant only one thing.
Crown Guard DOPO.
They descended onto the arena floor in tight formation, black armor slamming into the sand in perfect rhythm.
Their appearance cut through the chaos at once.
They wore black tactical vests with deep red patches stitched across the chest and back. CROWN GUARD was printed across each one in bold white letters. White DOPO patches were fixed on the left shoulder. The right shoulder carried a solid red Northern stripe, the continent's mountain insignia stamped in the corner of each patch. Red trimmed their gloves and striped their shin guards. Black helmets hid their faces behind faint crimson visors.
They were not fast or elegant. Their advance was slow and deliberate, the kind of wall you did not outrun. You were swallowed by it.
Weapons came up in a single motion. Some carried reinforced bo staffs wrapped in red grips. Others, shields strapped with red cross-bands. Shock batons dipped in crimson metal sparked faintly at the tips.
Their armor clattered with every step, loud and intentional, announcing their presence long before the first swing.
Their gear was cleaner, heavier. Their discipline showed in every line. These were not the guards Thiago had bullied through.
Two different Crown Guards moved at once, both healers.
The first climbed the cracked stone and pressed a glowing seal against the King's ribs. Golden light flickered across the broken wall. The second dropped to one knee beside the Prince and pressed a matching seal to his neck and shoulder to stabilize him.
Above them, one armored Crown Guard shouted down, "The King is stable, keep them contained!"
More Crown Guards moved in formation, shields out, batons drawn, formation tightening like a net.
Solace did not wait.
She grabbed Thiago by the front of his shirt.
"Thiago, go!"
She launched him out of the arena in a single heavy-density throw.
Thiago spun mid-air, reached into his pouch, and yanked out a shrunken flat shield, a standard DOPO defensive shield, rectangular and solid. He threw it downward.
It expanded just before impact.
Thunk.
The shield slammed into the dirt at a sharp angle. Thiago landed on top of it in a slide. When it slowed, he hopped off, grabbed the edge, shrank it again, and shoved it back into his pouch without breaking stride.
He sprinted toward position. He was not ready yet.
Inside the arena, Solace ducked under a Crown Guard baton and blocked another. Arlenna intercepted the next officer, blades crossing with a sharp metallic ring.
Solace glanced toward the wall.
Thiago was too far to hear. Too far to shout too. And she did not have time.
"I hope he is ready," she said quietly.
She grabbed the nearest child and threw.
One after another.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
Whoosh.
Bodies flew over the wall.
The Crown Guard reached her.
Arlenna stepped between them at once.
Two swords. Two hands. No hesitation.
"Touch them, and I cut you down," Arlenna said.
She clashed with the first Crown Guard, steel ringing off reinforced armor. Their movements were sharper now, trained for real threats.
Another Crown Guard engaged. Then another.
Arlenna fought them in tight circles, flicking blood from her blades, moving like she had trained for this moment her entire life.
Solace kept throwing. Thiago kept working. And the Crown Guard kept coming.
Thiago grabbed the second pole and jammed it into the ground beside the other. It expanded at an angle and almost knocked him over.
"Come on!"
He wrestled it straight, bracing the pole with one hand while the other pulled the net free.
He hooked the rescue net and stretched it across the poles, letting it hang loose and angled so it would slow the fall.
He reached for the anchor spikes.
A shadow moved across the sand.
Thiago looked up.
A kid was already in the air.
His jaw dropped. "Solace, no!"
Too late.
The kid slammed into the high end of the net. The entire corner ripped free. The net whipped sideways, ready to dump them straight onto the ground.
Thiago did not think.
He threw his spear straight through the loose corner of the net and shrank it mid-throw so it slid clean through. On the other side he expanded it again. The spear haft snapped into place horizontally between the two posts like a huge bar.
The net caught on the expanded spear, snagged, and redirected the kid's fall into a slide instead of a drop.
Thiago sprinted under and caught the child as they slid down the improvised rescue bar.
He exhaled. "Done. No more surprises, please."
He looked up.
Two more kids were already flying.
His eyes widened. "Solace, you have got to be kidding me."
He shoved the rescued child behind him and ran back to the net.
He hauled the loose corner up and tied it off against the spear-bar, yanking the knot tight until the whole setup stopped wobbling.
One pull. One final knot.
The net held.
Kid number two dropped in. Thiago steadied the net and helped them down.
Kid three followed right after. Thiago caught them the same way and pushed them toward safety.
The net was fixed. It was holding.
And Thiago was finished dealing with it.
Back inside the arena, Arlenna shot forward first.
Her blades spun once, just once, before she lunged straight into the Crown Guard line.
Steel rang out as she cut past the first shield, twisting her body sideways to slip through a gap. She slashed a wrist, stepped over a low sweep, then darted toward the next guard before the first even hit the sand.
A second guard charged. Arlenna ducked under his strike, rolled across her shoulder, and came up behind him. Both blades tapped the back of his knee, one, two, clean and precise.
He collapsed, his leg refusing to respond.
She did not watch him fall. She was already moving.
Another staff swung at her head. She bent backward sharply, the staff rushing past her nose.
She snapped upright and sliced the joint at the attacker's elbow. He froze, arm hanging useless.
A shield crashed toward her. Arlenna sidestepped, twisted, and carved a line across the guard's thigh. His stance buckled at once.
She pivoted again, spinning between two Crown Guards, both blades flashing as she slashed at exposed joints, never stopping.
It looked choreographed. It was not. It was survival.
One guard slipped past her and charged a child running.
Arlenna saw it.
She did not hesitate.
She threw herself in front of the kid and took the shield hit with her shoulder, then drove her elbow up under the guard's chin. The impact rocked him back.
The child stumbled behind her. Arlenna pivoted, scooped her leg around the kid's waist, and with a small, controlled kick to their side, sent them sliding gently in Solace's direction.
"Solace!" she snapped.
The guard dropped.
More guards rushed in.
Arlenna's breaths quickened, but her movements stayed clean.
Spin. Lunge. Slash. Dodge. Step. Cut. Pivot. Block.
Even surrounded, she carved space with skill alone, breaking the formation apart piece by piece.
But the Crown Guard kept coming, wall after wall closing around her.
A shield slammed into her side. A staff smashed into her ribs.
More boots hit the floor. More vests marked CROWN GUARD – DOPO. More shields. More staffs.
The pressure closed in.
Then the air rushed sideways, as if something had cut through it at high speed.
A blur slammed into the formation.
Solace.
She hit the ring like a battering ram, body turned light as air, momentum at full force. The impact blasted guards off their feet, shields flying, armor skidding across the sand as if they had been struck by a rolling boulder.
She ricocheted through them like a bowling ball, clearing space around Arlenna in an instant.
Arlenna gasped, half-standing, half-falling. Solace grabbed her forearm and hauled her upright like she weighed nothing.
"You good?" Solace asked, eyes already tracking the next wave.
Arlenna sucked in air. "Not for long."
Solace saw more kids still trapped behind collapsing guard lines. She could not see Thiago. She could not see the net. She could not see anything through the bodies.
But she heard children screaming as they flew through the air.
"I hope he is catching them," she muttered.
She clicked her tongue once.
"All right. Sending them now."
She turned light-density, sprinted past soldiers, scooped up three slaves, and flung them toward Thiago in sharp, clean throws.
Another guard tried to intercept. Solace ducked under his swing, turned heavy-density for a split second, and shoulder-checked him so hard he bounced off two others.
Then she grabbed two more kids and launched them.
Solace did not slow.
She grabbed the last cluster of slaves, spun, and threw them in rapid succession, each body sailing toward safety.
Now that the kids were safe, Solace turned fully toward the incoming wall of Crown Guards.
She sighed, her hands dropping into her pockets.
"Finally," she said. "I can focus."