"We want nothing from you, Miss Toriyama." He guided her forward, toward where Magus knelt surrounded by cloaked figures. "But we know what he did to you. The whole castle knows, even if they pretend otherwise."
"The walls have ears. And some of those ears belong to us."
They stopped a few feet from Magus. The prince looked up at her approach with a smile.
"Rina." He laughed—high, strained. "Come to watch? I didn't think you had it in you."
"Quiet." The scarred woman struck him again with her palm. "You don't speak unless spoken to."
She turned to Rina, her expression softening slightly.
"We know he marked you. One of the old slave brands—the kind that rots the mind from the inside out... We thought it was only a myth... But it was real, as it turns out."
Rina's breath caught.
"We can't remove it ourselves. The magic is beyond us... In fact, our most capable mages can't even sense anything from you." The woman's jaw tightened as she looked at a few cloaked figures, who merely shook their heads.
"This mark must be... The pinnacle of magical sophistication."
Magus chuckled quietly to himself, "pffft... Hahaha... You guys sure are stupid..."
"SILENCE!" A kick to his face, a tooth flying off as he fell to the ground, blood coming out of his mouth.
The woman took a deep breath.
"But, like any slave mark, the owner can free you. If he chooses to."
She grabbed Magus by the hair, wrenching his head back.
"Absolve her. Release the mark."
Magus's eyes met Rina's, who took a step back, feeling her chest twist.
'I... This... This feeling. Me. Caring for him. It's just the mark...'
And slowly, impossibly, he began to smile.
"Release..." He tested the word. "You want me to release her?"
"Do it, or we start removing fingers."
Silence.
"Ah." His smile widened into something manic. "I see. You think this is leverage. You think she matters to me."
The woman's eyes narrowed.
"I don't care about your feelings, princeling. This is about doing what's right. Release her. She is a human being with a will of her own. Do that, and we might be more lenient regarding your punishment."
He looked at Rina.
"Tell them, Rina. Tell them what you feel. Tell them how the mark has been eating at you. How you can't trust your own thoughts anymore. How every doubt, every fear, every crack in your perfect little worldview might be the magic working its way deeper—"
'Theatrics.' The word echoed inside Rina's head again.
"ABSOLVE HER!" The woman struck him again, splitting his lip.
'But…' Rina bit her lip, 'this is my freedom! Theatrics or not, If he can free me…'
Magus spat blood and kept laughing.
"... Say, bitch," He called to the woman, "You have quite the capable magicians, right? Use them to see if I'm lying for this. This will be good."
The woman looked to the back, nodding at a cloaked mage. He walked over and chanted a spell. A mana circle emitted from his palm, aimed at the prince.
"Speak." The woman demanded.
A moment of silence.
Rina held her breath as she watched.
"The type of mark I placed on Rina Toriyama, the Otherworlder..." He said, his smile widening,
Everyone present leaned in.
Rina gulped.
"... can NEVER be removed. You cannot "absolve" the type of influence I placed on her mind as I pressed my medallion on her skin. Even if I die."
"...."
Silence.
Rina eyes widened. Her face went pale.
'He's lying.' Rina repeated in her head, 'He's lying. He's…'
Theatrics. He was putting on a show.
'BUT WHO GIVES A FUCK!!?' She roared in her head, 'I WANT TO BE FREE!'
The woman looked at the mage...
The mage, begrudgingly...
Nodded. Magus was telling the truth.
The House of The Risen Sun all gasped, casting glares at Magus.
Rina collapsed to her knees as she lost strength in her legs.
"There." Magus grinned through his bloodied face. "Happy now?"
"You..!" The woman raised her blade through gritted teeth. "You rotten bastard!"
He looked at Rina again, tears of manic laughter streaming down his face.
"HAHAHAHAHAHA!"
His laughter echoed through the silent forest.
"YOU WILL NEVER BE FREE FROM THE MARK! NEVER! NEVER! HAHAHAHAHAHA—"
The scarred woman drove her knee into his stomach, silencing him. He crumpled, still wheezing with broken laughter.
Rina stared at the ground, barely holding herself up with her arms.
At the blood on his face. The dirt in his golden hair. The way he curled in on himself as they all joined and struck him again. And again.
Rina gulped. She looked closely.
She watched the bile leave his mouth. His weakening wheezes and coughs.
She watched them beat him, and felt...
"More..."
The scarred guard looked down at her,
"Hm?"
Rina got up. The House all looked at her and made room for her as she walked toward Magus... Who was barely breathing.
"MORE...!!!" She glared, striking his face, and he kept weakly laughing.
"YOU BASTARD..!!! I'M MY OWN PERSON!!! I HATE YOU!!! I HATE YOU!!! I HATE YOU!!! I HATE YOU!" She screamed, silencing the house. Punctuating every scream with a fist to his face...
.. A face that didn't stop laughing in between his harsh whimpers
"Enough." She turned to Rina, her expression unreadable, but her tone gentle. She placed a hand on RIna's shoulder while holding her fist from hitting him again.
"We need him alive. I understand your wrath, Miss. But he must answer his crimes properly."
She studied Rina for a long moment.
Rina breathed. As she looked at her, her eyes filled with tears.
*Hick*
*hick*
The woman then pulled her up and embraced her. Holding Rina's face against her bosom as she cried into her shirt quietly.
"...." The woman looked down at her, then at the House.
"Take the princeling away. There's a great deal of work left before his punishment." She instructed. The House nodded collectively and began moving.
A few minutes later, Rina relaxed. The woman kept petting her head.
"Join us." She offered softly.
Rina blinked her tears away. "... W-what?"
"The House of the Risen Sun fights for those the crown has discarded. The enslaved. The exploited. The forgotten." The woman gestured at the carnage around them—the dead guards, the burning trees.
"Unfortunately, this is what resistance looks like. It's ugly. It's violent. But it's necessary."
"You could help us," the scarred guard added quietly.
"Your magic. Sanctuary. It could save lives. Our lives."
Rina looked at them. At Magus as he was being wrapped and carried away. At the blood on her hands from where she'd beat him.
'If I go with them...'
'K-... Kazuya. The others. They're still in the castle. The king would—'
"I can't." The words came out broken. "My friends. My classmates. If I disappear, they'll—"
"Be used as hostages. Or executed, out of fear they collaborated with us." The woman nodded slowly, unsurprised.
"We know."
She exhaled.
"But you misunderstand, Miss Toriyama. This isn't entirely an invitation."
Rina's breath caught.
"W-what do you mean...?"
The woman crouched down to meet her eyes.
"You witnessed us capture the crown prince. You watched us beat him. You participated." Her voice was calm.
"If you return to the castle alone... what do you think happens?"
Rina's mouth opened. Nothing came out.
"Best case, they believe your story. That you were a helpless hostage. That you fought back." The woman tilted her head.
"But the king will have questions. Many questions. And the methods they use to extract answers from suspected collaborators are... not kind."
"They're the type to extract out of you. Even when they have mages capable of truth spells." She punctuated. Somehow, her scar turned more visible as she said it.
The scarred guard shifted uncomfortably behind her.
"You must've noticed it already. Otherworlders aren't human to them, Miss," he said quietly.
"Not really. You're tools. Weapons. And a tool that might be compromised..."
He didn't finish.
The woman continued, her tone still soft.
"Even if they believe you initially, doubt will linger. You'll be watched. Tested. And the moment you slip—the moment you hesitate, or flinch at the wrong time, or fail to perform exactly as they expect..."
"..."
"I believe you're smart enough to know what I want to say."
Rina's hands trembled.
"B-but my friends—"
"Your friends are already in danger," the woman said flatly.
"They were in danger the moment they were summoned. You staying and getting yourself killed won't protect them. It will only confirm, in the king's eyes, that Otherworlders cannot be trusted."
Makoto's face flashed in her eyes.
'Right,' she thought.
Makoto was executed, she thought.
She stood, looking down at Rina.
"Come with us, and you live. You grow stronger. And perhaps, one day, you'll be in a position to actually help them. Rather than dying as a suspected traitor in some dungeon cell."
Rina stared at the ground. Her tears falling on the bloodied soil.
'She's right.'
'I hate that she's right.'
'If I go back, even if they believe me...'
She thought of Kazuya. Of his smile. Of the way he looked at her.
'Would he be able to protect me?'
'Kazuya. Kazuya… I...'
"But to... Abandon my friends. To run away..."
"So what?" The woman asked, gently raising her chin.
"...!" Her eyes widened.
"You're afraid. Maybe even a coward... So what?" She asked.
Rina felt her throat clamp.
"You're still a child. Children..."
"... Should abuse the privilege of being cowards until they can't anymore. And when that moment comes..." her head neared Rina's.
"You will be stronger than anyone."
"I..."
Her voice came out hoarse.
"I don't have a choice. Do I...?"
The woman's expression softened, just slightly.
"You do have a choice, Miss Toriyama. It's just that one of the options ends with you dead."
Silence stretched between them.
Then Rina laughed—a broken, hollow sound.
"That's... that's not really a choice."
"No," the woman agreed quietly.
"It isn't. This is the rot we're trying to burn through. The rot of Aurelia."
She extended a hand.
Rina stared at it for a long moment.
'Kazuya.'
'I'm sorry.'
'I'm a coward. I'm sorry...! I'm not strong like you.'
She took the hand.
The woman pulled her to her feet.
"W-what's your name?" Rina asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
"We'll have time for proper introductions later. For now, we move."
She turned and began walking. The House fell into formation around them.
Rina looked back once—at the blood-soaked clearing, the dead horses, the trampled earth where Magus had knelt.
'The mark is unremovable.'
His laughter echoed in her skull.
'You will never be free.'
She turned away and followed the House into the trees.
'I'm... going to try!'
The sun continued to rise through the canopy, indifferent.
And just like that.
6 months went by.
One year, and 2 months after Makoto's execution.
And behind the gates of the Abyssal Dungeon
A pair of footsteps could be heard approaching.