We had one day before someone noticed the archive had been opened.
Ren knew this with the certainty of a man who had spent thirty years navigating the machinery of imperial bureaucracy — reading its silences, its rhythms, the particular quality of its panic. He didn't explain how he knew. He just said, "One day," and the way he said it left no room for argument.
One day to figure out what to do with a document that could unmake the throne.
We went back to Kaien's residence. Not the official wing — the private one, at the far end of the estate, where the walls were thick and the servants were the kind who had been with the family long enough to know when not to ask questions. The kind who set out tea without being asked and disappeared without being dismissed.
