The carriage rumbled steadily over the uneven, winding roads, carrying me alone through the vast, unknown lands. Thick curtains were drawn tightly across the windows, shielding the interior from prying eyes—and yet, that was only half the truth. The real reason the curtains stayed closed was far more personal: my photophobia, an intense intolerance to light that made even a sliver of daylight unbearable. No matter how much I yearned to see the world outside, to drink in the sights and colours of this new realm, the harsh glare was an invisible wall I could not breach.

  I imagined what the landscape might be—rolling hills stretching toward the horizon, ancient forests whispering secrets in the wind, fields dotted with wildflowers, and distant mountain peaks crowned with snow. Given my sheltered life—confined to the mansion’s cold walls or the endless gloom of purgatory—any glimpse of the outside world would be breathtaking.

  Instead, I turned my attention to the crumpled sheets in my lap: a “newspaper,” as Arthur called it. The term felt oddly quaint, like a relic of a simpler time. The edition was already a month old, which robbed much of its excitement, but still, I read eagerly. The news provided a window into the world I now inhabited, and my curiosity was insatiable.

  Most of the reports were tedious—accounts of how fast some random earl rode his horse or which noble hosted the grandest feast—but tucked between the mundane stories were pieces that captured my interest more deeply.

  The kingdom I lived in, the Worchester Kingdom, was apparently flourishing. Its economy was booming, largely driven by heavy public spending. Yet the majority of that funding was funnelled into one thing: raising armies. Armies destined to clash with the elves to the east.

  On paper, things seemed stable—prosperous even—but the surface was deceptive. The eastern regions were plagued by unrest and hardship. Forced conscriptions tore men and women from their homes, while entire villages were uprooted and relocated in the name of military strategy. Skirmishes with the elusive elves were a constant shadow, a thorn in the side of a kingdom.

  At first, I thought the outcome of these battles didn’t concern me. After all, I was a mere tenant in this kingdom, borrowing the name and power of a family I barely belonged to. But reality was less forgiving.

  The White territory—the land I now called home—lay directly on the border of the elven forest. This wasn’t just any border; it was the fault line between two very different worlds. If we lost the war, my tenuous grip on influence and protection would crumble.

  And the humans weren’t just defending—they were pushing forward.

  Following a string of hard-won border clashes, the army had taken a bold, perhaps reckless step: they were invading the heart of the elven forest itself.

  This forest, shrouded in legend and mystery, was a place few dared to enter. Where the edges of elven territory looked much like human lands—lush and green, dotted with villages and small towns—the deeper woods were something else entirely. The air there was thicker, heavier with magic and ancient power. The trees themselves seemed alive, watching, whispering in languages lost to time.

  None knew what truly dwelled within that labyrinth of shadow and light.

  And now, human armies marched blindly into the unknown, risking everything on a gamble that could either end the war—or ignite a conflict far greater than any before.

  While I was still buried in the newspaper, mentally dissecting the implications of the eastern campaign, the carriage gave a sudden jolt before coming to an unexpected halt. I frowned, clutching the paper a little tighter. A moment later, the door creaked open—only a few centimetres at first, allowing a shaft of dazzling afternoon sunlight to stab into the carriage like a blade of fire. Thankfully, the sun was on the far side, spilling its brilliance in the opposite direction. Otherwise, the mere touch of its light might have drained me of consciousness entirely.

  “Can I come in?” came Arthur’s voice, unmistakably his—calm, low, and authoritative. Still, it surprised me. He was learning manners? The man who had once barged into rooms like he owned the world was now asking for permission?

  “Sure,” I replied, keeping my tone neutral.

  The door swung open, and I instinctively closed my eyes to avoid any direct contact with the light. The moment he stepped inside, the door was pulled shut again with a firm thunk, and the shade of the carriage returned in full. Arthur lowered himself onto the bench across from me without a word, his movements neat, efficient. The carriage resumed its journey with a lurch, the horses pulling us forward once more as the rumble of wheels over uneven ground returned.

  I turned my attention back to the crinkled newspaper in my lap, but I wasn’t really reading anymore.

  “How come this carriage is so uncomfortable?” I muttered, more to myself than to him. “Even with a pillow, it feels like we’re rolling across a battlefield full of potholes.”

  Arthur didn’t answer immediately—he merely made a sound, a low hum in his throat, as if acknowledging my complaint but not bothering to address it. I arched an eyebrow, not expecting much more. Small talk wasn’t his forte, and I knew he didn’t come here just to chat about the state of the roads.

  He sat in silence for a few minutes, his eyes fixed on the opposite wall, jaw set in quiet contemplation. The longer he waited, the more certain I became that he was debating how to phrase something. He never wasted time on pleasantries unless absolutely necessary.

  Finally, he spoke. “We’ll arrive at Castle Humel tomorrow.”

  I looked up from the paper.

  “There, two female mages will join you,” he continued, his tone clipped and businesslike. “They’ll sleep in this carriage during the night and ride in it during the day. I want you to keep an eye on them—nothing too close, but enough to ensure they don’t cause problems.”

  I tilted my head, curious. “Cause problems?”

  He glanced at me briefly. “We don’t need a scandal because one of them lays with a man. Or worse. No bad publicity. Not now. Understood?”

  “Aye,” I replied with a small smirk. It was such a strange task—playing chaperone to two magical women I hadn’t even met—but I had no real reason to argue. Orders were orders, and as long as I played my role convincingly, Arthur would have little cause to interfere with my true intentions.

  “And what about my unit?” I added smoothly, watching him carefully. “I assume I can still recruit soldiers for it?”

  “You can,” he said with a slight nod.

  He leaned back again, seemingly content with the exchange. Silence settled between us, but not the uncomfortable kind. It was more like a pause in a conversation between people who knew each other too well to fill the air with pointless words. Still, something lingered on the edge of my mind—a thought, a question, a pull.

  I sifted through the possible topics I could bring up, sorting them one by one in my mind. The newspaper? Already covered. The mages? Still unknown. My unit? Permission granted.

  Then it hit me—something far more intriguing, something that still itched at the edges of my thoughts like a splinter.

  “Why are we at war?” I asked, my voice quiet but deliberate.

  Arthur didn’t respond immediately. His hand rested on the door handle, fingers tightening as if the question had made the metal resist his grip. He turned slightly, his face lit faintly by the fading light outside. His expression was caught somewhere between exasperation and contemplation—like someone weighing whether or not to lie.

  “A good soldier doesn’t ask such questions. He follows orders,” he finally said.

  That was all. No explanation. No justification. Just the cold doctrine of a soldier. But I was neither good nor obedient. And I certainly didn’t see myself as a soldier.

  So I stared grimly at his back as he pushed open the door and stepped out, bathed briefly in the golden light of the dying day. Then he was gone, leaving behind only the creaking of the wheels and the lingering scent of dust and leather.

  The rest of the day passed in silence, broken only by the occasional murmur from outside and the constant rhythm of the road. I reviewed my plans again and again, turning them over like precious stones. So far, everything was proceeding smoothly. Arthur was growing to rely on me—just slightly, but enough for now. And Mary? She was backed into a corner so tight that the only path forward for her was the one I laid out.

  No matter how this ended, I would walk away stronger.

  Eventually, the carriage rolled to a halt. The light filtering through the cracks told me it was still too early to leave—I could feel the remnants of sunlight prickling at the edge of my awareness like invisible needles. I waited patiently, counting the seconds, listening as soldiers began to set up camp. Poles driven into the ground. Canvas flapping in the wind. The clang of metal, the murmuring of hundreds of voices blending into a restless, churning mass.

  When the sun finally dipped beneath the horizon and shadows claimed the world outside, I opened the door and stepped into the cool dusk.

  Before me, a sea of activity unfolded—soldiers erecting tents in disciplined chaos, fires blooming across the field like scattered stars, crackling and spitting sparks into the encroaching dark. Meat sizzled over open flames, and the scent of sweat, smoke, and something halfway edible hung thick in the air.

  I had never seen so many living humans gathered in one place. Not in purgatory, and certainly not in the sheltered halls of the mansion. Their souls, yes—I’d seen countless of those. But the living were something else entirely. Loud. Brash. Curious. And above all, filthy.

  As I stepped into the firelight, the crowd noticed. Conversations faltered. Eyes turned. Whispers passed like wind through grass.

  Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

  Some stared—perhaps with curiosity, perhaps with something else. A few of the bolder ones whistled, laughing behind calloused hands. The more refined among them, the ones with polished boots and straighter backs, said nothing. But even they watched me with veiled interest.

  “What?” I said, sweeping my gaze across them. “Never seen a girl before?”

  With deliberate slowness, I reached behind me into the carriage and drew out the sword Arthur had given me. Still sheathed, its modest length and worn hilt didn’t seem particularly impressive. If anything, it looked more ceremonial than practical.

  A ripple went through the watching men—some amused, some confused. One of them stepped forward from the crowd.

  “Watch out,” he said with a grin, his tone mocking. “You’re gonna hurt yourself if you try to pull that out.”

  He was tall, broad-shouldered, and clearly no stranger to battle. Faded scars crisscrossed his arms like twisted rivers, each telling stories I didn’t care to know. His presence was imposing, but his expression betrayed a dangerous lack of thought. Arrogance without caution.

  I sized him up with a single glance and dismissed him just as quickly. He might’ve been a good warrior once, but he was also foolish—stepping out in front of the others, trying to challenge someone who clearly carried the Duke’s favour. He painted a target on himself, and the others wisely stayed behind the safety of numbers.

  “Thank you for your kind words,” I said smoothly, voice cool. “I’ll keep them in mind.”

  I stepped left.

  He moved in my way.

  I stepped right.

  Again, he blocked me, always with that same smug grin.

  My eyes narrowed as I looked up at him. This was no random moment of bravado. Either he was genuinely brainless enough to pick a fight with someone who could ruin his career with a word—or Arthur had sent him.

  It wouldn’t be unlike Arthur to stage something like this. A confrontation to test me. To build my reputation among the men without risking his own status. And if that were the case… well, it was exactly what I didn’t want.

  I needed obscurity, not attention. I needed to stay in the background, where I could manipulate events unseen. If rumours started to spread—about my strength, about my nature—then hiding what I truly was would become impossible.

  So I gave the man one last warning, low enough for only him to hear.

  “Listen,” I said, voice barely above a whisper, “this is going to get very embarrassing for you.”

  But of course, he didn’t listen. They never do.

  There was no graceful exit from this situation—no subtle words or clever turns to dissolve the tension. He wouldn’t let me pass, and the crowd’s gaze burned hotter with every second. So, with no other choice, I resolved to end it… in my own way.

  I took three slow steps backward, each one careful, measured, as if I were retreating out of fear. The weight of my still-sheathed sword hung lightly in my hand. I didn’t draw it—didn’t even look like I intended to. Instead, I pointed it toward him with a trembling grip and widened my eyes, feigning fear.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” I said softly, with a quiver in my voice that sold the lie beautifully.

  He laughed. Of course he did.

  It was the kind of laugh men let out when they think they’ve already won. He didn’t even reach for his weapon. He simply stood there, arms loose at his sides, watching me like I was a clumsy puppy trying to nip at a wolf. He was waiting for me to charge—probably imagining himself catching my sword mid-swing and delivering a lecture afterward about “knowing my place.”

  I gave him what he wanted… just not in the way he expected.

  With a breathless gasp, I ran toward him, my footsteps light and quick—like a girl rushing into a mistake. Just a metre away, I stumbled, catching my foot on nothing, and pitched forward in what looked like an absolute mess of flailing limbs and panic.

  His arm shot out, right hand aiming to grab the falling blade, still sheathed. He expected resistance, a tug-of-war. Instead, I let go entirely.

  The sword flew from my hands, accelerating with just enough force and angle to strike—hard—just below where he expected. I’d tilted the hilt upwards at the last possible momentwith a well-timed flick, and the weapon drove cleanly into his groin with an ugly, blunt impact.

  He dropped like a sack of potatoes.

  A howl of pain tore through the air as he curled in on himself, hands clutching desperately at the wound. The nearby soldiers recoiled, stunned. Then, as the silence unraveled into snorts and chuckles, the laughter began to bubble through the ranks.

  Still on the ground, the man writhed, utterly humiliated. I stepped forward and plucked my sword from where it had landed beside him, his moaning drowned out by the amusement of the crowd.

  I walked away quickly, the blade cradled carefully in my arms, my expression flustered but not panicked. A dazed, lucky girl. Not a fighter. Not a threat. Just a curious accident they’d all be gossiping about later in tents and around campfires.

  It was perfect.

  By controlling the narrative through weakness, I erased myself from the centre of the story. No one would whisper of a prodigy or of danger. No tales of a girl who could take down a trained fighter. Only of a poor idiot who’d been dropped by a misstep and a fluke. A lesson in ego—not power.

  I smiled as I slipped back into the moving crowd. It had been almost too easy.

  But even the success annoyed me, in a way. I had already stood out far more than I wanted. A girl my size and apparent age walking among hardened soldiers was conspicuous enough. Now, I would be remembered—even if just as the "girl who got lucky." I needed to speak with Arthur about this soon. If that meathead was responsible for this plan, the stunt had backfired. The attention I earned might be harmless now, but it could easily turn into scrutiny later.

  The rest of the evening passed with uneasy calm. Soldiers gave me a wide berth, some out of awkwardness, others because they feared being the next man to be taken down by a stray stumble. It confirmed my suspicion—Arthur had staged it. These men knew I was under someone’s protection. Nobody pressed further. Nobody wanted to test boundaries.

  Yet it left me in a precarious situation.

  I needed soldiers for my unit. But not just anyone. I needed competence, reliability, and, more importantly, a degree of intelligence—something surprisingly rare in men drawn from farms and gutters. Surrounding myself with dull blades would only get me killed, and worse, blamed.

  But how was I to find the right people without drawing more attention? I couldn’t just march around camp, handpicking soldiers like choosing bread at the market. That would clash with the image I’d worked so hard to build—the powerless girl, protected but insignificant, floating quietly beneath notice.

  I needed a plan. I needed a way to see who was worth the risk without revealing what I truly sought.

  And I needed it before we reached the elven forest—because once we crossed that invisible threshold into the unknown, mistakes would no longer be a luxury I could afford.

  After pacing along the outer edges of the camp for a while—careful not to draw more attention than necessary—I spotted a group of six men gathered loosely around a tree stump, cards in hand and coins clinking softly in the fading evening light. Their laughter was crude but not hostile, and the scent of burnt meat wafted from a nearby fire. A low-stakes game among grunts. Exactly what I needed.

  I approached quietly, letting the rustle of my boots against the trampled grass announce me. A few heads turned, eyes narrowing with confusion and mild suspicion.

  “Is that poker?” I asked, tilting my head as I studied the makeshift table.

  The conversation ceased altogether. All six of them stared—some blinking, others squinting as if trying to determine whether I was real or some illusion conjured by camp smoke and exhaustion. I stood out like a drop of ink in milk. A girl. A child, seemingly. And one who spoke their language with a casualness they didn’t expect.

  It took a long, dragging second before one of them, a man with uneven stubble and the kind of sunburn that screamed poor judgment, spoke up.

  “Yeah… who’s asking?” His tone was more curious than confrontational.

  “Me.” I stepped closer and lowered myself into a kneel between them, peering over the edge of the stump with the kind of wide-eyed interest I’d seen in human children watching magic tricks. “Mind if I join for a few rounds?”

  He looked around, clearly unsure, but the others offered nothing more than shrugs or amused grunts. One of them scooted aside, creating just enough space for me to join their circle. The mood softened. Novelty disarmed suspicion.

  “Sure, I guess,” he said, sounding like he’d just accepted a dare.

  They wrapped up the current hand quickly, then one of them—a lean man with a crooked nose and a hunter’s build—took it upon himself to deal the next round. Before I could reach for anything, a few silver coins were pushed toward me.

  “For buy-in,” the hunter said with a grin. “Call it a welcome gift.”

  How generous.

  My cards: a seven and a nine. Not awful, but nothing to place a kingdom’s fate on. Still, I watched as the first three cards—the flop—were laid down: an eight, and two kings.

  Now that was interesting.

  A straight teased me, almost within reach, but the twin kings introduced a threat I couldn’t ignore. Anyone with a third would already be grinning behind their teeth. I glanced around the circle. Most were unreadable in the way that men with empty minds often are—except the one opposite me. His pupils dilated, his fingers twitched, and his lips pressed together just a little too tightly.

  “All in,” I said softly.

  A few dropped out immediately, unwilling to risk their coins over a hunch. But the man opposite me didn’t hesitate. He pushed his stack forward with a flourish and a grin that could have carved through stone. So eager. So confident. I almost pitied him.

  But the last two cards—the turn and the river—betrayed me. A four and a jack. Completely useless.

  He flipped his cards over with flair, revealing what I already knew: the third king. A full house.

  I made a small, disappointed noise and looked down as though fighting back tears. A few men shifted awkwardly, clearly unsure what to do. One patted my shoulder in a clumsy attempt at comfort. I let the moment hang, just long enough to sell the image of a crushed child, and then smiled brightly—like sunlight breaking through clouds.

  “That was fun,” I said, as if the loss meant nothing at all.

  And in truth, it didn’t. I had already won everything I came for.

  This wasn’t about coins or cards—it was about them. Their tells. Their reactions. How they spoke to one another, how they treated an outsider, how their eyes flicked when nervous, how their words faltered when lying. Poker was a game of deception, of mental control. It was a perfect test for the kind of men I needed.

  “Mind if I just watch for a while?” I asked, folding my hands neatly in my lap.

  No one objected. I wasn’t loud, didn’t demand a rematch, didn’t throw a tantrum like they might’ve expected. Just sat quietly and watched.

  And oh, how revealing the next few rounds were.

  Their play was abysmal. Not one of them attempted even the most basic techniques of card counting. Their bluffs were telegraphed so badly a blind dog could see through them. Every gesture, every twitch, every shift of the eyes practically screamed their intentions. These men couldn’t deceive each other, let alone an enemy on the battlefield—or me.

  None of them were fit.

  I knew I was being too selective. That in a real war, people recruited from necessity, not preference. But I couldn’t afford incompetence in my unit. Soldiers who acted on impulse, who couldn’t keep secrets, who cracked under pressure—those were liabilities I couldn’t afford to babysit.

  After an hour or so, I rose and thanked them politely. They were too wrapped up in their latest hand to care much, and I slipped away as easily as I had arrived.

  I wandered off into the camp again, keeping to the shadows, scanning for another group around a table or a fire. Somewhere, among the clamor and the laughter and the stink of sweat and roasted meat, there had to be someone different. Someone sharp. Someone who could lie to my face and make me believe it—if only for a second.

  Because that was the kind of mind I needed in battle.

  The kind of mind that could survive.

  And maybe—if I was lucky—the kind of mind that could keep up with me.