The night air of Valoria was crisp, carrying the scents of burning coal and spices from the lower markets.
The shadows across the red-tiled roofs stretched like a giant chessboard above alleys faintly lit by distant oil lamps.
Haruto and Aoi moved in absolute silence.
With Primordial Resonance active, the weight of their footsteps completely vanished; Haruto’s blue mana lightened Aoi’s inertia, while her crimson vitality gifted him explosive agility to leap between beams and cornices without making a single sound.
About forty meters away, perched on the sloped roof of an abandoned lumberyard, the Inquisition tracker kept adjusting his refraction mirror.
He believed his targets were still sleeping peacefully back at The Iron Stag.
He’s focused on the inn’s window, Haruto transmitted through their mental link, thoughts resonating directly from mind to mind without moving his lips.
He’s overly confident because his artifact nullifies scent and standard mana signatures.
Poor guy, Aoi replied in his mind, a playful edge to her thoughts.
He has no idea we don’t operate on standard mana anymore.
How are we taking him down?
You take the left, cutting off his escape route.
I’ll strip away his traction.
Don’t use your greatsword; we need his mouth intact to answer questions.
Understood.
Aoi veered off like a crimson streak toward a neighboring chimney, skirting the spy’s field of vision.
Haruto advanced straight ahead, pressing two fingers on his right hand together as he built up a micro-vector of air pressure.
The Inquisition tracker, a gaunt man in grayish camouflage gear, blinked when the refracted image in his crystal began to ripple.
Confused, he lowered the lens.
“A thermal interferen—?” Before he could finish his thought, a burst of compressed air slammed directly into the base of his ankle.
It didn’t break the bone, but it instantly erased the friction between his boots and the slick tiles.
The tracker lost his footing and began sliding down the roof.
Panicking, the man reached for a signal dagger to fire a flare into the sky, but as he turned his head, he ran face-first into a figure waiting for him below.
Aoi was already there.
Without making a sound, Aoi’s hand clamped like an iron vise around the tracker’s throat, cutting off his airway instantly and lifting him inches off the roof.
With her other hand, she snatched the signal dagger and the refraction crystal before he could crush them.
“If you scream, I’ll break your jaw before the first syllable leaves your throat,” Aoi whispered into the man’s ear in an icy tone, her eyes glowing with a menacing blend of blue and crimson.
Haruto landed smoothly right behind them, projecting a tiny three-meter dome of acoustic insulation around the trio.
“Take it easy, crow,” Haruto said, pulling back the spy’s leather mask to reveal the pale, sweat-slicked face of a man no older than thirty.
“You have five seconds to tell us how many of your comrades are deployed in Valoria before my partner decides to test the density of your skull against the tiles.” Feeling the overwhelming pressure of the Primordial Resonance—an aura that appeared in no Vatican manual—the tracker swallowed hard, his eyes darting back and forth in terror between the two fugitives.