He told her the truth again, calm and unhurried. "I told you. I’m a transmigrator. I’ve lived through a past you’ve already had, a present you’re in now, and a future you haven’t reached yet. This world, to me, was once just a novel."
She stared at him, the words clearly not computing.
It sounded like a madman’s boast, a cruel and elaborate mockery.
She probably thought he was making fun of her.
Her voice came out clipped, sharp with suspicion. "What do you want from me?"
"I told you that, too. Back in the woods." He repeated the line, his tone unchanging. "Nothing. This was never about leverage."
"I don’t believe you," she said flatly.
He let out a short, humourless breath. "Not believing me is probably the smartest thing you’ve done all day. If you had trusted me blindly, I’d have found a way to use it against you eventually."
A low, frustrated growl tore from her throat, more animal than human. A long, charged silence stretched between them, the shadow-flowers pulsing softly in the slow-motion quiet.
Then, a smirk ghosted across Cane’s lips.
"Pop a tit."
Raven stared. Her head tilted just slightly, a flicker of genuine, profound confusion breaking through the layers of anger and fear.
"What?"
"That’s it," he confirmed with a solemn nod. "That’s the price for my silence. Just one. Your choice."
She continued to stare, her mind clearly racing, trying to find the angle, the hidden trap. The demand was so crude, so simple, that it was utterly baffling. She had braced for blackmail, for servitude, for something monstrous that a man holding this kind of power would demand. This was just... pathetic.
"Is that... really all you want?" she asked, her voice laced with suspicion.
He let the silence stretch for a beat, two, just long enough to be cruel. Then his entire demeanour shifted. He stood up straighter, his face becoming a mask of grim, zealous purpose.
"No," he said, his voice dropping into a dramatic, serious pitch. "What I really want is your help. The Ashen Talons were just the beginning. A flawed attempt at a noble goal. Together, you and I, we can finish what they started. We’ll burn this decadent academy to the ground, a pyre for the corrupt nobility it protects. From its ashes, we will resurrect the glory of the Talons, a final, spectacular act of vengeance that will reshape the kingdom!"
"Gasp!"
Raven was shocked!
Her breath caught in her throat, and real alarm flashed across her face. The idea, absurd as it was, resonated with a part of her she thought was long dead.
Then he broke character, a loud, barking laugh shattering the dramatic tension.
Cane started laughing so hard his stomach hurt.
"Oh my god, you fell for it! I can’t believe you actually fell for it!" He wiped a fake tear from his eye. "Your critical thinking is top-notch right up until someone mentions your old murder-hobo club, and then it just checks right out the door."
A furious, embarrassed flush spread across her cheeks, a deep, blotchy red. "That’s not funny," she snapped, her voice tight with shame and anger. "You shouldn’t joke about things like that. Not with someone who was actually there."
The humour vanished from his face. When he spoke again, his tone was flatter, more honest than anything he had said to her since they walked into the room.
"You’re right. It wasn’t funny." He met her eyes directly. "I don’t want anything from you. Not tonight, not going forward. The whole performance, in the woods and here, it was never about getting something from you. It was about proving to myself that I could rattle you. I’ll admit, it’s a shitty way to go about trying to become someone’s ally."
As the tension finally began to drain from the space, the Shadow Garden wavered. The silent, dark flowers folded back into nothingness. The boundless void around them started to creak and groan, the familiar shape of the storage room bleeding back into existence at the edges.
Raven watched him, still braced for the catch. "So what happens now? You expect me to just trust that you’ll keep your mouth shut? With nothing binding you to it?"
"You have my word," he said plainly. "For whatever that’s worth to you right now. Probably not much." The last of the shadows dissolved. They were standing in the dusty storage room again, surrounded by stacked crates, a single shaft of morning light cutting through a high, grimy window. It was as if the last several minutes had never happened.
He shoved his hands in his pockets. "But if you want something more concrete than a promise from a stranger with a bad reputation, we should just keep talking. Actual conversations. Not interrogations at knifepoint. We find a private spot, often enough that you can watch for yourself whether I’m the kind of person who sells people out."
Her expression didn’t soften, but something in her rigid posture eased, a subtle shift in calculation. She weighed the offer, the pragmatic choice of keeping an enemy close versus the risk of letting him walk away entirely. After a long moment, she gave a short, sharp nod.
"Fine," she said, her voice flat and unenthusiastic. "This doesn’t mean I trust you. It just means I’d rather have my eyes on you than not."
She turned around to walk away as the Shadow Garden dissipated.
But before she did, Raven turned around.
She looked him in the eyes and pulled out her right breast.
Her pale breast bounced slightly as she flashed Cane. Her nipples were small and rock hard, surprisingly. Was she getting off to this? Cane found that rather amusing.
Sadly, he didn’t get much more of a look as she quickly tucked her perfect breast back in. A slight blush adorned her face, almost unnoticeable.
"That’s all you’re getting. If you tell anyone about this. About ANY of this, I will k-kill you myself."