Monumental Wager

The morning sun cracked through the sky like a judgmental eye. Dew shimmered on the tall grass, birds sang nervously, and the Jublean village was already bustling—well, in a cautious, you-better-not-step-on-a-stick kind of way.

Inside a communal hut, Mira stared at the wall like it had insulted her bloodline.

She didn't sleep. Not because of the thin bedding, not because of the frogs serenading outside her tent all night, but because of him.

Adam.

Red yukata casually tossed aside. Smiling too much. Flirting with that musclebound Amazon. Making food with the kids. Being adorable to everyone but her.

"I’m not jealous," Mira mumbled, arms crossed. "I’m a powerful mage with a tragic past and dazzling hair. I don’t get jealous. I incinerate."

"Who are you talking to?" asked a little Jublean girl who had been squatting beside her since dawn.

"My inner demons. Go away."

Meanwhile…

Adam wiped sweat from his brow after helping fix a broken totem pole with some of the older Jublean teens. The mistrust had softened just a little—probably because he smiled like a golden retriever and took a literal punch from an old woman who thought he was Jurgen reincarnated. He deserved a medal.

Still, the Mira tension lingered.

He glanced toward her tent with that confused look men get when they've done something wrong but don't know what it was because technically, being polite isn't a crime.

“Maybe I should talk to her,” he muttered.

“Maybe you should not,” said one of the teen warriors, deadpan. “She was growling at her soup last night.”

Back at the edge of the cliff, a low groan echoed up from the trail like a prophecy.

Ka’Lerah—who had been patrolling in silence, ever vigilant—turned her amber eyes to the jungle path as something, someone… slithered up from the abyss.

It was Hafiz.

He was covered in mud, leaves in his hair, one sleeve torn, and his usual graceful composure absolutely obliterated. But his eyes were sharp, burning with purpose. And also hatred for banana leaves.

“Okay,” he breathed, planting one knee on the final step. “Took me all night, a sprained dignity, and possibly rabies, but I’m here.”

Then he looked up.

Ka’Lerah stood above him, twin-bladed spear in hand, the wind catching her crimson war paint and hair like a poster for a fantasy war movie.

“You…” she growled in native Jubleanic tongue. “Velk zu tahn. Jurgen tarash meh!”

“Right,” Hafiz muttered. “Language barrier. Let me try…”

He raised a hand in peace, stepping forward slowly.

“I am not Jurgen. I am Hafiz. I bring no harm. I seek—”

Ka’Lerah lunged like a missile, spear flashing through the air.

“OH COME ON!” Hafiz leapt back, nearly falling again, dodging the blow by sheer reflex. “Do you people just wake up violent?!”

Shouts echoed through the village. The second male had arrived—and Ka’Lerah was trying to remove his head from his shoulders.

That’s when Adam turned his head, ears catching the sharp crack of blade-on-stone.

“Wait… that voice—” He sprinted toward the noise, nearly slamming into a fruit basket. As he turned the corner—

“HAFIZ?!”

Hafiz, now backflipping over a soup pot, looked up mid-flight. “ADAM?!”

“I thought you were DEAD!”

“I’M ABOUT TO BE!”

Ka’Lerah snarled, lunging again—but Adam skidded in between them just in time, arms out like a human shield.

“WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, HE’S WITH ME!”

The villagers paused. Ka’Lerah narrowed her eyes. Hafiz groaned.

“I crawled up a death mountain for this, and now you’re hugging spears? I want a refund.”

Ka’Lerah snarled as her bladed spear flashed down toward Hafiz’s neck like a streak of divine punishment. But—

CLANG!

The tip of her weapon halted—caught between iron and resolve.

Hafiz, crouched low, arm raised, his iron gauntlet clamped tightly around the shaft of the spear. Sparks sizzled. Raindrops hissed as they touched the heated metal.

Her eyes widened in fury. But then—she froze.

Because Hafiz said, slowly, carefully, and with an accent that absolutely slaughtered the syntax:

“Sha... Ka'Lerah, ne vi-joor'khen. Zha'se Hafiz... mes-no tala ven. Vel’ka shornai.”

Ka’Lerah blinked. Her body stiffened—not from fear, but surprise.

He was speaking Jubleanic. Not fluently. Not perfectly. But it was there.

A patchwork of vowels and guttural flow, tribal and sacred to the women of the cliffs. She could hear it in his tone, see it in his gaze—it wasn’t mockery or manipulation. It was genuine effort. Rough, like a traveler brushing dust off an old tome. But real.

"...You speak the old tongue?" she asked cautiously.

Hafiz nodded, still holding the spear. "...Tried my best. Studied from ruins. Bits. Phrases. And a very angry book."

Ka’Lerah gave a reluctant grunt, easing her weapon back. “You sound like an old goat drowning.”

“But you understood me?” Hafiz asked.

She nodded once.

Hafiz exhaled in pure relief and fell back onto the wet grass like a man who just defused a bomb using Google Translate.

Adam skidded to a stop beside him, gasping. “DUDE. I thought you were gonna die!”

“I nearly did. Three times. One of them was emotional,” Hafiz muttered, wiping a smear of mud from his brow. “Nice village, by the way. Not very... welcoming.”

“What are you doing here?” Adam asked, lowering his voice.

Hafiz’s lips tightened ever so slightly. His eyes flicked toward Ka’Lerah, who was still watching him with narrowed eyes. “...Long story. I had... premonitions. Saw some puzzle pieces. Thought I’d follow the trail.”

“Wait, what kind of puzzle—?”

“Local legend stuff. Totally harmless. Probably false,” Hafiz lied smoothly, brushing mud off his gauntlet. “Not destiny-altering or future-ruining at all.”

Adam squinted. “You’re a terrible liar.”

Hafiz smiled without joy. “You’re worse at keeping secrets.”

Before Adam could press further, a familiar voice called out from behind.

“…Who’s that?”

They both turned.

Mira stood there, arms crossed, her long crimson braid slightly undone from a restless sleep. Her lavender eyes honed in on Hafiz like a sniper scope.

Hafiz sat up straighter, trying not to look like a deranged cave troll who’d just rolled uphill for twelve hours.

“Mira, this is Hafiz,” Adam said, smiling, rubbing the back of his neck.

Mira tilted her head. “And Hafiz is…?”

“My best friend!” Adam beamed.

There was a beat of silence.

“…No, we’re not,” Hafiz corrected flatly. “We’re just friends.”

Adam blinked. “Wait, what?”

“We’re not best friends. That would imply emotional vulnerability and a shared trauma bonding event. We haven’t had that.”

“We literally fought in the Siege of Ardessa together—”

“Still not enough. I’ve had deeper relationships with moss.”

Mira cracked a grin despite herself. “I like him.”

Adam looked betrayed. “What—what is happening?”

Ka’Lerah, arms folded, watched the trio with a mix of confusion and mild suspicion, her spear still within reach. She spoke quietly to one of the nearby village guards in native tongue.

“The second male speaks like a drunken turtle. But he is… interesting.”

The guard responded, “Should we kill him anyway?”

Ka’Lerah glanced at Hafiz, who had just tried and failed to shake mud from his boot with dignity.

“…Not yet.”

Ka’Lerah’s eyes narrowed as she studied Hafiz’s stance.

His footwork was steady, posture deliberate—but his strikes were clearly pulled, movements almost teasing. Not with arrogance, but something else.

She gritted her teeth. “You’re not serious.”

Hafiz gave a half-smirk, lowering his gauntleted fist. “If I was serious, you wouldn’t still have eyebrows.”

Ka’Lerah’s blade whirled, barely grazing his cheek—just enough to cut a single lock of hair.

“You mock me.”

“No,” Hafiz said, stepping back casually, arms behind his head, “I just believe in unnecessary effort only when I’m emotionally invested. Which I’m not. Yet.”

Ka’Lerah blinked. And then, to Adam’s horror, she laughed.

A short, harsh bark of a laugh—but a laugh nonetheless. “Strange male…”

Hafiz winked at her before sauntering off like someone who totally didn’t almost die by jungle queen twice.

Later that morning, the rain had mostly stopped. Morning mist clung lazily to the cliffside trees, curling between the wooden huts of the Jublean village like ghostly fingers. Smoke rose from cookfires. Children darted between woven baskets and drying hides, shouting in wild bursts of native tongue.

Hafiz sat near the edge of the village well, surrounded by at least six small Jublean kids climbing on him like he was a jungle gym.

“Tola-ka!” a little girl yelled, pulling on Hafiz’s arm.

“No, no, don’t—my elbow doesn’t bend like—ow—okay that’s new,” Hafiz grunted as one perched on his shoulders and tried to use his headband as reins. “I am not a transport creature—your barter economy can’t afford this ride!”

A pebble smacked him in the cheek.

“...Okay. Two rides for a fish. I’m easy.”

He chuckled, genuinely enjoying their chaotic energy—this village, for all its tension and mystery, had a strange sense of warmth. It felt… untouched. Unfiltered. Primitive, but not cruel.

But still… Hafiz’s eyes occasionally flicked to the trees. To the shadows. He wasn’t just here to play. His mission—his vision—still pulsed behind his thoughts like a warning bell. He was hiding something.

And he had to keep hiding it. For now.

Across the clearing, Adam stood a bit stiffly beside Mira, who was now wearing a travel cloak over her usual mage attire—dark violet lined with crimson, clasped at the neck by the familiar red crystal they'd come to return. Her silver runed staff glimmered faintly in the light, catching the curiosity of several nearby villagers.

“I still don’t understand why you’re trying so hard to make Ka’Lerah like you,” Mira muttered, arms crossed.

Adam blinked. “What? I’m not!”

“You were literally bowing to her like she was royalty ten minutes ago.”

“I was being respectful!”

“She threw a rock at your head.”

“She missed!”

Mira rolled her eyes. “It just seems like you’re very interested in impressing her.”

“I’m trying to earn trust,” Adam insisted, tone low but sharp. “We’re in their territory. We need their help. I don’t have the luxury to—”

“—to care about how I feel?”

The words hung in the air like a snapped string.

Adam froze. Mira’s face flushed, but she didn’t look away.

“I didn’t mean—”

“It’s fine,” she said quickly, waving it off and turning away. “Focus on your diplomacy. You're really mature now, huh?”

She stormed off before he could respond.

Adam groaned, dragging a hand down his face.

Hafiz, now only five meters away and halfway into a piggyback race with three children, watched the exchange, dramatically miming throwing up into his hand.

“Ugh. Gross. Maturity. Feelings. Eww,” Hafiz muttered to a child in Jubleanic, who didn’t understand but mimicked the retching anyway.

Ka’Lerah passed by them both, glancing toward Mira and Adam’s tense distance.

“You like playing with younglings,” she said to Hafiz.

He glanced at her, half-lidded. “They’re less judgmental than adults and don’t try to stab me.”

“You’re strange,” she said.

“I know,” Hafiz smirked. “And you haven’t even seen my dance ritual yet.”

Ka’Lerah raised a brow, but didn’t comment further.

Instead, she glanced at Adam across the square—and then back to Hafiz.

“…He’s not like Jurgen.”

“No,” Hafiz said, eyes softening a bit. “He’s not.”

The morning sun burst through the clouds like a blade of gold cleaving through grey. The village square—really just a flattened patch of clay ringed by totems and raised platforms—buzzed with tribal drums and excitement.

It was the day of the Cho’Turan, the Great Trial. A ritual combat held every two cycles to choose the Jublean Champions—protectors of the tribe, bearers of honor.

Ka’Lerah stood at the center, twin-bladed spear in hand, wrapped in minimal yet ceremonial crimson-threaded leathers, her bronze skin glinting with sweat and crimson tribal paint. Around her stood challengers—strong, broad-shouldered women, each ready to prove themselves.

From the crowd of mostly villagers, Hafiz leaned against a tree post, arms crossed, a piece of jungle fruit in one hand, eating with the slow grace of a man who wasn’t about to burst out laughing.

Next to him stood Adam, arms folded, trying to look anywhere but directly at Ka’Lerah’s intense muscles.

And failing.

“You look like a twelve-year-old seeing his first swimsuit calendar,” Hafiz muttered with a grin.

“I’m observing their fighting techniques,” Adam said stiffly.

“Oh yes,” Hafiz snorted. “Extensive... techniques. Especially the part where your eyeballs haven’t blinked in thirty seconds.”

Adam flushed. “Shut up.”

Then Mira arrived.

“Oh, this is where you’ve been,” she said, tone sharp enough to slice fruit.

Adam turned. “Mira, I—”

“Gawking at women in loincloths while we’re supposed to be diplomatic guests?”

“It’s the Champion Trials! I’m not gawking!”

Hafiz, meanwhile, was already losing it. He laughed—loud, unapologetic, hands on his knees.

“You two are like a married couple on a jungle honeymoon,” Hafiz gasped. “I’m gonna die.”

“You might,” Mira snapped, narrowing her eyes at him.

He straightened up, grinning. “Relax, both of you. You’re emotionally constipated. I have just the fix.”

Hafiz reached into his coat and, like some jungle love guru, whipped out a folded leaf with hand-drawn diagrams on it.

“I call it the F.L.I.R.T. Protocol,” Hafiz announced. “Finesse. Light teasing. Intentional eye contact. Resonance. Touch. Works every time.”

Mira squinted. “You’re a menace.”

Adam peeked at the diagram. “This... actually makes a weird amount of sense.”

“Exactly,” Hafiz said, smug. “Go on, try it on her.”

Adam turned to Mira, nodded seriously—and then immediately attempted Step 3 and Step 4 simultaneously by holding her hand and dramatically locking eyes like some dashing prince in a discount romance novel.

Mira stared at him.

Then blinked.

Then turned around and walked away. Without a word.

“…She mad?” Adam whispered.

“Oh, she mad mad,” Hafiz said, watching her vanish into the crowd.

But Mira didn’t just storm off.

Hours passed. The trial ended. Ka’Lerah won again, obviously. The feast began. And Mira was nowhere to be seen.

The realization hit late, as the sun dipped into orange.

“Mira?” Adam called, checking around the tents.

“Not in the stream either,” said a villager girl who had been braiding Hafiz’s hair for the past hour.

Ka’Lerah frowned. “She left.”

Adam stiffened. “What do you mean?”

Ka’Lerah’s gaze turned toward the southern trail—the shadowed path leading into dense jungle.

“She took the hunter’s route. Alone.”

A hush fell.

Adam’s face turned pale.

“Mira…” he whispered.

But Hafiz… Hafiz’s eyes darkened.

Because even as the festive drums continued, even as laughter echoed from the fires… he pulled the Tome of Wisdom from beneath his coat, away from everyone’s gaze.

He flipped it open—pages already scrawled in looping, foreign ink—and what he saw turned his expression grim.

Paths. Endless possibilities. All of them darker now.

Somewhere in those endless timelines… Mira was screaming.

Hafiz clenched the book shut.

He whispered low, “This wasn’t in the earlier pages…”

And for the first time in weeks… he felt the path shifting beyond his control.

The trees howled.

Rain lashed through the canopies as Hafiz ran—no, soared—through the forest trails. His cloak billowed behind him like a storm-drenched shadow, boots thudding against slick bark, leaping from branch to branch with a grace that would make cats envious and gravity insulted.

“Of course she’d leave,” Hafiz muttered, barely dodging a low-hanging vine. “Of course she’d go off alone. Of course I have to fix this while lover-boy’s still in the village braiding daisies or some nonsense.”

The forest thickened. The light dimmed. Even the birds grew silent, as though the trees were holding their breath.

Then—there it was.

A hollow in the cliffside. Mouth of a dark, yawning cave. Like the world itself had bitten open a wound and left it festering in shadows.

Hafiz landed just outside, boots splashing into the muddy pool near the entrance. He narrowed his eyes.

He didn’t hesitate. He entered.

The cave was unnaturally cold. Dripping water echoed like ticking time. And then—

A faint glow.

Blue, eerie. Coming from deeper within.

He stepped closer.

And froze.

There, resting on an altar of black stone, Mira lay unconscious—breathing, but barely. Her crimson braid sprawled over the stone like spilled wine, her clothes soaked, and her body twitching faintly, caught in fevered dreams.

And beside her, with violet eyes glowing like twin lanterns and a wickedly serene smile—Velvet.

Pale as bone. Slender fingers adjusting glowing vials. A thick, glowing serum bubbling over a glass funnel. She wore her signature black gothic corset, dark purple hair coiled and wet, with serpentine scales glistening on her legs beneath the folds of her lab-style skirt.

Hafiz’s voice came sharp and cold.

“Step. Away. From her.”

Velvet turned.

And blinked.

“…What?” she muttered.

Hafiz stood tall, soaked head to toe, armor scratched, gauntlet raised slightly.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” she said. “My detection sphere didn't—how?”

Hafiz tilted his head.

“I walk outside fate.”

Velvet narrowed her eyes. “Now that’s interesting.”

They locked stares for a long, tense breath.

Then Hafiz lowered his gauntlet slightly.

“You abducted her,” he said. “How?”

Velvet smiled.

“Oh, darling… let me tell you a story.”

She placed the vial back onto its rack like a maestro laying down a baton.

“She wandered too close to the southern glade. I was experimenting with psychic echoes—very delicate work—when I sensed a raw emotional surge. Regret. Jealousy. Rage. All the good stuff.”

She walked around the altar slowly, one gloved finger trailing along Mira’s arm.

“I tracked the source… and there she was. Sleeping on a log. Like a fairytale cliché. So I decided—why not bring her in? A test subject with emotional instability, strong mana, and connections to him?”

“You mean Adam,” Hafiz said flatly.

Velvet grinned. “Mmm. Yes. The boy with the tragic eyes and zero brain cells.”

Hafiz didn’t laugh. He stepped forward.

Velvet raised an eyebrow.

“Careful, shiny gauntlet. You’re stepping into my domain.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” Hafiz replied.

Her smile turned sharp.

“You should be.”

A silence fell. Only the bubbling serum hissed softly.

Then Velvet tilted her head.

“You’re not from the royal circles, or the cults, or the academic towers. Who are you, really?”

Hafiz didn’t answer.

His gaze dropped briefly to Mira.

Velvet saw that flicker—and smiled wider.

“Oh… you care about her.”

“…No,” Hafiz said. “I care about the damage you cause.”

Velvet snorted. “Uh-huh. Sure, mysterious man. Keep your secrets.”

Then she walked toward the wall of the cave and pressed a glowing sigil with her palm, sealing the entrance shut with a soft thump of magic.

“No one's leaving until I finish explaining my brilliant plan. You're just in time to watch me rewrite biology.”

Hafiz flexed his gauntlet slightly, magic humming beneath the steel.

Velvet turned back, her grin widening. “I was hoping someone would interrupt. I'm bored.”