Unknown Variable

Anna and Maren were left alone on the street as the barracks' heavy gates closed behind them. The city of Frola was still a hive of nighttime activity at a little after eight o'clock.

At last, Maren exploded again, “Anna! What did you mean ‘faster methods’?! Are you going to fly?! Is that another secret evolution thing?!”

Instead of answering, she held up a hand, and a faint, shimmering interface, visible only to them, materialized in the air. Her finger tapped on a newly appeared icon under her race skills. It was a simple icon of a running figure, wreathed in a crimson glow.

[Passive Skill: Enhanced Running]

“There,” Anna stated. She then turned to her supposedly all-knowing holy sword. “Is this just running, but better? How does this work? The description is blank.”

Maren floated closer, peering at the UI with a scholarly air that was completely undermined by her total lack of knowledge. “Well, obviously! It’s ‘enhanced’! That means it’s more… enhanced,” she declared with profound confidence.

“That doesn’t help at all...”

“You probably just run faster than a normal human and your stamina is higher. It’s a passive skill, so I assume you just… run.” She paused, her light flickering. “Maybe.” Another pause. “I don’t really know, I told you! Also swords don’t get running skills!”

Anna sighed. “Useless.” She looked down the long, relatively empty street that led towards the city center. “Guess I’ll have to test it myself.”

Like a sprinter at the starting line, she took a ready stance. "All right, let's start with a quick jog."

The skill came to life the instant she committed to the action. It felt more like the world itself slowed down, waiting for her to pass through it, rather than like running at all.

Her feet hardly seemed to make contact with the floor. There was no noise, no thumping of feet.

To the people that see it, the sight was utterly bizarre. “V-Vampires!!!” They screamed.

Anna doesn’t mind about them, she looked back from the end of the street, not even remotely out of breath. “Huh,” she said, a flicker of surprise and delight in her eyes. “So that’s how it works. I mean no wonder people got scared.”

Maren zipped up beside her, spinning in excited circles. “Anna! You just went nyooom! You didn’t even look like you were running! You looked like a ghost! A very, very fast and pretty ghost! That actually is way cooler than a horse!”

A sincere smirk of amusement appeared on Anna's lips as she glanced at the mayhem she had unintentionally created, the strewn chickens, the staring citizens. There was no way that the fifteen-kilometer journey to the temple would be problematic. 

"I wouldn't hit anyone with this."

The great hall in the temple was as large, chilly, and quiet as she had left it. Bella stood in the middle, illuminated by a single column of moonlight.

She opened her mouth to report, to lay out the facts of her successful infiltration and the subsequent battle.

“You probably have a lot of questions, but—” Bella snapped, “I also don’t know what happened!”

She began to pace, her movements sharp and agitated. “Last night, I was in the scriptorium drowning in paperwork, as usual. A sealed letter appeared on my desk—a warning of an imminent attack on the barracks. I went immediately. By the time I got close, the fight was already underway, and to my complete shock, Ars Caelus was already there.”

She stopped, looking at Anna intently. “He noticed me. It spoke to me, in my mind. It said, ‘Do give your order, Lady Bella.’ So I did. I analyzed the situation and gave the only logical order: end it.”

Anna nodded. “The single slice. It was… efficient.”

“Extremely,” Bella agreed. “Afterward, I thought the weapon would return to me, but no. Caelus told me that the real Serenya had given him a single, direct order: allow me to use his power to neutralize the immediate threat, and then he was to return to her side immediately. So, yes, Serenya IS still out there, watching us like we’re pieces on her private game board!”

The information clicked into place for Anna, but one crucial piece didn’t fit. “Wait,” she said, her voice sharp. “If you only arrived to deliver that final attack… then you’re not the one who purified all the corruption seeds I planted.”

Bella froze mid-pace, her shock genuine. “What? No, of course I didn’t,” she said, bewildered. “They were your responsibility. I thought you were going to purify them yourself as part of your cover.”

Two of the most strategic, control-oriented minds in the kingdom stared at each other, faced with a variable they hadn’t accounted for. An unknown player was actively moving on the board, interfering with their plans.

“It must have been Serenya,” Bella finally concluded, her voice tight with a frustration that bordered on resentment. “While Caelus was engaging with whoever it was fighting, she must have been moving through the barracks. She’s a fast fighter, impossibly so. She could have located and cleansed all ten seeds before I even finished my attack.”

She shook her head, a look of grudging, bitter admiration on her face. “Before she disappeared, Anna, her mana reserves were measured at thirty-four million.”

Anna’s eyes widened. Thirty-four million. The number was absurd.

“I know,” Bella said, seeing the shock on Anna’s face. “It’s a ridiculous figure. But that’s Serenya. She truly is the near-perfect Saint of Minilon. And like I said, she’s not stupid.”

Anna’s mind, the cold engine, immediately began processing the new data. The shock faded, replaced by stark analysis. “So, Serenya is active, but hidden,” she stated, her voice flat.

“She sanctions your use of her weapon for large-scale threats but operates independently on a micro-level. She purified my work without my knowledge.” She looked Bella dead in the eye. “I don’t even know if she’s an ally or not.”

“Exactly! She’s treating me like a subordinate, feeding me information on a need-to-know basis. And she’s treating you like an asset to be managed from the shadows. She’s a perfect Saint, Anna, but she is a terrible strategist. By hiding, she’s allowing Yarte to gain ground and the kingdom to fracture!”

“This changes the objective, then,” Anna said, bringing the conversation back to the core problem. “We’re no longer just fighting Yarte. We’re also trying to work around a saint with a higher power level than either of us. The question is what does she want?”

Bella’s shoulders slumped, the weight of a decades-long secret finally pressing down, “What does she want?” she echoed, a bitter laugh escaping her lips. “The same thing she has always wanted: freedom. She wanted to free every dark beings, she wants us to be on par with humans. Not being treated as slave.”

“That’s a valid reason. And why does she do it in shadows?”

“I’m afraid this is all my fault. It’s why I called you here.”

She looked at Anna, her expression grim. “Yarte. Twenty years ago, he was the kingdom’s most brilliant mage, and he was chosen by the temple to be Serenya’s personal magic tutor. But Serenya… she refused. She chose me to take her place in public, to be her shield.”

“The moment I stood before Yarte, he knew,” Bella continued, her voice low. “My mana was a fraction of Serenya’s. He was a genius; he connected the dots instantly. He knew it was me who cleansed the temple of its previous staff. He assumed I’d killed the real Serenya and usurped her name, her power, everything. He refuses to teach me.”

“He went straight to the King, accusing me of treason and murder. He said I’m Bella, not Serenya. But the King dismissed it,” She said with a humorless smirk.

“My work in the temple had been… thorough. I used methods that left behind traces of dark magic. The King’s official verdict was that ‘the attack was perpetrated by a dark cult. No Saint would use such evil mana to destroy her own temple.’ Yarte had the truth, but no one would believe him. It drove him mad with hatred for the name ‘Serenya’ and ‘Bella’”

“So what happened to Yarte?”

Bella smiled, “I simply told Sir Nennoch, the strongest knight in the whole of Minilon, that Yarte has gone mad. He’s crazy and must be dealt with. Nennoch understand and hunt him down through the forest.”

Anna’s mind was racing, but one horrifying detail stood out. “Hold on,” she cut in, her voice sharp and incredulous. “And why did you kill everyone in the temple?”