Jacob hadn't even finished the second syllable of his scream before it all came to an abrupt end. One moment they were soaring through the air, and the next his feet had been unceremoniously dropped onto solid ground, his knees buckling slightly from the sudden landing. Before he could collect himself or demand an explanation, laughter rang out behind him, rich, unrestrained, and thoroughly amused.

He turned slowly to see Evendor and Henry both shaking with mirth, not even bothering to hide it. The kind of laughter that wasn't just at something funny, but something embarrassing, and Jacob's cheeks flushed instinctively as he lowered his head in quiet shame.

"You're sure this is your brother, Henry?" Evendor said between bursts of laughter, his voice carrying that same playful mockery that stung just enough to be annoying. "From those screams alone, I would've sworn it was your sister you brought up here."

Jacob flinched, though he said nothing, hoping that maybe Henry would jump to his defence. And for a brief moment, it seemed like that might actually happen, Henry's tone turned serious, his chuckling cut short as he spoke.

"That's a bit unfair, Evendor," he said, pausing just long enough for Jacob to lift his eyes in tentative relief. "My sister's screams are way more dignified than that. His were the kind you'd expect from a frightened child. Honestly, Jacob where's your sense of shame?"

And with that, both men broke into a fresh round of laughter, this one louder and longer than the last. Jacob, left standing awkwardly in the centre of the room, simply sighed and let it wash over him. There wasn't any point in fighting it, not when they were clearly enjoying themselves this much at his expense.

Eventually, he forced himself to look around, brushing the dust from his tunic as he did. The room itself was plain and modest, clearly not one of the main chambers of the tree.

The walls and floors were smooth and white, softly reflective under the ambient glow that came from above. At the centre stood a low table, surrounded by a set of chairs and a deep green sofa, the upholstery clean and functional, the kind of space clearly intended for short rests and quiet meetings rather than ceremony or grandeur.

"Alright," Evendor finally said, his laughter settling into a lingering grin as he straightened. "You two can wait here. I'll see what I can do and talk to the others."

There was a hesitation in his voice, and a shadow of something more complicated passed across his expression as he turned toward the door. "That said, I wouldn't get your hopes up. The place you're asking to enter… it isn't just sacred, it's tied to the very roots of our people. And my siblings, well, let's just say they don't share my tolerance when it comes to humans. No offence meant."

"None taken," Henry replied almost immediately, his tone calm and unbothered as he lifted a hand in a gesture of understanding. "Their bitterness makes sense. But they'd do well to remember that Eterna wasn't part of the genocide. Our hands, at least, are clean of that blood."

Evendor gave a brief nod, something almost solemn in his gaze, and then without a word more turned and leapt from the room, vanishing into the open air outside with the same effortless grace that seemed to defy gravity entirely.

Once the elf had leapt from the room and disappeared into the canopy above, Jacob turned toward Henry, unable to keep the suspicion from his voice. "You know the prince?"

Henry gave a quiet chuckle, the kind that suggested the answer was far more complicated than the question. "Surprised? Don't be. I know a lot of people, Jacob. Prince Evendor and I go back a long way, we've been friends for years."

Jacob didn't respond at first. His mind was still tangled in confusion, because out of all the things he had read or heard about the elven royal siblings, Prince Evendor stood out, not just because of his rare talent in both aura and mana manipulation, a feat so uncommon it bordered on myth, but also because of his reputation.

He wasn't just known, he was feared, and not only by humans. He was supposedly the spearhead of one of the more militant factions in Elvheim, a group of elves who openly advocated for war against humanity, a return to blood and fire and conquest.

Evendor was seen as someone who loathed humans with a kind of cold, refined intensity not impulsive or savage, but deliberate and deeply personal.

"Prince Evendor hates humans more than his siblings do," Jacob finally said, his tone hesitant, laced with disbelief. "He's supposed to be one of the worst among them when it comes to that."

Henry gave a dismissive wave of his hand, as if brushing away smoke. "Ah, the rumours. They're always more exciting than the truth. He doesn't want to kill all humans, Jacob just about ninety percent of them."

Jacob stared at him.

Henry looked back at him for a moment, then sighed. "We're business partners."

"Business partners?" Jacob echoed. "With a genocidal elf?"

Henry gave him a side-eye. "Very funny. Since when did you start making jokes?"

The question cut deeper than it should have. Jacob went quiet, suddenly self-conscious. He had been trying, clumsily maybe, to imitate the way Lucas or Henry carried themselves, the effortless way they joked in every situation.

He wasn't sure if it was confidence or indifference that made it work for them, but clearly, he hadn't figured it out yet. He pressed his lips together and said nothing more.

"Anyway," Henry continued, the moment already forgotten, "you don't have to worry. Dad knows about the partnership. He's fine with it."

Jacob muttered under his breath, "Even more reason to worry."

He thought he'd said it quietly enough to go unnoticed, but of course Henry heard him. A knight of his level wouldn't miss a whisper, even from across a battlefield and certainly not in a room this small. Still, Henry chose not to react. He simply turned his gaze to the window, letting the silence stretch for a few seconds before he moved the conversation forward.

"You should be more concerned about your request," he said at last, tone quieter now, more thoughtful. "Evendor will try to help, sure he'll make an effort for my sake. But let's be honest: he's not going to bend over backwards. If you want to enter that chamber, you'll have to offer them something. They're not going to open the doors just because I asked."

"A deal?" Jacob asked, his confusion mounting. "What kind of deal? I don't have anything to offer them. They're royalty what could I possibly give that they don't already have?"

"I'm not going to do everything for you," Henry said, and his tone shifted slightly, not harsh but definitive. "Figure something out. Tell them you'll arrange a meeting with the Grand Scholar. Or with my father. I don't know, you're smart. Use what you've got."

Jacob exhaled slowly, feeling the weight of that reality settle over him. It was one thing to ask for help. It was another to barter with a prince who viewed his very existence as distasteful. Whatever came next, it wouldn't be easy.

Jacob was still too stunned to speak, his mouth slightly open as his mind scrambled for something to say, but before he could so much as form a word, a dense pressure suddenly fell over the room like a suffocating shroud, and instinctively he fell silent, every thought eclipsed by the overwhelming weight of presence that had just entered.

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Three elves stepped into the room, each of them unmistakable due to the same tell-tale sign: silver hair, smooth and luminous like threads of light, cascading past their shoulders with an almost ceremonial weight.

One of them, of course, was Evendor, his posture as relaxed as ever, but beside him stood a man and a woman who moved with a kind of disciplined grace that was at once beautiful and vaguely threatening.

Unlike Evendor's rugged, athletic build, these two carried themselves like sculptures brought to life, serene, poised, almost too perfect, and their expressions left no room for doubt as to how they felt about their current company. They didn't try to hide it. Their eyes landed on Jacob and Henry with open disdain, and the sharpness of their gaze alone seemed to make the air thinner.

"Prince Dravil. Princess Melera," Henry said with a shallow bow and the faintest smile. "It's an honour."

Melera barely acknowledged the greeting before turning to Evendor, her voice pitched just loud enough to ensure Henry would hear her clearly. "So this is the one with the glib tongue you spoke of?"

Henry's smile didn't falter in the slightest, and before Evendor could even open his mouth, he stepped forward and answered for himself with cheerful ease. "Then it seems Prince Evendor has mentioned me after all. I'm Henry Skydrid, the one with the glib tongue, as you so charmingly put it."

Her expression twisted instantly, a subtle sneer breaking through the smooth veneer of her beauty. Dravil gave no such restraint; he looked Henry up and down once, then frowned in clear distaste.

"I don't like him," Dravil said curtly, his voice calm but clipped. "Too talkative. Too sly."

Then, turning sharply toward Jacob, his tone tightened. "And you. Your name?"

Jacob stood, his movements stiff but controlled, and bowed as best he could. "Jacob Skydrid."

Dravil held his gaze for a beat longer than necessary, then glanced sideways at Melera and spoke again, this time with derision so pointed it left no doubt. "And this one has the aura of a coward. A remarkable group of friends you bring with you, Evendor."

Evendor only raised a brow and offered a faint smile that clearly said, I told you they wouldn't like you.

Melera glided toward the nearest chair, her expression still taut with contempt, and sat down without another word. Dravil followed a second later, his movements smooth and silent, and Henry, unaffected as always, moved to take a seat opposite them. Evendor remained standing for a moment longer, and just as he made to sit, Melera snapped at him with undisguised scorn.

"You too, Evendor. Stop pretending to be gracious. It's sickening."

Evendor's response was immediate and sharp. "Mind your words, common blood."

His voice didn't rise, but something in the tone made Jacob wince, a tone that didn't ask for obedience, but assumed it. Melera turned to him sharply, eyes narrowed with fury, but said nothing as she sat beside Dravil, who was now clearly stifling a chuckle behind a raised hand.

The room, though technically civil, was brittle with tension, and Jacob, standing awkwardly at its edge, felt like a misplaced object in the middle of a battlefield.

Melera turned her focus on him again, her annoyance now fully visible and unfiltered. "And what exactly gives you the confidence to walk into this place and make your request, Jacob Skydrid?"

Her voice cut clean through the air, silencing even Dravil's quiet laughter. Evendor, too, turned toward Jacob now, his earlier indifference slipping into something more measured, more curious, not angry, not yet, but clearly waiting for a reason to be.

Jacob hesitated. The answer was simple enough, Henry had brought him here without warning, without explanation, without giving him any sense of how difficult or inappropriate the visit might be.

But how exactly was he supposed to say that? How did one explain that they were standing before three members of elven royalty purely because their older brother had decided, on a whim, to drop them in the deepest waters available just to see if they could swim?

He shot a glance toward Henry, hoping for help, but all he saw was that maddening grin, just a little too amused, like someone enjoying the show far more than he should be. And in that moment, Jacob understood, Henry had brought him here because it was difficult, not in spite of it.

There were other routes they could have taken, easier paths, less hostile alternatives. But Henry had chosen this one for a reason. And he clearly wasn't planning to explain himself.

Jacob lowered his gaze just slightly, not out of fear but with the quiet caution of someone who understood the need for tact in a room like this. His voice, when he spoke, was calm, deliberate, and without false confidence.

"You may ask anything of me," he said, his eyes fixed just to the side of Melera's narrowed gaze, "and I will attempt to fulfil it, provided it lies within my ability. In return, I ask only for a brief moment at the base of the World Tree."

He didn't elaborate. He knew he couldn't tell them about true runes, that they might respond differently in an environment so saturated with raw mana that it bypassed ordinary channels of casting.

He only knew that if the rune refused to stir even there, in the most ancient and mana-rich root system on the continent, then his assumptions about ambient energy were flawed. And if that were the case, then the answers he sought lay elsewhere.

Dravil let out a dry, incredulous laugh, short at first, then louder as he leaned back in his seat with exaggerated disbelief.

"And what exactly," he said, between fits of laughter, "could you possibly do for us? Run errands? Clean floors? Maybe serve as our messenger boy for a few years?"

His words weren't meant to wound so much as to amuse, to underline how absurd the request seemed in his eyes. But Evendor, perhaps out of a lingering obligation to Henry, or perhaps because his views were not quite as fixed as his siblings', interjected in a voice surprisingly measured.

"Let us at least consider it," he said, glancing at Dravil, "connections, even fragile ones, have their uses."

Dravil laughed harder, his voice rising in disbelief. "Connections? From you? Did I hear that correctly?" He turned to Melera, as if needing a witness to his own astonishment. "Evendor, speaking of diplomacy. Evendor, of all people, suggesting alliances."

His tone turned sharp then, all humour draining out of it. "Tell me, was it in the name of 'connection' that you burned two cities to ash in the Holy Kingdom? Did you form new friendships when you left their bodies stacked in wells? Who are you to sit here and speak of building bridges, you hypocrite."

The room seemed to tighten at once. Evendor didn't raise his voice. He didn't need to. His expression twisted into something colder, something unguarded, and when he finally replied, it was with no attempt at grace.

"This is exactly why I despise you," he said quietly, almost conversationally, "you and every other branch-blooded coward. Always quick to speak, never knowing when to hold your tongue. Is it so hard for you to see that I'm trying to be nice?"

Whatever power he summoned came without warning, there was no visible light, no shift in temperature, no crackle in the air. But Dravil was forced to his knees all the same, body bent forward as if the very gravity of the room had turned against him.

Jacob couldn't feel the pressure himself, perhaps because it wasn't meant for him, but he didn't need to. The effect was clear. Dravil's hands trembled slightly, not in pain but in humiliation.

"Melera," Evendor said, his voice taking on a sharper edge, "you've been glaring at me since we stepped into this room, you have shown your ugly side to our guests, can you not at least pretend to be civil, perhaps you've forgotten that your mother was a maid, common blood through and through. And you, Dravil, you're not even of my father's bloodline, just a cousin dragged in through the side door. Neither of you have the right to speak to me as though we stand on equal ground. Or have I been too polite all this time, and given you both the wrong idea?"

Dravil, still stiff from the pressure that had just been lifted off him, ground out a response through clenched teeth, "Don't compare me to common blood, Evendor."

The insult only seemed to fuel the anger in Melera's eyes, but she kept her voice cold and clipped, as though pretending calm could somehow give her the upper hand. "And is it so wrong," she asked, "to call you out for what you are? A man willing to shed convictions for convenience? What business is worth abandoning your hatred?"

Evendor exhaled slowly through his nose, a deep and deliberate breath, and with it, the weight pressing down on Dravil dispersed completely.

Dravil, still bristling, returned to his seat with whatever dignity he could muster. But something in the room had shifted; the earlier atmosphere of jabs and playful contempt had been replaced by something quieter and more brittle. When Evendor looked at Jacob, his expression was unreadable, not the loud, forceful presence Jacob had encountered earlier, but something colder, heavier, almost regal in its calculation.

"Jacob will enter the chambers," he said at last, speaking not to persuade but to declare. "He owes us nothing. If he dies, so be it. Henry will confirm it was by his own choice. Understood?"

Jacob was no master of diplomacy, but he wasn't socially blind either. It was clear, even without anyone saying it outright, that Dravil and Melera had lost the moment Evendor's temper had snapped. Their opinions no longer mattered; they'd forfeited their place in the conversation the instant they challenged his authority in public.

More than that, Jacob could see, with a kind of reluctant clarity, that Evendor's decision had little to do with any belief in Jacob's worth or the legitimacy of his request. He had agreed to spite his siblings, to provoke them, to remind them of where power truly rested. The offer wasn't a gift. It was a tool of pettiness wielded with precision.

"Understood," Dravil said after a pause, his voice tight with restrained anger.

Both he and Evendor then turned toward Melera, who held Evendor's gaze for a long, unbroken moment, her jaw rigid with fury.

"Father will hear of this," she said finally, her voice low and bitter. "Inviting a human to the root over something this meaningless… it's reckless."

Evendor gave a small shrug, his tone unconcerned. "Let him hear. I doubt he'll care for your complaints more than he values my judgment."

Melera's lips pressed together, and the muscle in her jaw twitched once before she answered, her voice clipped and strained.

"…Understood."

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