"Raiden! What have you been doing? You could have—"

Miss Hilda's voice cracked through the alley like a whip. Her usually calm tone carried enough weight to make even the lurking thugs flinch.

Raiden froze mid-step, one hand half-raised as if caught stealing pastries. "I didn't do anything! I was just—"

"Just what?" Her eyes narrowed, sharp and disbelieving. "Playing tag with drunk men twice your size?"

The boy grinned weakly. "I was, um… conducting a field experiment?"

"Raiden."

"…I'll be quiet now."

The alley smelled of cheap ale and damp stone. Broken crates lined the walls, and a stray dog padded through, sniffing at a knocked-over cup.

Somewhere nearby, music from the city streets echoed faintly — a reminder that the world outside this small disaster still moved on.

The thugs glared, their earlier confusion simmering into anger. The bald one, clearly their leader, crossed his arms and spat to the side.

Hilda took a slow, deliberate breath before turning toward them. Her voice softened, trained into professional calm.

"I am sorry for the trouble," she said, inclining her head slightly. "My apprentice—he was playing a foolish prank. I'll make sure he doesn't trouble you again."

Raiden's mouth opened in protest — apprentice? — but one look from her silenced him instantly.

Then, a sound broke the uneasy quietness in the area.

THUD.

The thug who'd been floating moments ago hit the ground like a sack of flour. The impact echoed down the alley. For a second, no one moved. Even the dog whimpered and scurried off.

Hilda's eyes widened, and the thugs' confusion melted into something uglier.

The bald leader took a step forward, fury twisting his face. "He's done it—kid's a witch or a demon! You will pay for this!"

The others surged behind him, their fear making them reckless.

Hilda immediately dropped to the fallen man's side, fingers pressed to his neck, her healer's instincts kicking in. She worked quickly, calm and professional even under the weight of hostile glares.

"Still breathing," she murmured, half to herself. "Fainted from shock, perhaps…"

She turned sharply toward Raiden, eyes narrowing in accusation and disbelief.

"Raiden. What did you do?"

He threw up his hands. "Nothing! I didn't— I couldn't have— I'm still trying to make Healing Touch work perfectly. It's not me, really."

Her gaze flickered with doubt, but after a heartbeat, she seemed to sense the truth. She straightened, brushing dust from her robes. "This isn't his doing," she said evenly to the men. "He couldn't have produced that kind of effect."

But the words only fueled their anger.

The bald leader snarled, veins bulging on his temple. "An apology? We don't want words — we want you. Let us each have a go. One round each. That will settle it."

A murmur rippled through the alley — disbelief from bystanders, excitement from those too foolish to intervene.

Hilda's expression didn't change. She simply tilted her head, that soft smile curling her lips.

"Is that what you want?" she asked pleasantly.

Her tone was almost gentle, almost kind.

And yet, something about the stillness that followed made Raiden's spine tingle.

The thugs didn't notice — but he did.

They had no idea what kind of storm they'd just invited.

Miss Hilda's smile didn't last. It thinned into something cold and precise. "You will regret this," she said, voice small but with the force of a bell tolling.

For one breath, the alley held only the scrape of a cart wheel and a distant lute. Then she moved.

It wasn't a blur so much as a subtraction — the space between her and the nearest thug vanished in the time it took to blink.

One second she stood with herbs tucked under her arm; the next she was directly in front of the man who'd ordered them to "have a go." Her motion was so clean and fast that it read less like speed and more like inevitability.

Her first touch was surgical. Fingers found an elbow and a knee with the ease of someone who'd memorized the map of a body from the inside out.

Two quiet, precise adjustments — a twist here, a pinning pressure there — and the thug's arm failed him.

Tap! Tap!

He staggered, a howl tearing from his throat as his weight folded to one side; his leg wobbled and then gave way beneath him. He collapsed onto his face, clutching uselessly at a limb that would no longer obey.

"You crazy bitch!" A second man lunged from the flank. Hilda met him with a soft exhale and the same clinical calm.

She caught his wrist, redirected his momentum, and in the space of an instant left his shoulder a ruin of nerve and tendon that screamed with pain but did not pour blood. He hit the ground in a heap, howling, unable to rise.

The alley filled with the sounds of men discovering their bodies had betrayed them. Groans, curses, the stuttering breath of shock.

There was nothing theatrical in Hilda's method — no flurry of flashy magic, no thunderous blast. Just the precise undoing of violent intent; parts that moved were made to stop, parts that would allow fighting were made to fail. It was the work of a healer who understood anatomy the way a locksmith understands the inner tumbler of a lock: how to disable without destroying.

By the time she stepped back, three men lay crumpled and whimpering, clutching now-useless arms or legs. The leader crawled on his belly, furious and humiliated, dragging himself along with one hand as he snarled and tried to retain some shred of bravado. He looked like a man who had miscalculated the world's cruelty and found it waiting on the other side.

Those who had been watching — a few errant market-goers and nearby stall-keepers — stood frozen, eyes wide. A couple of them dared to breathe a prayer, others simply stared, the earlier bravado gone from their faces.

Hilda did not gloat. She moved through the small, stunned crowd with efficient calm, kneeling by the fallen leader and checking for pulse and breath as if she were reading a patient's chart.

"He'll live," she said without drama, "but not without consequences. Call a cart. Take him to the healer's guild. He will be cared for — and he will not walk the same as before if he ever tries this again." Her voice brooked no argument; it was the voice of someone who could both save and make someone unable to stand again.

She straightened, dusting her hands. The thugs' leader tried to rise, red-faced and desperate, but the sight of Hilda's steady, unflinching eyes cut into the last of his swagger. He fell back with a curse, the fight drained from him.

Hilda's eyes finally found Raiden. They were not angry in the way a scolding parent could be angry — they were deeper, threaded with a tired, relentless seriousness. She folded the herbs into the crook of her arm and spoke slowly so that Raiden had to lean forward to hear.

"You will suffer the same fate if you keep misbehaving," she said, low and absolute.

The words landed harder than any blow. Raiden's thrill evaporated in the space of a heartbeat. Pride and showmanship dissolved to a new sensation: the small, cold bud of fear flickering under his ribs. He had wanted to shock, to test, to see the world react. He had not wanted real injury, not on purpose — and seeing men half-broken by Hilda's hands was not the same as watching them tumble for sport.

"Power without discipline destroys both the wielder and what they claim to protect," Hilda continued. "You think this is a game. Out here… this does not stay a game. You understand me?"

He did. The truth lodged in him with uncomfortable clarity: the city did not spare the reckless. His system's glowing bar in the corner of his sight pulsed like a heartbeat and, for the first time in days, that pulsing felt less like a prize indicator and more like a metronome counting the cost of his actions.

A faint chime hummed at the edge of his vision — soft and clinical, as if the system itself had noted the shift.

[Mission Progress: 80%]

Raiden tried to force a grin and failed. Instead, he swallowed and let a quiet breath out. The alley smelled suddenly of dust and iron and the sharp tang of adrenaline.

He realized Hilda's capabilities had been grossly underestimated by the thugs — and, by extension, that his own recklessness could bring a far worse reckoning than he'd imagined.

He managed a reply that was equal parts defiance and dawning respect. "I'll be stronger," he said, voice small but steady. "I'll be careful."

Hilda's expression softened the tiniest degree, but her next words were not kinder. "You must choose what you want to be — a tool or a shield. If it's the latter, you learn restraint. You'll one day stand in front of those who rule. Have some class."

Before Raiden could answer, the rattle of armor and the clack of hooves announced the arrival of men he hadn't expected.

Goldheart guards. Their cuirasses bore the family sigil, shining in the afternoon light.

Heads turned; the alley's atmosphere changed in a blink. The thugs' remaining bravado crumbled as realization dawned on them — the small boy they'd mocked was not merely some rich brat; he was the son of a lord.

"Young Lord," one of the guards barked, voice crisp. They moved forward, eyes taking in the scene with quick, efficient appraisal.

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