Infiltrating the Octagon (4)
Dawn broke over the city. Morning light filtered into the shabby little room, chasing away the shadows of the night.
Worried that the glare might disrupt Lumia's fragile slumber, Cain carefully drew the makeshift curtain he had fashioned from an old scrap of cloth. Yet as he pulled it shut, he noticed ragged holes puncturing the fabric. Shaking his head at the shoddy craft, he took a needle and thread, quietly stitching the gaps closed until not a speck of light could slip through.
That should keep the light out.
Smiling faintly with satisfaction, Cain tied off the thread—unaware that Lumia had already been awake for some time. Gently, with practiced tenderness, he tucked the blanket around her shoulders and brushed stray strands of hair from her forehead before slipping out into the chilly morning air to fetch breakfast and medicine.
The moment the door clicked shut, Lumia opened her eyes. Her fingers lightly traced the edge of the blanket where Cain's hands had just lingered.
"Coming home hurt again..." she murmured under her breath.
Though Cain tried his best to hide it, Lumia couldn't help but scrutinize his body every time he returned. At first, he had merely arrived covered in grime and dust. Soon after came dark bruises, followed by nasty cuts that appeared with alarming frequency. It was the sight of those worsening wounds that had driven her to tears only yesterday, pleading with him to give up on her.
This time, his clothes had been thoroughly soaked in blood. She didn't need to ask to know how severe the battle had been.
She resolved to give him an earful the moment he returned. She would tell him to stop getting hurt on her account, and swear that if he returned covered in blood again, she wouldn't touch a single drop of the medicine he brought. More than anything, she couldn't bear watching him destroy himself for her sake—especially when she knew better than anyone that ordinary medicine could never cure what ailed her.
As if answering her thoughts, the front door swung open.
The firm lecture she had prepared, however, evaporated like morning dew at the sudden sight of a stranger standing in the doorway.
A black-haired young man. Someone she had never laid eyes on in her life.
Terror seized her chest. No one aside from Cain and herself was supposed to know this hideout existed. The mere presence of an intruder here was a nightmare brought to life.
Biting her lower lip until it stung, Lumia forced herself to feign composure.
"If your goal is to take me in... please, just take me quickly."
Her voice trembled, but she forced the words out. Under normal circumstances, asking for someone's identity would come first, but she had no such luxury. She was the sole daughter of a ruined noble house branded with treason. She could never forgive herself if Cain were dragged down as an accomplice on her account.
The black-haired man, however, merely crossed his arms and leaned casually against the wall, uttering words that shattered her fragile resolve.
"Taking you in wouldn't change anything. The one I have business with is Cain."
"What...?"
Lumia froze. The man spoke as though he was intimately aware of Cain's comings and goings. The timing was too precise to be a coincidence—arriving the exact moment Cain stepped out. It meant their little sanctuary had been compromised from the start.
Desperation stripped away the last of her pride. There was only one card left to play.
"I beg of you... Please, take me instead! Just let Cain go! He's innocent in all of this, I swear...!"
She dropped to her knees on the worn floorboards, bowing her head low in supplication. She wanted to be thrown into custody immediately if it meant shielding Cain from the penalty of harboring a fugitive. Powerless and bedridden, begging was all she had left.
"Please... I'm begging you. Just leave Cain out of this..."
Junon watched her in silence. The sheer desperation in her voice was palpable. To confess her guilt and plead for arrest without a second thought spoke volumes about how deeply she cared for Cain. But at this rate, an actual conversation would be impossible. Calming her down had to come first.
"I didn't come here to report anyone," Junon said plainly.
Lumia's eyes remained clouded with suspicion. To earn her trust, he needed to lay the cards on the table.
"You can't be completely ignorant of what Cain has been doing," Junon continued. "He must have come back in a terrible state today, right?"
Lumia's expression faltered. A look of profound sorrow washed over her face, and she gave a faint, miserable nod.
"I'm here because I want you to convince Cain to walk away from that place. Along with a few other matters we need to discuss."
"Are you... being serious?"
"If you don't believe me, I can tell you exactly where he's been going. He's been serving as a nobleman's plaything at the largest underground gambling den in Mirpark Province."
"What?!"
Shock drained the remaining color from Lumia's face. As Junon calmly laid out the brutal reality of the Octagon, Lumia bit her lip so hard blood nearly welled, unable to conceal the crushing despair that gripped her heart.
That should be more than enough for her to rein him in, Junon thought.
Right on cue, heavy footsteps echoed from the alleyway. The door banged open.
"Lumia, are you awa—"
"You back?"
Cain had walked in holding a warm package of food, looking lighter than usual, but the cheerful expression vanished instantly the moment his eyes landed on the intruder.
"Run, Lumia!"
Instinct bypassed reason. Dropping the medicine and parcel, Cain lunged forward like a cornered beast, intent only on subduing the threat before him. He was completely deaf to Lumia's frantic cries from the bed.
Yet even in his blind fury, the scream that tore from her throat finally pierced his haze.
"I told you to calm down!! Can't you hear me?!"
A medicine vial clattered against the wall and rolled across the floor. In an instant, the room fell dead silent, as though time itself had frozen.
"He... he didn't come to report us," Lumia gasped, clutching her chest. "So let go of him. Now."
"Lumia, but...!"
How could he trust that? If this man had been sent by the nobility, Lumia would be hauled away in chains to face execution or rot in a pitch-black cell. But Lumia's eyes were blazing with a fierce, desperate conviction.
"If you disobey me one more time, I will walk straight to the guards and turn myself in. Let go of him."
"A-All right..."
Cain's hands loosened and fell away. No matter who gave an order, Lumia was the one person whose word was absolute law to him.
He's still entirely on guard, Junon noted, watching the young man's clenched fists. Cain glared at him with undisguised wariness, but he wouldn't dare attack again with Lumia standing guard.
"Cain," Lumia demanded, her voice trembling with barely suppressed fury. "Where have you really been going under the excuse of earning money?"
"Uh... what? Just manual labor, like I—"
"Are you lying to my face now?! Letting yourself get played like a fool by the nobles! Do you think I want to live seeing you come back covered in blood every single day?!"
"Lumia, that's..."
As expected, Cain had concealed the truth of the Octagon from her. A girl with her gentle disposition would never have permitted it in a million years. Looking at her, Junon was briefly reminded of someone else.
This discussion was bound to take a while. Lumia looked ready to drag every dirty secret out of him piece by piece.
"Call me when you two are done talking," Junon said quietly, stepping toward the exit. Normally, he might have stayed to eavesdrop on the details, but there was no need. With his head bowed in defeat, Cain would have no choice but to confess the whole truth.
Stepping out into the crisp air, Junon let out a small sigh. "Guess this sets the stage." Manipulating people's emotions like that always left a foul taste in his mouth. It wasn't something he cared to do twice.
Before long, a thoroughly chastened Cain opened the door and stepped outside, murmuring that they had finished speaking.
Back in his right mind, Cain bowed repeatedly, offering apologies over and over. He explained that he had assumed Junon was a bounty hunter aiming to capture Lumia for a reward, which was why he had lost his temper and attacked without warning. Junon brushed it off; seeing how much the two meant to each other, he had anticipated as much. More importantly, he knew Cain was fundamentally a decent guy, which was why he hadn't bothered to retaliate in the first place.
With tensions settled, it was time to get down to business.
To explain how they had ended up in this squalor, Lumia formally introduced herself.
The winter before last... the sole daughter of the Penarive baronial house, ruined under the false charge of colluding with Sirens...
She was indeed the wanted fugitive, Lumia Penarive. It made sense why Cain had reacted like a wild beast backed into a corner. Two winters ago, rumors that Sirens were kidnapping citizens had been treated as verified fact when several corpses were discovered in their territory, and the Penarive family, accused of aiding them, was condemned and imprisoned.
"Since then, we had no choice but to stay on the run," Lumia explained softly. "From Lemtert Village to the Jaquilia Hills, then circling all the way around the Tevizia Coast before finally arriving here."
That was practically a full clockwise circuit of Schytz Province. They must have endured unimaginable hardships along the way. To be stricken with a debilitating disease on top of that, forced to rely entirely on her sole companion for survival—the psychological burden on her shoulders must have been crushing.
All the more reason she needed to hear this.
"I understand your situation," Junon said. "Which is why I'm telling you, Cain: you need to stop going back to the Octagon."
"I don't care what happens to my body!" Cain protested instantly. "Lumia's illness comes first—!"
"I'm telling you not to go for Lumia's sake. I'm not nagging you; I'm dead serious. That isn't an illness you can cure with money."
Junon had clocked it the moment Lumia raised her voice earlier. Though the room wasn't freezing, her lips carried a distinct bluish tint, and he had caught glimpses of pale blue blemishes mottling her neck and left shoulder. Those were the unmistakable hallmarks of the infection.
"Lumia," Junon addressed her directly. "You used to be able to wield mana, didn't you? But right now, you can't harness a single trace."
"How did you...?"
"...Because that's the nature of the disease. It spreads through mana. That's why every physician you saw shook their head in defeat."
At some point, Lumia must have used magic to slay a demonic beast, only to be showered in parasitic micro-spawn during the confrontation. Though she mentioned hiding in Lemtert Village, the primary vector had almost certainly originated near the Penarive estate in northern Schytz.
In his past life, Junon knew why the Schytz Great Subjugation Campaign had dragged on for so long, and why the military had ultimately chosen an aggressive, scorched-earth offensive rather than a defensive hold: it was entirely because of the disease ravaging Lumia's body right now.
The Lemterte Plague. Those defending the front lines at Lemtert Village developed blue mottling across their skin as their stamina eroded, their internal mana systematically devoured by the parasites until they couldn't even stand, let alone fight. Left untreated, the infection drained every scrap of magic until the host perished in agony.
To survive, Lumia needed the antidote, but...
There's no way it exists at this point in time, Junon thought grimly.
A cure for the Lemterte Plague would only surface in the Principality well after the great subjugation campaign concluded, and even then, supply was so strictly limited that nobles had to pay exorbitant fortunes to secure a single dose. It wasn't until Professor Dahlia deciphered the plague's biological source and synthesized a new medicine that the nightmare ended. The members of Team Tembris had suffered immensely under its shadow in the past, etching the horror of the disease permanently into Junon's mind.
It was cruel, but sugarcoating reality would help no one.
"If things continue like this, Lumia's mana will be completely consumed, and she will die. Knowing that, do you still intend to throw your life away in that arena?"
The words fell like lead weights. Faced with Junon's unvarnished, brutal assessment, Cain's eyes welled with furious tears.
"How... how can you expect me to just accept that?!" Cain shouted, his voice cracking. "Are you telling me to stand by cold-bloodedly and watch Lumia die?!"
He knew the truth deep down. He simply couldn't bear to face it.
"I won't do it! I'll do whatever it takes! I'll earn money in the Octagon and buy whatever rare concoctions exist, even if there's no proof they'll work! Telling me to sit idly and watch her slip away is sadistic! I don't care if you're an upperclassman, you have no right to strip away my choice!!"
Watching Cain rail against an unchangeable fate struck an uncomfortably familiar chord in Junon's chest. It looked all too much like his own past self, desperately fighting reality. It was precisely because Cain was so utterly desperate that he had allowed himself to be dragged into the bloodsport of the Octagon. To Cain, Lumia's life was worth more than his own.
Which meant he would listen to reason now.
"I'll tell you this much," Junon said evenly. "Rather than feeding her that snake oil, letting me step in right now is a far better option."
"...What did you say?"
"The spots on her skin, the blue tint on her lips—they're textbook symptoms of mana depletion caused by the parasite. Why do you think I know this in such detail?"
Cain's eyes snapped wide. To his ears, that sounded like a claim of cure.
"Don't misunderstand," Junon cut in before Cain could speak. "It won't cure her. All I can do is buy time until an actual remedy is synthesized. Even if I intervene, I can't guarantee how much time it will give her. Will you still take it?"
Cain fell silent. Junon's sober warning gradually chilled the feverish panic in his chest.
Deep down, he had known all along. Lumia's condition was only deteriorating. No matter how much coin he spent on expensive tinctures, nothing had slowed the disease down. His desperate gamble on the Octagon had been driven by rumors that nobles possessed secret panaceas. The arena's announcer had spotted his desperation, dangling the promise of an impossibly expensive cure to lure him into the cage.
In truth, the Octagon had given him nothing. He had no real proof such medicine even existed, and by now, he knew in his gut that those parasites would never hand it over even if they had it.
Swallowing his pride, Cain bowed deeply once more.
"I will do whatever you ask. Even if it's only buying time... please. Help her."
"Are you certain?"
"Yes. I will stake everything on the man who actually shows me a tangible chance."
He had made the sensible choice. Junon then turned his gaze toward the bed. "Lumia, I'd like to hear your thoughts as well."
Lumia had wanted to ask what Junon planned to demand from Cain in return. If he meant to thrust Cain into an ordeal worse than the Octagon, she would refuse on the spot. But the unease didn't last. Without Junon's intervention, they would still be drowning in lies, completely blind to the true nature of her affliction.
"I will follow Cain's decision," she said softly. "Provided that..."
"Don't worry. I have no intention of running him into the ground."
"...Thank you, Sunbae-nim."
"All right. Relax your body, Lumia."
"Pardon? Why my hand...?"
"Sunbae-nim...? What are you doing...?"
Both of them blinked in confusion as Junon reached out, taking Lumia's fragile hand in his own. He closed his eyes, focusing his senses inward.
They knew he meant no harm, yet the sight was baffling—until the change manifested before their very eyes.
"Uh... ah...?"
"The blemishes...!"
The blue mottling marring Lumia's pale skin noticeably shrank, and a faint, healthy flush returned to her hollow cheeks. The method was remarkably simple: Junon was directly replenishing the mana that the parasites had devoured, substituting his own energy to stabilize her circuits. Under ordinary circumstances, pumping mana into a Lemterte host was sheer madness, but there were always exceptions to every rule.
"I've infused mana to temporarily halt the progression," Junon said, releasing her hand. "It isn't a cure, so wielding magic remains strictly forbidden."
"Wait... doesn't that mean you've been infected too?!"
"My constitution happens to be immune to this plague," Junon replied smoothly, though his sharp gaze flicked toward Cain. "Don't go asking anyone else to try this, Cain. Make one wrong move and you'll not only accelerate her symptoms, but the person helping her will catch it and die."
The warning was aimed squarely at the younger man, nipping any foolish ideas in the bud. Junon had done all he could for now; if her body failed to hold out even with this, there was nothing more anyone in this era could do.
"I've done my part," Junon said, turning toward the doorway. "Now it's your turn to help me, Cain."
It was time to pay another visit to the Octagon.