The night was already mature.

A man with a pale face and dazzling mane was walking in the hallway — bag in tow — face darkened. He walked hidden by shadows as if darkness itself was his ally. Every step he took, one could hear in his bag a creaking similar to glass rubbing against glass, but weirdly enough, despite his cadence and weight, his steps made no sound.

 

His walk was steadfast, full of assurance; he appeared to not want to be seen. He perfectly emulated the persona of the one who had heavy secrets to hide, and who tried to hide even that.

Such a man was walking alone in the hallways of the mansion. After 5 minutes of such a walk, he arrived at the entrance of the residence. From there, crossing the front garden, he could go outside, and that's what he did.

None of the sense of dignified urgency and secrecy he showed earlier was visible. He walked as if without a care in the world. At the entrance stood.. lazed the guards.

He didn't need to talk as they saw him arrive; the guards arose from the daze induced by the mundane task and, after confirming they hadn't seen wrong, opened the portal in a hurry. This man went outside. He wandered for about 20 more minutes outside of his residence — seeming to gallivant with no specific goal.

Soon, he had even left the vicinity of the darkness clan’s mountain range, a region where all the families excelling in darkness magic affiliated with the Balmungs lived.

And was now in a forest.

This man soon stopped.

Then, as if suddenly taken by rage, materialized wings — readying himself for battle.

Wings so dark the night itself seemed contain in them, so dark that their deployment was in the current environment invisible, this man with glorious wings was obviously Nathanael Balmung.

 

He then said, without turning — still showing his back to them — a voice brimming with confidence, "I am impressed by the tenacity of you, rats!"

He was mocking them, taunting them, even.

"You ungrateful fools, biting the hands that feed you?"

While his earlier words dripping with sarcasm still held a trace of playfulness, his words were now full of malice.

"Come get me now, unless you want to die as fools."

At these words, 5 smoke bombs flew from behind him right to the ground, thrown or rather abandoned by their pursuers as they fled in different directions.

"FUCKING COWARDS!" he howled, before sighing "Yet again what did I expect...'"

They tried their best to hide their energy and flee, but in the face of such a powerful master, this effort was vain; their mana pools, as visible as black on white.

In the dark night, Nathanael could see five yellow clouds of mana flying in diametrically opposite directions.

Lightning users.

"Eh thankfully, it's still doable," He said, sighing again, but this time in relief.

He then pulled out a metallic boomerang, light but sturdy, and threw it accurately at a target hiding behind a tree at about 20 meters away from him.

The boomerang hit something.

Behind the tree was a sixth spy, a young lad who was planning to make use of the confusion to stay hidden while the master ran around, subduing his companions. If the winged hound had been any more aggravated, he might have missed this detail; but then he wouldn't have been called the winged hound.

The boomerang drew a perfect arc, avoiding trees and rocks alike, and slit through the neck of the crafty man.

"Uh, what?" He said, as he couldn't even realize what had happened.

The cut was so perfect that his head didn't fall instantly. He only then realized how foolish he had been to make such a man his enemy. His heart was still beating and as blood came from his circulatory organ into his head, he, well, his head was propelled into the sky in a gory mess.

"No... way," said a disembodied head in midair before his eyes dimmed.

"In the next life, know your place. " His fully metallic boomerang came back tasting more metallic than ever and landed in his dark-mana-coated hand.

"One down, five to go," and as he flew towards the next of the six spies, he sighed — yet again.

[…]

That same night, in the very same sky.

"What a pain..."

"These damned Zephyria bastards, I will teach you what it entails to mess with the Balmungs.”

He was grumbling in the air, flying at supersonic speed. Cursing the name of these fiends, and another of the 7 Great Families. The spies that had just been subdued had all died powerless in front of the terrifying strength of this merciless hunter.

He was now flying back toward the mansion of the Balmungs. While he had known for a while about spies in his ranks, he did little as he had bigger fishes to fry, letting them stay and feeding them fake intel when appropriate.

However, now things were different.

The powerful Balmung family had an heir with no potential.

Such information being leaked to other families would have annoying consequences. It would have been one thing if he had simply been untalented as with elixirs and some more nurturing, he would have at least become a respectable warrior. However, as things were now, his future as a mage was inexistent.

His core, entirely unsalvageable.

These were all the things he was thinking about on the path back to his mountain range. Once at the residence, he didn't go by the front gate; he had told the guards he would be out for the night to set up what was to follow.

He flew through over them and bifurcated towards a nearby building on the residence.

"Hey, hey, wake up," said one guard as he shook his partner.

"What..?" said the grumbling man right beside him; waking up from a long nap.

"You didn't feel that just now?"

“What the hell are you talking about,” he said, his face warping in an annoyed scowl, “that dream was so good too..” he moaned.

"Hey! It's not the time to sleep!" The first guard said, aggravated.

He had felt something terrifying fly over his head; he had no way of knowing it was his master.

"Oh, fuck off. Who would have the balls to attack here in the first place? Wake me up when something real happens," he said, “just as I was about to dive in too!” he added, annoyed — before going back to sleep with a stupid grin on his face.

“But something real JUST happened,” he said.

Silence, before soon snores…

 

During that time, Nathanael was flying cozily in the residence, going toward an auxiliary building.

This was the servant's residence; a maidhouse, so to say.

“I hope that that fool got everything set up. With this, we might be able to buy a bit more time,” he muttered, lonely in the dark sky.

He had expressly asked the fool in question to keep a window open in his quarters to facilitate his arrival.

Waiting in a fully furnished room. Were a middle-aged man with sharp hazelnut eyes and salt and pepper hairs, as well as a kid with really dark pupils and black hair.

They were discussing waiting for their important guest.

"Father, do I really have to do this?" The kid said angsty. He knew of the importance of the mission his father was giving him, but he was no fool and also felt that it would be quite a dangerous affair.

He also kept scratching his arm, as if the stress gave him hives.

"Yes, son, this mission has been imparted to us by our Lord Nathanael himself. How could we refuse?"

"This affair is bigger than you can imagine; you are contributing to protecting the life of the son of our master. What greater honor could there be?"

As he said that, a shadowy figure appeared, and from the shadows emerged a pale face with a mane of black hair.

"Indeed, what greater honor could there be?"

 

"L-Lord Nathanael," they twittered as they stood up from the bed in unison and hurried to one knee.

Nathanael observed the scene, letting it linger before he said, "Relax, relax," happy about this show of respect.

"Gregoire, I see you prepared what I asked," he said, appearing seemingly out of nowhere in front of the young boy.

"B-but of course, master!"

He didn’t react to the answer. He was in his own world, moving the head of this child around as if he was a doll.

"Simply incredible," He said, as he analyzed every feature of this young boy’s face, obviously making the boy extremely uncomfortable.

He didn’t care.

"With a wig, he'd look no different from my son,"

"Some work will have to be done to his skin to look paler, and I'd have to find a way to make his pupils darker, but besides that.."

He whistled as if he couldn’t contain his own joy.

"Fantastic job, you didn't disappoint Gregoire"

"Where'd you find such a fitting candidate?"

"Hahaha, I am glad you like it, my Lord, I didn't have to look quite far, he is my son, Jeremy."

"Your son?" said Nathanael, puzzled. He wasn't exactly close to Gregoire, but he had seen his son quite a few times and he looked nothing like this.

"Yes, my Lord," He then hurried to explain, visibly proud of what he had done.

"I had Icario from the Galvrungs, master of 1000 faces, perform surgery on his face."

"I see..." While on the surface, his expression remained unchanged, he couldn't help but swear in his head.

'That crazy fool'

"You did a good job. I will provide the temporary hair as I said. Hopefully, his own hair will grow out soon enough."

He then went toward the window, and before leaping out, he said, "Have him be ready by the birth of my next kid."

He didn’t wait for an answer.

Nathanael didn't return home yet. He had a lot to think about, and he had to stay out until morning and come back by the normal door to make his alibi make sense.

Because of the discovery of his son’s broken vessel, it had been impossible to host a naming ceremony. The matter of his imperceptible energy was already well known amongst the allied clans, but even among them, no one would expect for his son to be utterly magicless. Since at the naming ceremony, common courtesy would be for the son to demonstrate that his core was functional, hosting the ceremony was impossible.

And as he had been five for two months now, if he didn't hurry to host the event, it would be troublesome. In this world of politics, raw strength wasn't all, while in brute strength the Balmungs could without problem withstand an offensive from the other clans, if it came to light that the heir of the Balmungs was trash even among the commoners, the currently docile families would jump on the opportunity to get closer to the crown. Obviously, generations of blood ties wouldn't be broken like that, but a seed of distrust would be the first step towards a hecatomb, and he absolutely couldn't allow that to happen. Just thinking about this info leaking made him shudder.

As he hated leaving loose ends, he had made sure the evaluator who had witnessed of his son's disability would bring the secret with him to the grave. He knew the emperor and that much could he could explain away easily. 

He had considered doing the same to Gregoire; however, learning of how far he had gone to get the body double, he doubted he would ever leak info.

He was a fanatic, and while such people could be troublesome, he knew quite well of how useful they could be. He also didn't like needless killing; war was a sport, and killing was just a distasteful consequence of that passion.

 

As for his firstborn, he never left his thoughts. Even though he was disappointed, killing him would be unfair, plus he had an unsuspected talent. Still, leaving such a troublesome element roaming in the mansion would be extremely dangerous, making him rack his brains about the best solution.

 

Flying in the dark sky, like a dragon over his domain, he said, with less affection than his words, seemed to imply, "You're really making me work, son."