As the days passed, the farmlands of Raven’s Nest, alongside the southern terraces beyond the reach of most visitors flourished beyond expectations. The golden seas of wheat rippled under the morning breeze, ready for harvest. Ravens soared lazily overhead, their caws blending with the rustling of the crops below. From the high stone balcony of his keep, Corvin watched with arms folded, face unreadable, absorbing the scope of what he had built.
He had prepared well.
Beneath the fields, massive underground storage chambers had been carved out through layers of reinforced earth. These weren’t crude bunkers, but ticulously enchanted vaults lined with runes and glyphs to store. Cold runes kept rot and moisture at bay, while sorting stones catalogued and preserved crates in perfect temperature and humidity. Each vault could store the entirety of a full harvest, and two of the were already near capacity, humming softly with containnt sigils.
The wheat alone had taken ten days to reap. Each acre yielded a ton, thirty percent more than the best harvests of any known region. A hundred and fifty acres of farmland now stood as clean rows of golden stalks reduced to bundled sheaves and crates stacked to the ceiling with grains.
But the bounty did not end there.
Fruit trees, carefully cultivated in concentric orchards along the terraces, bowed under the weight of their yield. Citrus of multiple varieties, plucked with precision by his tireless labor force. Orange, bloodfruit, sweetli, grapes of multiple types and exotic sunberries from Thalasien’s southern jungles glittered like gemstones under the sun. The plant mages among his Covenant Bound maintained growth cycles that bordered on miraculous. Fruit that normally needed months now matured in weeks. So trees had already given their second round of yield.
Berry thickets had sprung to life around the natural streambeds. Mintleaf, spicewood, and goldenroot were cultivated into herb gardens, tended by lifemages whose soft chants coaxed flavor and potency from the soil. Even the bees worked for him, guided by subtle psychic pulses emitted from Synod mages, creating amber sweet honey that glowed faintly with magical warmth.
With thousands of hands under his command, silent, coordinated, and relentless the harvest ran like clockwork. No festivals. No feasting. Just the slow, steady conquest of the land.
This... was efficiency. Dominion through cultivation.
Corvin leaned slightly forward on the balcony railing, the stone warm beneath his palms. Below, long carts pulled by undead warhorses moved in lines toward the fields edges. He didn’t need to issue a command. It was already in motion. All h needed to do was transport the cartes to the warehouses beneath.
Behind him, he felt her.
Valyne’s presence was subtle, not loud nor abrupt. But to Corvin, it was as if the air shifted with her arrival. He had felt her the mont she left her chambers, her steps slow and asured today.
She no longer stord through corridors like a flaming arrow, no longer burdened with the obsessive urgency of a Synod ssenger. There was a serenity to her now, a grounded confidence. He caught himself anticipating her presence.
Valyne stepped beside him, silent at first. She rested her arms lightly on the railing beside him, her raven dark hair glowing in the sunlight. Together, they watched the harvest unfold.
"You could feed whole of Argyll," she said softly, after a mont.
"That’s the idea," Corvin replied, his voice calm, quiet. The corner of his mouth tugged, the ghost of a smile.
Her gaze drifted over the orchards and grain fields, and for a heartbeat, the world felt strangely peaceful.
Since the Ranch Sauce incident, as he had begun to refer to it privacy of his mind Valyne had beco... different. Softer, yes. But not in the way of weakness. In the way of letting one’s guard drop just enough to breathe. She still argued, still rolled her eyes, still grumbled at Kaelyn but there was sothing real beneath it now. She was being herself instead of a Synod agent.
She laughed more. Frowned with less venom. She felt like a person, not a mission.
And he liked that more than he wanted to admit.
She tilted her head slightly and glanced at him sideways. "
"Your labor force is more efficient than most noble estates I’ve toured."
Corvin shrugged. "That’s because mine don’t waste dusk getting drunk on cheap wine."
She smirked. Valyne chuckled, the sound surprisingly light. "You really are building your own kingdom."
"No," he corrected gently. "I’m building sothing better."
Wheat was only a tool in his hands like many others.
He would soon need to leave Argyll.
Nefrath called to him. The continent of ash and blood. Where infernal essence corrupted the soil and the sky roared with purple lightnings. Where demons tore each other apart for ascension and survival. There, he could test himself against the worst the realms had to offer, ascend beyond the limits of an Archmagus... and reach the level of Planarch.
Harvesting arcane nodes. Experinting with virutic strains. Expanding his army, not just in number but in rank. Every step had led to this coming journey. His goal was not to ta Befrath now was it to conquere it. It was as simple as absorbtion.
And after Nefrath, only one continent would remain unexplored.
Atheris.
The mystic realm of elental islands floating. It was the one place Corvin had yet to set foot on. And if the readings he’d gathered from all his siphons and absorbtions correct, it would offer... different nourishnt.
He smiled faintly to himself, eyes on the golden waves below.
Yes. He would reap that land too.
Eventually.
--
Far to the northeast, beyond the endless waters of the Veilborn Expanse and the storm lashed isles of the Elental Archipelago of Atheris, lay the ancient forests of Umbraveyn. There, hidden beneath a permanent curtain of mist and magic, rose the black spires of the Obsidian Gate, the hearth and mind of Umbral Synod.
Within its deepest sanctum, the Hexarchy was in session.
Planarch Sleyndros stood silent as the final line of the report was read aloud. The parchnt in his hand bore the seal of the Shadows, Synod’s elite intelligence agents. His expression soured as his eyes passed over one na in particular.
"Gareth," he said grimly, the syllables tasting of old bitterness.
The Human Arbiter had been seen visiting the command halls of Iron March personally. A clear sign he wasn’t finished with Corvin. That ant danger. Complications. Provocation. Gareth’s presence was never diplomatic, it was strategic, and always violent in intent.
Sleyndros passed the report to Dhaelora without a word and turned to Vaelorin.
"Any word from the girl?"
Vaelorin gave a slow shake of the head. "None since her departure. Last report placed her en route to Raven’s Nest. If she’s still alive, she’s already inside the castle."
Dhaelora clicked her tongue, the sound dry and sharp. "Of course the human filth is going to try sothing. They’re nothing if not stubborn when their illusions of control are shattered."
She leaned back in herthrone like seat and added, smirking, "We should send Shadows to inform the new... ’Duke’."
The word was venom laced, a parody of the human title, and yet the Hexarchy understood the significance behind it. It wasn’t just political, it was strategic.
"Yvanna didn’t grant him that title out of admiration," Sleyndros said coolly. "And I doubt it was done entirely of her own will."
He folded his long fingers together. "It’s his insurance. By anchoring himself within the Gilded Dominion, he gains legitimacy and, more importantly, a shield. Now, he’s not just a Synod asset. He’s also a noble of Argyll. That makes retaliation... complicated."
Valeroan gave a slow nod. "It’s a shield. And a sword."
"Regardless," Sleyndros continued, "we need to warn him. Gareth does not move without purpose. He will not forget Verranus, nor forgive it."
Yserith Vale, who had remained silent until now, lifted her gaze.
"Arbiter Solen has sent formal notice," she said in her typically flat tone. "He requests that both the Aurelian Dominion and the Synod submit their confird forces for the upcoming Planar Invasion."
Dhaelora’s fingers paused mid tap against her chair’s edge.
"So it begins," she muttered, eyes narrowing.
She looked to the others. "Then I ask plainly, is this why Corvin embedded himself in Argyll? So he could be listed under Human command when the invasion begins?"
The air thickened with the weight of the question.
Because the implications were vast.
Planar Invasions were not rely military ventures. They were existential contests for supremacy. The Aether gained from a conquered world did not flow evenly. It flowed to those who bled, who commanded, who conquered. And it was divided accordingly, by contribution, by rit, by destruction wrought and victory claid.
Whoever Corvin fought under, that faction would receive his share.
And Corvin was not a footnote. He was a force. A one man catalyst of annihilation.
He wielded multiple magical affinity like a scalpel or a guillotine. He had crushed the Holy Verrenate and reduced its capital to ash.
If he were listed under the Gilded Dominion, or simply Human faction, it would an that they would gain credit for every city razed, every battle won, every enemy atomized by Corvin’s will.
That was unacceptable.
"He is ours," Dhaelora hissed. "Tested, bound, and unbound by our hand."
"But he is also clever," Vaelorin said softly. "We released the chain. He is not obligated to list under the Synod unless he chooses to."
"Then we must give him reason," Sleyndros said, his voice cool but decisive. "Send the Shadows. Send Valyne an urgent prompt. Make him understand what it costs to let the humans list him as their force."
--
Far across the north of Thalasien in the twilight glazed Groves of Aeloria, another cloacked figure was reaching the sa grim conclusion.
Whispershade, master of the Silent Aurora, stood cloaked in living shadow. His presence seed to absorb light, casting long distortions across the moss covered wood beneath him. The groves around him pulsed with old power. These were lands that rembered the world before empires, before borders.
Before even the divide of Elven race.
In front of him hovered a living map of Verthalis, an intricate weave of light cast by an ancient rootbound device. Magical runes shifted across its surface, marking troop movents, leyline pulses, and most critically, the location of key figures. One such figure glowed brighter than the rest, pulsing softly within the borders of Argyll: Corvin Blackmoor.
Whispershade studied the glowing rune with a quiet intensity. Behind his hood, he whispered more to the wind than to the assembled observers around him: "He ans to fight under a human banner."
The thought tasted like poison.
Corvin Blackmoor, a weapon of the Synod, now reborn as a Duke within the Gilded Dominion. A rcenary no longer, but a noble. A symbol.
And if he was listed under Argyll’s forces for the upcoming Planar Invasion, the consequences would echo across Verthalis.
The Planar Invasion was more than a military endeavor. It was an economic, magical, and political upheaval. Aether, the most precious substance in the known realms, would be harvested from the conquered world. But it would not be shared equally. It would be distributed, by blood shed and victories won.
Who Corvin chose to align with would determine who reaped the lion’s share of Aether. And a figure of his magnitude, capable of annihilating cities, was not a minor asset. He was a force of nature.
He was a storm.
And if the humans, those opportunistic apes of war claid his strength under their banner, the Aether flow would shift disastrously in their favor. Centuries of Elven supremacy in arcane standing could be undermined. Balance, once lost, would not be easily restored.
Whispershade’s thoughts flicked between potential futures like cards shuffled through smoke. He saw human mages infused with stolen Aether. Human Planarchs rising from the ashes of Verranus. They did not knew the exact number of Arhmagus of Planarchs of the humans.
No. That outco could not be allowed.
Two ssaes will be sent.
The first ssage was drafted for the Trio: Vaethryl Ilisennor, Tharien Vossiral, and Liraen of the Bloomwardens, his three senior field operatives already stationed within sight of Raven’s Nest.
The words were urgent:
"Convince him. Persuade him. Remind him who he is. Use every tool, words, gold, mories, seduction if needed. He must not be listed under Argyll. If we cannot reclaim him for the Aurelian Dominion, then ensure the Synod does. But he cannot fall into the humans’ greedy hands."
The second ssage, sealed in black wax bearing the sigil of the Mother Tree, was sent to far more dangerous address. The Obsidian Gate.
The anings were layered. Every mber of their wayward brethren would understand. Corvin wasn’t just a question of loyalty. He was now a question of survival, of influence, of dominance in the age to co.
The consequences of failure were unspoken, but understood with crystal clarity.
Corvin Blackmoor was more than a wildcard.
He was leverage. He was legacy. He was power incarnate.
And no one, no High Elf, no Dark elf intended to let that kind of force fall into human hands without a reckoning.
Too much was at stake.
Far above the grove, a flock of spectral owls scattered, ssengers of the Aurora loosed upon the winds.
The ga had begun.
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