Wonderful Insane World-Chapter 182: Pawns that Bites

The fire crackled weakly in front of him, a glowing red circle in the middle of a camp on edge. Night had fallen, heavy and warm, sticky with exhaustion and dried blood. Dylan remained motionless, his silhouette hunched as if he were mourning ten men. A perfect image of a traumatized survivor.

But in his head, chaos raged.

He had to leave. Before the interrogation. Before the curious glances turned into suspicion. He knew how these guys operated: a lone survivor, a vague report, and above all, a mark that shouldn’t be there. They’d slit him open under a flashlight to see what he was really hiding.

His hand clenched around the gem beneath his shirt. It pulsed slowly. As if it, too, was thinking.

"Damn it, I screwed up..." he thought. "I was good, yeah. Too good. The kind of lie that reeks of skill, not panic. The kind they don’t forget."

His gaze slid toward the supply tents, where Alka was supposed to be. No way he could talk to her. Too dangerous. But she was sharp. She’d notice his absence. And maybe... maybe she’d be quick enough to pass a word to Gael, that old fox who loved nothing more than botched operations. If anyone could clean up the mess behind him, it was him.

All he had left was one small hope: that Alka could lie as well as he could. Or better.

But he couldn’t ask too much of her. She had her cover to maintain. She wouldn’t risk it all for some grunt, even an infiltrator, even... even him.

"I’m screwed if they catch me. Pilaf?" He gritted his teeth. "They’ll skin me alive just for fun. They’ll know I’m bluffing. They’ll smell this thing on me. This damn gem..."

He didn’t even know if it was helping him or dragging him into the abyss.

He could have run alone. Stolen a uniform, slipped into the eastbound convoy. Played the wounded. Played dead, if he had to.

But this gem... it felt different from any other he’d encountered before. Dylan suspected it might even be more important than the soldiers and the officer themselves.

He wanted to show it to his mission partner—she, at least, would have answers—but...

He remembered her gaze, sharp, cold, but not cruel. She had that dangerous calm of people who always expect betrayal. She’d known he was bluffing from the start. But she’d kept him by her side.

"You tell yourself she’s just another pawn... but she seems like a pawn that bites," he thought.

And now? What would she think? That he’d messed up? Probably. But he wanted to believe she’d also realize he’d found something. Something big enough to justify the chaos he was about to unleash.

"Pass the message to Gael," he murmured inwardly. "Tell him I’m taking another route. That the gem chose me, or that I stole it, whatever. Tell him I’ll be caught and executed if he doesn’t act."

Dylan rose slowly, like an old man bent by exhaustion, and stepped away from the fire. No one was really watching him. The soldiers were too busy digesting the marshal’s orders and their own fear. The camp was in transition, convoys preparing, guards shifting posts.

"I’ll slip out during the wounded transfer. Or among the livestock being moved. There’s always traffic between storage areas and the wagons."

He spotted an unguarded supply tent. Behind it, an old sentry’s coat tossed over a crate. Perfect. He threw it over his shoulders. The sleeves too long, the fabric rough, but it would do.

He still had some blood on his hands. It made his act more convincing. Wounded, lost, dirty.

A plan was forming. Improvised, of course. Classic Dylan.

He cast one last glance at the dying flames. Over there, men laughed with nervous laughter, the kind that comes before orders too big to comprehend. The kind exchanged to forget the ground cracking beneath their boots.

He murmured, almost without thinking:

"You didn’t laugh, Captain Henslow... Not until I slit your throat."

A brief silence.

"Sorry, old man... wasn’t personal."

Then he turned on his heel, disappearing into the camp’s gloom, where the marshal’s orders hadn’t yet formed barriers.

He moved through the shadows. Not like a fugitive. But like a survivor on a mission.

In his skull, one certainty, vibrating like a scream:

"I can’t turn back. But I can move forward... until they catch me. And when that day comes, I’d better have more than just a pretty lie."

The fire was slowly dying. Small embers glowed like the last beats of an uneasy heart. Dylan had stayed there, almost frozen, elbows on his knees, shoulders slumped. The flickering light barely grazed his face—too calm for an ordinary survivor, but just tired enough to go unnoticed.

His back was soaked, and not just from the camp’s sticky heat. He was sweating what the others couldn’t see: silent panic. The adrenaline was fading, but clarity was skyrocketing.

"I have to get out. Before dawn."

He slowly dragged a hand over his face, pausing at his aching jaw. The gem still pulsed under his shirt, as if sharing his thoughts. Or provoking them.

"I don’t have the luxury of playing the wounded hero. If I hide, I end up interrogated. If I play dumb, there’ll always be an Awakened who senses something’s off."

He saw the scene again—the officer falling, his throat slit. That frozen look of incomprehension. And most of all, he saw his own hand.

Not the one that trembled. The one that cut.

"And if I hadn’t had this gem? He’d have killed me. Me, or someone else. And that’s something no one in this camp needs to know."

He sighed, long and deep. As if the air was suddenly too thick to breathe.

He had options, really. He recited them like a bitter prayer:

Option 1: Slip into a diverted convoy. Play the wounded. Hope to slip out with the others.

Too risky. They’ll call me in to testify tomorrow. The sergeant said so. I’m already in the records. I can’t just vanish.

Option 2: Play dead. Hide in a wagon with a body, or under a tarp.

Credible one time in ten. And if an Awakened senses me? If they sense the gem? Too many unknowns.

Option 3: Trigger a disruption—a fire, a diversion—and escape in the chaos.

Possible. But I’d need to know the exact layout of the perimeter. Patrols. Number of sentries. And I don’t.

Option 4: Trust Alka. Count on her to clear a path, cover his escape.

Still in the realm of fantasy. She’s undercover, yeah. But she won’t burn her cover for a shaky pawn. Unless she thinks he’s got something valuable.

He pressed a hand to his chest. The gem pulsed faintly, as if answering him.

"You. Maybe you’re my bargaining chip. Or my death sentence. I don’t know."

The wind had picked up, a warm current thick with ash and dust, as if the earth itself was coughing up the remnants of the day.

Dylan moved forward, hunched under the oversized coat, boots scraping against dry stones. He walked diagonally, cutting between wagons, avoiding lanterns and voices. Just another wounded man, dirty, lost. Nothing more believable.

He melted into the scenery. Until the scenery closed in on him.

A sound cracked behind him. Not a shout. Not an alarm. Just a rustle. Light. But too precise. Too deliberate.

He didn’t even have time to turn.

Something struck his back—a dull shockwave that shot up his spine, numbed his legs, and sent him crashing to his knees. He tried to scream, but an arm was already wrapping around his neck, tight as a wet rope.

A soft voice whispered in his ear:

"What did you think, Dylan? That we wouldn’t anticipate your little Plan B?"

He struggled, lashed out, but a boot slammed into his ribs. His breath caught in his throat. He collapsed sideways, hands already hauling him up, slamming him against a wall. His head hit a crate, a splinter slicing his brow.

The taste of iron filled his mouth.

He made out three figures around him. Three straight, calm silhouettes. Too calm to be ordinary soldiers. Awakened. The kind you don’t notice in a crowd because they’ve learned to disappear before they even appear.

The first drove a knee into his ribs, just enough to bend his spine without knocking him out.

"We’ve been watching you since the silo. Thought you’d bite sooner. But you’re the cautious type, huh?"

Dylan spat a thread of red saliva. He tried to rise, one last spark of defiance in his eyes.

"I’m... just a damn laborer..."

But a hand grabbed his braids. Brutally. Forced his head up.

And then, he saw her.

A silhouette stepping into view against the light, boots far too clean for this mud-caked camp. A light, almost dancing step. The hood pulled over her shoulders.

And that voice.

"It’s him. Take him away."

His heart lurched in his chest. He knew that voice. That precise tone. Almost affectionate in its cruelty.

He tried to speak, to ask, to understand. But the next blow was a leather glove against his temple, and the world swayed.