For forty-five minutes, they moved through the thinning forest in silence.

Iris led with a carefully intentional pace. Not fast enough to leave him, not slow enough to help him. Just close enough to be seen with him, a testament to her Lockhart duty.

Behind her, Ronan followed, leaning on the walking stick of compacted ice she had formed. It was a crude tool, but it served its purpose..

At first, the silence was a relief. When he spoke, his gratitude was too loud, his attempts at humour were shameless, and his presence felt more like a burden than a companion.

But as the minutes stretched on, the silence itself grew its own sharp teeth. It was empty. Too empty.

Iris kept her eyes forward, but her focus drifted back to the man limping behind her. His injury had seemed real enough. The leg bent at an unnatural angle, the sharp intake of breath when he put weight on it, the strained mana circulation she had sensed when she first found him.

But the performance had flaws.

Sometimes his limp was a heavy, pathetic drag. Other times, for a few clean steps on even ground, it was almost forgotten. The inconsistency was subtle. Not enough to be an accusation.

A figure stepped out from behind a thick, moss-covered trunk ahead.

Iris stopped, mana flaring automatically in her palms.

Behind her, Ronan’s shuffling ceased.

Darius Vale. He was not alone. Two other students, their expressions alert and their posture coiled for a fight, flanked him. His gaze moved from Iris to Ronan, and his eyes narrowed. Then, a slow smile spread across his face. It held no warmth. Only a sharp, predatory recognition. This was a meeting he had been waiting for.

"Well, look at this," Darius said, his voice a low rumble of satisfaction. "I didn’t think I’d find you so soon. And in such a convenient state."

Ronan shifted his weight, his expression melting into a performance of nervous confusion. "Do I know you?"

He made himself look like a cornered student, but Iris knew better. This was Ronan’s leader during the inter-class war. How could Ronan not possibly know him?

"Don’t play that game with me, Ashbourne. You know exactly what you did."

Iris’s gaze flickered to Ronan, watching his expression carefully. It betrayed nothing and he didn’t respond.

Darius noticed her watching. His tone shifted, becoming more formal.

"Lockhart. You don’t need to involve yourself. Our business is with him." He gestured dismissively at Ronan. "Leave, and we won’t trouble you."

It was a good offer. A perfect one. Darius would eliminate Ronan for her. She would avoid dirtying her hands, sidestep the political mess of nullifying an engagement with violence, and rid herself of a persistent inconvenience.

She should accept.

"Very well." With a faint sigh that conveyed just the right amount of noble reluctance, Iris stepped aside.

Darius gave her a short, appreciative nod.

That was interesting. With Ronan, his anger was a living thing. With her, he was all business. Grace had mentioned something similar during the war. Darius Vale was emotional, but he was not a fool.

Iris folded her arms. She was not watching Darius. She was watching Ronan.

His reaction was textbook.

Surprise when she moved aside. A flicker of genuine fear as Darius and his men closed in. Then, a shaky attempt at negotiation.

It looked like it was ripped straight out of some psychology textbook detailing how people reacted to certain situations.

"Look, whatever you think I did–"

Darius cut him off. Iris could not hear every word, but the shape of the conversation was clear.

Darius wanted an apology. He wanted acknowledgement that what Ronan did during the inter-class war was wrong.,

Ronan gave him something else. His shoulders slumped. He answered in a quiet, subdued tone that sounded almost apologetic, but lacked sincerity. It was oil on a fire.

Darius’s anger flared.

"You think that’s enough?" His gaze dropped to Ronan’s injured leg, and his expression hardened, becoming heavier, more personal. "An eye for an eye, is that it? A broken leg for a broken leg?"

So that was it. The ugly symmetry. The wound Darius had suffered when Class S captured him.

Ronan shrugged, his reply too quiet for Iris to catch.

Whatever he said, it shattered the last of Darius’s restraint.

"You–" Darius stepped forward, his fist pulled back, mana gathering around his knuckles.

Darius was about to attack him.

Ronan closed his eyes, as if bracing for the inevitable blow.

No. Not completely.

Through the thin slit of his lashes, Iris saw his gaze.

He was not looking at Darius.

He was looking at her.

Waiting.

Iris’s expression remained a mask of ice.

So that was the game. He had never believed she would let the attack land. Or, at least, he was willing to bet his face on the fine print of their political obligations.

He was calling her bluff.

She snapped her fingers.

Ice, crystalline and sharp, bloomed around Darius’s fist a hair’s breadth from Ronan’s cheek. His arm locked mid-swing. The sudden stop sent a jolt through his body.

"What–" Darius turned to her, his face furious.

"Enough," Iris’s voice was colder than the ice that held him.

She snapped her fingers again.

Ice shot across the forest floor, encasing his feet and locking him to the ground. A heartbeat later, his two companions cried out as thin, vicious needles of ice pierced their thighs, deep enough to shred muscle and ruin their concentration. They collapsed, their spells dissolving. Before they could recover, she expanded the ice, sealing their bodies from the waist down. Darius fought, his free hand flaring with mana, but with his stance broken and his punching arm trapped, he had no leverage.

It was over in seconds.

She walked forward, and took their nodes one by one. The crimson light of their sigils shattered.

Their protests were cut short as they vanished.

The points flowed into her node.

Iris turned back to Ronan.

He stared at her, his face pale, his void-black eyes wide with what looked, for a moment, like genuine shock.

"I... I thought you were going to let him–" His gratitude was a wave of cloying relief. He looked at her as if she had just pulled him from the jaws of a beast.

Iris scoffed. She would have loved to let Darius eliminate him. Not kill him, of course. Just remove him. But Ronan had made that impossible. The event was being broadcast. He was her fiancé, however technical. Letting him be beaten down while she watched would have been a political stain. Intervening made her look proper. Dutiful.

And it gave her three eliminations. Ronan had served a purpose after all.

A shimmer in the air caught her eye. The boundary. The outer edge of the zone was contracting, the air buzzing with compressed mana as the battlefield shrank. Soon, the survivors would be forced into the center.

Good. The sooner they found a real fight, the sooner she could find a clean way to be rid of him.

She turned without a word and started walking toward the heart of the forest.

Behind her, the now familiar sound began again. A crunch. A drag. A crunch. Ronan, the lost dog, limping dutifully at her heels.

Iris did not look back.

The scene still bothered her. And the way he looked at her when Darius was about to attack, like he knew the situation perfectly...

No.

She was done playing his game.

Now, she just needed an opponent strong enough to take him off her hands for good.