CHAPTER 237: SEEDS OF DISSENT

Minuvae stood before the Elven Elder Council once more as she looked up at them, high above her on their perches. Looking down on the rest of them as if they were some higher being. She grit her teeth as she felt the rage bubble up inside her.

Earlier, when she was fighting she was attacked by this hound-like Hive Beast. It was fast and it killed about ten of her fellows before Minuvae just barely brought it down with the help of two others.

Minuvae remembers approaching it, its white armoured body twitching on large branch of the trees. It had been tearing through the canopy, it was alone no others. But Minuvae felt a deep seated terror when she realised the Hive had the ability to scale the trees with absurd agility.

Yet there was only one here…

As Minuvae approached the dying beast with her dagger outstretched the beast started to talk.

Ego…

Minuvae paused at those words, she felt a fresh wave of terror crawl up her spine. The Hive Beast was smart when it fought, but she never expected it could talk.

So fragile…

The beast said and Minuvae approached. “What?”

Your traditions…

So weak…

Break under the slightest pressure…

“Ego, what did you mean by that?” Minuvae pressed.

The beast released a weak death rattle as it twitched on the ground. Its body was covered with so many arrows it looked like a porcupine but it still defiantly clung to life even as its blood soaked the bark beneath it.

Confuse tradition…

With wisdom…

Ego…

Then the beast let out a rattling breath and went limp. It was dead but Minuvae stood there like she was the one that had been struck a mortal blow. She knew what that creature was talking about, her people were so stuck in their ways that they could not adapt to this new world order.

That word. Ego. Not arrogance. Identity. The thing you defend even as it drags you under.

Her people were proud. She had been proud too. But pride was no shield now.

She looked up at the Council again, their gazes as cold and distant as ever. They hadn’t seen the Hive scale the trees like shadows. They hadn’t watched ten of their kin torn apart in seconds by a single creature. They hadn’t heard a dying monster whisper truths their teachings refused to acknowledge.

And they didn’t want to.

Minuvae swallowed hard. Her fear wasn’t just for what might come, it was the gnawing sense that no one else would see it until it was too late. That the Council would lead them straight into extinction while chanting the old words.

She couldn’t follow them anymore. Not if she wanted her people to live.

“I’ll speak plainly,” she said, her voice louder than she meant. “The Hive are evolving. And if we don’t, we die.”

One of the Elders frowned. “You presume much, child.”

“I saw it,” she snapped. “I heard it. It spoke. It knew what we were. What we cling to.”

She took a step forward. Her voice steadied. “You can stay here and pretend tradition will protect us. I won’t. I won’t let pride be the reason we fall.”

For a long moment, no one said anything. The air was heavy with disapproval. But Minuvae didn’t flinch.

Fear still churned in her chest, but for the first time, it wasn’t paralyzing. It was fuel.

“They know, they know they can beat us, we aren’t being fought, we are being studied. We can’t win against attrition. Our traditions will be the death of us, our obescience to the council will be the end of us!” Minuvae pleaded not to the elders but to the room.

Her voice rang off the stone walls, trembling with urgency, not weakness. Faces turned. Some avoided her gaze. Others looked shaken. A few... uncertain.

“They evolve while we repeat. They learn while we recite. They are adapting to kill us, and we’re letting them.” Her breath hitched, but she forced it down. “The Council won’t act. Not fast enough. Not in the way that matters.”

She scanned the room, soldiers, scouts, young minds raised to obey.

“I’m not asking you to betray the elders. I’m asking you to save your people. I’m going to fight them on their terms. And if anyone wants to live to see the next moonrise, I suggest you start thinking for yourselves.” Minuvae shouted, and she was cut off by an elder’s thunderous rebuke.

“YOU OVERSTEP EXILE!” one elder roared.

Minuvae paused and turned around to face the elders, all deference gone, just numb exasperation.

“What else do I have to lose?” Minuvae croaked.

The words hung in the air like a curse, too quiet to be defiance, too honest to be dismissed.

She held their gaze, each and every one of them. The ones who sent warriors to die while they debated in circles. The ones who watched the forest burn and waited for signs from spirits that never came. The ones who sat in safety while the Hive adapted, killed, and learned.

Minuvae turned away for the last time. Let them call it exile.

And then footsteps.

One, then another. A young scout stepped from the shadows, eyes fixed on the floor but walking with purpose. A battle-scarred warrior followed, muttering a quiet oath as he passed the Council’s gaze. Then more rangers, healers, even two record-keepers from the back of the room. Tribe leaders, clan heads, great advisors and specialists.

Only those of importance were ever allowed in this chamber. Every seat held weight. Every voice, a pillar of the Elven domains. These weren’t just followers they were the backbone of the realm.

And now, half of them were leaving.

They moved without fanfare, without speeches just weary resolve. Some looked back once, as if expecting to be stopped. None were.

The Elders sat frozen, their authority intact in name only. Tradition had kept them aloft, but conviction was leaving the room.

Minuvae walked at the front, saying nothing, feeling the quiet shift behind her. It wasn’t triumph. It wasn’t even hope.

“Exile!” a voice shouted from behind and Minuvae turned to look at the speaker.

It was a scarred elf, and she spotted the pattern of a cursed wound, no doubt from a vampire many centuries ago. He was the head of Clan Greenleaf, an old but small clan but renown for the quality of their trackers and rangers.

“What do you plan to do? We aren’t getting one in that room we just left!” the old elf barked.

Minuvae pondered. In truth, she knew they couldn’t fight the Empire and their Hive not directly. It would be a bloodbath. The Elves didn’t have the strength or the reach, and the Hive fought like no force they had ever faced. Logically, war was a losing game.

But she had lived in the Empire. She knew its people. She’d walked their streets, eaten at their fires, laughed with their children. She had friends there, good ones. People who wanted the same things her kin did: peace, safety, something better for those who came after.

The Hive was something else, something dark that had taken root within the Empire but it wasn’t all of it. Minuvae looked up slowly, the beginnings of a different idea forming in her mind, something radical in its simplicity.

The one thing they hadn’t tried was to simply… talk.

It sounded naive, maybe even foolish. But after centuries of silence, suspicion, and bloodshed maybe foolish was what they needed.

After all, the alternative was just to, well… die.

Keep fighting a war they couldn’t win. Watch more kin fall. Wait for the Hive to adapt faster than they ever could. Let the Elders chant the old songs while the world crumbled around them.

Minuvae took a breath and met the eyes of the scarred elf.

“We’ve tried silence. We’ve tried pride. We’ve tried war. All it’s done is get us killed.” She glanced around at the faces behind her leaders, warriors, thinkers.

“It’s time we try something different. Not because it’s easy. But because it’s possible. I’ve lived in the Empire. I know there are voices there who would stand with us if we give them a reason to.”

“I’m not asking you to lay down your weapons. I’m asking you to walk with me instead of toward another grave.” Minuvae said.

“Talk with the vampires?” Another voice asked.

“The Great Beast tamed the vampires, and I spoke to the Great Beast once. Perhaps I don't need to win over the Vampires just their master.” Minuvae said. From what she knows of the Empire the Empress is nothing if not pragmatic. She would not want a protracted war, there will be concessions considering her kin has foolishly tested the Empress’s patience for so long. Minuvae has argued against this constant provocation for over a year and in the back of her mind she was still surprised it took this long for the Empress to finally decide to respond.

The fact that it even took this long to respond indicated to Minuvae that the Empress was hesitant to start this war. Their terrain was difficult to assail, and a full unleashing of the hive might incur the ire of the angels.

The Hive cannot rage, it cannot be unleashed, the Angels will not suffer a resurgence of the horror.

So another option…

Minuvae trekked alone towards the Imperial lines. She knew this might be her last journey but she had to try. She walked towards the lines with her arms raised and yet the shots didn’t come. Then she saw him Ordias Derenge, Vampire General of the Averlonian Empire in all his terrible glory.

He stood like a statue wrought from iron, the black plates of his armor drinking in the dull light of the overcast sky. The crimson cape at his back flared in the wind like a banner of blood, and upon his chest, etched in silver and red, was the mark of the Phoenix, burning wings outstretched.

Ordias Derenge did not move. His eyes, cold and ancient, fixed on Minuvae. There was no kindness in them, nor cruelty, only a waiting calculation.

She stopped a dozen paces away, heart thudding hard, throat dry. His soldiers flanked him, still as shadows, but none raised a weapon. She realised then this was not mercy. This was curiosity.

“Hmmm.” he said, voice low, smooth, and sharp as a blade drawn slow from its sheath. “I did not expect you to come crawling to my gates.”

“I am here to parley.” Minuvae replied softly

Ordias tilted his head, just slightly like a predator considering whether the creature before him was prey or something else.

“To parley,” he repeated, as if tasting the word. “Bold. But irrelevant… unless the Elven Council sanctioned this.”

His tone darkened. “Any delay, any desperate plea from a lone diplomat, means nothing if the High Elders still posture and preen behind their borders.”

Minuvae swallowed her fear. “They didn’t send me.”

His eyes narrowed, the faintest crease forming at the corners. A flicker of tension stirred among the soldiers behind him.

“Then you waste my time.”

“No,” she said quickly, stepping forward. “I’m here because they’re too blind to act. They still think they can outlast you. I don’t.”

She paused, letting the weight of the moment settle between them.

“I’m not here for them. I’m here for the people who will burn while they debate.”

Ordias was silent for a long beat. Then he spoke, slower now, more curious than contemptuous.

“You speak treason, Elf.”

She nodded. “Then let it be treason. But if I can give you a reason not to raze the woods before the snows melt, I’ll say what needs to be said.”

A gust of wind stirred his cape, snapping it like a warning. His eyes never left hers.

“You have one chance,” he said. “Speak wisely. The Phoenix does not wait.”

Ordias took one step forward, his black armor shifting with weight and intent, the red cape behind him catching the wind like a living thing.

“And the Empress,” he said, voice low and measured, “does not wait either.”

His gaze sharpened.

“The Empire demands recompense for every trespass. Every border skirmish. Every elven scout that set foot where they shouldn’t have. You know the list. The blood price is long overdue.”

He looked her over alone, no herald, no escort. No sigil. Just one woman standing on a knife’s edge. “You carry no banner. No name. You speak for no one. So why should I care what you’ve come to say?” his voice calm, the words were dismissive but probing.

Minuvae held his gaze. “Because you don’t want this war.”

Ordias’s eyes narrowed slightly not in denial, but interest. “You think you know what the Empire wants?”

“I think I know what it can’t afford,” she said. “A campaign into the Wood of the Ancients is a war of years. Not weeks. Every tree taken will cost you ten men. Every hill another battalion. You’ll win eventually but what will you have left?”

She took another step. “And the Elven Council they’re just as blind. Clinging to old pride, old wounds. They still think you’ll blink first. But you won’t. Neither will they.”

Ordias said nothing. His soldiers stayed still, but the tension in the air curled tighter.

“So I’m here,” she continued, “because someone has to say it, this is madness. We both know it. The lines we’re about to cross won’t be undone. But they can be delayed. De-escalated. You want something in return for the trespasses. Fine. Let’s talk about what that looks like.”

A long silence. Then, finally he muttered, “Speak.”

Ordias stood still, a silent force at the edge of the ancient wood, red cape trailing in the cold wind like a bloodstained banner. His armor didn’t creak. His gaze didn’t drift. But he listened.

Minuvae took a step forward, voice steady, each word measured like she was walking a narrow path between life and death.

“You want recompense. Something to show the Empire that the war was worth starting. That the Phoenix still casts a long shadow. You already have it.”

Ordias’s expression didn’t change, but the weight in the air thickened.

“The war’s frozen. Weeks now, locked at the forest’s edge. Your troops push, we push back. Blow for blow. You’ve tried burning the trees they don’t burn. Magic runs too deep here. Siege lines collapse. Your engineers are building roads to nowhere. We’re holding. But we’re bleeding. And unlike you, we don’t have endless reserves.” Minuvae said.

“You’re grinding us down. Everyone knows it. The tribes whisper it. The council won’t say it aloud, but they see the end coming. If nothing changes, we’ll be finished by next summer.” She met his gaze. “But it doesn’t have to end in fire.”

Now, finally, Ordias spoke. “You came to offer surrender?”

“No, I came to offer the Empress a victory.” Minuvae said as she outstretched her arms as if in welcome

That gave him pause. Not surprise just interest.

“Go on.” Ordias said as he narrowed his eyes.

“You hold the advantage. But this is where you turn that into something lasting. Let the fighting pause. Let the tribes see that the Empire is willing to negotiate, even after drawing blood. That the Empress commands not just armies but restraint. If she accepts talks, the council will look weak. Fractures among the tribes will grow. Some will break ranks. And when the dust settles, the Empire will have allies inside the forest, not just enemies at its gates.” Minuvae said trying to state her case

Ordias studied her now, truly studied her. “A political win,” he said.

“A clean one,” she replied. “With your legions intact. And her authority solidified not just over the Empire, but beyond it.”

The wind stirred again, rustling the branches behind her. Still, he didn’t move. Then, slowly, “You speak like someone who understands more than she should.”

“I understand what happens if this goes on,” she said. “You win the war. And inherit a graveyard.”

Ordias was silent for a moment longer. Then, with quiet finality, “Speak your terms. And speak them carefully.”

Minuvae stood motionless in the clearing, cold wind tugging at her cloak. Before her stood Ordias Derenge black-armored, blood-eyed, the Vampire General of Necoronas, silent and watchful beneath the Empire’s red-and-white banners.

“A ceasefire,” she said. “You hold your lines. We hold ours. No more killing. Not while there’s still a way out.”

Ordias said nothing. His expression was unreadable, carved from centuries of war.

“In return, we ask for access to a leyline beneath Necoronas. It’s corrupted. Deep necromantic residue, older than this war. It’s poisoning the ley-stream that feeds into the Wood of the Ancients. That’s why the forest is dying.”

Ordias tilted his head, slowly. “We’ve known that node was tainted. It doesn’t touch our lands. No one’s bothered with it in years.” Ordias said his voice was tinged with slight confusion.

“I know,” Minuvae said. “But it’s killing ours.”

He narrowed his eyes slightly. “And instead of sending a message, your people sent blades. Raids. Ambushes. Months of provocation.”

“The elders believed the Empire wouldn’t allow it,” she said. “Especially not with the node lying in vampire territory.”

Ordias gave a cold, quiet laugh. “They were probably right if they’d asked to march through all of Necoronas and ‘cleanse’ it.”

“They would’ve,” Minuvae said. “That was their plan. They used the leyline as a pretext. But they want the vampires gone. Gone from the borders, gone from the Empire if they could manage it. The corruption just gave them a convenient excuse.”

Ordias’s voice turned to ice. “The Empress will never allow that. The vampires are too valuable. Militarily, politically, magically. If she thinks the cleansing is just cover for a purge she’ll torch your forest down to its roots.”

Ordias was quiet for a long beat. “So what are you suggesting?”

She looked him dead in the eyes.

“I need to go back. Not just to spread the terms but to rally the tribes against the elders. I have to break their control. If we’re going to end this, I need to start a rebellion.”

That hung in the air, heavier than anything that came before.

Ordias didn’t move, but something in his expression shifted. Less contempt. More calculation.

“You’re not here to make peace. You’re here to change the war from the inside.”

“I’m here to end it before the Empress does it for us,” she said.

He stared at her in silence. Then turned to his lieutenant.

“Send word to the Empress. Full report. Priority seal.”

Ordias turned back to her, voice cold and surgical.

“You may be just in time,” he said. “The Great Beast grows impatient.”

Minuvae didn’t need to ask. “The Hive.”

She clenched her jaw. “I’ve fought it. Those probes at the treeline? We held the high ground canopy positions, elevation advantage, and it meant nothing. Their creatures don’t march, they climb. They tear across bark like it’s soil. Leap between trees like they were bred for it.”

She paused, voice low. “They don’t feel like an army. They feel like a weapon.”

Ordias said nothing at first. Then, quietly: “That wasn’t even a full release. Just observation. Pressure. Measuring magical flow, density, reaction time. That’s how the Hive prepares.”

She looked up at him. “It felt... planned.”

“It was,” he said. “Because this isn’t a standard brood.”

There was a pause. Minuvae narrowed her eyes. “What does that mean?”

Ordias’s tone sharpened. “Most Hive broods are guided by tacticians, brood mothers, creatures designed for coordination, for control. This one isn’t. This one answers directly to one known as Malegaros.”

She blinked. The name meant nothing. “Who?”

His gaze didn’t soften. “Some forgotten horror, they call him the Flesh-Smith. Few outside the Empress’s inner circle know the name. Fewer survive long after hearing it. Malegaros isn’t a commander. He… it.. is a sculptor. The Great Beast’s personal architect of annihilation. It doesn’t fight for territory. It doesn’t hold positions. It shapes Hive broods for singular, absolute destruction.”

Minuvae stared at him.

Ordias continued, voice like stone dragged across steel. “Whenever some ancient thing is pulled from the lower burrows of the Hive, when the Beast wants not war but ruin, Malegaros is the one sent to prepare it. This brood isn’t meant to conquer your forest. It’s meant to remove it.”

Minuvae’s breath caught. “And the Empress?”

“In full cooperation,” he said. “She adjusted the Empire’s engagement rules before the first clash. Lowered the bar for war. Quietly. No announcement. And then your council stepped right into the threshold.”

“She wanted the war.” Minucae muttered through gritted teeth.

“She and the Beast needed it,” he corrected. “And now the Hive has begun its work. You’ve already seen the result, and that’s without Malegaros fully releasing his design.”

A long silence passed. Then Ordias added, offhand and almost disinterested:

“Supposedly, in some ancient dialect, Malegaros translates to Malicious Hunger. I don’t know if that’s true. But I’ve seen the aftermath. It fits.” Minuvae looked toward the trees, the shadows between the branches darker than they’d been a moment ago.

“I need to go. Now. If I don’t bring the tribes away from the elders, if I don’t tear them down this won’t stop. They’ll march us straight into extinction.” Minuvae said.

“If you’re serious about rebellion, don’t waste time softening the blow. Don’t try to reason with the old guard. Cut them down. Publicly. Irrevocably. Because what’s coming doesn’t wait for consensus.” Ordias stated coldly.

Minuvae nodded. “I understand.”

Ordias studied her for a long moment.

“No,” he said. “You don’t. Not yet.”

He stepped closer, the air between them tightening.

“You’ve seen the Hive’s probes. What they did at the edge of your forest wasn’t even the start. Those weren’t elite strains. Just initial assets. Raw deployment. No adaptations. No refinements.”

“They were still effective.” Minuvae said, voice tight.

Ordias gave a slight nod. “Because they didn’t need to be anything more.”

He paused, then continued with the weight of experience behind every word.

“The brood Malegaros has moved now, it’s an amalgam. A fusion of every strain that’s ever worked. Streamlined. Efficient. Horrific. A patchwork of perfected cruelty, built to function across terrain, climate, and resistance types.” Ordias said, his voice cold and clinical

“If it’s been deployed, it means the Hive and the Empress already deemed your forest a foregone conclusion. This isn’t a trial. It’s an execution.” Ordias said as he glanced at the trees behind her.

Ordias turned, red cape flicking like a blade in the wind. “Move fast. Not to stop what’s coming. That may already be beyond you.”

Minuvae stood in the cold silence that followed, the weight of his words heavy on her shoulders. Then, without lifting her gaze, “Why are you telling me this?”

Ordias didn’t turn at first. When he spoke, his tone was detached, matter-of-fact. “Because tribute does not flow from a dead race.”

He paused, then added, almost as an aside. “That’s not my line. That’s something the Great Beast said when asked why, it left some of its conquests breathing.”

He turned then, fully, his gaze meeting hers without the faintest flicker of warmth.

“And to its credit, it never has fully destroyed a civilisation. Not entirely. Not yet. But I wouldn’t bet against its willingness to break precedent.” Ordias added.

Minuvae's mouth set into a thin line, her silence confirmation enough.

Ordias stepped toward her, slow and steady. “Me? I don’t care for ashes. I care for outcomes. Bringing the Empress a vassal, beaten, bloodied, but intact wins me favor. And power.”

His eyes narrowed. “You? You're useful if you succeed. You're a line in my report if you fail.”

He let the words sink in, then stepped back. “So go. Break what you must. Return with something I can use. Something the Empress can bind.”

His voice dropped as he turned once more.

Because if you don’t…

You will know true terror…