The Villain Professor's Second Chance-Chapter 712: Sylara’s Inner Turmoil (2)

Morning clawed its way over the treetops, pale gold seeping through the mist as though the sky itself bled light. By the time Sylvanna reached the first perimeter post, sentries were stamping cold from their feet, blades resting across forearms while they traded rumors louder than discretion allowed. Their chatter dwindled as she stepped into view. One guard's eyes widened; another swallowed hard and pretended to re-knot the cord on his quiver.

"Morning, Captain," she offered, though none held that rank. It was safer to wrap dread in routine words.

No one answered.

She continued forward, Raëdrithar falling a length behind—enough distance to lessen panic, enough presence to remind every onlooker that her shadow contained lightning. Tents dotted the clearing like earthen cocoons. Between them, cook fires sputtered, bronze kettles already simmering watery porridge. Scouts queued for ration bowls glanced over shoulders; whispers burst like sparrow wings.

"She looks just like her."

"Did you see the sparks? Same fury in the eyes—"

"What if it's a ruse? Let her into our lines, then—"

"Ssh, you'll bring the storm down."

The words didn't surprise Sylvanna; what struck her was the fear's texture—thin, brittle, desperate to crystallize into something solid that could be grasped. It reminded her of frost sheeting a pond: beautiful until weight cracked it open.

She passed a weapons rack where half-elves waited to sharpen blades. One young smith—mottle-skinned, ears barely tapered—froze mid-stroke. A whetstone slipped from his grasp, thunked onto mud. His partner nudged him, hissed a reprimand. They both bowed their heads until she'd gone by.

A knot formed in her stomach, thick and sour. You are storm and calm, Raëdrithar had said with silence. But storms didn't mend fractures; they widened them.

An elder's rough baritone split the camp's grim murmur. He stood by the largest supply yurt, spine ramrod-straight despite the weight of moss-oak pauldrons drooping on his shoulders. "The council convenes!" he barked. All talk stuttered out like candles in wind. Eyes followed him as he strode toward the hearth-clearing at camp's heart—eyes then flicked to Sylvanna, calculating cause and future blame.

She exhaled and trailed behind. Raëdrithar halted on the clearing's fringe; even he sensed that elders disliked beasts near deliberations. His absence at her side felt like someone had stolen part of her balance.

The council ringed a firepit blackened by a hundred hasty decisions. Elders in bark-bound robes, captains with helms tucked under arms, healers whose sleeves bore fresh brown stains—every one of them carried fatigue like a second cloak. As she stepped up, a ripple of tension buzzed through the gathering: the air before lightning, fear masquerading as authority.

"She looks just like her."

The phrase hissed behind a folded cloak, louder this time, almost daring confrontation. A different voice rose in reply—a sharper timbre layered with outrage. "And what if she's a spy? A double agent?"

An elder with knot-white hair jabbed his staff for attention. "Virellionn's shadow," he announced, throat rasping. "She carries the same blood markings. We gamble our lives daring her presence inside our walls."

The words fell heavy and cold. Sylvanna clenched gloved fists, leather creaking. That chill behind her ribs flared into anger's ember.

Before she could speak, Vaelira Greenbark stepped forward. Morning light caught the edge of her moss-iron cuirass, scattering emerald motes onto the mud. "Bark and bluster," she said, tone flat but cutting. "She saved you yesterday. You"—she pointed to the white-haired elder—"would have bled out from a dryad's thorn if her storm had not torn its roots."

The elder's mouth worked, but no retort formed.

Vaelira turned, addressing the semicircle. "Ask yourselves: would Virellionn have spared our wounded? Would she have cried out when corrupted vines strangled our ward lines, warning archers to cut clear? She fights against the corruption, not for it."

Murmurs fluttered—doubts warring with gratitude.

Boots crunched gravel. Draven entered the ring without ceremony, a ledger clasped in one gauntleted hand. His cloak still smelled faintly of the charred siege beast, a mix of scorched iron and sap pitch. He surveyed faces with clinical detachment, as though reading cipher runes.

"Virellionn is an anomaly," he declared. His voice sliced through protests forming at camp edges. "Sylvanna is a weapon. Remove her, and you surrender a thirty-one-percent advantage in projected engagements. Your banners may favor courage, but numbers remain sovereign."

Someone spat near the fire. A heavier silence followed, freighted with anger and fear interlaced.

An elder healer stepped forward, palms raised—not in blessing, but caution. "Numbers do not comfort spirits, Master Granger. Trust cannot be tallied."

Draven's eyes flicked to the healer, then away—dismissal disguised as acknowledgment. "What comforts spirits is survival."

Husky coughs. Shifting feet.

The white-haired elder regained voice. "Even if we concede her value, safeguards remain prudent. I propose restraint—place her under ward until this war's end."

Gasps rippled outward. Some faces nodded relief; others frowned, gauging cost. Restrain the storm and maybe lose its lightning.

Vaelira didn't wait. "She bares her soul at every clash." Gauntlet tapped Sylvanna's rune, dormant but visible at the hollow of her throat. "That mark wouldn't lie dormant if corruption ruled her. Bind her, and you prove the camp rules by fear, not valor."

Across the circle a sergeant—eyes red-rimmed from lack of sleep—shuffled forward. His voice wavered. "My squad owes her their lives. We were pinned when she broke the blight-beast's chestplate. If the council chains her, you chain us all."

More murmurs, the pitch shifting—fear now mingled with respect.

Draven flipped the ledger open with a crisp snap. "Decision point," he said. "Either leverage the asset under monitored conditions, or weaken our flank and invite higher casualties." He closed the book.

The council hesitated.

The white-haired elder's staff thudded in surrender. "She must be watched," he said, grudging. "Shadowed by sworn eyes."

Over murmured assent, Vaelira's sword kissed the ground, formal and resonant. "Greenbark Vanguard will take that duty."

Sylvanna felt a strange tug—gratitude wedded to humiliation. Chains could be ropes pulled tight to save a climber—or ties to stake someone down. She couldn't tell which she'd just accepted.

The consensus was quiet, reluctant. No cheers, only the rustle of cloaks and the low sigh of wind as tension bled from taut shoulders.

Sylvanna stood still, feeling chains slipping around her wrists.

_____

The war-tent was a living thing—root-walls coiled into ribs overhead, their inner bark exhaling a faint resin scent that clung to every cloak. Strips of bioluminescent moss were threaded through the latticed ceiling, giving off a muted jade glow that pooled over maps and armor alike. Whenever a commander shifted, the floor responded with a mellow creak, as if the forest listened in on the council it sheltered.

Draven waited at the central table, a slab of polished heart-oak supported by three squat trunks fused together at the base. A constellation of stone markers already littered its surface: blue for river crossings, amber for watchtowers, crimson for enemy sightings that scouts had risked lives to sketch. He positioned one obsidian shard at the northern edge—a silent reminder that Spryghold Grove, once marked by emerald, now lay dead and black.

Commanders filtered in like wary predators circling a watering hole. The Ashleaf captain, face still smudged with soot, rested a gauntleted hand on the table rim; his fingers twitched whenever the moss-light brightened, as if bracing for bad news. Two Moonflame officers from the healing corps brought the sharp scent of burn salve with them, their sleeves mottled where fresh blood had tried to seep through ward-weave. Vaelira arrived last, helm tucked under her arm, braid rings clicking each time she exhaled.

When Sylvanna stepped across the threshold, conversations hushed. She felt more than saw the subtle shift: shoulders stiffening, eyes tracking Raëdrithar's shadow beyond the flap. She squared her stance, choosing the one sliver of floor where lamplight did not make her appear taller or more threatening. It didn't help. Even the moss seemed to dim under the weight of the assembled distrust.

Draven's voice sliced the stillness. "Whisperroot Sanctuary is Virellionn's next target."

He cast a minor rune; filaments of pale light rose from the map and shaped themselves into a three-dimensional rendering of the forest's south-western crescent. Whisperroot appeared as a thicket of luminous trunks radiating lines of mana that pulsed like veins. The image prettied what reality could not: an ancient nexus where centuries-old guardian spirits kept the ley lines braided and healthy.

"If she seizes it," Draven continued, "every ward we rely on will rot from the inside. Dryads, root-runners, sentinel oaks—anything bound to forest core will recite a new covenant in her name."

A hush greeted the revelation. Someone inhaled with an audible rasp. The Ashleaf captain swore under his breath—and sent a guilty glance toward Sylvanna, as if the oath might compel a lightning strike.

"Question," murmured the eldest Moonflame officer. She pushed a twist of gray hair behind one pointed ear. "What intelligence gives certainty that Whisperroot is her next move?"

Draven tapped the floating map. Two red markers rippled outward down a river valley: last night's corrupted patrols. "Trajectory extrapolated from these contacts, plus intercepted command sigils on fallen beasts. Those glyphs reference 'Root-Zero.' Whisperroot is the only nexus qualifying."

The logic shut down further challenge. Silence thickened until it throbbed.

Sylvanna swallowed. "And you want me to lead the mission?"

Eyes pivoted to her. There was calculation in every stare: weighing chance against consequence, lightning against corruption, her face against Virellionn's. Some glances held admiration, some raw fear, others the hollow neutrality of soldiers accepting that they might follow her or kill her, depending on tomorrow's orders.

Draven met her gaze head-on. Slate-gray irises caught the moss-light and gleamed like wet flint. "You're the only one she might hesitate to kill."

A surge of heat climbed Sylvanna's throat—outrage, nerves, unsure which. "So I'm bait?" Her words cracked louder than she intended; they snapped through the tent like thrown bone.

Draven's eyebrow lifted a degree, then smoothed. His silence stretched a heartbeat too long, an answer wrapped in calculus rather than empathy.

Vaelira set her helmet on the table with more force than protocol allowed. "If she turns, if this is a trap—" The princess left the alternative unsaid: if lightning arcs the wrong way, if hope devours us from within.

"She won't." Draven's reply held neither warmth nor arrogance, only the chill of absolute conviction. He didn't look at Sylvanna while speaking; he looked at the map, as though her fate existed solely as a dataset inside those glimmering lines. "Not while I watch."

That did it. Something in Sylvanna's chest squeezed until her ribs ached. Not trust—control. She was back to being the arrow in his quiver, the variable he trimmed until satisfying.

A flap rustled; Raëdrithar's muzzle slipped through the entrance, silver eye glinting. No one dared protest, yet several commanders stepped back instinctively. The Guardian's presence carried a weight that bent the air—ozone tinged with warning. He scented the tension, whiskers twitching, then fixed his gaze on Draven with a stillness that bordered on judgment.

"This mission," Draven continued, unperturbed, "will rely on infiltration, not siege. A small strike element enters Whisperroot via the western cataract. Sub-surface tunnels feed the sanctuary's root-well from the waterfall. Corruption anchors will be inside those tunnels." He accented the holographic map; blue tunnels flared beneath the glowing forest, weaving like veins under bone.

The Ashleaf captain grunted. "Those shafts are half-flooded and pitch-dark. We'd need lantern druids to navigate."

"Not if you follow storm light," Draven said. All eyes zipped back to Sylvanna. He flicked a finger and her rune ignited azure on her collarbone, a small northern star in the gloom. Whispers sparked: prayerful, fearful—it was hard to tell.

"If she turns that rune on us," hissed a younger lieutenant.

Vaelira's voice overrode him. "And if she doesn't, you gain a weapon that can cripple anchors before they breach the canopy. We can't pierce those wards by conventional steel—the corruption feeds on impact spells. Lightning severs them."

The lieutenant bit down on more protest.

Draven placed two black stones near the sanctuary icon. "You will deploy a secondary squad—Greenbark Vanguard under Vaelira's command—to shadow the strike team. Contingency radius, forty ash-paces. If Sylvanna…" His gaze flicked to her at last, unreadable. "…fails to stay within designated parameters, Vaelira has tactical primacy to terminate the bond."

A rush of blood roared in Sylvanna's ears; for a blink she heard nothing but the echo of that cold stipulation. Terminate. Earlier, she'd imagined chains. Now she saw a blade waiting to shear those chains—and her—clean through.

She scanned faces. Some commanders nodded, accepting the grim necessity. A few looked away, shame flickering. Vaelira met her eyes and gave the faintest shake of her head—regret, perhaps, or assurance she'd try all else first. But even the princess couldn't rewrite the clause now etched in the war's ledger.

Sylvanna drew a breath but found it thin. "What about support once we're inside?"

"The cataract tunnels open into a central root well." Draven rotated the glowing map; a spiral chamber appeared beneath Whisperroot. Spears of pale light represented anchor totems, pulsing red at the core. "I project six corruption pylons braced against the inner bark. Destroy any three and ley coherence collapses, resetting the sanctuary's natural warding. A guardian spirit will reclaim the space—if it still lives."

"And if it's already corrupted?" asked the elder Moonflame officer.

Draven's expression didn't change. "Then you'll see to its release."

Euthanize a spirit older than empires. The unspoken sentence left an acrid taste on every tongue.

Raëdrithar huffed, steam curling through the entrance flap, as if reminding them guardians had voices, too.

Sylvanna noticed how Draven's hand, resting on the table, flexed once—almost a human gesture of doubt—before returning to stillness. For the first time, she wondered whether the mask of logic hid not disdain but dread of miscalculation.

Vaelira cleared her throat. "What resistance do you forecast inside the sanctuary?"

"Root husks," Draven answered. "Hollowed dryads bound to anchor pylons. Possibly blink-stags fused into the outer bark—expect charge ambushes." He moved three small thorns onto the model, marking probable ambush vectors. "Their speed decreases in confined tunnels. Your advantage is maneuverability and Sylvanna's ranged bursts."

A hush followed. Everyone counted inward—supplies required, lives risked, prayers owed.

Sylvanna felt the gaze of every officer slide to her, heavy as waterlogged cloth. She touched the rim of her quiver, fingers brushing arrow fletch. Lightning whispered along the bowstring at her back, a subconscious greeting to nerves.

"If she turns, if this is a trap—" Vaelira began again, softer now, as though personal stakes weighed more than rank.

"She won't," Draven repeated. His tone could have frozen sap. "Not while I watch."

Sylvanna's breath hitched. She wasn't sure which cut deeper: the council's fear or Draven's unyielding confidence born not of trust but surveillance.

Not ally. Not friend. An equation to balance.

The war-tent waited—breathless, expectant. The moss above dimmed then glowed brighter, as though the forest itself pushed her toward decision.

Pulse thrumming, she stepped closer to the table. The holographic overlay cast blue lines across her face, making her reflection in Vaelira's helm look half-ghost, half-thundercloud. Beneath the lines her eyes stung, yet her voice emerged steady.

"I'll do it," she whispered.