Dissecting the Long Night's Conspiracy

In the study of Blackpine Main Fortress, the fire cracked now and then, its light flickering across a desk piled high with documents.

Shien had been sitting there for hours.

Yasol's orders for the entire front lay open on top of the desk. Beneath them were a map of troop deployments across the Seven Fiefs, a map marking Grayblood Lesion outbreaks in the Graymist Defense Zone, and the White Fang Fief battle report he had just gone over again and again.

His eyes were bloodshot. For days, he had been using intelligence sent through White Fang Fief's Sacred Flame Echo Console to work through how the battle might unfold. He had barely stopped.

He had to take every report apart and read it several times, then run through every possibility over and over.

Blackpine Fief's support knights should have reached White Fang Fief by now. The battle would be at its fiercest. Whether White Fang Fief held would be decided in the next few hours.

Just then, the Canon of Grace and Righteousness in his mind suddenly trembled.

The Grace Values of nearly a thousand people—Blackpine Fief's mobile unit and White Fang Fief's defenders—surged at the same instant.

The pattern was painfully familiar. He had seen the same sharp rise after several of the bloodiest battles of the last Blood Moon Season.

It meant White Fang Fief had not fallen. At least, it had survived this crisis.

Sure enough, hurried footsteps sounded outside. Murray pushed the door open, strode to the desk, and handed him a freshly decoded slip of paper with both hands.

"My lord, a highest-priority message from White Fang Fief's Echoing Platform."

Shien took the slip and scanned it.

The Echoing Platform could not transmit a long report. This was only the first urgent message, containing the