The sun hung low behind the golden spires of Assyria as Shirou and Kurono walked down a broad avenue paved with black-and-cream marble tiles, their new clothes clean and simple, drawing no special attention. The morning chill clung to the air, though it was steadily fading beneath the warmth of the rising sun and the city's pulsing life.
Around them, the capital bustled with elegance and order—market stalls, street magicians performing harmless charms for children, scent of roasted meat in the breeze. But amidst the charm lingered the eyes.
Guards. Everywhere.
Shirou's sharp gaze caught them on street corners, near merchant wagons, atop balconies—armor shining, swords at their hips, some leaning lazily on spears, others patrolling with the stiff-backed discipline of veteran soldiers. They weren't just humans, either. A female halfling with braided silver hair stood watch near the fountain, speaking in clipped tones to a full-blooded orc who bore the insignia of a Sergeant on his pauldron. Nearby, a cloaked beastkin—sharp-eared and feline-eyed—scanned the crowd with quiet intensity.
And not all of them were free men.
Shirou's eyes lingered for a second longer on a pale-skinned elf in chainmail, his features sharp and noble even beneath the collar at his throat. The elf stood straight, still, watchful beside his master—a rotund nobleman whose laughter seemed too large for his frame.
Kurono tugged lightly at Shirou's sleeve.
"Shop," he said quietly.
Shirou nodded, his thoughts folding into themselves. They turned down a quieter alley where the walls were lined with polished wooden signs, embossed with silver runes: enchantment wards, shop symbols, spells of silence and privacy. One, with a symbol of a helm encircled by a serpent, drew their attention.
"Armor and Arcana – For the Prepared Adventurer."
The bell above the door jingled softly as they stepped in. The shop was warmer than the street, lit by floating lanterns and filled with the scent of leather, old parchment, and a metallic tang that hinted at enchantments humming in the air.
Weapons and gear lined the walls. Swords floated gently in display cases, glowing faintly with magic. There were shields that shimmered with reflections not their own. Daggers that vibrated when someone stepped too close. Armor hung from racks like slumbering beasts, some made of metal, others crafted from chitin, woodbark, or scaled hide. A particularly elegant breastplate bore the crest of a phoenix, and when Shirou passed it, the feathers shimmered like living fire.
Kurono drifted to a wall of rings and small trinkets, his eyes catching on a tiny obsidian dagger with a sapphire in the hilt. He held it up. "Poisoned?"
The shopkeeper, a middle-aged woman with silvery streaks in her braided hair and runes inked up her forearms, gave a sharp nod from behind the counter.
"Drow make," she said. "Whispers in the dark. Don't take it into temples. You'll offend something."
Shirou glanced at her, raising an eyebrow. "And how much for one of those? Just curious."
"Five silver and a favor," she said with a grin. "That's for the dagger. For the armor on your left? You'll need twenty gold and your real name."
Kurono blinked at that.
Shirou smiled thinly. "We'll look around."
As they wandered deeper, Shirou watched the enchantments with an appraising eye. Most of the items were low-grade—first or second tier enchantments. Light-weighting. Durability. Flame resistance. There were a few standouts, but nothing truly dangerous. It meant one thing: The powerful stuff wasn't sold to just anyone.
Still, it gave him a framework. The city was advanced. Not in science, but in magical economy. Enough to control access to high-grade weapons. Enough to know who could afford them. That made thieving more dangerous.
He glanced back at Kurono, who stood near a rack of black cloaks with gleaming runes sewn into the hems.
"Stealth?"
Kurono nodded. "Fades noise. Not sight."
"Good to know."
They passed by a curtained section guarded by another slave—this one a tall, red-eyed man with white hair and demonic horns curled against his skull. He wore no armor, only the collar and a single enchanted blade strapped across his back.
"Restricted access," the demon said flatly, eyes locking onto Shirou with unnatural stillness. "Invitation only."
Kurono's fingers curled at his side.
Shirou offered a polite nod. "We won't trouble you."
They left soon after, Kurono managing the small talk and asking the woman at the counter for directions to nearby magic shops and any inn with decent beds. She assumed, like everyone else, that they were registered arrivals—ordinary adventurers come from the Gate, part of the usual crowd of summoned.
The misunderstanding suited them just fine.
On the way out, Shirou dropped a copper coin into the hands of a child sweeping the shop's doorstep. The child bowed—but behind him, another set of eyes glinted. A man in city colors stepped out of the shadows nearby, eyes narrowed as if he had just caught a strange scent.
"Time to go," Kurono muttered.
Shirou didn't argue. They melted back into the flow of people, careful to remain ordinary, unremarkable.
The market was a living thing, but it had teeth. Slaves walked with bright clothes and seals, guards smiled with polished swords and silent warnings. And in the shadows, word was spreading of a thief who moved unseen.
For now, Shirou and Kurono walked in step with the city's rhythm.
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Shirou's boots clicked softly against the sun-warmed stone of the main street, his hands tucked casually in the pockets of his tunic. His crimson eyes flicked to the sides every so often, not out of anxiety, but with the precision of a hunter observing the forest. His companion, Kurono, walked quietly beside him—his expression unreadable, his posture loose but alert.
"Keep an ear out," Shirou said without looking.
Kurono gave a small nod, almost imperceptible. "Mn."
He let his focus slide inward, honing his senses as he'd been trained to do—sight dimming slightly as sound began to bloom in his mind like ink dropped into water.
The city was alive.
Footsteps in sync, boots with iron caps—a patrol. Light giggles and clinking glass—two noblewomen at a tea stall. Grumbling from a dwarf arguing with a merchant about the price of mana-thread. The occasional sharp cry of a hawker announcing imported spices, enchanted utensils, or minor scrolls for household use.
But beneath it all… the whispers.
"—heard she doesn't age, not a day in twenty years—"
"—Semiramis? More goddess than woman. That mind—"
"—the coliseum's prize, they say it's a phoenix egg this time—"
Kurono narrowed his eyes slightly, filtering the noise like a sieve. The Duchess's name floated constantly from mouth to mouth, spoken with reverence more than fear. It wasn't just her beauty they praised—though they did that often and in nauseating detail—it was the order, the structure of the city, the way everything seemed to run like clockwork.
Even the slaves.
They were everywhere—working in shops, carrying parcels, polishing armor, sweeping marble steps outside great merchant halls—but none of them looked broken. They were dressed plainly but cleanly, most with visible muscle or a quiet sense of focus. The collars gleamed like jewelry in some cases, enchanted with silver inscriptions that hummed softly under close observation.
One elf with dusky skin and an emerald gaze paused to bow to her master, then returned to her task without complaint, humming softly under her breath.
Nobody looked twice.
Slavery wasn't hidden here. It wasn't punished either. It simply… was. Like the cobbled roads or the palace spires in the distance. And yet, despite their status, the slaves bore no marks of violence. No open wounds. No dead eyes.
Kurono's stomach turned slightly, but he said nothing.
"What did you hear?" Shirou asked, still scanning the street ahead.
"Coliseum," Kurono murmured. "Other side of city. Fighters arriving."
"Prize?"
"Secret. Rumors. Big."
Shirou gave a low hum of interest, rubbing his chin with the edge of his thumb. "Tempting fate, that kind of spectacle."
"They say," Kurono added, his voice lowering, "Semiramis… built this. All of it. The city. The laws. Slave code. Trade routes."
Shirou's brows rose slightly. That explained the uniformity. The quality of the magic. The discipline in the soldiers and the strength of the defenses.
And it explained why nobody wanted to cross her.
Even now, as they passed another pair of guards, Shirou noted the way the patrols barely glanced at them—but their stance never slackened. The guards weren't corrupt or complacent. They were proud, polished professionals. Trained to kill, and more than that, trained to obey.
The two continued walking in silence for a while, the city unfolding around them like a blooming flower of stone and light. Banners fluttered from high balconies. Carriages passed drawn by lizard-horses with glittering reins. A group of adventurers swaggered past, all tattoos and brash laughter, heading for what Shirou could only guess was the adventurer's guild.
Eventually, the path forked—one leading toward the smell of smoke and steel, the other echoing with distant cheers and drumbeats from the direction of the coliseum.
The city was a machine. A perfect one.
And somewhere in its heart, a woman named Semiramis sat upon a throne—not of gold, but of order.
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They had passed three armor shops already, each more extravagant than the last, but Shirou's eyes had only flicked over the wares briefly. He wasn't shopping—he was studying. Patterns, enchantments, materials. Trying to understand the current level of magical craftsmanship in the Empire.
Kurono, for his part, had kept his head down, eyes flicking occasionally to Shirou for silent confirmation as he listened in on the voices around them. A pair of mercenaries chatting on a bench, a robed figure buying beast-hide gauntlets, even a trio of well-dressed men speaking too loudly for discretion. There was a pattern forming in the chatter, like a rising drumbeat in the background of the city's heartbeat.
Exploration.
Not just idle dreams of treasure and glory—there was organization to it. Momentum. Intent.
"Pandora," Kurono muttered suddenly, breaking his silence. His voice was low but sharp, like a knife beneath a cloak.
Shirou glanced at him, eyebrow raised. "What about it?"
"They talk about… expedition. White Sacrament. Funding. Adventurers going to purge demons. Land is cursed, they say."
Shirou narrowed his eyes slightly, recalling the name. The White Sacrament. That eerie presence he'd heard mentioned before. Something about justice and cleansing and holy law. Their name carried weight—too much, he thought. And now they were investing in conquest?
Kurono kept listening, his eyes half-lidded, as they passed a weaponsmith's shop where enchanted blades hung behind a pane of magically reinforced glass. Inside, a knight in silver armor tested the weight of a two-handed sword while a cat-eared shop assistant—not a beastkin, but a hybrid slave—stood nearby with notes and a respectful bow.
"Pandora… demon king's land. Savages. Darkness. Need to be purified," Kurono murmured, summarizing from multiple conversations. "Old empire fell there. Now, they want it back."
Shirou's gaze darkened slightly as they turned down another street, the shadows falling long across cobbled stone. Something was wrong in the tone people used. It wasn't fear. It was certainty—as though the people they spoke of weren't even people. Just beasts to be broken.
"They say dark immortals rule it," Kurono added, brow twitching. "Worship demons. Dark gods."
"The old propaganda," Shirou said softly, glancing toward a mural of Semiramis carved into the side of a temple, her eyes like shining obsidian, her smile sharp. "The kind they teach when they want to justify bloodshed."
There were signs of preparation, even here—carts stacked with supplies, crates labeled with expedition marks, slaves being fitted with chains that had light-based runes etched into them. A group of young adventurers laughed loudly over maps, pointing to a massive parchment that depicted a jagged continent drawn in aggressive, thick lines—Pandora, scribbled in blood-red ink.
From the rumors, it wasn't just a wild land. It was history itself—a land said to be the origin of the Demon King who had once plunged the world into centuries of darkness. His return had become a myth, a tale told to children.
But myths had a habit of walking again when disturbed.
Kurono stopped in front of a stall selling enchanted lockets, his ears still catching conversation.
"White Sacrament's High Priest himself gave blessing," he murmured. "They're calling it the 'New Crusade.'"
Shirou exhaled through his nose. "They'll call it justice. Just like they always do."
"Kill enough people," Kurono whispered, "and they call you holy."
The two stood in silence for a moment, surrounded by the noise of the city but untouched by it. The coming war wasn't being fought in iron yet—it was still wrapped in silk and scripture.
But it was coming.
And when it did, Shirou had no doubt that the city, the slaves, the order… all of it would be swept up in something far darker than the chaos it claimed to prevent.