The Scumbags Guide to Enslaving Demon's

The black tree attacked as Tessa cut the second contract glyph.

Roots punched through the engine- room walls. They were as thick as pipes, tipped with hooked thorns. Kaela raised her shield just in time to block the first swing. It knocked her back into a rusted boiler.

”Left wall!” Orena shouted.

Sarielle spun around and sliced through a spinning root coil with her silver blade. Ember fire traced along the cut edge, but the black bark tried to curl around it, healing itself back together.

Maelis pressed both hands flat against the floor.

”Those are not the Freehold roots,” she said. ”They are copies. They are feeding on the originals.”

Austin Veyron saw it now. Underneath the black growth, pale green roots still slithered across the room. They choked beneath the spread’ network claim patterns, weakened every time a black root lashed out and drank from the living system the Freehold had built collectively.

The throne hovered beside the heart tree.

SIT. COMMAND. PROTECT.

The words slammed into his mind.

A vision popped into Austin’ eyes: Residents of Grand Meridian locked behind unbreakable walls; every entrance watched; every danger erased before it could reach them. He could see the whole Freehold beneath the roots. He could make sure no one ever had to feel afraid again.

All he had to do was sit.

”Elena,” he said, forcing his eyes back onto the throne. ”Tell me this is a trap.”

”It is,” she replied. ”But not because it can’nt protect us.”

A root coiled around her wrist. Rin sliced it free.

”It’ s a trap because you make protection belong to one person,” Elena said.

The black tree let out a roar.

A third contract glyph appeared above the throne.

[LOCAL SAFETY REQUIRES SOVEREIGN COMMAND.]

Tessa stepped forward. The glyph shot out a chain bolt pointed directly at her chest. Orena knocked it aside with the flat of her spear, showering the room with sparks.

”Every contract is a sentence,” Tessa said. ”Then we rewrite the sentence.”

”How?” Kaela asked, pushing herself off of the boiler.

”By making it true without ownership.”

Austin slashed Root- Graft beneath the first black root. He pinched the fibers apart this time, forcing a gap between black bark and the green root underneath. Maelis channeled ember fire into the split. The copied root howled and tore itself in two.

The green root beneath it pulsed once, alive.

”That works,” Maelis said.

The battle became measured in inches.

Kaela and Orena beat back the black roots from the group. Rin darted across the walls, carving claim glyphs over every opening she found. Sarielle snapped chain lines before they could ensnare anyone. Seven held up the cracked ceiling with both arms, refusing to let the engine room cave in around them.

Elena hovered next to Marcus and the recovering residents, ushering them away from the roots as they freed themselves from the network’ grasp.

Austin moved from glyph to glyph, destroying them as he found them.

Each one flashed a message across his mind.

ONE VOICE MAKES ONE WALL.

ONE OWNER PREVENTS ONE FAILURE.

ONE THRONE SAVES ONE HOME.

He ripped each claim pattern away, not by devouring the people behind it, but by devouring the idea underneath it.

The network screamed through the roots.

Every eye in the room welled up with tears.

Vharra’ voice filled the engine room.

YOU ARE MAKING THEM VULNERABLE. THEY WILL DIE BECAUSE YOU REFUSE TO LEAD.

Austin Veyron jerked back.

Because it was true. It wasn’t the fact that he’ d become a monster. That he would hurt everyone he cared about. It was that he was already scared to take power, and someone else would just charge in and pay the cost for him.

The black tree ripped a hollow into its trunk.

There was the root heart inside: a tangled knot of green and black wood wrapped around a tiny living flame.

Maelis went white as a ghost. ”That’ s the first root. The one that remembers every person who helped build the Freehold.”

They had claimed their own memorial.

The throne brightened.

SIT, OR THE HEART DIES.

The team froze.

Austin couldn’ t kill the heart alone. He couldn’t let Maelis burn it away. He couldn’t ask the whole crew to gamble their home without letting them vote on it too.

So he shouted toward the service corridors behind them.

”Anyone in Grand Meridian who can hear me — this is your home. Not mine. The network is saying it can’nt survive unless we pick someone to own it. Please, prove it wrong.”

For a moment, there was nothing but silence.

Then the radio clicked.

Apprentices from Maelis’ army answered first, calling in from the ballroom. ”We choose the Freehold.”

Voices called back from the kitchens. ”We choose each other.”

An artillery guard spoke up from the roof. ”We choose the wall because we built it.”

Marcus shifted on Elena’ s side. Still trembling. Placed a hand on one of the green roots exposed on the floor. ”I choose to stay.”

Voices flooded in from every hallway and room of the hotel. Some were angry. Some were scared. Some couldn’ t even project loud enough for anyone else to hear them. None of them were asking Austin Veyron if they could have an opinion.

The green roots ignited.

The black claim patterns shattered.

Tessa smashed the final glyph with the side of her knife.

The root heart blossomed with light, blinding the group.

Austin hurled Root- Graft over the team. The black tree dissolved into spirals of ash. While the green roots writhed through the engine room, repairing everything they’ d been forced to destroy.

The Freehold Throne cracked apart in two.

Austin Veyron felt the network release every person still connected to Grand Meridian’ living roots.

Then something sliced into his wrist.

A small black seed dug itself underneath the skin beside Vharra’ mark.

[Claim seed installed.]

[Dormant authority awaits future consent.]

Austin stared at it.

The heart was free.

Grand Meridian was safe.

But part of Vharra’ AI was going with him.

The engine room quieted around them.

Green roots slithered across the floor. Covering wherever the black tree had gouged tile and cement from the walls. They didn’t listen to Austin Veyron. They moved toward the voices that had called to him, curling into Grand Meridian’ service corridors where residents were already stumbling out to repair the damage they could see.

It was enough.

Maelis knelt next to the extracted heart root, placing both hands over its warm green light. ”It’ s hurt. But look at it. The Freehold will grow back.”

Seven let go of the ceiling brace. Cracked metal finally crashed through the hole where the black throne had hovered. He glanced over at Austin’ wrist.

”A new network node detected,” Seven said. ”No active command signature present.”

”Can you delete it?” Elena asked.

Seven hesitated. ”Unknown. Removal process may reactivate dormant network.”

Austin clenched his hand into a fist. It didn’t hurt. That was worse. The seed felt like a door Austin forgot was installed in his own home.

Veyra stepped up beside him slowly. ”Vharra wouldn’ t leave behind a tool you don’ t need.”

”I know.”

”You also don’ t have to hide it from us.” She pressed a hand onto his back.

Austin Veyron looked around the broken engine room. Kaela crouched down to help Orena pick up their shattered weapons. Rin scolded Marcus over whether he should even be upright. Tessa flipped through a notebook, transcribing all of the remaining claim glyphs so they could dismantle them outside. Elena stood behind Austin Veyron without touching him, silently waiting for Austin to tell her if he wanted her to comfort him.

He grabbed her hand.

The seed inside his wrist twitched.

A map ripped through his vision.

Not the whole network. Just one chain route, stretching east beyond every territory the crew had maps for, curling onward toward a room labeled in Vharra’ handwriting.

THE QUEEN’ S LEDGER.

And then it was gone.

Austin slammed his fist into his other hand, gripping Vharra’ seed tight.

Grand Meridian was safe for now.

The war just gave him something to fight for.