Chapter 54: Kenny
Hajin pulled the dark tunic over his head, adjusting the collar before reaching for the belt hanging off the back of the chair. The room was small but clean, a cheap inn near the guild district that cost him two silver a night.
’Today is the day,’ he thought, buckling the belt and sliding the sword into the sheath at his hip. ’The Ranker exam.’
He rolled his shoulders once, testing the fit of his clothes before grabbing the royal badge sitting beside his bag on the bed. He turned it over once, then slipped it into his inner pocket.
’Allen said to bring the registration fee,’ he thought, tapping his inventory to confirm the gold was still there.
He reached for his bag when something outside the window pulled his attention. Voices, not loud but clustered together in a way that meant people were gathering to look at something.
He paused, his hand still on the strap.
"Did you see him?"
"He’s barely holding on, someone get a healer!"
"That’s a Flint crest on the armor, isn’t it?"
He frowned, walking over to the window and pushing it open wider. The street below was filling up fast, people pressing against the sides of the road while pointing toward the main gate.
A horse was limping down the center of the road, its legs shaking with every step. The rider was slumped forward in the saddle, one hand gripping the reins while the other arm was just gone, severed cleanly below the shoulder with the stump wrapped in a crude, blood-soaked tourniquet.
The armor was dented and cracked in a dozen places, the silver anvil and crossed hammers of the Flint family crest barely visible under layers of dried blood.
Hajin recognized the face immediately.
It was Kenny.
His cousin’s skin was gray, his eyes half-closed, and the arrogant expression that had been permanently stamped onto his face since childhood was completely gone, replaced by the hollow, vacant stare of someone who had seen something that broke him.
’What the hell happened to you?’ he thought, his fingers tightening on the windowsill as he watched the horse stumble to a stop in front of a group of guards who rushed forward to catch Kenny before he fell out of the saddle.
’He’s a five-Shard knight,’ he thought, staring at the missing arm and the blood still dripping onto the cobblestones. ’If something inside that gate did this to him, then whatever is in there is genuinely terrifying.’
He watched the guards carry Kenny’s limp body toward the nearest healer’s post, the crowd parting around them while people whispered and pointed.
’Was it just him?’ he wondered, scanning the road behind the horse. ’Where’s the rest of his squad? Did they not make it out?’
The road behind the horse was completely empty.
He stood there for a few more seconds, then stepped back from the window and pulled it shut.
’Well, it’s not my problem,’ he thought, turning around and grabbing his bag off the bed. ’Whatever happened in that gate is Flint business. I have my own exam to worry about.’
He slung the bag over his shoulder, checked the room one more time to make sure he wasn’t forgetting anything, then walked out and shut the door behind him.
The stairs creaked under his boots as he came down into the main floor of the inn. The breakfast crowd was thin, mostly travelers and a few off-duty guards eating quietly at the scattered tables.
Juna was already sitting at a corner table near the back wall, two plates of food laid out in front of her with a cup of water on each side. She had her arms crossed, her tail curled around the leg of her chair while she watched the stairs with a focused expression that softened the moment she saw him.
"You’re late," she said, nudging his plate toward the empty seat across from her.
"I was watching something outside," he said, dropping into the chair and pulling the plate closer. It had eggs, bread, and a thick strip of salted meat, simple but solid.
Her ears twitched once. "The knight?"
He looked up at her, not surprised she already knew. Her hearing was sharp enough to pick up the commotion from down here.
"Yeah," he said, picking up the bread. "Kenny. My cousin from the Flint family."
She watched his face for a second, looking for any trace of concern or worry, but his expression was the same flat, unbothered look he always wore when something didn’t directly involve him.
"You don’t seem worried about him," she noted, taking a bite of her own food.
"I’m not," he said plainly, tearing the bread in half. "He called me family trash and tried to start a fight with a princess. If something in that gate chewed him up, that’s between him and whatever he pissed off."
She let out a quiet huff through her nose, her tail giving a single lazy flick. "Cold."
They ate in silence for a few minutes, the noise of the inn settling into a low background hum around them. He finished the meat first, then the eggs, washing it down with the full cup of water before leaning back in the chair.
"So," she said, setting her fork down. "Are you ready for the exam?"
He looked at her across the table, a small, confident smile pulling at one corner of his mouth.
"Let’s go find out."
The healing post was a squat building tucked behind the main barracks, it was a place that smelled like blood and poultice paste no matter how many times they scrubbed the floors.
Kenny lay on a narrow cot near the back wall, his remaining hand gripping the edge of the mattress while a healer worked on sealing the stump where his arm used to be.
His skin was still gray, his breathing shallow, and his eyes kept drifting in and out of focus like his body couldn’t decide whether to stay conscious or shut down.
The healer had barely finished wrapping the wound when the door opened.
Heavy boots hit the floor in a measured, unhurried rhythm. The healer looked up, froze, then immediately stepped back from the cot without being told.
The man who walked in wore the black and silver plate of the Royal Knight Order, the armor polished to a mirror finish with a captain’s crest stamped into the left pauldron. His face was hard and weathered, the kind of face that had stopped caring about pleasantries a very long time ago.
He looked at Kenny’s missing arm, the blood still soaking through the fresh bandages, the shattered pieces of Flint armor piled on the floor beside the cot, and didn’t flinch.
He didn’t ask if Kenny was alright. He didn’t offer condolences or ask about his squad. He pulled a chair from the corner, set it beside the cot and sat down, his eyes fixed on the young knight’s face with the cold, clinical focus of a man who only cared about one thing.
"What is the estimated rank of the gate?" he asked.
Kenny’s eyes slowly dragged toward the captain’s face. His jaw moved once, twice, the muscles in his throat working hard to form words through the pain and blood loss.
The healer standing behind them held her breath.
"Seven," he whispered, his voice cracking on the word. "Seven... shards."
The captain didn’t move. He just sat there, perfectly still, staring at the broken knight in front of him while the weight of that number settled into the room like a stone dropping into deep water.
A seven-shard gate, sitting a few miles from the capital walls, this was not good at all.