Arcane: TTB: Ch. 155

"Why won't this thing light?"

Jayce's hands were shaking so badly from the cold that he could barely hold the ferro rod steady. He scraped the survival knife along its length again, sending a shower of sparks onto the pile of dead leaves he'd gathered.

Nothing. The sparks died instantly, leaving him with nothing but growing desperation.

Back at The Last Drop, Cipher watched the drone footage with something approaching guilt. He'd at least given Jayce basic survival tools. That was more than some people got in similar situations.

In the original timeline, according to information he'd pieced together, Viktor had literally watched Jayce crawl up a cliff with a broken leg, no fire-starting equipment at all. The guy would have had to resort to friction fire if he wanted warmth. And Viktor had just observed from the sidelines, occasionally appearing like some cosmic horror to make Jayce question his sanity.

Compared to that nightmare scenario, Cipher's version of wilderness survival was downright merciful. So his conscience, which had been bothering him slightly, stopped bothering him entirely. He was practically a saint in comparison.

The problem was that Jayce had zero practical experience with this kind of camping. His choice of tinder was completely wrong, wet autumn leaves instead of the dry, fibrous plant material that would catch from sparks. Part of that was probably his limited mobility. With his leg fucked up, he was in too much pain, too cold and exhausted to go searching for better materials. He'd grabbed what was nearby and hoped for the best.

But his technique was also shit. Even if he'd had the right tinder, the way he was scraping the rod wouldn't generate enough heat to get sustained combustion.

"FUCK!"

Jayce suddenly lost it. He collapsed forward onto the ground, pounding his fists into the dirt, screaming his frustration.

The sound echoed off the rocks.

Even Heimerdinger looked uncomfortable. "Oh dear. The poor boy."

The Yordle raised one furry hand to cover his eyes, as if he couldn't bear to watch his former student suffering like this.

Of course, his fingers were spread wide enough that his eyes could still peek through at the screens. He wasn't looking away at all, really. Just performing the gesture of sympathy while remaining fully engaged with the drama.

"He's an idiot," Powder said flatly, not bothering to hide her boredom. She yawned, stretching. "Ferro rods are mostly magnesium. If he'd just scraped some shavings onto the leaves first, he could've lit it easy."

She was unimpressed. If it had been her out there, she'd have figured it out immediately. Piltover geniuses were all book-smart and practically useless when it came to improvising with limited resources.

Zaunites learned that skill early or they didn't survive childhood. She could remember being maybe five years old, building functional explosives from literal garbage she'd found in the Lanes. Monkey bombs, she'd called them. Little mechanical monkeys that would chase targets and detonate.

Good times.

Thinking about her childhood made her think about how much time she'd spent not being in her workshop lately, which made her think about why that was, which made her turn to glare at Cipher.

She wasn't interested in Jayce's wilderness adventure at all. If Cipher hadn't been so enthusiastically hosting this viewing party, she'd already be in bed. But as the primary engineer on the Southern Gate Plan, she had about a thousand things she should be doing right now.

Instead, she was sitting in a bar, sketching design drafts by hand while keeping one eye on Cipher and occasionally helping operate surveillance equipment. All because she'd noticed him paying attention to too many women lately. It was making her paranoid, forcing her to maintain constant surveillance just to feel secure.

Exhausting was what it was.

"Powder, have some faith in him," Viktor said gently. "He's just never encountered this situation before. He's disoriented. Give him time. He'll manage."

Unlike Powder's pessimism, he had confidence in Jayce. Of everyone present, he knew the man best. They'd worked together for years, developing Hextech from theoretical framework to practical applications. During that process, Jayce had failed hundreds of times. He encountered setbacks that would have broken lesser researchers. And he'd powered through all of it through sheer stubborn persistence.

Jayce's personality was resilient as hell. He could handle enormous pressure. Viktor believed he'd break free from this predicament through willpower alone, same as he'd overcome every other obstacle in his life.

And just as he predicted, after screaming himself hoarse, Jayce pushed himself back upright. His face was streaked with dirt and tears, but his expression had shifted. He didn't immediately try lighting the fire again. Instead, he examined all the resources he had available. Then, exactly as Powder had suggested, he used the knife to scrape magnesium powder directly onto the leaves. Not aggressively, but with precision, creating a small mound of highly flammable material. He positioned the ferro rod just above the powder and struck it hard with the knife's spine.

The sparks caught instantly this time. The magnesium flared white-hot, igniting the leaves, which in turn caught the smaller twigs he'd arranged in a pyramid structure.

Within seconds, he had fire.

He quickly added larger branches to the growing flames, building it up into something sustainable. Real warmth began radiating outward.

Viktor let out a breath. "There. See? He figured it out."

Successfully starting the fire meant Jayce had cleared the first major hurdle. At least he hadn't failed immediately, which would have been embarrassing for everyone involved.

Besides, if he'd failed completely, Cipher would just arrange additional trials until the lesson stuck. This wasn't over until Jayce learned what he needed to learn, and Cipher's attitude on that point was inflexible.

Jayce dragged himself closer to the flames. The altitude was high up here, and the wind was vicious. He'd been freezing for hours now, his core temperature dropping into dangerous territory. But as the warmth started to penetrate his cold-numbed skin, his thoughts drifted somewhere unexpected.

He found himself thinking about Mel.

Her embrace was warm like this. On bright afternoons, when he was exhausted from council work or research, she'd let him rest with his head in her lap. She'd run her fingers through his hair, speak to him in that low, soothing voice, offering guidance and perspective on whatever problems were troubling him. Her hands would massage the tension from his shoulders and neck, working out the knots of stress and anxiety. And when he woke from those brief naps, if he was still uncertain about his path forward, she'd provide counsel with the wisdom of someone who'd navigated political waters since childhood.

She'd always known how to guide him back to clarity. How to make him feel capable and strong.

The memory made his chest ache. He wondered what she was doing right now. Whether she knew he was missing yet. Whether she was looking for him. She had to be. She loved him. He knew that as certainly as he knew anything. But she'd never find him. Not out here, not with Camille covering her tracks. And he had no idea if he'd survive long enough to make it back to her on his own.

The thought made something break inside him.

"Camille!"

The words tore from his throat as a roar. He stared south, toward where Piltover lay beyond the mountain range.

"I won't yield to you!"

His hand clawed into the dirt, fingers digging deep.

"For Piltover. For the vision Viktor and I share. For Mel, for Professor Heimerdinger, for everyone who believes in me... I cannot die. I will not die."

The conviction settled into his bones like iron. "I will not hand my home over to someone like you."

Suddenly, he understood what he had to do.

Survive, get back, and reclaim what was his.

So many people were counting on him. His work wasn't finished. The future he'd promised to build still needed building. He couldn't die. Not here, and not like this.

With his body temperature rising and the threat of hypothermia receding, Jayce forced himself into a sitting position. He looked down at his right leg, where the bone was clearly misaligned from Katarina's strike.

He picked up a thick branch, placed it between his teeth, and bit down. Then, without giving himself time to reconsider, he grabbed his calf with both hands and wrenched the bone back into alignment.

The pain was indescribable. Agony shot up his leg and spine, exploding in his brain like a bomb. He couldn't even scream around the branch clenched in his teeth, just made a horrible muffled sound.

Cold sweat poured down his face. His vision went dark around the edges. Every muscle in his body went rigid from the shock. Then the strength left him all at once. He collapsed backward, gasping desperately for air, completely spent.

That night was the longest of his life. Every minute stretched into an eternity of cold and pain.

But he didn't die.

---

"It is with deep regret that I must inform the council that Councilor Talis, whom we selected to defend Piltover, disappeared last night."

At the Piltover Council chambers, Mel made the announcement. Her face showed appropriate concern and distress, but anyone who knew her well could see the fury simmering beneath.

She'd only learned this morning about Cipher's "trial." Watching the drone footage of Jayce dragging himself through the dirt with a shattered leg had nearly broken her composure entirely.

The man she'd protected and guided was being tortured by Zaun.

She'd immediately lodged a formal protest through every channel available. This wasn't a trial, she'd argued. This was inhumane treatment, cruelty inflicted on someone who'd never done anything to deserve it. Her objections had been dismissed. Cipher insisted the trial would continue, and he had support from an unexpected source: Ambessa.

Unlike Mel, who'd spent most of her life in Piltover's comfortable upper society, Ambessa understood the brutal realities of power. She'd survived war, assassination attempts, political coups. She knew what it took to transform someone from naive idealist into effective leader.

In her assessment, Jayce's abilities were commendable but his temperament was fatally weak. He needed hardship to forge him into something stronger. Better to break him now and rebuild him properly than let reality shatter him later when the stakes were higher.

When she had undergone her own awakening, she'd faced the Wolf Spirit's trial. Any weakness would have meant death. And she'd emerged stronger for it.

So Mel's protest had been overruled, and Jayce's wilderness ordeal continued. Which left her in a spectacularly bad mood.

"Enforcer Kiramman, please brief the council on this case," Mel said, massaging her temples.

Caitlyn stepped forward, holding investigation files. "Commander Talis was abducted at approximately 1 AM last night from the top-floor laboratory of the Council Research Building. Anesthetic gas was used to render him unconscious before the perpetrators removed him from the premises."

"But the Research Building is guarded by enforcers," one councilor objected. "How could this happen under our protection?"

"Is this negligence?" another asked pointedly. "Did the enforcers fail their duty?"

A third councilor, examining their fingernails with affected disinterest, spoke, "If we can't trust the enforcers to protect our leadership, how can we trust them to defend Piltover?"

"The perpetrators did not enter the building," Caitlyn replied. "They conducted the assault from outside, climbing the exterior wall to access the top-floor laboratory."

Since leading her family into alliance with Zaun and undergoing ideological reform, she had lost whatever respect she'd once had for Piltover's council. These people were obstacles, relics of a failing system. She remained in Piltover for two reasons only: protecting the indentured workers, and completing the mission the Trifarix Council had assigned to House Kiramman.

"You can't be serious," one councilor sputtered. "The Research Building is forty meters tall. What kind of person could scale the exterior wall?"

If Caitlyn weren't a Kiramman, he'd have been much less polite.

"Enforcer investigation teams conducted aerial surveys of the exterior walls," Caitlyn continued calmly. "We discovered evidence on the western face, grappling hook impact points and dagger marks where blades were embedded to get a foothold. Forensic analysis confirms these marks were made last night. Therefore, we conclude there were two perpetrators. One equipped with a specialized grappling apparatus, the other using daggers."

Everyone in Piltover's elite circles knew about Camille and her signature grappling hook equipment. And she had motive, means, and opportunity to abduct Jayce.

The councilors weren't stupid. The moment they heard "grappling hooks," they understood exactly what had happened.

But unlike Jayce, they weren't brave enough to directly challenge the Clan Ferros. Cheering from the sidelines was one thing. Actually confronting that particular beast? That required courage they simply didn't possess.

Sure enough, the councilors exchanged uncomfortable glances.

"Ladies and gentlemen," one councilor said, breaking the awkward silence, "Commander Talis' disappearance demonstrates that Piltover's crisis remains unresolved. I propose we immediately select a replacement to assume his duties and continue defending the city."

The chamber lights dimmed. A spotlight illuminated the speaking councilor.

"Agreed!"

"Agreed!"

"Agreed!"

Three of the remaining four councilors voted instantly. Only Mel and Cassandra abstained, with Jayce obviously absent. And all three who'd voted were now staring at Ambessa, who stood behind Mel's seat.

In their minds, only she had the strength to stand against the Clan Ferros. They wanted her to step forward, to take the burden of leadership so they didn't have to.

"General Ambessa," one councilor said when she remained silent, "you're a decorated Noxian veteran. Surely you're the most qualified candidate to lead Piltover through this crisis?"

Ambessa didn't respond. She knew she wasn't the protagonist of today's performance. Someone else was.

"When did Piltover fall so low that it needs outsiders to govern it?"

The new voice was cold.

Click. Click. Click.

The sound of blade-legs against floor echoed through the room.

Camille strode into the council chamber like she owned it. Behind her came Katarina and a full contingent of operatives.

Ambessa's soldiers immediately formed defensive positions, hands moving toward weapons.

"Camille Ferros!" Mel stood. "This is the Piltover Council. What is the meaning of bringing armed forces into these chambers?"

Good performance, really. Almost convincing.

"Your naivety is charming," Camille said. "Power struggles have always been like this."

She walked directly to Jayce's empty seat and sat down, claiming it without ceremony.

"Do you want to test the Medarda's strength?" Ambessa asked with a sharp smile.

"You have no chance of winning," Camille said simply. "Mutual destruction serves neither of us. Better to reach an arrangement."

Her operatives moved forward, revealing the Hextech weapons they carried.

"Don't interfere with me reclaiming what rightfully belongs to the Clan Ferros. In exchange, I guarantee the House Medarda interests will remain untouched. Does that sound reasonable?"

Ambessa stared at Camille for a long moment, then glanced at the Hextech-equipped forces. Her own soldiers were tough, and well-trained. But they didn't have weapons that could match that firepower.

A fight here would be a massacre.

Finally, she waved her hand dismissively. "Fine. Withdraw."