Flames shroud The Stone's Rest, black smoke billowing into the sky. Embers fly out of the blasted doorway whenever a poor sod manages to escape with deep burns. The wails inside must be the ones who weren't so lucky. People flee the scene, and Raven offhandedly dismisses some of their lives with a rift of heat burning out their chests.

Glass shatters, and half a man falls out of a window and lands hard on the ground, groaning and crawling with his arms from the pyre. Raven can't help but chuckle at the soul, walking towards him before a hand grips her shoulder.

"What is it, r-runt?" The Druid asks, knowing it's Amelia.

"What are you doing? Haven't you done enough?"

The woman smiles at the soldier, as though she were a mother reminding her child about the same problem for the hundredth time. "A message has to be as c-clear as possible, o-or these idiots might make a-assumptions as to why we're here. Dissenters a-are not tolerated, and h-housing dissenters even more so. Maybe that t-thief would get the message."

"But harming civilians?" Amelia rebuts. "Destroying shelter? Torturing innocent people?"

"Now now, don't e-exaggerate," brushes off Raven, pointing a finger at the crawling man's head. In a moment, the head has a searing bore and the body becomes limp. "I just put it o-out of its misery, as a good Druid s-should."

"This is unforgivable," fumes Amelia. "What would the Empire say of this? What would the Arch-Druid say of this?"

"N-Nothing. Apprehending a dangerous t-traitor like Edelweiss T-Thatch is bound to result in casualties. With a-as much power as I-I have, I can't guarantee I w-won't collapse a building or accidentally hit, say, y-you."

The pyromancer leans her face into Amelia's, pressing an increasingly scalding finger into the girl's chest. "Understand?"

Amelia turns and marches away from the Druid, and the other onlooking soldiers merely stand scared. Raven eyes them with a smoldering gaze, and all of them scatter like ash, wary of being the next victim.

Raven groans. "Kids these days..."