Chapter 7 - Gathering the Forgotten

News of the miraculous bloom spread across the kingdom like wildfire. The people knew the true King was alive and working miracles from the shadows.
Eli and Commander Kael made their way secretly back to the outer ring of Sunspire—the sprawling slums where Eli had lived as an orphan. Entering an underground hideout, Eli was greeted by dozens of street children, rogue blacksmiths, and deserting palace guards.
"They call us nobodies," spoke Jax, a teenage street thief who had protected Eli when he was smaller. "But if our little prince is ready to take back his house, every street urchin in this city is ready to fight for him."
Eli stood on a wooden crate, looking around at the tired, ragged faces of the people who had fed him and kept him safe for five years.
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"We aren't going to storm the gates with blood," Eli said, his small voice full of absolute conviction. "We are going to unlock them. The city belongs to all of us."
Together, the street rebels and loyalist knights hatched a plan to infiltrate the castle through the forgotten underground aqueducts—the very pipes Eli used to crawl through when searching for scraps.