Seraphine didn't wait for the crowd to recover. Once Kaelen accepted her offer, she simply turned and said,
"Follow me."
Her voice carried a command so natural it wasn't domination — it was expectation.
Kaelen moved without hesitation, and the room parted for them.
I watched from the back, tea still warm in my hand.
Her steps… her aura… the faint imprint of a lineage she worked her entire life to bury.
Liones.
A bloodline that once shook the sky and later attempted to hide its own existence.
Tessandra Liones — hiding under "Seraphine Alrorias."
But of course… I had always known.
I smirked into my cup.
"Go on," I whispered. "Show him what a royal born for war looks like."
The apartment she brought Kaelen to was elegant in the most understated way.
Clean lines. Silver furniture. Curtains of faint violet silk.
But the air… the air was too still. Too reinforced.
A concealed circuit-rune glimmered beneath the floor.
Kaelen noticed.
"You fortified this place," he said quietly.
"Mm," she replied, touching the wall with her palm.
The entire room shifted, metal grating smoothly retracting as a circular panel opened in the floor.
A hidden elevator — seamless, silent.
"Come."
As they descended, the atmosphere changed from domestic to hardened steel.
Deep humming. Thick layers of mana-reinforcement.
This wasn't a training space.
It was an arena built to withstand monsters that devour cities.
The doors opened to a massive underground chamber — easily the size of a colosseum.
Runes crawled along the walls like living circuits, pulsing faintly.
Kaelen's eyes sharpened.
"This place… it could handle an Abysmal-class stampede."
"Higher," she corrected.
Her voice didn't boast — it simply stated fact.
Seraphine stepped onto the polished obsidian floor and loosened her coat, letting it fall aside. Beneath it, her battle attire shimmered faintly: black circuit-threaded armor hugging her form, her silver hair tied back in a loose, deliberate knot.
Kaelen exhaled once, steady.
Seraphine raised her hand.
"Kaelen Veystrum… show me who you are."
The instant he moved, the air snapped.
Gravity compressed — a distortion ripple echoing off the arena walls. Kaelen blurred forward, faster than most Trident-ranked hunters could track. His foot twisted, redirecting force into a diagonal strike.
Seraphine wasn't there.
She moved like a line of light being pulled by invisible hands — not teleporting, but too precise for the human eye.
Kaelen pivoted instantly, adapting mid-motion. His Chrono Circuit flickered—time slowed by a fraction. His perception sharpened.
He caught a glimpse of her elbow striking downward.
The impact hit his guard like a meteor, sending shock up his arms and digging his feet several inches into the ground.
Kaelen gritted his teeth, eyes blazing.
He attacked again.
Punches. Kicks. Spatial distortions flaring around him.
Every move refined itself in real time — adaptability blooming like wildfire.
And yet—
He didn't land a single hit.
Seraphine glided around every strike with measured grace.
No wasted movement.
No openings.
She pressed a palm to his chest lightly — almost gentle.
Kaelen felt his entire body lock, gravity spiking around him, slamming him to one knee.
He hissed through clenched teeth.
"…You're a monster."
"A flattering compliment," she replied calmly.
A final push of her aura sent him sliding back across the ground, landing on his back, breath knocked from his lungs.
Match over.
Kaelen sat up, wiping sweat from his brow.
Seraphine walked over and extended a cold metal water bottle.
He accepted it silently.
"…I didn't even touch you."
"You weren't supposed to."
She sat beside him, tilting her head so her silver-violet hair fell over her shoulder.
"I needed to see your growth rate… not your victory."
Kaelen's eyes narrowed.
"And?"
Her lips curved.
"You adapted to my tempo in under a minute. That alone is dangerous."
He swallowed a mouthful of water.
"So who exactly are you?"
Her expression changed — subtly, but unmistakably.
The aura she had been suppressing unfurled, slow and regal, like a throne rising from the dust.
It wasn't loud.
It wasn't overwhelming.
It was a presence that demanded acknowledgment simply by existing.
"Seraphine Alrorias… is the name I took when I wished to disappear."
Her eyes glowed faint traces of gold beneath the violet.
"My real name… is Tessandra Liones."
The arena lights reflected off her irises, turning them into twin crescents of moonlit metal.
Kaelen inhaled sharply.
"Liones… as in—"
"Yes," she murmured, finishing for him.
"The royal family whose ancestor once ascended to the Sky Islands. The bloodline that ruled the northern continent before vanishing from history."
She looked down at her hands, flexing them slowly.
"My bloodline was hunted… envied… desired… so I hid. Took another name. Built power in silence."
Her gaze sharpened again.
"And I chose you… because I do not intend to hide anymore."
BACK IN ARKION — ARATA
I closed the small viewing screen projected above my tea.
A faint smile tugged at my mouth.
"Tessandra… revealing the Liones name again, hmm?"
Veydra fluttered onto my shoulder.
"You knew she'd tell him?"
"Of course."
I leaned back.
"A prodigy meets a hidden queen of a fallen dynasty. Fate couldn't resist."
My golden aura shimmered faintly, undetected by the world.
"Let them grow," I whispered.
"The Era of Dungeons needs pillars… and I am tired of building them alone."