CRASH.
A heavy crystal glass shattered against the obsidian floor. The sharp sound echoed off the cold stone walls of the courtroom inside the Whispering Hollows.
"Impossible," King Aelroth hissed.
He gripped the stone railing of the scrying pool. He squeezed the stone so hard his knuckles turned completely white. He stared down at the rippling water, watching the image projected from the battlefield below.
Malakor had walked out of the Velvet Abyss. Vespera had not.
No one expected this.
Vespera the Seductress was the fiercest warrior of the Unseen Four. She was a monster born of pure darkness and a thousand years of trauma. She wasn't supposed to lose to a Tamaskritian Prince.
"She didn't lose, Your Majesty."
The voice came from the darkest corner of the room. It was raspy, incredibly weak, and struggling for air.
King Aelroth turned his head. Master Elidyr sat heavily in a wooden chair. He was the ancient weapon-master who had taught the noble sons of Athervale. He was the man who had trained the late Master Umbriel in the art of the dagger.
"What are you talking about, old man?" Aelroth growled. "She turned to ash. The enemy still stands."
"She won," Elidyr murmured. A faint, peaceful smile touched his wrinkled face. "She finally won against her own grief."
Elidyr looked up at the ceiling. His eyes were cloudy. He wasn't looking at the stone architecture. He was looking at a memory from a thousand years ago.
"She never got to touch the man she loved one last time," Elidyr whispered. His voice was trembling, thick with a regret that had festered for centuries. "She was just a girl. And I... I just stood there."
Aelroth frowned, the anger momentarily replaced by confusion. "Stood where?"
"In the courtyard," Elidyr coughed, a small speck of blood landing on his white beard. "I watched Umbriel's parents brutalize her. They kicked her. They cursed her. She was entirely innocent, but they broke her anyway. And I just watched."
The old weapon-master let out a long, shuddering sigh. The sound seemed to carry the weight of a millennium.
"I carried that guilt for thousands of years," Elidyr said softly. "I watched her become a monster because we failed to protect her humanity."
He closed his eyes. His breathing slowed down to a mere whisper.
"But today, she touched the warmth again. She is finally free," Elidyr smiled. "Now, I can finally go to my grave."
Master Elidyr's chest stopped moving. He passed away right in the chair, a look of absolute contentment frozen on his face.
"Master Elidyr!" King Aelroth screamed.
The King slammed his fists onto the scrying pool railing. The only person in the kingdom who truly understood the Unseen Four was dead.
Deep inside the Royal Palace, the atmosphere was completely different.
Astraea and her three older sisters were huddled together on a massive, silk-draped bed. They were shaking.
They weren't afraid of the deafening explosions outside. They weren't afraid of the Tamaskritian army. They were absolutely terrified of their mother.
Queen Luthien was pacing the room like an angry lioness protecting her den.
She was currently tying her eldest son, Kaelen, and her youngest son, Crown Prince Orion, to a thick marble pillar in the center of the room. She was using thick, glowing magical ropes. She pulled every knot fiercely tight.
"Mother! Let us go!" Kaelen protested helplessly. He struggled against the bindings, his face turning red with embarrassment. "Our kingdom needs us! I am a warrior!"
"You are an idiot!" Luthien snapped. She yanked the rope tight across his chest, making him grunt. "Don't you dare try to leave this room."
Orion, the Crown Prince, tried to be smart.
He focused his mana. He looked at the heavy wooden doors leading to the hallway. He triggered his innate ability to teleport a short distance.
Vwoop.
Orion vanished from the pillar. He reappeared near the door, mid-sprint.
THUD.
Orion slammed face-first into absolutely nothing.
Luthien had already cast a reinforced, invisible barrier across the entire room. Orion slid slowly down the invisible wall, groaning and holding his bleeding nose.
Luthien marched over. She didn't use magic. She reached down and grabbed Orion directly by his pointed elven ear.
"Ow! Ow! Ow! Mother, stop! The dignity of the crown!" Orion whined as she dragged him across the floor.
"The crown can stay on your head while you are tied to a rock!" Luthien barked.
She shoved him back against the marble pillar. She wrapped the glowing ropes around his waist, pinning his arms to his sides. She tied a thick knot and let out a massive, frustrated sigh.
"This is exactly why Elven girls survive longer than Elven boys," Luthien muttered. She put her hands on her hips, glaring at her two sons.
"We are all technically immortal," she continued, pointing a scolding finger at them. "But you boys are just impossibly harder to keep alive. It is like you are actively trying to get yourselves impaled!"
"We have to fight for our honor!" Kaelen argued, lifting his chin stubbornly.
"Do you think I carried you for months just so you could throw yourself onto a Tamaskritian sword?" Luthien hissed. "You will stay here. Both of you. If you die today, I will kill you myself."
Astraea and her sisters didn't dare say a single word. They just hugged their pillows tightly and watched their brothers get lectured.
High above the battlefield, the wind howled across the ruined top of the Great Barrier.
Cough. Cough.
Kyanos leaned weakly against the cold white stone. His body was incredibly fragile right now. His signature ice armor had completely melted away in the brutal methanol flames below. His skin was blistered and red.
Darius walked over slowly. He held a crude, uneven earthen pot he had molded with his earth powers. It was filled with fresh rainwater from Vane's summoned thunderclouds.
"Drink," Darius grunted, pushing the pot into his brother's hands.
Kyanos drank it greedily. Water spilled down his chin, washing away the ash and dirt. He handed the pot back with a shaking hand.
Vane sat heavily on the ground a few feet away. He was clutching his right arm. Or rather, the bandaged stump where his right arm used to be.
It was still night. But the terrifying, suffocating copper-red hue of the lunar eclipse was completely gone. The sky was pitch black, filled with cold, indifferent stars.
"Look on the bright side, Kyanos," Vane joked. His voice was raspy, and his face was pale from blood loss, but he still tried to crack a smile.
"What bright side?" Kyanos groaned, resting his head back against the wall.
"At least you only lost your armor," Vane said, lifting his bandaged stump. "I lost my dominant hand. How am I supposed to write love letters now? I am definitely going to die a virgin at this rate."
Darius just shook his head, staring out over the edge of the wall. "Save your breath, Vane. Nobody was waiting for your love letters anyway."
"You guys are so mean," Vane sighed, dropping his head back.
The jokes quickly faded into silence.
The three Princes looked down at the battlefield. Their eyes traced the path through the smoke, looking toward the Towering Whispering Hollows in the distance.
The fires were dying out. The screams were fading. But the air felt incredibly heavy. They all knew the climax of this bloody war was approaching.
Down on the mud and ash of the battlefield, the fighting had reached a haunting standstill.
Aurelius stood tall amidst the wreckage. He wore his heavy Dark Mantle armor. His golden eyes looked out through the narrow slits of his dark visor, silently analyzing the aftermath.
A few yards away, Ignis was kneeling silently in the dirt.
He had his head bowed in front of Thalor's headless body. Ignis didn't move to loot the corpse. He didn't cheer for his victory. He just stayed on one knee. It was a rare, genuine token of respect for a fallen enemy who fought not just as a warrior, but as a father.
Further back, the ground was completely shattered.
Valerius was collapsed on his back in the center of a massive crater. His armor was scorched black. His fingers still twitched with residual static electricity. He was completely drained of mana.
Durok's massive body lay near him. The giant's earthen shields were shattered into tiny pebbles. The beast was completely electrocuted, his body smoking from the Zeus Smash that had finally ended his rampage.
But Aurelius's golden eyes stopped moving when they landed on Malakor.
The Prince of Shadows was on his knees.
The Velvet Abyss was gone. The absolute darkness had shattered, leaving only the cold night air. And Vespera was gone with it.
Malakor had a haunted, empty look in his violet weyes. He couldn't process what had just happened. He couldn't shake the feeling of her weight against his blade. He couldn't forget the soft, desperate press of her lips against his.
Aishiteru.
The word echoed in his mind over and over again. It sounded like a curse. It sounded like a prayer. She had deliberately pulled his dagger deeper into her own heart. She had smiled as she died.
Malakor slowly reached his trembling hands down into the dirt.
He scooped up a handful of the fine, black ashes left behind when Vespera's body disintegrated. The grit felt rough against his armored gloves.
He didn't let the wind blow the ashes away. He raised his hands and pressed them to his own face.
He slowly smeared the black ash across his cheeks. He rubbed it into his forehead. He closed his eyes, his shoulders shaking slightly in the freezing wind.
It was the traditional mark of mourning. He was carrying her remains on his skin. He was carrying her soul.
"You didn't even give me a choice," Malakor whispered to the empty air. His voice cracked.
Aurelius watched the broken Princes.
He watched Ignis mourning an enemy. He watched Valerius broken in the mud. He watched Malakor smearing the ashes of the Seductress onto his face. He saw the grief, the exhaustion, and the death that surrounded his brothers.
Aurelius didn't say a single word. He didn't offer comfort. He didn't offer a command.
The Crown Prince simply gripped the hilt of his heavy broadsword. He turned his back on his brothers and looked straight ahead.
His heavy, armored boots crunched against the ash-covered ground. He started to walk. His dark cape billowed behind him in the cold wind.
He walked steadily toward the massive, obsidian gates of the Whispering Hollows.
He was moving forward.
Toward the Final Conquest.