Erza sighed, long and heavy, and the tension in her shoulders eased just slightly. She let her arm fall to her side, and the Sword of Vael'Tharion began to dissolve—not like ice melting, but like mist rising from a lake at dawn.
The blade shimmered, fragmented, and dispersed into the air like water vapor, each particle glowing faintly before fading into nothing. It did not disappear.
It returned to where it had come from—to her soul, to the core of her being, to the place where her power waited for the next time she would need to draw it.
The sword was never gone. It was always there, sleeping in her blood, waiting for her call. Ready to make her enemies bleed.
Isvarn felt the pressure lift from his shoulders, and he rose slowly, dusting off his fine clothes with careful, deliberate movements.
He did not speak.
He did not dare. One wrong word, one misplaced accusation, and his granddaughter would not hesitate. He knew her too well. He had watched her grow from a frightened child into a ruthless queen, had seen her crush her enemies without mercy, had witnessed her coldness turn armies to ice.
But he had also seen something new today. Something he had never expected to witness.
The mortal behind her—the one she had shielded with her own body, the one she had protected with a barrier of ice, the one she had drawn her sword for—was still alive. Not only alive, but standing close to her. Touching her barrier. Looking at her with something that was not fear, but something else entirely.
No one can even speak to her properly, Isvarn thought, his mind racing. Her personality is twisted beyond repair. She trusts no one. She loves no one. She has been alone for centuries. And yet...
And yet here she was. Showing affection. Showing protection. Showing something that looked very much like love.
To a human.
He took a breath and steadied himself.
He was the Queen's Advisor.
He had served three queens.
He had faced down angry nobles and scheming courtiers and enemies from beyond the void. He would not be intimidated by his own granddaughter.
"My Queen," he said, his voice carefully neutral, "please explain this situation to me. This old subject finds it difficult to understand your relationship with this mortal."
He already knew. He had known since the moment he saw the boy's eyes. But he wanted to hear it from her. He wanted to see if she would lie, or if she would finally tell the truth.
Erza's composure cracked. Her voice, which had been so cold and commanding moments ago, trembled with nervousness. She had faced down armies and gods and monsters, but she had never faced this—her grandfather, asking about Yuuta, about Elena, about the secret she had buried so deep.
"Well, Grandpa," she said, her words stumbling over each other, "you see... he is my slave. Yes. A slave. I am just... playing with him. That is all."
Isvarn did not react. His face remained still, his eyes fixed on hers.
"I find this deeply troubling," he said slowly, "that this mortal's eyes are so similar to Princess Elena's. And he looks exactly like—" He stopped. He had been about to say like he look exactly like Prince, but he caught himself. He saw the tension in Erza's face, the fear in her eyes, and he understood. She was hiding something. Something about a son. Something about a child that should not exist.
Erza laughed, a nervous, brittle sound. "Well, you see... it is such a nice coincidence, is it not? This cursed world is full of strange things."
Isvarn pressed harder, his voice growing colder.
"I find that hard to believe. As Queen's Advisor, I have always had doubts about the story of your pregnancy. You claimed that a spell backfired, that you accidentally created new life while experimenting with forbidden magic. The court believed you because they feared you. The elders believed you because they could not imagine anyone touching you."
He paused, his violet eyes boring into hers.
"But I never believed it. Not from the beginning."
Erza swallowed hard. Her throat was dry. Her hands were shaking.
"Now I understand," Isvarn said, and his voice lost all formality. It was raw, angry, filled with centuries of suppressed suspicion. "This mortal assaulted you. He forced himself upon you. He planted his seed in you and stained the bloodline of the royal dragons. He contaminated the legacy of our ancestors. He defiled the blood of Seraphina herself."
The words hung in the air like a death sentence.
Isvarn's aura exploded.
The pressure was immense, far greater than before, far greater than anything the small apartment had been designed to withstand. The walls groaned and cracked. The windows shattered, glass spraying across the floor. The floorboards splintered and buckled, and the ceiling rained dust and plaster down upon them.
Isvarn was not just angry. He was furious. He was enraged beyond reason. The thought that a human—a mortal, an insect, a creature that lived and died in the blink of an eye—had touched his granddaughter, had violated her, had contaminated the royal bloodline—it was too much. The apartment trembled on the edge of collapse, and still his aura grew.
Erza stood frozen, unable to speak, unable to move, unable to do anything except watch as her grandfather's rage threatened to destroy everything she had built.
The pressure in the room had become unbearable. Two auras—one ancient and cold, the other younger but fiercer—clashed against each other like opposing storms meeting over an open sea. The walls of the small apartment groaned and cracked, the floorboards splintered beneath their feet, and the air itself seemed to tremble with the weight of their power. Dust rained from the ceiling, and the windows, already shattered, now began to crack further, the glass spiderwebbing as if caught between two great forces.
Isvarn's aura was vast and old, honed over centuries of service and war. It pressed down like a mountain, relentless and unyielding, seeking to crush anything that stood in its path. He had faced down kings and queens, had stood against armies and gods, and he had never once backed down.
But Erza's aura was different. It was not older than his, but it was sharper. More focused. More desperate. It did not press down like a mountain—it cut like a blade. She was not trying to overpower him. She was trying to protect what stood behind her.
Both of them knew that if this continued, the city would not survive. The pressure they were emitting would shatter buildings, crack the earth, and send waves of destruction across Luna City. And yet, the small apartment building somehow held, as if some unseen force—or perhaps the will of the story itself—kept it standing against the impossible weight.
Erza could not back down. If she did, she would lose Yuuta. And losing Yuuta was not an option. Not again. Not ever.
I will kill him if I have to, she thought, her violet eyes blazing as she stared at her grandfather. I will kill my own blood. I will kill the man who raised me. I will kill him, and I will not hesitate.
She had never believed in blood. Blood had never saved her. Blood had never loved her. Blood had thrown her into the Snow Forest to die. Blood had condemned her to silence. Blood had tried to kill her, again and again, for the crime of being born weak.
But Yuuta was different. Yuuta had held her when she wept. Yuuta had searched all night for her ring. Yuuta had looked at her like she was not a monster, not a queen, not a weapon—but a woman. A woman who deserved to be loved.
And that was enough. That was more than enough.
She raised her hand to draw her sword again. The air around her shimmered, and the blade of Vael'Tharion began to materialize from the mist. If she needed to, she would call her army—the Legion of Eternal Frost, the soldiers who had risen from her shadow at the port. They were almost as powerful as dragonkin, almost as strong as mixed-blood warriors. They would fight for her. They would die for her. They would kill for her.
The pressure increased. The walls cracked further. The floor splintered. Isvarn's aura flared, and Erza's answered, both of them pushing, both of them refusing to yield.
And then she heard it.
A sound. Small at first, almost lost beneath the roar of their auras. But it grew louder, more insistent, more urgent.
It was the sound of someone vomiting.
Not the gentle sound of sickness, but the violent, painful sound of a body under siege. A body that was being crushed between two great forces, that was being pressed from all sides, that was failing under the weight of powers it was never meant to withstand.
Erza's breath caught.
She looked behind her. At the barrier of ice she had created to protect Yuuta. At the man who stood within it, his face pale, his body shaking, his hands pressed against his stomach.
And Erza paused.
Her aura vanished in an instant—not fading slowly like mist burning off in the morning sun, but disappearing completely, as if it had never been there at all. The pressure that had filled the room, that had made the walls groan and the floorboards splinter, that had pushed against Isvarn's ancient power with equal and terrible force—it was gone. Erased. As if she had never been angry at all.
Because she saw Yuuta.
He was vomiting. Not the gentle, quiet sickness of a stomach upset, but something violent and painful and desperate. His body was convulsing, heaving, trying to expel something that could not be expelled. He was caught between two great powers, crushed between the auras of two dragons, and his human body could not withstand the pressure.
It felt like being deep beneath the ocean. The pressure had risen suddenly, without warning, and his body—his fragile, mortal, human body—could not hold. His lungs could not expand. His heart could not pump. His stomach had given way first, forcing its contents up and out in a desperate attempt to relieve the crushing weight.
Yuuta's face was pale—paler than she had ever seen it. His hands trembled as they clutched the icy wall of the barrier she had created to protect him. His eyes were wide with pain, and his breath came in short, ragged gasps that seemed to cost him everything he had.
Erza's eyes shook.
She had seen this before. Once. When she had mentioned Fiona, and Yuuta had tried to stop her from reading his memories. She had seen the way his body had reacted to the weight of her aura, the way he had doubled over, the way he had vomited from the sheer force of her presence. She had realized then what her power did to him, and she had promised herself she would never let it happen again.
And yet it was happening again. Because of her. Because of her grandfather. Because of their pride and their rage and their refusal to back down.
Her heart pounded in her chest. Faster and faster, harder and harder, until she could feel it in her throat, in her temples, in the tips of her fingers. The fear of losing him was real now—more real than it had ever been. Not the distant fear of a year passing, of a promise kept, of a death sentence carried out. This was immediate. This was now. This was happening in front of her eyes, and she could not stop it.
She looked at her grandfather. He was still raising his aura, still pushing, still trying to dominate. He knew he could not win—she was younger, stronger, more desperate. But he kept fighting anyway. He kept pushing anyway. He kept trying to crush her, to force her to retreat, to make her yield.
Why? she thought, her mind racing. Why does he keep fighting when he knows he cannot win? Going against the queen is going against the nation. He has served the crown for centuries. He has advised three queens. He knows the laws. He knows the consequences. So why—
She paused.
The realization hit her like a blade to the chest.
He never intended to win.
Her grandfather was not trying to defeat her. He was not trying to overpower her. He was trying to kill Yuuta. He was using the pressure of their auras to crush the mortal between them, to end his life without ever laying a hand on him. And when Yuuta died, Erza would fall into dragon grief again—deeper this time, more devastating, more absolute. And in her grief, Isvarn would change her memories. He would erase Yuuta from her mind, erase Elena, erase everything that had happened in this cursed world. He would take her back to Atlantis, and she would wake up on her throne, and she would not remember that she had ever loved anyone at all.
He is not trying to save me, Erza realized, her blood running cold. He is trying to save the bloodline. He is trying to save the kingdom. He is trying to save the legacy of Seraphina. And he is willing to kill Yuuta to do it.
Fear flooded through her—not the fear of battle, not the fear of death, but the fear of losing him. Of watching the light fade from his crimson eyes. Of holding his body as it grew cold. Of waking up in a world where he had never existed, and never knowing what she had lost.
She did not know how to stop her grandfather. She had never learned how to handle situations like this. She had always used power to solve her problems—her aura, her sword, her army. But this time, if she used power, she would lose Yuuta forever. The pressure would kill him. The fight would kill him. Her own strength would kill him.
Should I call my ice knights? she thought, her mind racing. Should I open a portal and send him away while I fight? Should I—
But every path took time. And she did not have time. Yuuta was fading. His eyes were glazing over. His breath was slowing. He was almost there—almost at the end.
And then she remembered.
A way. A move. A gesture of eternal shame.
It was not easy to use. It was not something a queen did. It was not something any powerful being did, anyone who had the strength to change the world, to shape reality, to bend the universe to their will. It was seen as cowardice. As weakness. As a surrender of everything that made her who she was.
But she did not care.
She swallowed her saliva, her throat dry, her heart pounding. She bent her knees. She lowered herself to the ground.
She pressed her forehead against the cracked wooden floor.
And She knelt.
She bowed.
A Complete submission.
Not to her grandfather. Not to his power. Not to his will.
To save Yuuta.
The room fell silent. Isvarn's aura flickered, wavered, and then vanished, as if the very concept of power had been rendered meaningless by what he had just witnessed.
The Queen of Atlantis. The Blade of Atlantis. The most powerful being in the kingdom, perhaps in the world, had knelt. Had bowed. Had submitted.
For a human.
For a mortal.
For the man she loved.
A Queen of Atlantis Bowed Her head
To be continued...