The vast cellar remained quiet, save for the rhythmic breathing of the sleeping boy by the wooden boxes. Leiya stood directly beside Mira, her eyes locked onto the strange velvet box and the water damaged paper they were examining together.
Further in the back, Thorne walked deeper into the shadowed corners of the room. He dragged his heavy boots across the uneven stones, his eyes scanning the cluttered relics until he stumbled directly over a low, heavily bound wooden crate. The timber was weathered from the ambient dampness, its corner cracked open just enough to reveal a tight stack of papers tucked inside.
Thorne leaned down, his thick fingers prying back the wood to reach the contents. He pulled out several thick, heavy envelopes that had been sealed tightly away inside the vault.
"Hey, Leiya," Thorne muttered, bringing the stack into the thin beams of gray morning light. "Look at this. Found a pile of mail hidden away back here."
Leiya did not look up from the rusted chest immediately, her focus still fixed on the item Mira was holding. "Mail? What kind of mail?"
Thorne turned the top envelope over, wiping away a layer of black dust to read the dark, elegant ink stamped across the face of the paper. "Look at the writing."
Mira stepped closer to Leiya, her nose still wrinkled from the damp air as they both finally turned to peer over at Thorne. "What does it say?"
"It has an official seal," Thorne said, his voice dropping to a lower, serious frequency as he tracked the script. "It says from the King of Solstia to Leona Speedhardt."
Leiya's face went exceptionally pale under the dim morning light, her hands freezing instantly as the name echoed across the stone room. "Leona... those are her personal letters."
She stepped away from the chest and took the envelopes from Thorne, her fingers tracing the old wax seals. This subterranean vault had been designed by Kalamity and Leona to store the things they explicitly did not want their children to see. It was a repository of heavy secrets.
Leiya broke the first seal, spreading the brittle parchment under the morning light. The handwriting belonged to Leona. It was a precise, defensive log detailing a hidden mechanism within the cellar walls. There were also two maps packed alongside the papers.
"This letter explains everything about the hidden walls in here," Leiya said, her eyes rapidly moving over the ink. "Leona was specifically giving her dual blades to Kota. She locked them away hoping he would never have to fight, but if he needs them, he has to follow a map that leads to them."
Leiya carefully folded the page back down. Her eyes drifted to the second envelope, staring at the formal royal crest stamped into the heavy wax. Her jaw tightened.
"Jaeger, wake Kota up right now," Leiya commanded.
Jaeger nodded flatly, his boots stepping over to the old wooden boxes where the boy lay slumped. He reached down with his gloved hand and shook Kota's shoulder until the boy's eyes snapped open through a haze of exhaustion.
"What?" Kota muttered, rubbing his face as he forced his heavy frame back up into a seated position. "What do you want?"
"Come here," Leiya said.
Kota pushed himself up from the boxes, his boots dragging through the dust as he walked across the floor toward the center of the room. The rest of the group gathered closer as Leiya unfolded the second letter. The words reshaped everything they knew about the bloodline. It was a formal summons from the King of Solstia, who was Leona's biological uncle.
"The king wants his niece to return," Leiya said, reading the text out loud as she looked directly at Kota. "Leona's parents had lived their lives and passed on. This uncle was the next in line because he was kin. But he was only a placeholder. He wrote this years ago while your mother was still alive. He wanted Leona to take her mantle as queen."
Kota let out a sharp breath, his jaw tightening as he stared at the parchment. "A queen? My mother was a princess?"
"An heir," Leiya corrected, tracking the formal text. "She left it all behind for your father. She traded a crown for a life in the shadows. She ignored the call. She chose you and the world she was building here instead of the one she was born to lead."
"Let me see," Kota said, reaching for the letters and the two maps.
Leiya handed the letters to Kota. He took the documents into his own hands and read through the worn text himself, his eyes scanning the faded ink lines. He tracked the two distinct paths laid out before him, tracing the details of the layout. One map led straight toward the foreign territory, and the other map detailed the precise path to her hidden weaponry.
"We're going to that kingdom," Kota said, his fingers tightening against the heavy paper. "Once we come back, im going to find her dual blades."
The weight of the discovery settled over them like a shroud. They had come to the ruins specifically for information, and they had found a catalyst. The letters were not just relics of the past. They were a roadmap to a future that Leona had tried to bury to protect her family. Kota tucked the letters into his clothes. The journey was no longer about survival alone.
Kota looked at the dark corners of the cellar and knew they could not stay. The ruins of his fathers house had given up their final secret. Solstia was waiting. Whether it was a refuge or a trap did not matter. He had to see the place that his mother had walked away from. He had to see the throne she had refused.
"We leave at dawn," Kota said.
Without looking back, Kota headed for the stone stairs and climbed out of the cellar alone, stepping back up toward the surface and leaving the dark vault behind. The others did not follow him right away.
They remained deep within the subterranean room, their shadows stretching against the ancient masonry as they continued looking around the cluttered space, hunting through the remaining relics for anything else the shadows might be hiding.