The streets grew quieter the closer we got to the palace. Merchants thinned out, replaced by guards on patrol. The buildings here stood taller, grander manicured gardens behind wrought-iron fences, every stone whispering old money and noble blood.
We walked side by side, robes discarded. No point playing dress-up in this district. Royal guards had far sharper eyes than guild patrons.
"Hey," Serena said, breaking the rhythm of our footsteps. "About Vera."
"What about her?"
"I forgot to say this earlier." She turned to me. The usual brightness in her face had softened into something quieter. Something real. "Thank you."
I said nothing. Let her talk.
"Veracci and I became friends early in our academy days," she said. "But we never really talked much. Her schedule was insane. Mine wasn't much better. And Vera isn't exactly the type to hunt you down at the cafeteria for small talk."
A pause.
"At first, I thought she was just another cold, stuck-up noble from a big family. She barely spoke. Kept to herself. Everything about her screamed leave me alone."
Serena's gaze drifted to the road ahead.
"But then I remembered something you told me," she continued. "Don't judge a book by its cover."
That line. I'd said it years ago, back when we were still kids. Serena had asked why I kept reading strange books that nobody else touched. I had no idea she'd held onto it this long.
"So I took a chance and reached out," she said. "Turns out, behind that icy exterior was just a girl who had never learned how to let her guard down. Someone who'd spent her entire life clawing to prove her worth, until she forgot what it felt like to just... be a person."
She looked at me.
"You saved her, Recci. Not just her life. You gave her a second chance."
"I should be thanking you," I said. "For staying by her side."
"Don't mention it," she replied. Then her smile shifted. Not the sunny one. Not the business one. The smile of someone steeling themselves for something heavy.
"But there's something I'm curious about."
Her pace slowed. When she spoke again, her voice carried a different weight.
"Hey, are you from the future?"
My stride didn't falter. My expression didn't change. But deep in my chest, something tightened.
"This again," I said, flat as ever. "Are we doing another interrogation?"
"Yes." No hesitation. "But this time it's different. I want the truth."
"You usually back off."
"Usually, I do. Because you're my friend, and I didn't want to push." Her voice hardened. "But this time is different, Recci."
She stepped ahead of me, then turned and planted herself in my path. Those bright blue eyes locked onto mine. No playful spark. No teasing grin. Just a gravity I'd rarely, if ever, seen from Serena Valenrose.
"You know why I'm asking," she said.
I held her gaze. "I can tell you one thing for certain, I'm not from the future. So I don't know why you're pushing this hard."
"Because of the Demon King."
Those three words dropped between us like a stone.
I went silent.
The Demon King.
Of course. Of course. I'd been so buried in everything, Veralyn, Crescentia, taxes, schools, economic reform, that I'd let myself forget the single most important fact about this world.
Magic and Love wasn't just romance and palace drama. Once the academy arc wrapped up, the story pivoted to adventure. The hero's party, led by the prince, would embark on a quest for legendary weapons to defeat the Demon King, freshly risen from an age-long slumber.
And that Demon King had already awakened. Recently.
The public didn't know. Only the nobility and those in the highest circles had been briefed. The kingdom was keeping it under wraps to prevent mass panic. But Serena, the woman who ran a business network spanning every kingdom on the continent, of course she'd caught wind of it.
"What about the Demon King?" I asked, keeping my tone level.
"You already knew."
Not a question. A verdict.
I offered nothing. Because she was right. I'd known. I'd just been so consumed by Veralyn's situation that I'd let myself forget this world had problems far bigger than an arrogant prince and an unfair tax code.
"The reason I'm pressing you this hard," Serena said, her voice soft, but every word edged, "is because I need to know who you really are."
She stepped closer.
"The Demon King has awakened. Monster activity is spiking across the continent. Kingdoms are bracing for a war that might swallow everything." Her eyes never blinked. "And in the middle of all that, there's a man who's had impossible knowledge since childhood. Who built a business empire from nothing. Who's on a first-name basis with the king himself. Who seems to know what's going to happen before it does."
She stopped.
"So tell me, Recci. Are you friend, or foe?"
That last question came with a face I had never seen her wear. No warmth. No charm. No trace of the woman who hugged strangers like old friends. This was the face of a leader measuring whether the person in front of her was a threat.
The air between us turned heavy.
"Enough with the silly questions," I said finally. "We have a tax reform to deal with."
Serena held me in her stare for a few more seconds. I could see the war playing out behind her eyes, instinct screaming dig deeper against a decade-plus of trust.
Then, slowly, she exhaled.
"You're deflecting again," she murmured. "Fine. I'll let it go. Because I respect you."
She turned on her heel and started walking. But after a few steps, she stopped. Didn't look back.
"Don't betray me, Recci." Her voice was steady, but something underneath it trembled. "Because I would die for you. You know that."
I said nothing for a long moment.
This was the first time I'd seen Serena become someone who wasn't Serena.
The woman who lit up every room she entered, who smiled like the sun was a personal friend, who threw her arms around total strangers as if they'd known each other since birth, that woman now stood with her back to me, shoulders rigid, voice threatening to crack.
Was it the Demon King's awakening that had rattled her this badly? Had the shadow looming over the world forced her to question everything, even the people closest to her?
Or maybe she'd been carrying these doubts for years. Turning them over in silence. And only now found the nerve to say them out loud.
"There's one thing I can promise you," I said.
Serena didn't turn around.
I walked forward until I stood beside her.
"I will never betray you."
Nothing more. No explanation of who I really was. No answers to the questions that had been stacking up in her mind for over a decade. Just six words, and the hope that they'd be enough for now.
Serena was quiet for several seconds.
Then her shoulders loosened. And the faintest trace of a smile, barely there at all, touched the corner of her lips.
"Alright," she whispered. "I'll hold you to that."
We walked on in silence. But it was a different silence than before. Heavier, yes, but more honest. Like something buried had finally been dug up and laid in the open. Unresolved, maybe. But at least acknowledged.
A few minutes later, the palace gates appeared in the distance. A sprawling white edifice with spires that clawed at the sky, ringed by high stone walls and rows of armed guards standing at attention.
As we approached, two sentries at the gate turned toward us. Their eyes swept us head to toe, and the moment they recognized the woman at my side, their posture snapped straight.
"Welcome, Lady Serena," one of them said, bowing deep. "Do you have business with His Majesty?"
"I do," Serena answered, her tone already crisp and professional. As though the conversation that had just shaken us both never happened. "It's quite urgent."
"Of course. Please, enter."
The gates swung open.
I watched the two guards bow. It was genuine respect, not the stiff, rehearsed kind demanded by protocol, but the real thing. Born from knowing exactly who this woman was: the owner of the empire that kept this kingdom's economy breathing.
I walked in beside her without a second glance from either sentry. They probably assumed I was a bodyguard. Or an assistant. Or someone too unremarkable to bother questioning.
We stepped onto the palace grounds. Before us, the royal residence of the Kingdom of Grandcrest soared skyward in a grandeur that even the game had never quite captured. Gleaming white walls. Towers that pierced the clouds. Gardens that stretched further than the eye could follow.
And somewhere inside those walls, a king sat on his throne, unaware that the two people walking toward him carried an idea that could reshape his kingdom forever.