Elijah
Royal Dungeon
First Terrain
Lower level
Kingdom of Ashtarium
I never got the chance to talk to Steph—not really—about the things she was hiding from me. Victor Van Helsing had brought it up, cracked open the door to something deeper, but I let it slide. Maybe I wasn't ready. Maybe I didn't want to know.
And now we were too deep—both figuratively and literally. The Ashen Waste stretched around us, the first hellscape of the lower floor. We'd crossed a line, and there was no going back.
We'd fought hard. Against the Shedim, there's no such thing as holding back. Every swing, every spell, every breath felt like a gamble. Some of us paid dearly. The Ysera Compact had done all they could—Fey magic was potent, yes, but even their grace had limits. Especially when it came to healing humans.
As for me… being a Vampire should've given me the edge. Faster regeneration. Greater resilience. But the Shedim left more than claw marks or burns—they scarred the soul. I could feel it, something hollow echoing deep within me, like a bell that had cracked and would never ring true again.
Soul wounds… those were different. Hidden. Lingering. Healers avoided them not out of cruelty, but because they were nearly impossible to mend. Only a few could even begin to understand how.
And none of them were here. None of the soul wounds were fatal—thankfully. The Ysera healers had done what they could, mending flesh and knitting broken bones. But soul wounds were different. Those required time, rest… and cultivation. There was no shortcut, no spell to undo the damage. Only patience and the slow restoration of one's essence.
I could feel it, though—my soul core pulsing, saturated with enough energy to push me into the Warrior realm. The breakthrough was close. It would be easy, natural even.
But that wasn't my goal.
Father had made it clear. The Warrior realm was a stepping stone, not a destination. I had to aim for the Master realm—and I agreed. I still had some of Jack Kuria's blood, its energy potent and wild, and I'd gathered a few Mana stones from the terrain—cracked crystals, humming softly with dormant power. But it wasn't enough. Not yet.
I needed something more. Not just mana stones, but a Mana Core—refined, living essence. Something strong enough to anchor a true breakthrough. Unfortunately, the Shedim didn't leave cores behind like most Mana Beasts. Even Captain M'rael didn't know why. Their deaths left only silence. No trace. No reward.
So, I waited. Waited for the chance to face something else—something that would give me what I needed.
I took another gulp from the Synthblood flask, dulling the thirst that clawed at my throat. It wasn't pleasant, but it helped. At least we'd managed to keep our crawler intact—though by all rights, it should've been torn apart days ago.
"How are you feeling?" Steph asked, her voice cutting through my thoughts.
"Fine," I said. "Other than the fact this heat's going to kill me."
The deeper we went into the Ashen Waste, the worse it became. The heat was unbearable, oppressive—thick like a weight pressing down on our chests. Even with Validus, my body reinforcement technique, the temperature gnawed at my endurance. It shouldn't have. It was supposed to shield me from external extremes, but the Waste didn't follow normal rules.
The Vampires in Helsing's group were suffering. You could see it on their faces—sweat, fatigue, frustration. They weren't like us. My people, the Ashtarmel, were born from fire. We carried heat resistance in our blood. It didn't make the pain disappear, but at least it made it survivable.
"We should be nearing the border of the first terrain," Captain M'rael said, eyes scanning the burning horizon. "There should be an exit portal nearby. We can leave the Dungeon now—before things get worse."
"I'm not leaving," I said quietly but firmly. "Not until I break through to the Master realm."
The captain stiffened. "Your Highness… this is madness. Only Master realms can endure the lower floors, and we barely have enough of them now. We need to regroup. Strategize. Live."
"No," I said again, my voice colder this time. "I go on. If the rest of you want to leave—if even you decide to step out—I won't stop you. But I won't take another step backward."
I hadn't used it yet. The ability factor. True Fantasia.
Not the kind that conjures illusions or tricks the senses—this was different. This was desire made real. A self-induced manifestation that bent reality around my will. A bridge between what should be and what is. And if the others left… then maybe it was time to stop hiding it. Time to let reality reshape itself around me.
"And you too," I said to Steph. "If you want to leave, I won't stop you."
"And let you die?" she replied, her voice steady. Steph stood completely unaffected by the heat, her expression calm, unwavering. I still couldn't understand how she handled the oppressive climate so effortlessly—but I was grateful she stayed. Just having her near eased something in my chest.
I caught myself staring, admiring her without meaning to. Beautiful and unbothered as ever. I shook my head. No distractions.
"We keep going," I said.
When we reached the border between the first terrain and the second, the exit portal finally came into view. It pulsed dimly against the wall of a jagged magma platform, flickering like a dying ember. The crawlers rumbled to a halt in front of it, forming a loose semicircle as murmurs passed through the ranks.
Uncertainty hung thick in the air.
"What's going on?" I asked, approaching the three group leaders. Victor Van Helsing turned to face me.
"Elra of the Ysera Compact wants to leave," he said. His tone was neutral, but I could tell he didn't agree.
Elra, the dwarf woman barely standing at four feet ten, stepped forward. Her brown hair clung to her freckled, sweat-slick skin.
"This is more than we bargained for," she said. "Only Master realms can survive this. Adepts and Warrior realms? We'll just get people killed. I won't let my people suffer for nothing."
"Come on, Elra," Dwayne Hoffman, the grizzled leader of the Bathory Dominion group, growled. "We've barely crossed the first terrain and you're already giving up?"
"That's exactly why I'm giving up," Elra snapped back. "If the first terrain was this brutal, what are the others going to be like? What about the middle floor? The upper floor? We'll be lucky to even get past the second terrain alive."
She wasn't wrong.
Victor looked to me next. "And what about you, Prince Elijah? Will you leave?"
"No," I said calmly. "I'm going on."
Silence fell. Several Master realm cultivators stared at me like I'd lost my mind. Then Victor let out a sharp laugh, startling a few of the nearby scouts.
"Your Highness… I think you should—"
"No," Victor interrupted himself, the smile vanishing from his lips. "If he's still pressing forward, then he has a reason." He studied me with a look I didn't like—calculating, knowing. "You're lucky to have her with you, Prince."
I blinked. Was he referring to Steph?
Before I could press the question, the ground beneath us trembled violently. A deep rumble echoed across the landscape, followed by a sudden pulse that cracked the very earth. Fissures spiderwebbed across the magma platform, and in an instant—
The portal vanished. Snuffed out like a dying candle flame.
Panic spread like wildfire through the Ascendants. Screams echoed. Crawlers revved and turned, people shouting over each other—
Then the ground erupted.
A geyser of molten lava burst from beneath us, spraying fire and ash as the terrain began to collapse. From the heart of the eruption, something moved—not a tremor, not a quake, but a living presence rising from beneath the magma.
Then it emerged.
A colossal form, forged of molten rock and burning hatred, tore its way out of the ground. Lava clung to its body like armor, dripping in thick streams from its six arms. Its eyes glowed with deep crimson, and every breath it exhaled seethed with volcanic steam.
A Magma Shedim—a variant we had only heard about in whispered rumors. No one thought they were real. Now it stood towering above us, easily thirty feet tall, radiating a heat so intense it scorched the air.
The battlefield turned to chaos.
The beast let out a roar—no, a howl—that shattered nearby rock into dust. Before anyone could react, it lunged forward, and the ground exploded beneath its feet as it charged straight into our ranks.
The Ysera Compact moved to intercept, their mages casting layered shields and elemental wards in unison. Gleaming barriers of Fey light snapped into place, followed by vines of emerald flame and glowing runes in the air—but it wasn't enough.
With a single molten fist, the Shedim obliterated the front line. Half the Compact vanished in an instant—burned, crushed, erased. Those who remained tried to retreat, forming tighter clusters and layering more spells. Elra's voice rang out, commanding her people, calling for fallback lines and backup wards.
They listened.
But the Shedim was faster.
It surged again, cutting through the formation like a blade through cloth. The wards shattered, screams rang out, and one by one, the members of the Compact fell—until only Elra remained, standing on scorched stone, blood running down her arm, her axe trembling in her grip.
"No…" she whispered, her voice ragged. "Not like this."
The beast turned toward Elra, its molten eyes narrowing with simmering awareness. But instead of striking her, it let out a thunderous howl and shifted its gaze elsewhere—almost as if she were no longer worth its attention.
Then it moved.
With a sweeping motion, the Shedim brought down one of its massive fists. Lava burst from the cracks in its three molten arms, spilling in thick, blazing blobs that splashed across the battlefield like artillery fire.
Steph shoved me aside just in time, vanishing in a blur as she activated her movement technique. An explosion followed—blinding and deafening. One of the crawlers was launched into the air, spinning helplessly before crashing back down in flames. Fire spread like a plague, engulfing machinery, stone, and flesh.
"We need to turn around—head back to Vhal Karez!" Captain Dwayne shouted over the chaos, his men unloading enchanted rounds into the creature with little effect. As they tried to reach their crawler, the earth convulsed beneath them. Jagged spires erupted upward without warning, skewering their transports and severing any hope of retreat.
The atmosphere itself had changed—no, it was being changed.
I could feel it in my bones. The mana in the air had grown volatile, dense, almost suffocating. The terrain warped subtly under the pressure, as if bending to the Shedim's presence. This wasn't just a beast. It was a force of nature.
"What the hell is it doing here?" Captain M'rael muttered, eyes wide.
"What is it?" I asked, keeping my voice low.
"That thing…" he said slowly, "That's the true Shedim. The real one. The others we've faced were just Fission Beasts—fragments it creates to fight, to study, to adapt. Every time they fall, the data returns to the core. And the core... evolves."
"But aren't they supposed to stay dormant?" Ray said.
"They do. Most of the time. But something woke it."
Before I could respond, another explosion shook the ground. The Shedim tore through the Bathory Dominion's line like paper, its molten arms sweeping bodies aside in a fiery arc. In one brutal movement, half the group was gone.
And now… it was coming straight for us.
The Shedim opened its gaping maw, gathering an enormous concentration of fire-aspected mana. In the next instant, a searing beam of red-hot energy erupted from its mouth, tearing across the ground in a straight line. The explosion that followed sent a crushing wave of pressure that hurled everyone apart like scattered leaves.
Smoke swallowed the battlefield, thick and choking. I hit the ground hard, my skin blistering from the sheer heat. The air reeked of scorched metal and burned flesh. Some of the Helsing group had been reduced to ash—only molten corpses remained where they once stood.
Gritting my teeth, I pushed through the pain and forced myself upright, my hand tightening around my sword.
But before I could regain my footing—
A flash of silver. A blade—sleek, white-metal, gleaming with lethal intent—darted for my heart.
I barely had time to react.
A figure intercepted it, steel crashing against steel in front of me. Sparks flew. I blinked, disoriented, realizing just how close I'd come to death. Within the smoke, I caught glimpses of shadowy movement—flashes of steel, the clang of weapons, ripples of mana.
I tried to push forward, but a hand seized my arm, yanking me back.
I extended my senses instinctively—energy, aura, intention—trying to identify the one pulling me. It was Steph. Her grip was strong, firm with purpose, dragging me away from the kill zone. We burst out of the thick smoke, gasping for air. Captain M'rael and Ray emerged beside us, coughing, bruised, but alive.
A monstrous howl echoed across the landscape, shrill and furious. The shadow of the Shedim loomed through the smoke, advancing relentlessly.
"That damn thing's still coming," Ray muttered, eyes wide with disbelief.
"We need to kill that thing," came Victor Van Helsing's voice. He stepped through the haze, carrying Elra in his arms—wounded, but alive. Behind him, Dwayne was slumped over, bloodied, being carried by Nettle.
The Shedim's shadow loomed closer, its molten body cutting through the smoke like a walking inferno. The ground cracked beneath each step, lava dripping from its limbs, steam rising in choking waves.
I knew we couldn't outrun it. We wouldn't survive another attack. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, letting go of the pain, the fear, the noise. I reached inward—past the seared skin, past the exhaustion in my limbs—to the core of my being, where True Fantasia waited.
[True Fantasia-Domain Invocation: Dreamforge domain]
The words weren't spoken aloud. They were etched into the space between my thoughts and the world.
Reality trembled. A sudden cold burst outward from me, spreading like a wave of thought, of will—of fantasy becoming law. The scorched terrain around me began to shift, steam hissing as fire met frost. The Shedim paused, sensing something wrong.
The air changed.
A ring of blue light spiraled out from beneath my feet, and with it, a domain took shape—a frozen reality carved from my desire. Jagged peaks of shimmering ice burst through the scorched stone. Frost spread like veins across the ground, swallowing the battlefield.
The Shedim roared in defiance, charging toward me. But within this domain—my domain—it was no longer unstoppable. Ice surged upward, encasing the beast's limbs, locking it mid-stride. Its molten flesh hissed and cracked as layers of crystallized will encased it. My breath came faster. My vision blurred. Every second the domain held, it drained me more.
The Shedim screamed again, lava pouring from its mouth, but the beam died halfway through, silenced by the creeping frost climbing its throat. The creature thrashed, but in this world—the one I imagined, the one I willed into being—it was bound by my law. And then, with a final surge of focus, I froze it solid. A statue of fire turned to glassy ice, trapped mid-roar.
The silence that followed was deafening. My knees buckled. The domain shattered around me like broken glass. Ice gave way to heat again, the natural atmosphere rushing back in. I collapsed forward, barely able to hold myself up as I puked out blood. The strain of using the domain against a powerful being like the Shedim was too much.
"Elijah!" Steph was at my side in an instant, catching me before I hit the ground.
"I got it," I said, my voice hoarse. "But… I'm done. That's all I had."
All around us, the battlefield stood still. The Shedim, frozen in place, cracked slightly as frost continued to creep through its molten core. It wasn't dead. But it wouldn't move for a while.
The ice was holding—but only barely. It wasn't natural. It was the result of my reality alteration, a byproduct of my domain. And now that the domain was gone, the ice wouldn't last much longer.
"We need to kill it before it breaks free," I said to Steph, my voice strained. I didn't know why I believed she was the one who could finish it. I just knew. Deep in my soul, it felt right.
Steph locked eyes with me. Then, without a word, she stepped forward.
As she moved, runic markings began to spread across her body—glowing lines of pale green light that pulsed with power no human should possess. Ancient, primal. Otherworldly. She drew her sword, and in a flash, launched herself from the ground.
A streak of green cut through the air.
In a single, perfect movement, she pierced the frozen Shedim clean through the chest. A burst of blinding green light flared outward from the point of impact.
Steph landed lightly on the opposite side of the terrain, near the boundary wall. Behind her, the frozen body of the Shedim cracked… then shattered, the pieces collapsing into steam and melting ice.
From within the fading mist, Steph emerged holding a large, glowing core in her hand.
She walked back to me calmly, not even winded, and handed it over.
"Here," she said softly.
I took it, the core still radiating with searing heat and dense mana. Around us, the others stood in silence—just staring at me.
****
Later, I stood among the dead.
Their bodies remained where they had fallen, burnt to molten remnants. Blackened armor. Warped bone. There was nothing left of the Ysera Compact, save for Elra, who sat in silent grief.
The Helsing Guard and Bathory Dominion had also suffered heavy losses. So many had died in seconds—sacrificed to the madness of this Dungeon.
I stopped when I saw a body that hadn't been scorched.
It was Tasha.
A silver-white blade had been driven through her chest. No burning. No melting. Just a clean, fatal thrust.
"Tasha was with me," Steph said quietly behind me. "When I found you in the smoke."
"Someone tried to kill me," I said slowly, the memory coming back sharper now. "A blade came out of nowhere."
Steph nodded. "And she died protecting you."
I felt sick to my core. The weight of how close I'd come to dying—how my life had been spared because someone else had died for me—churned in my gut like poison. I turned away, boots crunching over the scorched, broken earth as I moved through the wreckage.
Blood dripped from my lashes, smearing streaks of red across my vision. I barely noticed. The heat. The noise. The exhaustion grinding into my bones. All of it felt distant—like it was happening to someone else. Lost beneath the roar of what I had just come to understand.
Tasha died for me.
Steph stayed beside me, silent but steady, her presence grounding me as I fought to steady my breathing. Then, without warning, the portal—the one that had vanished before—flickered back into existence.
"So… should we continue?" Steph asked quietly, her tone unreadable.
In time, the group began moving through the portal, one by one, returning to the lowest Sanctum of the Palace, just outside the Dungeon.
No one spoke.
They walked like shadows—drained, heavy with silence, the mood wrapped in a thick fog of mourning and weariness.
The Helsing Guard, once the largest force among us, had started with nearly twenty Ascendants. Half of them were gone. The Bathory Dominion fared worse—only three of their members remained. And my group… we had lost just one. But somehow, that one felt heavier than all the others combined.
After the portal closed, I returned to my chambers within the spire tower where the Foldgates were housed. Steph walked behind me in silence, my guards trailing at a respectful distance. No one said anything about Tasha's death.
But I felt the weight of it with every step.
Once inside my chambers, I sealed the doors with a gesture, letting the silence settle like dust. I reached into my space ring and pulled out the Shedim's core, the heart of a monster born from flame and death. It pulsed with violent, living energy—raw, dense, and alien.
This was it.If this didn't work… I'd have no choice but to return to the Dungeon.Even if I had to go alone.
"It'll work," said a voice.
I turned. Steph stood in the doorway, arms crossed, gaze steady. There was something in her eyes—certainty… or knowledge she wasn't ready to share.
I raised an eyebrow at her confidence.
There was so much about her I didn't understand. She could see the question forming in my eyes. She sighed and stepped fully into the room.
"Before I tell you about myself," she said, "maybe you should break through first."
"Right," I muttered, forcing myself to focus.
I moved to the cultivation pad, sitting cross-legged in the lotus position. I retrieved Jack's blood—still warm with energy—and the cluster of mana stones I had gathered from the terrain.
Carefully, I arranged the stones in a circle around me. Then, I uncorked the vial and drank every last drop of Jack Kuria's blood.
The effect was immediate.
A euphoric surge coursed through my body, electrifying every nerve. My soul core pulsed deep within, reacting to the infusion of foreign essence. My breath hitched as energy spilled through my veins like liquid lightning.
I placed my palm over the Shedim core, and with a single breath, drew its power inward. My soul core—that invisible metaphysical nucleus seated in the depths of my consciousness—began to siphon the incoming energy. Not greedily, but with profound resonance, like it had been waiting for this exact moment.
The blood and mana from the stones formed spiraling currents around me. My mana core, located just beneath the sternum, began to glow. The structured lattice surrounding it shimmered as it absorbed the influx.
Both cores—soul and mana—entered a state of hyperactivity. My breath grew shallow. Time slowed.
And then—
They aligned.
For most cultivators, the Warrior realm is a necessary bridge. The mana core strengthens, stabilizes, and then prepares for the leap to Mastery.
But my path was different.
Because of the True Fantasia, because of the fusion of bloodlines—mine, Jack's, the ancient echoes within me—my cultivation rejected stagnation.
The energy spiraled faster now—torrents of power cycling through me as my soul core fractured, then reshaped into something crystalline and refined. It pulsed like a star being born inside my chest, while my mana core compressed violently, its raw essence reforged into Force Mana, denser and more potent than before.
My entire being screamed—body, spirit, mind—pushed to the brink.
And then it happened.
A sharp, searing pressure erupted in my gut. My chest clenched.
I doubled over, choking—and then vomited.
Thick, black sludge spilled from my mouth, slapping against the floor in viscous streams. It reeked of rot and metal, the scent of burnt blood and tainted mana. My body convulsed once more as the last of it poured out—impurities, toxins, residual waste from years of stagnant growth and flawed energy flow.
It was everything I no longer needed.
My body trembled, drenched in sweat, but the weight I'd carried for so long—spiritually and physically—was gone.
I collapsed back onto the cultivation pad, breathless, chest rising and falling like I'd been holding my breath for days.
The world felt clearer, sharper. My soul hummed with power. My mana obeyed without hesitation. And beneath it all… I could feel something new stirring—deeper, truer.
The Master Realm had opened to me.
When I opened my eyes, Steph was still standing nearby. She didn't flinch at the sight of the blackened puddle on the floor. Her expression was calm… maybe even proud.
"You did it," she said softly. "Skipped a realm."
I sat up slowly, wiping my mouth. My limbs felt heavy, but my core buzzed with clarity.
"Yeah," I said. "But damn… it felt like I died for a minute."
"You're lucky you only threw up," Steph said. "For us humans, when we break into the Master realm, we expel impurities from every part of the body."
"Every part?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I mean every part," she replied, deadpan. "Unlike you Manaborn types, our bodies aren't as refined. We accumulate way more impurities just from existing."
Impurities—they were more than just waste. They were spiritual toxins, built up through years of cultivation at the lower realms. Imbalances in energy flow, flaws in circulation, and minor disharmonies—all of it accumulated throughout the Awakening stage. When one entered the Master Realm, the body underwent a violent yet essential refinement process that expelled those impurities.
For humans, it was much worse.
Unlike Manaborn, who were designed from creation with bodies attuned for energy manipulation, humans had to learn. To struggle, to adapt. Our physiology wasn't shaped for mana—we had to earn our compatibility.
I rose slowly from the cultivation pad, still a little sore, and walked over to the bar lining the far wall of my chamber. The shelves were lined with Ascendant-grade spirits—liquors brewed from mana-infused fruit, aged in void-tempered casks. I scanned the bottles, then started mixing.
"Want one?" I asked, glancing over my shoulder.
"Why not?" Steph said, stepping further into the room.
I smiled and returned to my work. I hadn't practiced mixology in years—not since graduating from the Royal Academics—but I'd been decent at it once. My father had hated it, of course. Said it was "a distraction from proper cultivation." Still, I'd learned how to craft a damn good drink.
I slid a glass across the bar to Steph, who took a sip.
"I'm glad to know your bartending skills haven't rusted," she said.
I raised my own glass. "So… are you going to tell me, or should I pry it out of you?"
Steph exhaled softly, setting her drink down.
"My mother's name is Macros. But… it's my father's family that was close to the Helsings."
"Your father's family?" I blinked. "Wait… are you—"
"A Benandanti," she said.
I froze, mind flashing back to the runes I'd seen lighting up her skin when she brought down the Shedim. That greenish glow—the soul-script patterns—runic power. A signature of the Benandanti bloodline.
"But Benandanti aren't the only ones who use Runes," I said quickly, trying to save face.
"I know," she replied, amused.
"So… you took your mother's name instead of your father's. Why?"
Steph swirled her drink, her expression tightening.
"Because I wanted nothing to do with the Nikias. I left Nexia, took my mom's name, and enlisted in the military."
I nearly choked on my drink. "The Nikias? As in… descended from Margo Nikias? The one who fought beside Dante Lionheart during the Long War?"
She nodded.
That name stirred memories. The Nikias family had once been bound closely with the Lionhearts—until a historical fallout fractured that alliance. Afterward, the Nikias had relocated, establishing power in another region, away from the Lionheart sphere.
"Nexia…" I muttered, thinking aloud. "Don't the Nikias… own the casino syndicates?"
"They do," Steph said.
"And most of the criminal underworld in Nexia."
"Exactly."
I leaned back, staring at her.
"So that's the family business you wanted nothing to do with?"
"But I still don't get why Victor was so interested in you," I said, watching her closely. "He made it seem like… There was something more going on."
Steph gave me a knowing look. "You do know the Benandanti possess a Divine Protection, right?"
"Yeah… something dragon-related?" I said, unsure. "Dragon god or… whatever?"
She smiled faintly. "The Divine Protection of the Dragon God. It's the source of our runic power—passed down through our bloodline."
I nodded slowly. "Right, I've heard of that. But still… it doesn't explain why Victor looked at you like he was sizing up a relic."
Steph leaned back slightly, her voice quieting. "The Nikias family… what made them just as renowned as the Lionhearts or the Helsings… is that we didn't just have one Divine Protection."
I blinked. "Wait—you had more than one?"
"That's not supposed to be possible," I said. "A Divine Protection can only be given once. That's the rule."
"Usually, yes," Steph said. "But my family was… a special case."
I raised an eyebrow. "So what's the second protection?"
She didn't hesitate. "Nike's Mantle. The Divine Protection of Victory. Given to my ancestors by the old gods of Macedonia—before even the rise of formal cultivation orders."
My eyes widened. "Seriously? I've never heard of that."
"It's not public knowledge," she said. "Only certain Benandanti bloodlines know about it. And even fewer ever awaken it."
"What does it do?" I asked, leaning in.
Steph exhaled, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. "It's… complicated. But simply put, it gives us a persistent metaphysical advantage. A buff. In battle, in plans, in breakthroughs—things tend to go our way."
I stared at her, stunned. "No way."
I dropped my drink and moved from behind the counter, sitting beside her on the couch, eyes locked with hers.
She didn't flinch. "Why do you think your trip to Kettlia went so smoothly? Why do you think so many of us survived the Shedim's attack? Why do you think your breakthrough worked—even skipping a realm, which shouldn't be possible?"
I paused, mind racing. I didn't want to believe it was some external force. But the look in her eyes told me she wasn't bluffing.
Then I frowned. "But… we didn't all survive. Tasha's dead."
Steph looked away for a moment. Then quietly, she said, "My power wasn't spread over everyone."
My throat tightened. "What do you mean?"
"My focus… was on you," she said. "They were just within the sphere of the blessing. But I wasn't protecting them. I was protecting you."
"Why?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper. "Why me?"
Steph looked at me then, gaze steady.
"Because I'm not just your secretary," she said. "I'm your assigned Royal Guard."