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[ LOCATION: Valvoral Coast, NEW EARTH ]
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"How does it feel to remember who you are—Kaviar?" Alteria smiles.
"Don't call me that—Raze is fine. Kaviar has an expensive taste to it."
Her smile doesn't fade, but it stills.
"I figured you'd say that."
Wind curled off the water. Sharp. Crisp. The kind that carried old salt and something else—something older.
Raze didn't look at her.
His eyes were on the horizon. The sea didn't shimmer. It churned. Slow. Wide. Unbothered.
"I'm not that kid anymore," he said. "The one who could pick up anything and make people clap."
Alteria stepped closer. "You still could."
"I don't want to."
A pause.
She didn't argue.
"That boy—Kaviar—he didn't quit because he got bored," Raze continued. "He quit because everyone kept trying to turn him into a tool."
A silence passed. Deep.
Then—
"Now look at me," he said, not laughing. "Summoned. Bound. Weaponized again. Like fate didn't even try to switch the formula."
Alteria's voice came softer. "But you're not a tool."
He turned. Just slightly. Enough to see her expression.
"You sure?"
Her gaze didn't waver. "Yes."
The sea wind pressed between them.
"Because Kaviar didn't have a choice," he muttered. "Raze chose the fire. Even if it burns."
He stepped past her—slow, even.
At the cliff's edge, he raised a hand.
Fire flickered at his fingertips. Small. Focused.
Obedient. For now.
Not wild. Not instinct.
Just… owned.
He let it pulse. Once. Then extinguished it.
"I'll keep the name," he said. "But I'll make it mine."
Alteria watched him. No smile.
Just something sharper. Something sure.
"Then let the world learn it the right way."
Alteria coughed.
Not loud. Not forced. Just a rasp that came up raw and stayed too long.
She tried to wave it off, like always. "Just a side effect," she said. "Been training too hard."
But I could see it. The flush under her eyes.
The way her fingers trembled when they thought no one was watching. Her mana pulsed wrong.
Not wild. Just thin.
Like something was draining it slow.
A mana sickness. That's what she called it.
Said a bug was going around. Said it was contagious.
The system didn't warn me.
It just pinged—quiet, casual.
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[ status updated: mana resistance acquired (basic) ]
[ source: exposure to anomalous strain ]
[ risk: nullified ]
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Fitting.
I watched her steady herself, pressing a cloth to her lips when she thought I wasn't looking.
"Don't hover," she said through the cloth.
"I'm not."
"You're brooding. Same thing."
I didn't reply.
She moved to stand. Wavered.
I stepped forward before she could fall.
She caught herself. Just barely.
Still didn't meet my eyes.
"I'm not weak."
"I didn't say you were."
"You're thinking it."
I exhaled, slow. The fire in me stirred—not hot. Not now. Just aware.
"You can fall," I said. "You don't have to pretend for me."
That made her pause.
She looked at me then.
Really looked. And for once, she didn't argue.
I picked her up. She let me. No resistance. No posture. No false strength.
Just weight. Warm. Breathing.
Her arms didn't wrap around my neck.
They just rested. Light against my chest, like she wasn't sure if she was being carried or floating.
She coughed again. Softer this time.
"Go into the forest," she murmured, breath brushing my collar. "I want you to see the capital."
I didn't ask why.
I walked.
Past the edge of the castle's outer fields. Past the stone markers and broken prayer steles.
Into the trees.
The forest didn't hum—it listened.
Roots coiled around ruins.
Old glyphs faded into trunks.
The path wasn't carved; it was pressed into the dirt by those who needed it once.
She stayed quiet. I could feel her watching me instead of the way ahead.
The climb wasn't steep. Just long. Meant to tire the kind of people who only wanted views, not answers.
And then—
It opened.
The cliff's edge.
Trees broke to nothing. Just wind and drop and sky.
Far below water ate the land. Sea and ocean.
Just beyond that The capital stretched miles.
Torchlight roads winding through stonework veins.
Towers in bloom.
Walls that once held armies now curled in like tired arms. Alteria shifted slightly in my hold.
I didn't look at her. My eyes stayed on the spires.
The horizon.
"It's bigger than I remember," she murmured.
I exhaled. Let the silence hold.
She grabbed it by the neck.
The moment.
"In my grandmother's decree," she said quietly, eyes still on the capital, "I'm to tour the world. Show face. Smile pretty. Sell myself to the other royals."
Her voice didn't shake. But it wasn't steady either.
"Make allies in case a war breaks out."
The breeze tugged at her hair.
"My father was a general," she went on. "They expect me to be something... sharp. Tactical. A ruler they'll fear."
She paused.
"I don't want that."
Her hand shifted against my chest.
Not gripping. Not pushing. Just grounding herself.
"She didn't want that either," she added, softer now. "My grandmother. She wanted peace, but the kind that lasts past coronations."
She finally looked at me.
"I don't know if I can be what they want… and still be who she saw in me."
The capital flickered below us.
And the silence returned. Not empty. Just waiting.
"I wasn't always meant to be royalty," she said.
Her voice shifted.
Less weight, more history. Like she was reciting something she'd only recently accepted.
"My mother was a waitress. A worker. A cleaner when she had to be. The kind of woman who scrubbed floors with pride, not shame."
The wind thinned.
"My uncle was a general—like my father. But not as high-ranking. Not as revered. He was known for his kindness. Subservient. Loyal to a fault. The kind of man who'd shield a stranger if the world fell."
She paused.
"He died in the coup."
Her words came sharper now.
"One of his men was a spy. Leaked his position. It wasn't an ambush… it was an execution."
Her jaw tightened.
"He performed seppuku. Took his own blade. Not because he was ashamed—but because he didn't want his death claimed by a traitor's hand."
She looked out again. The sky didn't move.
"He wasn't radical. Not loud. Not angry. Just… gentle. But I think I understand it now."
Another pause. Her voice softened.
"Not wanting to be thwarted by someone else's will. Not letting the story end in a stranger's mouth."
She exhaled through her nose.
"Do the thwarting yourself, I suppose…"
Alteria's fingers tensed slightly against his collarbone. Her weight hadn't shifted, but something in her grip told him the next words were already loaded in her throat.
"That's why I thought I didn't need you," she said, soft but stripped of ceremony. "That's why I thought I needed a Drakos."
Her voice didn't rise. It deepened.
"I can't show you now, of course—but I'm a very capable person. Trained by the finest teachers money can buy. My father made sure of it."
A gust passed behind them. She didn't flinch.
"I can kill. But I don't want to."
Her breath caught slightly on the next line.
"I can cause harm—but it'd hurt me more than I'd hurt them."
Each word settled into the air like a decision she'd already made.
"I can sever ties. Sever fate. Sever lives… but only in retaliation."
Her throat worked once.
"Never if I strike first. I don't see the point in war if you haven't wounded me first."
A pause.
"But… plans changed."
She didn't explain.
Didn't have to.
Silence settled between them like a sheet stretched taut across two lives that had learned to bend around expectation, but never asked for it.
Then—
"Were you even listening?" she asked, not annoyed. Just tired of speaking into the wind.
Raze's eyes hadn't left the horizon.
His voice came quiet.
"Maybe."
He placed her down gently.
Like something sacred—not fragile.
His hand hovered near her side a moment longer than needed. Then drifted away.
His eyes dropped to his palm.
Calloused. Burnt in places. Faint scars mapped across the knuckles like quiet reminders.
"I am…"
The words came slow. No hesitation. Just weight.
"Raze Santiago Von Rimu."
He let the name settle. Not as declaration. As truth.
"And I am also…"
A breath.
"Kaviar Ka'eli Romania."
The wind didn't move. The forest didn't answer.
But something in the air shifted.
Like the world had been waiting for him to say it. Not because it didn't know.
Because he hadn't known it until now.
"You gave me that name."
He said it like a tether—not accusation, not praise.
Just truth. Something that had always been there, waiting for the breath to give it shape.
Alteria looked up. Slowly.
Not in surprise. In knowing.
Her lips parted like she meant to answer, but nothing came. Just breath. Just air. Just relief.
Then—
A sound caught in her throat. Soft. Unwelcome. Real.
Her hand rose to her mouth, slow, like her body didn't want to betray what her eyes already had.
Tears.
Not many. Not loud. But there.
She turned her face slightly toward the cliff's edge.
The city below didn't shimmer. It blurred.
A smile cracked through. Wide at first. Then tighter. Softer. Like it didn't belong to royalty.
"I thought you'd never say it," she whispered.
She reached for his wrist.
Just barely, fingers brushing the edge of his skin.
"And I thank you…" her voice broke, caught again, "for accepting it."
She blinked once, slow, trying to pull the tears back before they fell. One escaped anyway.
It traced her cheek like something earned.
Raze stepped closer to the edge.
Not out of recklessness. Not curiosity.
Just gravity, gentle and personal. Like something in the light was calling for his weight.
The cliff caught the sun first.
It crawled up his boots, kissed his chest, curled against his jaw. Warm, not hot. Not burning.
He let it simmer.
Face tipped toward the light, eyes closed.
For a breath, for a blink, it didn't feel like a battlefield waited behind him.
It felt like peace had a pulse.
Alteria watched him from a step behind.
Her smile was still shaped by the tears.
Wiped away, but not erased. She pressed her sleeve to her cheek one last time, then turned.
"Let's go back to the castle."
It wasn't a request. Just something tender said to gravity.
Raze opened his eyes. Still soft from the sun.
He stepped back.
And the cliff gave.
Not a crack. A snap.
Fast. Violent. Final.
The stone beneath his foot vanished.
Not crumbled, ripped. A sound like bones breaking echoed down into the trees below.
His heel slipped.
The ground dropped.
His hand flared with flame too late.
Weight pulled faster than instinct.
And then—He was gone.
Falling. Reality flickered around him like broken glass in water.
Alteria spun—"RAZE—!"
But he was already out of reach.