[POV Liselotte]

  The days in Whirikal had taken on a strange cadence—a mixture of academic normalcy and war preparations that kept my nerves under constant strain. The air of the capital, once light and vibrant, now felt heavy, like the atmosphere before an electrical storm that stubbornly refuses to break. The new heroes—Julian, Arthur, Yvonne, and Cedric, along with Mizuki—had adapted to their new lives with astonishing speed. Under Leah’s guidance and Chloé’s watchful eye, they had repced panic with quiet determination, finding within the academy’s walls the home the Church had denied them.

  For me, however, time was becoming a tangible enemy.

  I stood in the King’s private training courtyard, sword raised, lungs burning. William faced me, his silhouette framed against the morning sun, which seemed paler than usual today. We had been working on transitioning the “va” of my mana into steel, trying to find that bance point where the cold wouldn’t extinguish the energy, but instead focus it.

  “Rest, Lotte,” the King said suddenly, lowering his weapon. His voice cked the usual vigor of our sessions; it sounded heavy, as though he were carrying the weight of the entire mountain range on his shoulders.

  I sheathed my sword and wiped the sweat from my brow, feeling the lingering chill of my own magic trying to stabilize my body temperature. “Is something wrong, Your Majesty? We still had an hour of practice before the audiences begin.”

  William walked to the edge of the courtyard, gazing northward, where the clouds were turning a metallic gray.

  “Pns have changed, Lotte. The war council met st night after receiving the test intelligence reports. We can’t wait the six months we had pnned. The mission is being moved up. We’ll depart for the front in less than a month.”

  The impact of his words hit me like a physical blow. I froze—and not because of my mana. “Less than a month? But… Your Majesty, we’re barely finishing the organization of supplies. The heroes’ training is only halfway done. Is this because of what we saw in the sky?”

  William turned toward me, and for the first time I saw a shadow of genuine concern in his veteran eyes. He confirmed my suspicions with a slight nod.

  “That surge of energy wasn’t just a signal—it was the beginning of a massive deployment. As soon as we learned that the Demon King—or whatever it is that awakened—had returned to life, I sent a group of elite scouts, my ‘Silver Shadows’ unit, to the borders of demon territory. The reports we received st night are… arming.”

  He moved toward the map table we always kept nearby. “They suffered constant attacks. Creatures that once roamed alone are now operating in organized squads. But the worst part is what they found before retreating. They managed to spot a small border city we believed abandoned. As they approached, they saw a tide of demons, ogres, and minotaurs marching from there toward the center of demon territory. This isn’t a retreat, Lotte. They’re gathering. Our strategists believe this means the demons won’t wait for our siege. They’re preparing their own expedition to conquer the world.”

  I felt a hollow form in my stomach. The machinery of the goddesses was moving faster than Tiara had led me to believe. They were forcing the collision.

  “This means I’ll have to suspend our intensive training,” the King continued, his tone apologetic. “I must devote every hour of my day to logistics, alliances with the other kingdoms, and the mobilization of the heavy cavalry. I won’t be able to teach you everything I wanted about the Mana Bde or the advanced techniques of my lineage. It’s a shame, because you have the potential to surpass me—but time has slipped through our fingers.”

  “I understand, Your Majesty. Duty to the kingdom comes first,” I replied, though part of me felt exposed in the face of what was coming.

  “But you won’t leave empty-handed,” William added, some of his fire returning. “During these next few weeks, before my departure, we’ll refine your basic swordsmanship and reaction attacks. If you can’t master the supreme technique yet, we’ll make your bde so fast and lethal that no one will be able to get close enough to force you to use it. You will be my family’s shield, Lotte. That is your battle while I fight mine.”

  The rest of the morning passed in tense silence, broken only by the sound of steel cshing. The King demanded three times more than usual from me, polishing every angle of my guard, correcting every millimeter of my footwork. When we finished, he dismissed me with a firm grip on my shoulder that felt like a transfer of command.

  I walked back toward the academy, lost in thought. Whirikal’s sky seemed to be watching us, a gss dome on the verge of shattering. My mind churned with doubts. How could I stop this game of the goddesses? How could I prevent Leah from losing her father, or Mizuki and the others from being thrown into a meat grinder?

  If I want to stop the war, I have to understand why it exists, I thought as I passed beneath the academy’s entrance arch.

  The Church’s official narrative cimed that demons were pure evil, soulless beings bent on destroying Gaia’s creation. But after witnessing the goddesses’ manipution, I no longer believed in the priests’ absolute truths. If I could uncover the real reason the war between humans and demons had begun centuries ago, perhaps… just perhaps, I could find a third path. A crack in the script the goddesses had written for us.

  With that resolve burning in my chest, I diverted my path toward the Academy’s Grand Library. It was an imposing structure—a tower of wisdom that held records dating back to the kingdom’s founding. As I entered, the scent of old parchment and tent magic enveloped me.

  “Liselotte, what brings you here so early?” asked the head librarian, an elderly man who barely lifted his gaze from his tomes.

  “I need the oldest historical records we have,” I replied, heading toward the sections on Forbidden History and Chronicles of the First Dawn. “I’m looking for information on the beginning of the conflict. Not the Church’s version—civil records, ancient war journals… anything that speaks of the first encounter between the races.”

  The old man looked at me over his gsses, his expression a warning. “Those are turbulent waters, girl. Sometimes the truth is more dangerous than ignorance.”

  “Right now, ignorance is going to get us all killed,” I shot back firmly.

  I ventured deeper into the aisles of shelves that stretched all the way to the ceiling. I was determined. While the King prepared with the sword, I would prepare with knowledge. If I wanted to save Leah and protect my new home, I had to uncover the secret hidden behind centuries of bloodshed. My search for the origin had begun, and I felt that the answers I would find there would change the course of history as much as my own ice magic.

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