Chapter 2

A small, ice-cold hand clutched weakly at my robe.

That faint touch severed my awakening divine power. The dungeon was freezing, and Arya trembled violently in my arms. High fever was burning her alive, her skeletal frame cold as death.

Even dying, this seven-year-old pressed her purple cheek against my wound, trying desperately to stop the bleeding: "Doesn't hurt, Mama... Arya keeps you safe..."

My heart twisted like a knife was turning in it.

Without hesitation, I cut off the divine power healing my body. I seized that thread of pale gold flame and forced it entirely into Arya's frozen heart.

The light flickered beneath her skin and vanished. Her furrowed brow relaxed slightly, her breathing steadying to barely alive.

Then the divine fire went dark. Pain and darkness swallowed me whole.

Time became meaningless.

When I woke, the blood had dried black on the stone, stinking of rot.

My throat was desert-dry, tasting of copper. Alexander had cut off all water and food. Without that divine spark, Arya would be dead.

I dragged my broken body closer, wrapping her in what little warmth I had left. The frost sword wound wouldn't close—each breath felt like razors in my lungs.

Suddenly, the iron door creaked open.

Rose perfume announced Isabella before she appeared, flanked by two high-ranking mages.

She wore flaming red silk embroidered with the Grand Duchess's phoenix totem. Her face glowed with health—no trace of the sickness that had been killing her.

My heart's blood had done more than suppress her demonic corruption. It had made her radiant.

"My God, Cecilia—look at you, wallowing in filth like a mangy dog." Isabella pressed a lace glove to her nose, eyes bright with disgust and victory.

I stared through her. No point wasting breath on the already dead.

My silence made her angrier. She moved closer, looking down at me and unconscious Arya with open contempt.

"Alexander has set the date, Cecilia. Next full moon—my Nirvana Ceremony." She stroked the phoenix on her gown like a pet. "Once I complete the ritual and become the true Phoenix Heir, he'll strip your title. Aurora City gets one mistress. Me."

I nearly laughed.

Nirvana Ceremony? An ancient rite that only true phoenix blood could survive. This woman couldn't even sense fire elements, yet she dreamed of rebirth?

"What's so funny?!" Isabella's voice went shrill. "You dried-up husk—you think you can still mock me?"

"Just your stupidity." I met her eyes calmly. "You think my blood makes you a phoenix? You can dress a pig in silk, Isabella. The flames will burn you to ash."

"Bitch!" Isabella's face twisted with rage. Her boot came down hard on my piercing wound.

The agony made my vision go black. I bit my lip bloody to swallow the scream, using my body to shield Arya completely, not letting Isabella hurt her in the slightest.

"Still got a smart mouth? Let's see how long you last!" Isabella sneered, then suddenly seemed to remember something. She pulled an object from her dress and waved it before my eyes.

It was the Stellar Amulet. The translucent blue star stone set in mithril.

The token Alexander had hung around my neck with his own hands when I saved him from the Abyss years ago. Later stolen by Isabella, it became ironclad proof of her fabricated "life-saving grace."

"Alexander said this witnesses our love." Isabella's eyes glinted with malice. "But I've always found it an eyesore. After all, something you touched could never be pure."

I stared at that amulet, my fingers scratching bloody tracks on the stone floor.

"What are you going to do?" My voice was cold as ice.

"What am I going to do? I just think, since you're so attached to it, why don't I destroy it right in front of you." Isabella's shrill laughter rang out.

She threw the amulet on the ground and raised her iron-studded boot, bringing it down with a vicious stomp.

Crack—

The star stone shattered into dull powder beneath her heel.

My heart seemed to shatter with that sound.

Not because I still cared for him—but because that stone was the only proof of what really happened. Now even that was gone.

Inside that star stone, I had sealed a fragment of memory from the Abyss—I had thought that one day he would see those images and understand what really happened.

But now, everything was destroyed.

"How's that? Does it hurt? Feeling helpless?" Isabella looked at me triumphantly. "Cecilia, you'll never win against me. Everything you had—your husband, your status, your bloodline—it's all mine now!"

Just then, heavy footsteps echoed outside. Alexander strode in.

His eyes fell on the powder scattered across the stone. His face darkened. "What happened? How did the amulet break?"

Isabella's expression crumpled instantly, tears spilling down her cheeks.

"Alexander... I brought it to show Cecilia, to convince her to forgive you. But she went mad—snatched it and smashed it. She cursed us both to burn in hell..."

"Cecilia!" Alexander rounded on me, eyes blazing. "That was the only proof Isabella saved my life in the Abyss! How dare you!"

I looked up at the man I'd once loved. His blindness was almost beautiful in its completeness.

"You destroyed what she gave you, Alexander. Not me."

"Still defiant!" Lightning crackled to life in his palm.

The bolt hit me like a battering ram.

I flew backward, crashing into stone. Burned meat. That's what I smelled. The pain should have knocked me out—instead, it sharpened everything to crystal clarity.

"Mother!" Arya jerked awake from the residual shock. She crawled toward me sobbing, but Alexander grabbed her by the collar and hauled her up.

"Throw this little bastard in the Thunderstorm Tower! Let her learn some respect!"

"Let her go! Alexander, take it out on me!" I crawled forward desperately, only managing to grab a handful of mud from his boot.

Alexander looked down at me without mercy. "Cecilia, this is a warning. If you dare touch Isabella again, I'll make you watch your daughter burn."

He left with Isabella and Arya. The dungeon held only me and the scattered powder that had once been my hope.

I lay on the frozen stone floor and suddenly began to laugh softly. The sound echoed in the deathly silent chamber.

Human love—so false, so blind. How pathetic it all seemed now.

I closed my eyes. The divine seal inside me was already covered in spiderweb cracks, needing only one final fatal blow to collapse completely.

No rush. Because I knew that a few bowls of blood could never fill the abyssal void inside Isabella. The complete backlash of demonic energy was only a matter of time.

I would wait quietly in the dungeon's darkness.

Soon, Alexander. When you discover that ordinary heart's blood is no longer enough, and for the sake of that false woman, you come to personally carve out the last thing from my body...

That will be the end of this sick charade.

And the day your real nightmare begins.