“I'm truly sorry, Bingxia. For this order from the Illuin Family, I'm willing but unable. I can't take it on.”

“…Oh? I thought, with our years of friendship, you'd sell me this favor, sister.”

The private room gleamed like gold leaf under lantern light, dishes glittering like jewels on porcelain. Five nobles sat there in silks, faces luminous, four with hair like poured sunlight. Yet that opulent tableau rubbed against the air wrong, like silk snagging on a thorn.

On the table, the chef’s bespoke delicacies still held the symmetry they had when served. A passerby might think no one had lifted a chopstick. Look twice, though, and you'd see the steam had died, the warmth gone to ash. It wasn’t that hands were slow. No one had the mood to eat.

Of course not. This wasn’t a banquet. It was a bout.

And now, the bout had ended.

“I do trust you, sister Bingxia.” The Elf who had started speaking turned her gaze, a blade sheathed in velvet, to the lone white-haired woman at the table. “But I won’t trust an outsider who’s holding back from us. On that point, please forgive me.”

She rose, skirts whispering like river reeds, and parted the beaded curtain at the door. Her companion set down her teacup with a soft ring, bowed, and murmured, “We take our leave,” before they slipped out.

The room fell to the brittle chime of beads tapping beads, a silver rain against wood. When that last echo thinned and vanished, Bingxia tipped her chin to the ceiling and let out a thin breath, like mist.

“You’ve handed us one fine mess, Miss Adelaide.”

She said it gently. The other Elf at the table—Qingning, who had watched the ebb and flow with taut nerves—spoke up, her voice a tremor under glass. “Yeah, Adelaide. This is the third major merchant refusing to work with us. You really should clear up the Blood Magic rumor. If this keeps on…”

Her worry bled through every syllable. Adelaide, by contrast, lifted her cup with unhurried fingers and sipped the tea gone cool, the surface rippling like wind on a dark pond.

“It’s just one fireworks merchant saying no, Qingning. We’ve still got four backups, don’t we?”

Qingning frowned, knot tightening between her brows. “Uh… we do have backups, but—”

“—I agree with her. One fireworks merchant backing out isn’t a catastrophe.”

Bingxia cut in, calm as frost. “And even though my good sister said it that way, what she’s worried about isn’t your Blood Magic compatibility. She’s afraid of something bigger.”

She turned her eyes to Adelaide and held them, then let her voice drop, the drumbeat after a long lead-up.

“Miss Adelaide, how exactly do you plan to win the Trial of ‘Truth’?”

“…”

Adelaide didn’t answer. Bingxia pressed on. “As far as I know, you don’t have new, overturning evidence about the Nuharman massacre. Even if the Carne Family is tangled in it somehow, the only Nuharman who might’ve known are beyond speech, and the criminals from the Nacha Tribe were all hanged. Everything’s dead and silent. What can you use to prove Silan hid something?”

Adelaide only watched her cup. The dark tea held a warped mirror, her reflection bent like a mask in water.

After a long pause, she spoke. “Bingxia, Qingning… what you need to know is this: I will win.”

The two gold-haired, blue-eyed Elves didn’t reply. They expected her to lay down a hidden card, the ace under the sleeve. But the white-haired lady stopped there. They waited. No follow-up came.

So? How do you win? Bingxia’s eyes flashed a sharp edge. “Miss Adelaide, let me remind you. You promised me your success wasn’t a ‘maybe,’ but a ‘certainty.’”

“Yes. That hasn’t changed—if anything, I’m more certain now.”

“But you look uneasy. Why? I hope the answer isn’t that you’re setting up a gamble… a gamble we can’t afford to lose.”

Adelaide finally lifted her face and met Bingxia’s stare, flint to flint. “Bingxia, I should remind you too. Our pact was: if I prove myself in the Trial of ‘Good,’ you’ll provide every resource I need.” She paused, gaze sweeping both Bingxia and Qingning. “And the resource I need most right now is you—your trust.”

She put the weight on that last word and didn’t blink. Her look wasn’t just defiance. It was a mountain that wouldn’t move.

Yes, just as Bingxia said, an anxious throb lived under Adelaide’s ribs, the kind gamblers know. But the gamble that chased her sleep wasn’t about losing the Flower Dancer election. It was larger than the Flower Dancer, larger than the Savia Rose, larger even than the Elven parties that would rise and fall afterward.

Because of that, she could speak with iron in her voice. And that iron steadied the two family representatives.

Qingning sank into silence. Bingxia, after a long look, breathed out again and closed her eyes, weariness like a hand over her lids.

“Say it’s like that. But if you tell us nothing, how do we give you the right resources?”

Honestly, I wouldn’t mind less work. But if we sit out and you fix it alone, it feels like we missed the play—Adelaide caught the tease in her tone and let herself laugh, light as a windbell.

“That part’s nothing to worry about. I’ve got a troublesome task that only the two of you can handle.”

“Oh? Speak freely.”

“I want this: after I win the title of Flower Dancer, the flower-plucking ritual will be… broadcast live.”

Bingxia and Qingning blinked, surprise like sparks. Bingxia hummed, thought flashing quick. “Live… Oh, you mean long-distance real-time image magic?”

As one of the First Generation who inherited god-gifted otherworldly language and knowledge, Bingxia grasped Adelaide’s thought at once. No need to explain. Adelaide went on.

“Yes. Then, on site we’d only need the essential figures, like Queen Dreamlan and the Flower Dancer herself. Meanwhile, everyone across the nation can use the real-time image spell to watch me cut the Savia Rose—”

“—W-wait!” Qingning blurted out, face like she’d heard sacrilege. “The Savia Rose ritual is the grandest festival of the century. Many Elves come to worship in person. You can’t just change a tradition that’s stood this long!”

Adelaide watched her shake her head like a rattle drum. She cocked her head and shrugged. “Why not?”

“Huh?”

“Qingning, our Fana Family is already ‘traitors’ in the eyes of conservative Elves. Why cling to a tradition that bakes in bias?” She shook her head. “Tell me, how many Elves can worship on site?”

“Uh… the venue holds around two thousand…”

“Right. A mere two thousand—and those two thousand are family leaders in high seats or tycoons with names like banners. What about the rest of the Elven subjects? Do they lose the right to pilgrimage just because they lack the power or the purse?”

Qingning’s words died in an instant. Bingxia, instead, clapped slowly, a smile like a crescent blade.

“Turning the Flower Dancer’s rite from an elite ritual into a celebration everyone can join… fits the Fana Family’s open-equality slogan nicely. I like it. Hearing it from a human is a pleasant surprise.” She nodded, then propped her chin on her hand, eyes on Adelaide. “But on the technical side—how do we pull it off?”

Qingning caught up and rushed in. “Yeah. Real-time image magic’s mature, but long-distance communication depends on the Sealing Array. The Sealing Array will overload during the ritual.”

Adelaide nodded. “Mm. That’s a real snag. We’d need a high-speed communication array independent of the Sealing Array.”

“Ah? Building that out of nowhere is way too hard! The mana alone is astronomical! This plan isn’t realistic!”

Qingning wasn’t wrong. The flower-plucking isn’t just symbolic pilgrimage. It’s the centennial repair of the Sealing Array.

When the Savia Rose is cut from the World Tree, the World Tree’s century of stored mana surges into the dried Sealing Array. The volume is a flood enough to drown cities. The Array goes beyond its limit. The Elven Realm and the Nacha Tribe both fall into two days of night, and the Array temporarily loses every function except sealing the Void Rift—including communication.

Adelaide had heard that when she first entered the Elven Realm, over ale from two “uncle” Elves at a tavern. Back then, with no foothold, the news hit her like a dropped stone. She gave up the naive plan to steal the Savia Rose without a sound.

Now, she’s miles from that version of herself. Fame and standing are different stars.

Enough that she could pat Qingning’s shoulder and, with careless ease, drop a line the old her wouldn’t dare.

“Don’t worry. For mana, our powerful backer will lend a hand.”

“Backer? Who?”

“Why, Her Highness Menglan.”