The Sacred Heart was within arm’s reach, yet Adelaide froze like a traveler at a cliff’s lip.

A mountain of tearing pain rolled through her skull; she forced her gaze to anchor on the figure ahead like a nail in wood.

Even with her eyes shut, she’d know him—no golden hair, no almost-girlish face needed; that soft, androgynous tone was a calling card.

“Rahman…” She ground the name out between her teeth like grit.

The youngest of the royal three brothers arched a brow, a smile curling like smoke. “Touching. Years pass, and my dear companion still remembers. But rather than reminisce, let’s open with something fitter—why are you here, eldest Miss of the Douglas Family?”

“Heh. Shouldn’t I be asking you?” Her voice moved, and another iron wedge of pain split her mind; she kept her face steady like ice, but he saw through the strain and laughed.

“Oh, eldest Miss of the Douglas Family, you’re clever. A question this simple hardly needs my explanation, right?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t.” She let a brittle laugh ring like glass.

Of course. Anyone tied to Rockridge only had one aim—soft talk and hard force. If Skela came here, sniffed trouble, and tried to run, he’d make his move, drive Skela to fuse with the Sacred Heart, and raise him into a third medium.

Compared to Matis’s labyrinth of plots, Rahman and Rockridge felt almost bluntly cute; yet that didn’t mean it would be easy. Adelaide’s smile stayed light as wind, but her eyes locked on the vein snaking from Rahman’s tailbone to the Sacred Heart like a leeching tether.

“Rahman.” Her voice sank with storm weight. “No more chatter. Surrender now. What you’ve done, now and before, I’ll count as never happened.”

“Oh? My dear partner, you mean you’ll spare me?” His smile lifted like a crescent moon.

“No one needs to know, as long as you stop doing useless, stupid things.”

“How familiar. Last time, and the time before, you said we could walk our separate roads.” He shrugged, a leaf in a lazy breeze. “Tempting, but I refuse.”

Adelaide’s eyes narrowed; scarlet surged like a flood behind her pupils.

“You’re not my match.”

“In raw talent, I’m far beneath you. But…” His laugh broke like dry sticks. “We Blood Mages steal flesh and soul. In civil war, is measuring innate aptitude a bit… heretical?”

“You sacrificed a whole dragon’s head back then and couldn’t beat me. You have no chance now.”

“Oh, hard to say. Because this time… my offering is a god’s heart.”

The vein flushed like a river after rain; Adelaide’s pupils tightened to pinpoints. “You’re no longer a ‘Pure One’! If you force a fusion with the Sacred Heart—”

“—you’ll become a grotesque monster. I know.” His words fell like ash; the curve of his mouth looked half sorrow, half release. “To most people, Blood Mages are monsters already.”

He breathed out, voice thinning like mist. “If not for him, I’d have died as a ‘monster’ long before today.”

His tone dimmed to a whisper, a lantern guttering. Adelaide heard the steel beneath it; she had no room for doubt. She drew the Ceremonial Sword that Menglan had given her; her other hand slammed the Sacrifice sigil to her chest, ready to ignite the Crimson Frenzy.

But the Sacred Heart’s beat—eternal and steady—suddenly sprinted like a startled stag.

The pure-white heart shrank and swelled in a wild rhythm; bell-like booms carved visible ripples in the air, matching the throb in Adelaide’s chest like a drum to a drum.

Then a flood not hers crashed in—memories like a river breaking its banks.

A battlefield like hell. Formless Chaos Spawn burned by holy light, only to surge back like locusts, gnawing tri-race warriors even when they were nothing but shattered limbs.

“—Cough, cough!” Air stopped in her lungs like a jammed gear; her hands stalled for a heartbeat.

In that blink, Rahman completed the link.

A shrill screech ripped open the air like torn metal.

His blood touched the Sacred Heart and behaved like volatile reagents—instant expansion, instant detonation, not fire but blooming meat.

He’d never been tall—next to his two brothers, almost childlike. Now that smallness inverted like a flipped plate.

His body swelled in a rush, not the beautiful, draconic morph from his dragon-head sacrifice; this growth was tumor-crazed, ugly as rot. In seconds he was a several-meter meat mountain.

One glance told Adelaide the truth—this is what happens when a non–Pure One touches the Sacred Heart.

She had just dragged herself from the invading visions when the giant scene hit like a wave; there was no time to shock. His fist, as big as a carriage, hammered down where she stood.

“Tsk!” She slipped aside at the last living instant, breath slicing cold air. Whether it was the Heart’s power or madness, Rahman moved like a storm—meat mountain outside, lightning inside.

His strikes had lost a mage’s elegance and precision, but raw force rushed in like a boulder rolling downhill.

Fighting him felt like a quake. Every punch and stomp turned the ground to drums and threw Adelaide off balance, while his mass stayed steady like a rooted tree.

Afterimage kicks and hammer-fists came down like summer rain. He didn’t care about wounds; each clash with her blade shaved off slabs of meat, and every pump from the Sacred Heart flooded new blood, birthing tumorous growth to stitch and strengthen.

After several passes, Adelaide fell behind like a falcon in headwind.

He drove her back step by step; most of the time she only barely slipped past death, danger snapping at her like dogs.

But something was wrong.

Forced fusion had spiked Rahman’s power to a height she hadn’t touched, but he still wasn’t the strongest she’d faced.

In strength, in speed, in regeneration, he lagged far behind Soul Devourer Sormaidon, and Matis—who stole Chaos and replicated miracles—stood beyond him like a mountain beyond a hill.

Her disadvantage came not from Rahman, but from the Sacred Heart.

Every time she reached for Blood Magic, that heartbeat spiked like a drumline, and the moment she moved her blood, images flashed like lightning and stole a step.

A narrow helmet slit and hooded vision; heavy breaths like bellows. Her hand locked on an assassin’s throat, choking life like pinching a candle. Lush plains scorched under holy light, punishment for southern shepherds’ revolt—green turned to ash.

The scenes sharpened like knives; the tearing in her mind worsened; she slowed, her dodges pushed to knife-edge timing.

Why… why again?

Every time she fought him, she stumbled for strange reasons, like tripping over unseen roots.

Why? Her power outstripped this high-aptitude waste by a canyon.

She clenched her jaw; while dodging, she fought to dam the invading images like shoring a riverbank. Feral anger spread with nowhere to spill.

A straight punch drove toward her face like a battering ram. This time, she couldn’t evade. She raised her sword, took it on the edge, and the shock tossed her like a leaf, slamming her into the cathedral maze wall.

“Cough…” Iron sweetness rose in her mouth; she wiped the blood away with the back of her hand, eyes snapping to the Sacred Heart tether behind Rahman like a spider silk.

She could end this fight with one stroke.

Though cysts studded him like moons on a night sky, the vein to the Heart remained itself, wrapped in a thin membrane—fragile as wet paper.

She knew it: find an opening, ignite Crimson Frenzy, slip behind him, sever that link, and the farce ends.

But she didn’t want to.

Beneath the rising ferocity, an instinct sounded like a temple bell—warning.

Cutting the link meant getting close to the Heart’s core.

That sounded fine, but she knew—proof or no proof—that if she approached too close, it would force her into union like a current dragging a swimmer under.

The thought sat in her mind like an engraved command.

And she did not want to fuse here.

By plan, she came to take the Sacred Heart, to use it as a bargaining chip with the crown when all was done, not to plug it into her chest like an eager blade.

Truth was, she couldn’t be sure she was still a “Pure One.”

She hadn’t directly killed “humans,” her materials were corpses, ready-made. But “personally kill” was foggy as mist.

What is “human”? Only the human race? Does the Nacha Tribe count? What about Elves, the god’s supposed children?

And what counts as “personally”? A fist turning a man to pulp is direct. But pushing someone off a cliff? The kill comes from gravity and stone.

If that still counts, what about triggering a snow avalanche that forces the victim to jump?

If only the first counts, maybe she still held her status like a candle’s small flame. If the last did too—counting Matis—then those who died because of her were countless as stars, and her forced fusion would be ten thousand times more grotesque than Rahman’s.

And that wasn’t the worst. She couldn’t confirm her “Pure One” status, and Rahman pressed on like a rabid hound, no care for life, no space left for choice.

If going near the Sacred Heart meant forced fusion, she had one card—gamble. Bet she was still “Pure,” cut the vein, and before he lingered… or truly died… before her “Pure One” identity failed, attempt to fuse.

Should she gamble?

Instinct recoiled like a hand from flame. Her feet stood on stone, yet she felt herself at the cliff edge, pebbles crumbling under heel.

One step, and she’d fall with the stones into a black ravine.

No. She couldn’t…

There was still time. She could retreat, reweave the plan like mending a net. Yes—just a small revision, for safety.

Like a dam breaking, fear surged like a tide. Adelaide stopped trading steel and turned her sword to defense, eyes searching for an exit like a hawk seeking a gap in the clouds.

But she couldn’t escape.

Not only because the cathedral’s inner maze twisted like a labyrinth of thorns, but because Rahman had gone full frenzy—biting on her like a wolf, never letting go.

He wasn’t guarding the Heart now; he simply wanted to fight Adelaide to the death, like two storms colliding until both were torn to rain.

One side fought with no restraint; the other was bound hand and foot. The tide kept sliding into a single, dark current.

Adelaide’s wounds multiplied. Heavy fists crashed in, like hammers on thin ice. Even with top-tier wards on her skin, bones nearly cracked. Her steps skittered, off-balance. The snowball rolled, and dodging Lahman grew harder.

At last, after a dozen chases and retreats, her disadvantage broke past a line. Her wards were almost spent. Lahman’s palm, honed to a blade, flashed toward her face.

Panic surged first, like cold water over the heart. Then she moved. She drew her own blood as sacrifice and slapped up a mana shield in haste.

It was a terrible mistake.

—Thump!

A bell-tower heartbeat crashed in her ears. Adelaide’s pupils unfocused. The incoming hand-blade was replaced by a vision invading her sight.

She stood in a dirty alley.

High walls strangled the sunlight. In the cramped, black throat of space, yellow-green smears spread, and ink-black blood pooled into a viscous stream.

Bodies were stacked, breathless upon breathless, exhaling only death.

Before that hill of limbs stood a youth cradling an infant.

Emaciated, head bowed, his skin clung to bone. Dry fingers slid across the infant’s pale cheek.

A gash yawned in the infant’s belly—just like on every corpse behind the boy.

He lifted his head and looked at her. His cracked lips parted.

You want to say something?

She heard no voice. She felt the tremor, like a ripple in glass.

She turned and saw her most loyal guard drop his sword. He stared at his blood-stained hands, shaking, unable to believe what he’d done.

He twisted back, eyes veined in ruin, and roared at her.

Adelaide stared, lost, like fog swallowing a path.

You want to… tell me what?

She couldn’t hear, but pain stabbed deep in her chest.

As if a right had been stripped away.

…

The vision ended.

Adelaide stood stupidly where she was. Lahman, not far away, remained in slow motion, gathering the next wave.

Cold touched her brow.

Blood slid down from the fresh cut Lahman’s blade had opened, seeping into her eye. Her sight blurred like rain on glass.

In that blur, she saw Lahman’s mouth form a line she remembered.

“You’ve grown weaker, Adelaide.”

She froze. The scene overlapped the alley. That androgynous, soft voice swelled, drowning the bright thread of reason.

As she’d always said to herself: his face, his skills, his temper—none cut as deep as that voice did.

At the root was that single sentence he’d thrown like a knife.

For a long time, Adelaide couldn’t forget. She didn’t even dare recall it. She couldn’t accept what it meant—a self stamped “loser.”

But that should have changed, right?

Yes. You should have changed. You’re not that weak, useless failure anymore, right? Facing Soul Devourer Sormaidon or Matis, you won. Why? Because you got brave. You learned to shove everything onto the table. All or Nothing—that classic movie line is why you’re alive. It’s the blade you point at every battle. You seized this world’s cheat. No one’s harsher than you, so no one can beat you. No one dares bet more than you, so everyone ends up under your high heels. That’s the truth. Just keep gambling. The throne’s within reach, isn’t it?

Right, everything was smooth. So what’s wrong now? What are you doing, Adelaide? A sliver of uncertainty, and you think of running? You won’t make the right choice? Why? Because of Mira? Because of those days with her? On the way back, those nights curled together, sleeping in her scent…

You were happy, weren’t you? You craved that warm fragrance at her hair and neck. You wouldn’t let go. You wouldn’t risk it. You got timid and soft. You stopped betting everything. It’s almost…

Almost like you turned back into that useless wreck.

Yeah, you know who I mean—Jiaqi. The one who wouldn’t send that angry message in the dialogue box, wouldn’t resign, died suddenly without quitting. Trash. God! Was that life’s lesson not enough? Look at you now. All-or-nothing courage is your only weapon. Without it, you can’t even beat the waste in front of you, a man with nothing but high compatibility. Puhahaha! With that cautious, hedging heart, you want to be emperor? With that timid retreat, you dream of protecting Mira?!

“—Shut up…!”

Adelaide groaned in pain. She clutched her head. Time nearly stopped, but the bell-heart kept pounding.

Too loud. Too loud.

Her skull felt like hands were prying it in two. It was the night she learned the truth of the assassination all over again. The same tear. The same voice. The same refusal…

In the chaos, her instinctive resistance was shoved to a corner. In the war inside, it got smaller and smaller, then drowned by a rant that was wild and illogical—hey, how can you say I lack logic? I am you. I’m helping you look in. You already know what to do, don’t you?

Yes. You know what you should do. Come on, prove yourself. To this damn country. To those scum who look down on you. To that sadistic, stupid-ass god. To the world. Cut Lahman in two. Pull out his guts. Twist his lungs into rope. Hack that blasphemous dog mouth to bits. Take back the power he stole from you. Yes, he’s a thief. You’re a king. Kings have this right. So kill him. Take back your power. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him. Kill him—

A feverish buzzing flooded her skull. Her vision snapped into a field of crimson.

When she came back to herself, her ears held only a drumbeat tremor.

She looked down and saw a pure white heart thumping in her hand.

Lahman’s cleaved body lay to the side, blood running out like a broken spring. He hovered at the brink.

Only then did she see it: in forcing the Sacred Heart’s power during the fight, Lahman had already been eaten down to something no longer human. He looked like a giant’s cadaver in a hall; the once-pretty face deformed, features unreadable.

A thing like that couldn’t have said that line.

But who spoke in her skull no longer mattered.

In the end, only a thief died. Who cares about a thief’s life?

Adelaide didn’t care how long he had left. She tossed aside the title of “Pure One” like a wilted flower. She just drank in the sight of the pure white heart beating in her palms.

Ah…

So beautiful.

This is…

mine.

Her thoughts cut like a wire. The hand holding the Sacred Heart pressed to her chest.

Without surprise, it slipped in as if into water.

Unlike Lahman’s grotesque fusion, it felt like it had always been a part of Adelaide. In a blink, it meshed with her original heart, synchronized, and took over.

The new rhythm didn’t bring the discomfort her instincts had feared.

Instead, she felt… elation, like sunlight breaking cloud.

She lowered her gaze. She tore away her shredded white silk stocking, revealing pale skin. On the surface, her long legs hadn’t sprouted ropey muscle. Still the slim look of a wheelchair heiress.

Yet she stood easily—without any muscle-enhancement array.

She flicked a casual kick at Lahman’s corpse. His mound of flesh flew like a ball. Still no strength array humming under her skin.

She tilted her head and used his near-dead body as a sandbag, testing each limb. The result pleased her: even without strength augmentation, she could erupt with power on par with the Nacha Tribe.

And the Sacred Heart gave more than brute force.

She wiped her brow where the blade had cut. Her fingers found nothing. The skin was already smooth, like water over stone.

More: when Adelaide stirred her blood, she found her precious blood nearly inexhaustible. She could hold Crimson Frenzy for dozens of seconds. The lost blood would surge back the next heartbeat from the Sacred Heart, refilling her like a river.

She sprinted through the maze for a few laps in a red blaze. After playing enough, she stopped and stretched, satisfied as a cat after sun.

In her yawn, she noticed the greatest gift of the Sacred Heart.

The tearing that had almost split her in two was gone.

External memories still flowed in—but now they were scenes, not shards.

Her origin. The story with that dragon. Her rise in the Chaos Uprising. Her years upon the throne. And, at the end… her furious, unyielding death.

Feeling the final truth, Adelaide’s face twisted for a heartbeat. A dark, violent tide rose. She mastered it quickly, pressed her forehead, and laughed.

It’s fine. This time… everything sits in my hands.

A voice exactly like her own echoed inside, whispering soft as silk. It no longer ripped her. It made her whole.

Yes…

Just like Menglan said, she won’t repeat the same ruin.

This time, she won’t fear failing to protect the one who matters.

This time, no one will betray her.

Unlike that former body that only flung foolish holy light, she, with the Sacrifice Domain, can punish any traitor now…

She tapped her lower lip, thinking, like a blade tapping a cup.

Speaking of punishment, why not start with…

those two?