Chapter 135 The Truth Behind Blood and Dust

Chapter 135 The Truth Behind Blood and Dust
Lyla’s emotional collapse felt nearly absolute as she stepped away from Lysander on that castle peak. However, Lysander was not a man who would allow his world to crumble without one final stand. With a swift, authoritative movement, he seized Lyla’s wrist. His grip did not hurt, yet it was unyielding—a silent declaration that Lyla’s flight ended here.
"Let me go, Lysander!" Lyla cried out, her voice breaking from emotional exhaustion. "I don't even know who to trust anymore!"
"You are coming with me," Lysander hissed, his eyes flashing with an intensity that transcended mere anger. "Not as a queen, and not as a healer. But as a witness to the history you accuse me of falsifying. If you want the truth, I will give it to you—all of it, down to the bloodiest root."
Ignoring Mordred’s triumphant gaze from the shadows, Lysander unfurled his golden wings. With a powerful thrust, he took Lyla into the air, piercing through the thick night sky. They did not head toward Atheria, but instead flew far toward the forbidden mountains on the northern edge of the Empire, toward an ancient shrine buried beneath layers of ice and time—The Shrine of Memoriam.

Upon arrival, the air felt heavy with the suffocating scent of history. Lysander lowered Lyla into a vast hall where the walls were covered in frozen stone reliefs.
"Mordred gave you one side of the coin, Lyla," Lysander spoke, his voice echoing through the giant pillars. "He gave you a narrative of victims and oppression. Now, look at what actually happened before the first sword was even drawn by the Golden clan."
Lysander ignited a golden flame in his palm, illuminating the reliefs that had long been hidden from the outside world. Lyla stepped closer, her eyes tracing the ancient carvings. There, depicted in stone, was an era under the rule of the Shadow Dragons that Mordred had omitted.
It was not peace that she saw, but terror. Lyla viewed reliefs showing dragons from other clans in chains, used as sacrifices to bolster shadow magic. There were images of villages scorched not by war, but for the mere amusement of the shadow rulers of that time. The inscriptions beneath, written in an ancient tongue readable only by royal blood, told of the Law of Darkness: where light was considered a weakness and every infant born with a light element was to be executed or enslaved for life.
"They were not just leaders, Lyla. They were predators," Lysander explained with a bitter tone. "The Shadow Dragon clan at that time used their power to drain the very essence of life from this land. Drought, famine, and mass death didn't happen because of nature; they happened because they harvested life energy for their own immortality. The Golden clan’s rebellion was not about seizing a throne. It was a final desperate attempt to survive before the entire dragon race turned to dust."
Lyla stood frozen before a large relief showing the moments of the coup. It was clear that the rebels did not attack with hatred, but with tears—it was a suicide mission to liberate thousands of dragons being tortured in underground dungeons.
"My father, my grandfather... they carried the burden of being traitors in order to become saviors," Lysander continued. "Mordred was born from the remnants of that darkness. He doesn't want justice; he wants to restore an era where he can trample on others' lives at will. That is the truth he wrapped in sweet words."

A haunting silence enveloped the shrine. Lyla felt her knees go weak. All the doubts Mordred had planted suddenly withered, replaced by a guilt that pierced her heart. She had allowed the enemy to poison her mind; she had left the man she loved most to stand alone against heinous accusations.
With uncontrollable sobs, Lyla turned and threw herself into Lysander’s arms. She hid her face against his broad chest, soaking in the warmth she had nearly cast away.
"Forgive me... Lysander, forgive me," she whispered through her tears. "I was so foolish. I let him get into my head. I doubted you... I am so sorry."
Lysander held her tightly, yet his body felt rigid. There was still something lingering—a distance that a hug alone could not bridge.
Lyla looked up, meeting her husband's golden eyes. "You forgive me, don't you?"
Lysander paused for a moment, then slowly released the embrace. He looked at Lyla with a gaze full of pain—not from Mordred’s betrayal, but from his own failure.
"I forgive your doubt, Lyla. But I know that you still haven't fully forgiven me," Lysander said softly.
Lyla was stunned. She wiped her tears. "I truly regret doubting your clan’s history, Lysander. But... you're right. In my heart, it still hurts. Why did you have to hide this from me from the beginning? Why did you let me find out from the mouth of a monster like Mordred?"
Lyla’s voice sharpened again. "My trust was shattered not by history from two thousand years ago, but by your actions today. All this time we’ve shared a bed, shared a vision for the future, and yet you still treat me like a stranger who isn't ready to hear the bitter truth. You 'protected' me until I felt isolated in ignorance. That isn't love, Lysander. That is control."
Lysander stepped back, his face showing a deeper devastation than any he had felt on the battlefield. He realized that the wall he had built to "protect" Lyla had instead become a prison separating their souls.
"I was afraid..." Lysander’s voice trembled, a rarity for the Dragon King. "I was afraid that if you saw how bloody our history was, you would look at me as the descendant of butchers. I was afraid of losing the only light in my life if you knew this throne was built upon the corpses of shadow dragons."
"And you preferred that I find out from your enemy?" Lyla asked cuttingly. "You underestimated my strength, Lysander. You underestimated my love."

Under the fading glow of the golden fire, Lysander did something no one in the entire Empire could have imagined. A man who had never bowed to any king, a knight whose pride was as high as the heavens, slowly sank to his knees.
He prostrated himself at Lyla’s feet.
"Lysander! What are you doing?" Lyla backed away, shocked to see her husband humble himself so completely.
"I do not want this throne back if that is the price. I do not want this world if you are not in it," Lysander spoke, his voice muffled as he bowed his head until it touched the cold stone floor at Lyla's feet. "If you need me to kneel here forever just so you know that you are everything to me, I will do it. If you need me to kiss the dust beneath your feet as a sign that I am entirely yours—not as a king, but as a man who failed to cherish you—then let the world see me like this."
Lyla trembled at the sight. Her heart, which had been frozen by anger, began to crack at the man’s sincerity. However, she did not immediately tell him to stand. She wanted him to feel the weight of the distance he had created.
"Stand up, Lysander," Lyla finally whispered, her voice hoarse. "Your kneeling won't erase the secrets you've already kept. But perhaps... it is a start for you to learn to speak to me as a partner, not as a protector."
Lysander raised his head, his red-rimmed eyes looking at Lyla with pure devotion. He knew the journey to regain her full trust would be long, perhaps even harder than the war against Mordred.
"I will tell you everything," Lysander promised as he stood slowly. "Every shred of a secret, every sin of my ancestors, every tiny fear in my mind. No more walls. No more false protection."
Inside the ancient shrine that stood as a silent witness to the destruction of an era, the two souls stood amidst the ruins of their trust. The truth had been revealed, but the wound in Lyla’s heart remained open. That night, they did not return home in victory, but with the bitter realization that love without brutal honesty is merely a sandcastle waiting for the tide to wash it away.
And in the darkness outside, Mordred laughed softly. He had lost one lie, but he had succeeded in seeing the Dragon King crawl. To him, it was the beginning of the end he had planned.