Chapter 107 Xavier POV
Chapter 107 Xavier POV
So, I let the silence stretch. I let my expression harden into a cold, defensive wall, playing the exact part the viper expected me to play.
Let her think she has won, I thought, my heart hardening into a block of ice as I closed my eyes, tuning out the shouting elders.
I reached deep into my core, grabbing the thin, bleeding thread of the Celestial Tether stretching out into the dark forest.
It was cold, vibrating with Elena's raw shock and heartbreak, but I poured every ounce of my royal mana, my remorse, and my unyielding devotion into the bond, forcing my voice directly into her mind.
Elena.
I felt her mental signature flinch a mile away, her thoughts bristling with a defensive, sharp sass that I welcomed like a dying man welcomes rain. What do you want, Your Majesty? Come to finish the Council's job?
I am so sorry, I projected back, my fingers gripping the edge of the tactical table outside as the rain began to fall again.
I was a fool. The silver-haired girl... Livia. She didn't use magic on me—she used my own worst terrors. She made me believe the Void-Anchor was destroying you. But I just saw her, Elena. I saw her kill Grace with ancient, forbidden magic. She is the one. The woman from the black glass throne.
Through the tether, I felt the exact moment Elena's anger dissolved, replaced by the lethal, brilliant precision of the partner I had sworn to protect.
The bond between our souls warmed, the artificial friction melting away as our minds entwined across the distance.
I will keep the camp contained, I vowed to her, my mental voice dropping to a dark, possessive whisper that carried the full weight of a King's promise.
Let her think I am broken and you are exiled. Stay in the shadows. Be my ghost. And when she moves to strike, we will tear her world apart.
The noon sun beat down mercilessly on the central square of the capital, turning the rain-slicked cobblestones into a shimmering mirror of heat. Duke Hallway’s "Iron-Sash" mercenaries had cordoned off the entire district, their heavy shields forming an impenetrable wall of iron around the grand execution gallows.
A messenger had stumbled into our camp just after dawn, weeping and breathless, claiming that the Duke was preparing to hang thirty more weavers at midday to draw out the "rogue thief" Elena.
It was a beautiful, theatrical lie.
Through the Celestial Tether, Elena and I had dissected the report in seconds. The messenger's mana signature carried the faint, icy residue of ancient violet sorcery. Livia wasn't just baiting a trap; she was pushing a shattered, grieving King into a reckless, suicidal frontal assault. She wanted me to march my exhausted rebellion directly into a meat grinder, effectively wiping out the resistance while she claimed the crown from the ashes.
“He’s taking the bait,” Elena’s voice echoed directly inside my mind, sharp and steady. She was positioned high above the square, a phantom shadow clinging to the gargoyles of the grand cathedral. “The Duke’s personal vanguard is lining the high roofs with heavy arbalests. If your ground troops step into the square, they’ll be turned into pincushions in thirty seconds.”
“Let them aim,” I thought back, my mental projection a cold, dangerous growl. I stood at the head of the rebel column just outside the North Gate, my fingers tightly gripping the hilt of my broadsword. My expression was a mask of cold, unhinged fury—the exact picture of a broken Sovereign marching to his doom. “Are you in position, my ghost?”
“Always, Your Majesty,” she whispered through the bond, and I could feel the faint, cocky warmth of her sass humming against my core. “Just try to look sufficiently desperate. It really suits your jawline.”
I suppressed a grimace and drew my blade, the steel ringing out across the silent street. "For Drakmor!" I bellowed, unleashing a deliberate, chaotic flare of blue lightning across my shoulders. "Break their lines!"
With a roar, the Black-Iron Ravens charged. We flooded into the narrow avenues leading to the square, a tide of desperate humanity slamming into Hallway’s iron phalanx. The moment my boots cleared the threshold of the plaza, the high roofs erupted. Heavy, steel-tipped arbalest bolts rained down like a iron deluge, hissing through the air to pin my front rank into the mud.
"Now, Elena!" I roared through the tether, planting my feet and throwing my left hand toward the sky, erecting a massive, crackling kinetic barrier to shield the infantry beneath me.
Above the din of battle, a silent tempest awoke.
Elena dropped from the cathedral spire like a falling star, her obsidian daggers already alive with the dark, gravity-warping force of the Void-Anchor. She didn't strike the ground; she caught the rim of the highest roof, swinging her body inward with terrifying momentum.
"Honestly, boys," her voice rang out, dripping with pure, unadulterated sass as she landed directly behind the line of arbalest snipers. "Static positioning in an urban combat zone? Did the Council teach you nothing, or are you just naturally this bad at your jobs?"
Before the mercenaries could swing their heavy weapons around, Elena spun in a lethal, fluid circle. The emerald ring flashed a violent, deep jade, unleashing a localized gravity vortex that violently yanked the arbalests right out of their hands. The heavy iron weapons collided in mid-air, shattering into useless scrap, while the snipers were thrown off balance.
With two rapid, blinding slashes, she cut the support ropes of the high scaffolding. The entire wooden platform groaned and collapsed outward, sending a dozen elite snipers tumbling into the alleyways below.
The high threat was neutralized in a matter of heartbeats.
“Roof is clear, storm god,” Elena reported mentally, her breath only slightly hurried. “But we have a guest. Southern terrace. Third floor balcony.”
I shifted my gaze across the smoking square, my kinetic barrier absorbing another wave of mercenary arrows. There, standing on the gilded balcony of the Merchant Guild, was Livia.
She was no longer wearing the tattered rags of a camp maid. She wore flowing, midnight-silk robes that seemed to swallow the noon light, her silver hair braided with dark pearls. She wasn't hiding her aura anymore. A suffocating, ancient pressure radiated from her form, a deep violet sea of forbidden mana that made the air itself taste like copper.
She looked down at the chaos in the square, her eyes fixing on me with a chilling, triumphant amusement. She believed she had won. She believed my army was trapped and my assassin was exiled.
Slowly, Livia raised her hand, her fingers curling around a glowing, crystalline key—the first Ley-Line Key of the capital.
“She’s opening the seal,” I told Elena, my chest heaving as I channeled my lightning to blast through the remaining shield-bearers in front of me. “She’s going to drain the city’s core.”
“Not on my watch,” Elena retorted. I felt her presence shifting rapidly across the high structures, a lethal ghost closing the distance from behind the villain’s blind spot. “Keep her eyes on you, Xavier. I'm going to go take what's mine.”
I stepped over the shattered remains of the iron phalanx, my broadsword crackling with royal plasma as I locked eyes with the master of the Council. The final arc for the fate of Drakmor had officially begun.