Chapter 89: Blood Vested On

Chapter 89: Blood Vested On
The chains were strong, laced with wolfsbane, but my enchantments still hummed faintly under my skin. They hadn't noticed. Perhaps they didn't know what to look for. Or perhaps, they were too arrogant to believe a half-deity could have laid protections so subtle.
Closing my eyes again, I whispered a chant under my breath... soft, spell words in a language that vibrated against the stone walls. A faint glow stirred beneath my skin, weaving through my veins like golden thread. The pain from the wolfsbane flared, but I gritted my teeth and pressed on.
"With the Moon Goddess' blood vested on me, Her grace, by Her bond, awaken strength that lies beyond..."
A surge pulsed through me.
I felt the wards crackle against the chains. Not enough to break them, not yet, but I had time. Time, and hope. They hadn't silenced the bond I shared with Thaddeus, Theodore, and Cretheus. I had sent the signal. A whisper through our connection. They would come. They always would.
But until then...
I glanced toward the corner of the cell, where shadows seemed to pulse unnaturally. Something stirred there. A shift in the air. I wasn't alone anymore.
A soft rustle. A breath not my own.
Chills ran down my spine. Did someone come in that I didn't notice? Based on the footsteps earlier, I knew that the five elders of the Azai Clan were here.
I wanted to open my mouth to ask who was there. But the second thought of doing it would save me some trouble from the people who were guarding outside.
And then a voice, gentle, feminine, yet threaded with ancient power, spoke from the darkness.
(Kiena, my dearest...)
My breath caught.
A glowing figure stepped into the candlelight, cloaked in silver mist, her face eerily familiar. My heart stilled.
"Mother...?" I whispered in a soft gasp.
I couldn't be wrong, right? That was Mother's voice! That angelic, godly voice! It was the same voice I heard when we were in the Adamantine Volcano.
"Mother, is that you?" I whispered in confirmation, my lips quivering in longing. "Mother...?"
But I didn't hear anymore. Gone was the presence I had felt earlier. But I felt a soft caress in my heart, enough to let me know that She was here... with me. And father.
That gave me hope. 
I unshackled myself and carefully got down from the platform. Whatever they were planning was for me, even if that was a ritual, I wouldn't let them do it with me. 
My gaze drifted upward, past the flickering candlelight and cold stone arches, to a narrow gallery that loomed above. It felt as though there was an audience waiting for the performance to begin. And I was center stage, wrists bound, body angled toward the altar in the middle of the room.
The metallic tang of dried blood clung to the air. Somewhere, a ceremonial bowl gleamed under the torchlight.
My stomach turned.
They didn't need to say it. I could feel it in my marrow. The air buzzed with intent, weighed down by the weight of something ancient and dangerous.
This was their plan all along. My truth, once revealed, had become a weapon. Four clans, rivals until now, united with a shared hunger. And I had handed them the reason.
Not by mistake.
But because something inside me, something older than logic, had pulled me here.
As if fate itself had opened the door and shoved me through it.
"Mother, I don't know what your plan is for me, but I will trust you as I am in this awful situation," I murmured as I looked around to find a viable weapon for me to use for myself. I knew that my claws were the most suitable weapon to defend myself that was why I cast an enchantment on myself that I would be immune to any weapon or wolfsbane that could harm me. 
I was more far-fetched with my abilities of being the Goddess of Gallant and Retribution. I felt having an awakening during the time that I almost lost consciousness.
I stared up at the ceiling, eyes narrowing as an idea bloomed behind my smile. The iron cuffs still bit into my wrists, but I didn't care. With a quiet exhale, I scaled the cold stone wall, the weight of the chains making each movement ache.
Once I reached the beam above, I let the metal drop.
CLANG.
The sound echoed like a scream across the stone chamber.
Footsteps thundered outside. The door burst open. Three guards stumbled in, eyes darting, breath caught in their throats.
"She's gone!" one hissed.
"No way," the second muttered, rushing to the dropped chains. He ran a finger over the cracked links. "We sedated her. This... This shouldn't be possible. Especially not with wolfsbane still in her system."
The third guard backed toward the door, voice shaking. "We need to tell the others. If she's really out, and they find out we lost her—" his sentence hung, unfinished, heavy with dread.
They turned to leave.
The door slammed shut behind them.
I landed like a shadow from above, boots hitting stone with a soft thud. "Looking for me?" I said with a smirk.
Before they could scream, I moved. Fluid, silent, brutal. My elbows found throats and ribs, pressure points and nerves. One by one, they collapsed, a heap of groans and dead weight.
I stood over them, pulse steady.
Let the others come.
Smoke curled from the torches lining the corridor outside, flickering in rhythmic pulses like breath from some sleeping beast. I crouched beside the unconscious guards, wiping blood from my knuckles, and took a blade from one of their belts—cold, silver-edged, still wet from recent use. The enchantment around me flared as the metal grazed my palm, but the pain never came. I had burned the wolfsbane from my system the moment I awakened what lay dormant in my veins.
I turned toward the massive door now sealing me in, heart thudding in slow, deliberate beats. This chamber wasn't just for ritual.
It was a seal, a cage, a theater of sacrifice.
Every stone whispered of old rites, of screams muffled beneath ancient chants. And above it all, the watching gallery remained shrouded in shadow, cloaked figures shifting behind the bars.
They were here.
Watching.
Waiting.
But one thing I so wanted to do right as of this moment was to be after for the elders of the Azai Clan. 
Their downfall has come...