Beneath a sky bereft of both moon and stars, darkness held dominion over the Valley of Mendiants. The night was so profound that it seemed to swallow the very contours of the land, leaving only silence in its wake.
Seated amidst that oppressive stillness, Victoria remained deep in meditation. Beside her, however, Elysia's patience was rapidly reaching its limit. Silence had never been a companion the fairy could endure for long.
"Vicky... Vicky... Vicky..." Elysia drifted circles around her. "Say something. Are you alright?"
Victoria released a faint sigh before opening her eyes.
"Yes, Elysia. I'm perfectly fine. My senses have expanded considerably. I can feel nearly everything around us, yet there isn't the slightest trace of life nearby. The valley feels completely abandoned."
"How is that possible?" Elysia frowned. "Just a few hours ago, we ran into dozens of those strange people. Could they be using some sort of spell to conceal their presence?"
"Perhaps," Victoria replied calmly.
Closing her eyes once more, the fallen princess stretched her awareness across the valley. Again and again, she searched for the faintest spark of life hidden within the darkness. Yet the land remained eerily empty.
Then, several minutes later, a subtle disturbance rippled through her sharpened senses.
"Wait."
The sudden sharpness in her voice instantly caught Elysia's attention.
"What is it?"
Victoria rose to her feet.
"Something is coming." Her gaze hardened. "No... three things."
The vibrations rapidly grew stronger. "And they're moving incredibly fast."
A heartbeat later, her eyes narrowed. "They're here."
The moment those words left her lips, an oppressive murderous intent crashed down upon her.
Victoria spun around and drew her blade in a single fluid motion, long before her eyes could identify the source of the threat.
High above, standing atop the ancient stone ghats overlooking the valley, three colossal silhouettes loomed in the darkness. The night concealed nearly every detail of their forms. Only pairs of glowing eyes pierced the black veil, marking their positions.
Yet even without seeing them clearly, one truth was unmistakable.
Those creatures were far removed from anything human.
"What are those things!?" Elysia exclaimed, startled. Then an idea struck her. "Wait, Vicky! I'll light up the area. It'll help us see them properly."
"No." Victoria's answer came without hesitation.
"Why?" The fairy blinked.
"Listen, Elysia." Victoria's voice remained steady.
"As you already know, I am destined to face foes far more terrifying and powerful than these creatures. If I cannot overcome opponents like these—or fight under conditions such as these—then what meaning is there in continuing this journey?"
Mana slowly began to gather around her body, weaving itself around her like a cloak.
"Consider this a test. I will deal with them myself. I already have a plan." She tightened her grip on the sword. "Hide somewhere and do not interfere."
"Hmph! You're always trying to act tough!" Elysia pouted. "You'd better not lose."
With that, the fairy darted away into the darkness.
A faint smile tugged at Victoria's lips. "Who do you take me for?"
Mana surged around the fallen princess as she lowered her stance and prepared to meet the approaching monsters.
Without warning or mercy, the three figures descended from the darkness like falling comets.
Victoria leapt backward as they crashed into the ground, the impact sending fragments of stone scattering across the surrounding ghats. Knowing that opening her eyes would reveal little more than the glow of their eyes amidst the darkness, she closed them completely and surrendered herself to her senses.
Almost immediately, one of the creatures rushed toward her. Victoria attempted to evade, but the relentless pressure exerted by the two other assailants left her with little room to manoeuvre. Forced onto the defensive, she raised her guard just as a violent force struck her.
The impact hurled her through several stone terraces, shattering weathered rock in her wake. Yet such an attack was far from enough to break the fallen princess. Before the dust could settle around her, she had already regained her footing and launched herself back into the fray.
"That attack..." she examined calmly. "It felt like being struck by a gigantic whip. The force itself isn't particularly threatening, but its speed is another matter entirely."
The creatures continued their assault without pause. Blow after blow came from every direction, preventing Victoria from establishing any rhythm of her own. Although her senses could detect their presence, they still lacked the precision necessary to fully discern their forms and movements. She could tell where they were, but not enough to anticipate every strike before it arrived.
These limitations complicated the battle considerably, yet Victoria remained patient. Like a hunter waiting for prey to expose a weakness, she endured the barrage while carefully observing every sensation conveyed through her sharpened senses.
Then, to the creatures' surprise, she calmly sheathed her sword.
The next attack came almost immediately. A tremendous force crashed against her, as though a colossal hammer had descended from above. Victoria crossed her arms and blocked the blow head-on. The impact rippled through the valley, causing the surrounding stonework to tremble, yet she did not retreat even a single step.
A second strike followed at once. This time, an intense pressure erupted along the left side of her body. It felt as though hundreds of razor-sharp needles were attempting to pierce her flesh simultaneously.
Victoria reacted instantly.
Driving her arm outward with explosive force, she met the attack head-on. A distinct cracking sound echoed through the darkness, followed by a shrill cry of pain. The creature's reaction left little room for doubt—something had been broken.
Moments later, her ears caught the faint sound of droplets striking stone while the metallic scent of blood reached her nose. Victoria touched her left shoulder and felt warm crimson staining her fingers.
Without warning, the creatures immediately retreated.
She was not even given the opportunity to wonder why. An ominous rumble suddenly rolled across the valley above her, growing louder with each passing second. The sound resembled massive rocks grinding against one another before giving way.
Something enormous was collapsing overhead.
One after another, immense masses of stone broke loose and rained down upon the fallen princess.
"Vicky!!!"
Elysia's cry echoed through the valley as the avalanche engulfed Victoria entirely. Within moments, nothing remained visible of her but a mound of shattered rock and dust.
At a distance, the three colossal creatures slowly approached the site of the collapse. As they drew nearer, their monstrous forms receded, flesh and bone shifting until they resembled men once more.
"Is she dead?" one of them asked.
"Who could survive that?" another replied.
The third remained unconvinced.
"Do not lower your guard. She endured every attack we threw at her and even managed to wound me. For a woman, her resilience is extraordinary."
The three men remained vigilant, their eyes fixed upon the rocky mound. The valley fell silent once more. Then a voice emerged from beneath the debris.
"Orion."
The chant was soft, almost a whisper. Yet the effect was immediate.
The countless rocks burying Victoria trembled before rising into the air.
This spell was one of the five Afforae she had mastered through natural talent alone. Even Aristovelli had expressed rare admiration for the speed with which she had learned it. Though she had practiced it extensively during her brief apprenticeship, this was the first time she would employ it in a true battle where death waited behind every mistake.
A faint smile crossed Victoria's lips.
She had been eager to discover just how useful it would prove.
With a sharp motion of her hand, the levitating boulders shot forward. The projectiles tore through the darkness like a storm unleashed. Their size and speed left little room for evasion.
The three men reacted instantly.
Abandoning their human appearances, they reverted to their monstrous forms and raised their defences. One after another, the rocks exploded against their bodies and limbs, sending fragments scattering across the valley. Yet despite the ferocity of the barrage, none of them yielded a single step back.
The moment the assault ended, they repositioned themselves and prepared for the next attack. To them, the hail of stone had merely been a distraction.
Then they saw her.
Victoria stood amidst the settling dust, her hand resting upon the hilt of her sheathed sword.
Throughout the battle, mana had continuously cloaked her body like an invisible mantle. Now, however, that mana began to withdraw.
Not dissipate, gather.
Slowly, it converged toward a single destination.
Her eyes.
As Victoria drew her blade from its scabbard, she gradually opened them. A brilliant radiance shone from her gaze.
At first, it was little more than a faint glow. Then it intensified with every passing heartbeat until its brilliance eclipsed even the luminous eyes of the creatures standing before her.
For the first time since the battle had begun, Victoria saw them clearly.
Above, hidden among the shadows, Elysia's eyes widened in realization.
"Amazing..." The fairy stared in awe.
"All this time, she wasn't simply enduring their attacks. She was gathering mana and concentrating it within her eyes. She recreated the very advantage that allowed those creatures to hunt in this darkness."
A smile spread across Elysia's face. "Now she can see them."
The fairy almost felt sorry for the monsters. "They're finished."
The fallen princess's gaze swept forward, and the world before her resolved with striking clarity. At last, the shapes concealed within the darkness stood revealed.
Before her loomed the three creatures in their true forms.
One bore the twisted fusion of a tiger and a bear, its frame packed with hardened muscle and a mouth bristling with densely clustered, needle-like teeth. Another took the shape of a massive two-tailed serpent, its body coiled with venomous menace. The last resembled a gorilla, though deformed in a way that stripped it of all-natural order, leaving only raw, oppressive strength in its place.
Victoria understood at once.
They were the result of an Afforae known as Ophisis—a spell that allowed its caster to assume the appearance and biological structure of any creature, object, or individual, depending entirely on the depth of their understanding of the chosen model.
The users of this technique were Ur, Ter, and Marr—three Selifehian men belonging to the secondary branch.
By birth, their kind were afforded little standing within their house. Only when excess remained after the royal household had been satisfied were they permitted the barest share of sustenance. Yet these three had been granted privilege from an early age, not by lineage, but by strength—raised as tools to protect the royal family, in the hope that their service might restore their fallen house to nobility.
And so, as it stood, their worth had long since been reduced to a single purpose: to eliminate any obstacle that stood in the way of that ambition.
Failure would render them useless. And useless men were discarded without hesitation.
Victoria exhaled slowly. Then she fully drew her sword. An oppressive aura began to seep from her frame, pressing against the air itself.
"The only reason you held the advantage until now," she said calmly, "was because I could not see you. That is no longer the case."
Her blade angled slightly as she took her stance.
"Take me to my companions without resistance… or you will die here, without ever understanding what happened to you."
The response was immediate, but not in words. There was no hesitation, no negotiation—only murderous intent. To them, only one outcome mattered upon their return to their king.
The head of their enemy.
Ter struck first, his gorilla-like form surging forward with a ferocious punch aimed directly at Victoria.
She met it with her left hand.
The impact detonated against her palm, carving a crater into the earth and fracturing the surrounding ghats as if the vale itself had groaned under the force. Yet her stance did not shift even a fraction.
With a motion far too precise for raw strength alone, Victoria seized his arm. Before Ter could even realize the outcome of his strike, she twisted it with brutal efficiency. Bone snapped under the torque, and in the same motion she tore the limb free entirely.
A scream escaped him, but it was already too late.
Victoria drove her blade forward, mana flaring along its edge, and pierced straight through his heart.
The creature froze as he drew his last breath.
Then his monstrous form dissolved, reverting to that of a man. Victoria did not hesitate. To ensure the kill, she drew her blade across his body in a single horizontal arc, severing him cleanly in two before casting the remains aside.
Blood erupted into the air.
With a faint flick of mana, Victoria repelled the spray downward before it could reach her, dispersing it into the shattered ground.
Even Elysia, watching from a distance, covered her mouth in shock at the sheer brutality of the scene.
But there was no time to process it. Marr reacted instantly, fury overtaking reason at the sight of his cousin's death.
His serpent form surged forward, coiling around Victoria in an attempt to crush her within its crushing grip. The pressure was immense, enough to fracture stone—but Victoria remained unmoved. The beast pressed harder, refusing to relent, and when its coils failed, it struck again, lunging with venomous fangs aimed at her exposed frame.
They shattered the moment they touched her skin.
A howl of pain ripped through the creature as its own attack failed catastrophically. In desperation, Marr released his grip and spat a wave of venom at her.
The acid burned through parts of her attire, but her skin remained entirely untouched.
"Even poison does nothing to her…" the thought flashed through what remained of Ter's awareness, disbelief overtaking pain.
But before the moment could settle, Victoria was already moving. In an instant, she appeared before Marr in mid-air, blade drawn.
There was no time to react.
No time even to think.
The arc of her strike carved through the darkness, and Marr's head was severed cleanly from his body.
His massive serpent form collapsed in violent motion, thrashing blindly through the night in search of what it had lost, before gradually losing strength and reverting to its human shape—a young man of roughly twenty-three years.
Silence followed.
Victoria stood amid the aftermath, her expression tightening slightly. Her attire was scorched in places, and despite her attempt to repel it, the battlefield had finally succeeded in staining her with blood.
She exhaled faintly, visibly displeased.
"You are next." Victoria's voice was calm—almost devoid of emotion.
"Consider yourself fortunate. I am obliged to keep you alive for now. Without you, locating my companions would become unnecessarily difficult. Though to claim you will leave here unharmed would be… an exaggeration."
Ur, the last remaining survivor, stood frozen for a moment. Between instinct and loyalty, hesitation warred within him. Yet one truth remained undeniable—whatever choice he made, his blood would be spilled here.
If death was inevitable, then he would not meet it as prey.
He drew in a sharp breath, and his resolve hardened.
"If I must die… then let it be for my people."
"FOR THE SELIFEHIANS!!"
With a roar that tore through the valley, he charged in his beast form.
Victoria exhaled softly.
As if the declaration meant nothing to her, she raised a hand and calmly brushed a strand of hair back into place. Then, without haste, she levelled her sword toward him.
Mana gathered along its edge.
"Reich."
The word left her lips like a verdict.
At the tip of her blade, a dense point of compressed force ignited—then erupted outward in a devastating shockwave.
The blast tore across the valley in a straight line, erasing everything in its path. Stone shattered, air fractured, and the ground itself buckled under the overwhelming pressure as the force surged forward like a collapsing wall of invisible power.
***
Within the Selifehian cave, panic erupted.
A violent tremor shook the chamber, sending men stumbling to their knees as cries echoed off the stone walls. Torches swayed wildly, their flames nearly snuffed out by the force that rippled through the earth.
"What is this!?" the Selifehian king roared, while his son Myorr moved quickly to steady him.
Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the shaking ceased.
Silence returned—but it was not peace. It was the uneasy stillness that follows calamity, when reality itself feels uncertain.
The assembly exchanged confused glances, struggling to comprehend what had just transpired.
That confusion did not last.
From the mouth of the cave, something rolled across the stone floor, leaving a dark trail of blood in its wake, until it came to rest before the altars where Aiden and Godric lay, directly at the feet of the king.
It was Marr's head.
A breath later, the answer arrived.
From beyond the torchlight, a figure emerged.
The fallen princess emerged from the darkness into the flickering torchlight of the cave.
At once, the Selifehians recoiled.
She did not rush. She did not need to.
Ur's broken body rested across her shoulders like a hunter's spoils. Her left hand remained locked around her sword's hilt, the blade still embedded through what remained of him, blood dripping in slow, steady streams onto the stone floor.
In her right hand, she carried the severed upper half of Ter's body as though it weighed nothing at all.
The cave fell into absolute silence.
One by one, the Selifehians began to retreat, careful and measured, as though even a misstep might invite immediate death.
Only King Knorru remained still.
He was old—older than most within that chamber could remember. A century of rule and survival had given him the ability to recognize truth when it stood before him.
And what stood before him now was not merely a woman.
It was death, given form.
"No one needs to tell me what she is," he murmured under his breath.
"Myorr!!" he suddenly barked, voice cutting through the tension. "Kill that woman. Now. She is dangerous."
The prince obeyed without hesitation and stepped forward, yet something within him stalled his advance. Instinct surged before thought could take hold, and his seer's ability awakened on its own, dragging him into a vision he could not resist.
What he saw was not battle, nor defeat in the ordinary sense, but something far worse.
He saw the Selifehian people reduced to corpses scattered across the Valley of Mendiants, their homes gone, their future erased, their lineage extinguished entirely, until nothing remained of them at all.
The vision ended as abruptly as it began, leaving Myorr staggering back as though he had been drained of every ounce of strength, cold sweat running down his face while his breath came in ragged bursts.
Confusion spread among the gathered warriors as they turned toward him, and even King Knorru's expression tightened.
"What is wrong, my son?" the king demanded.
Myorr struggled to steady himself as his eyes remained locked on the woman standing in the cave's entrance, and when he finally spoke, his voice carried a certainty that silenced even fear itself.
"I saw it," he said.
"What did you see!?" the king pressed.
Myorr swallowed hard before answering, each word heavy with finality.
"If we do not submit to that woman," he said, "We face extinction."