Inside the High Council Room, the atmosphere was already tense.
Aurelian stood at the head of the council table, his expression hard and unwavering as the nobles of Aquilonis argued amongst themselves. The table was lined with high-ranking officials and noble representatives, many of whom had begun whispering concerns about the Empress's condition.
Rumors had begun to spread. Dangerous ones.
The Empress was said to be unstable. Emotionally compromised. Possibly… losing control.
"The Empress is well." His voice rang sharp and final. "Whoever started these rumors will face treason charges."
He didn't say it aloud, but he was certain none of these whispers had come from within the Empress's Palace. The servants and knights under Ceres's command were loyal to the bone. They would sooner cut out their own tongues than speak ill of her. He had spoken to every one of them. Not a single lie had crossed their lips.
He suspected the leak came from someone in this very room.
Then, one of the older nobles stood.
"Master Tuf," said Baron Leon Blackwater, head of the Blackwater family, and father of Celion, Cecilion, and Celestria. "You promised to prioritize Aquilonis for supply shipments from your empire. But to this day, not a single crate of magialloy has arrived. Not one."
A few of the other nobles murmured in agreement, their expressions pinched with entitlement.
Tuf, who had been standing against the far wall near the door, straightened. His boots echoed with deliberate weight as he walked toward the front, right to Baron Leon's face.
Celion swallowed hard. He knew that look in Tuf's eyes. That stillness. When a predator went still… that's when it was closest to striking.
"And what exactly are you implying, Blackwater?" Tuf asked, his tone deceptively calm.
"You have not fulfilled your promise," Leon said, standing straighter. "We surrendered our rights, our land, our titles, as nobles. In good faith."
Tuf let out a low chuckle.
"Rights?" he repeated mockingly, turning to the rest of the room. "Did you all really believe you still had rights to begin with?"
A nervous ripple spread among the nobles.
"Rights," Tuf repeated with disdain, "are only for the living. And if you've forgotten, you wouldn't even be standing here if not for the Empress. You'd be nothing but dust and memories."
He paused. His eyes sharpened.
"And yes. The Empress is unwell."
"Tuf!" Aurelian's voice cracked through the tension.
But Tuf turned to him coldly.
"Shut up, vermin." His words were sharp as blades. "These spineless aristocrats want to talk about rights? Then let's give them their rights."
He turned back to Leon, tone now dangerous.
"I haven't given you anything yet because the Empress needs me. She is unstable. Her condition is delicate. And quite frankly, I am at the edge of my patience. So listen carefully, all of you…"
Tuf's gaze swept the room, daring anyone to look away.
"If she worsens because of your pestilent greed, remember this, 'Dead people have no rights.'"
The color drained from the faces of several nobles. One even looked ready to vomit.
Aurelian let out a tired breath and ran a hand down his face.
Sometimes he wondered, were these nobles brave? Or just so greed-driven they'd become stupid?
Did they forget so easily?
Did they forget how close Aquilonis came to being wiped from the map of Solmara?
And here they were, questioning the one man who nearly erased them all.
He was about to speak, when suddenly, the ground beneath them trembled.
A faint rumble turned into a violent quake.
"Fuckkkkk!!" Tuf shouted, his gaze snapping to the window.
Everyone turned.
The sky outside was turning black. Not clouded. Not stormy.
Pitch black.
The light of day was being swallowed whole.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck!" Tuf cursed again, his body already moving.
"Everyone, stay indoors, unless you want to die."
Tuf's voice echoed across the entire kingdom of Aquilonis, carried by magic through every street, every home, every tower. It wasn't a request. It was a command.
And across the kingdom, no matter their rank or status, people obeyed. They didn't know what was happening, but they knew better than to question the voice of Tuf.
Then his tone shifted.
"Kitten," he said softly, voice now intimate and low. "Calm down. I'm coming out."
"Master Tuf, what is happening?" Count Revan Orland asked, alarm written all over his face.
Tuf turned to him, then glanced at the rest of the council.
"Death," he said coldly. "Death just came to visit your kingdom."
He looked toward one of the nobles he knew was truly loyal to the Empress, then swept his gaze across the others.
"If you want to live, keep your fucking mouths shut, you vermin."
"What the fuck… is that a giant?" Dorian gasped, one of Captain Hugo's men, staring wide-eyed out the window.
Everyone turned, their attention snapped to the view outside.
And they saw it.
The largest man any of them had ever seen in their lives. Towering, massive, at least as tall as a three-story building. Each step he took made the ground tremble violently.
Gasps filled the room.
"Hah!" Aurora shrieked, stumbling back as a man suddenly appeared on the Emperor's Palace veranda without warning.
He had long black hair and an inhumanly beautiful face. His eyes blazed, with crimson fire. He wore a strange outfit, nothing like the robes or armors of the kingdom. A suit. Black. Elegant. Unfamiliar.
The veranda door swung open, untouched by any hand.
"Comet," Tuf called.
The man bowed his head. "Master."
"How pissed is she?" Tuf asked, his tone darker now.
Comet's voice was nonchalant, like he was giving a weather report. "I am not sure 'pissed' is the right word, Master. But the Demon Lord made her promise not to kill anyone."
Everyone in the room inhaled sharply.
"Fuck," Tuf cursed again, eyes narrowing.
Luna was more than pissed. And while promises didn't usually matter to her, this one had been made to their father. The only consolation is that Luna, despite all her power, never broke a promise made to Caelum.
"That's a demon," whispered Sir Cedric Hallam, his eyes glowing faintly as his Holy Knight instincts kicked in. The man had never encountered a demon until now, but his blood knew. His soul knew. It screamed in warning.
The nobles recoiled instinctively, stepping away from the veranda, from the demon standing so casually in their midst. Comet gave them a glance, a single, uninterested sweep of his eyes, as if silently saying you're beneath me.
"Stay indoors," Tuf said again, this time directly to Aurelian.
And then, he vanished.
Reappearing in a blink at the main gates of the Emperor's Palace.
Comet followed a heartbeat later, disappearing and appearing beside him like a shadow.
Inside the Council Room, everyone remained frozen, watching through the windows.
The giant was getting closer.
And now, they noticed something else.
With each step he took, it wasn't just the ground that shook, the earth around him died.
Flowers wilted. Trees blackened. Grass turned to ash in his wake.
Then they saw another figure.
A second presence moving beside the giant, gliding on some kind of mechanical mount they'd never seen before. It hovered like it wasn't bound by gravity, keeping pace beside him effortlessly.
And though the rider's face was concealed by a sleek helmet, the curve of her form made it undeniable.
She was a woman.
And every instinct in those watching screamed the same truth.
She was the 'Death' Tuf warned them about.
Thanks to their enhanced senses, Aurelian, the elite knights, and seasoned fighters could see and hear what was unfolding at the Emperor's Palace gates, even from a distance.
The two unknown visitors stopped in front of Tuf.
"What the…" Captain Hugo couldn't finish his sentence as the woman dismounted from her strange, hovering mount and removed her helmet.
Because aside from her midnight black hair… she looked eerily like the Empress.
Aurelian stood frozen.
Yes, he had seen Luna's image before, Tuf had shown it to them just a few days ago. He already knew she and Ceres bore a striking resemblance.
But seeing her in the flesh was something else entirely.
There was no denying it now. Not in Aurelian's heart.
They were connected. Related. Somehow.
And somewhere deep inside Aurelian's chest, something screamed, a gut-deep certainty that once this woman and Ceres met… he would lose her.
Not just to another man.
But to an entire destiny he could never be part of.
"Kitten," Tuf greeted, stepping forward with both arms outstretched in an open embrace, flashing his most charming smile. "I'm so happy to see you— aghhhh!"
His sentence was ripped apart mid-word as a shadowblade tore through his chest.
Summoned by Luna.
"Do I look like I'm happy to see you?" Luna growled.
Her voice burned with fury, but her eyes… her eyes bled pain.
Tuf staggered, looking down at the blade embedded in him. He turned his head toward Comet.
"What the hell did you tell her?" he hissed.
"Every word you said, Master," Comet replied flatly, hands behind his back, unbothered.
He and Orso stood still nearby, completely unfazed by the bloodshed.
There was no need for them to intervene. If Luna had attacked anyone else, they'd be dead already. But this… this was between siblings. And though Demon Lord's children did not die easily, that didn't mean it wouldn't hurt.
Luna yanked the blade out, and stabbed him again.
Tuf didn't fight back.
"Kitten, let me explain," he began, grabbing hold of her shadowblade just before it could pierce him a third time.
Luna's eyes widened in disbelief.
That gesture, that refusal, hit deeper than any wound.
As if he was denying her something she truly wanted. Something only he could give her.
"Let go," Luna hissed.
And Tuf obeyed.
The blade plunged into his chest again, and he let out a colorful curse, eyes watering slightly from the pain.
"Kitten… the Empress needs me here," Tuf tried to reason with her, voice ragged but calm, even as the blade was driven into him over and over again. "I thought you'd understand."
"So someone's more important than me now?" Luna's voice broke, rage, heartbreak, and jealousy tangled in every word.
"I understood when you played with other women. I understood when you wandered, flirted, disappeared. I understood. But how could you think I would accept you claiming another, a human, no less, as yours?!"
In her fury, Luna's shadowblade twisted, transformed, shifting into a black, gleaming death scythe.
And in one fluid, brutal motion, she beheaded him.
Gasps and choked screams erupted from the nobles and soldiers watching inside the Council Room. Some covered their mouths in horror. Others stood frozen, paralyzed by what they'd just witnessed.
They couldn't believe it.
Tuf, the same being who nearly erased Aquilonis from the map… the same man who withstood the full force of Aurelian's four ice dragons during the previous battle… the same entity no one could even scratch, save for the four Saintess Knights, had just been beheaded in a single, effortless swing.
Another collective gasp.
Because right before their eyes, Tuf's severed head reappeared, snapping back onto his body as if it had never left.
"Kitten! That fucking hurts!" Tuf cursed, glaring at Luna with disbelief.
"Really?!" Luna shrieked.
Without missing a beat, she attacked again, this time with more fury. Her Death Scythe moved like a cursed wind, slicing him, not just once, not twice, but into hundreds of pieces.
She shredded him like meat on a butcher's slab.
Again.
And again.
And again.
So many times the watchers lost count. Because every time she carved him apart, Tuf regenerated instantly. Whole again. Cursing and spitting like nothing happened.
And that… that was the moment everyone realized the horrifying truth.
During their war with Tuf over a month ago…
He wasn't even serious.
"Bear! Stop her!" Tuf finally yelled, appearing once more with a groan of pain, blood already vanishing from his reforming flesh.
He turned toward his towering older brother, seated cross-legged just beyond the gates like a bored mountain come to life.
Orso barely glanced at him.
"Father said, you and Luna talk. I bring you home," Orso replied, his deep voice calm and detached. Despite sitting monk-style, he still towered over the entire palace gate.
"Fuck you, Bear!" Tuf shouted, already bracing as Luna lunged at him again.
Orso merely nodded with a sigh.
Tuf gritted his teeth and turned back to Luna.
Of course he could stop her. He could end this with a flick of his fingers. But he knew better.
If he touched her now, if he blocked her rage, she would explode even worse.
And the truth was, he couldn't raise a finger against her. Not like this. Not when she was hurting. Not when she felt betrayed.
"Kitten!" he shouted, blood spraying from another slash. "This is not talking!"
"Oh?" Luna hissed, her voice as sharp as her blade. "And what made you believe I came here to talk?"
Then she sliced him again.
And again.
Celion, still standing near the window, whispered the question on everyone's mind, his voice low and trembling.
"What are they…? If cutting them into pieces doesn't even kill them, then what will…?"
No one could answer.
The nobles who'd been so bold earlier, demanding answers and rights from Tuf, had gone deathly pale. Their mouths shut. Their legs shaking. Any ounce of arrogance long gone.
"LUNA!" Tuf roared, frustration boiling over. "I'm getting angry now!"
But this time, Luna didn't hear him.
She wasn't listening anymore.
Because her eyes, those burning, wrath-filled eyes, had frozen.
She wasn't looking at Tuf.
She was looking past him.
Everyone, even Tuf, noticed her sudden stillness.
Tuf, Orso, and Comet followed her gaze, slowly turning toward the connecting path between the Emperor's Palace and the Empress's Palace.
And there, she stood.
In the middle of the path. Regal and unmoving. Flanked by Legion on one side and Seiryu on the other.
Draped in light. Drenched in silence.
Ceres.
Her aura blazed even without effort. Her long hair shimmered in the wind.
And Luna… stared.
Completely stunned.
"Mother…" Luna and Orso whispered in unison, disbelief dripping from their voices.
Tuf's mouth dropped open slightly. "Oh fuck."
He looked at Orso who slowly looked at him.
"Bear… let me explain…"
But it was too late.
Orso stood.
Massive.
Menacing.
Silent.
"Fuck!" was all Tuf had time to say before Orso lunged, an impossible burst of speed for someone his size.
And just like that, Tuf was swallowed whole by another tidal wave of sibling wrath.