"It won't budge!" Mark's son cried out in frustration.
The family had rushed back to help. His wife, alarmed by her husband's stubborn decision to save the stranger, had followed with the children in tow. The sack wrapped around the Seer's head was unusually thick and mercilessly knotted, refusing to tear.
While Mark wrestled with the sack, the children and their mother attacked the chains around her legs with nearby rocks, desperate to free her.
Mark felt the knot shift. Frenzied, like a madman, he yanked at it until the sack finally loosened—but what he uncovered drained the color from his face. Beneath the sack, her eyes were still blindfolded, and her mouth was sealed with a locked gag.
Confused and breathless, he barely had time to think when—
"We did it!" one of his sons shouted.
The chains on her legs had broken.
The Seer shifted, reacting faintly—grateful. But their joy was short-lived. The child's cry had carried through the arena, and one of the black lions heard it.
Its ears twitched.
Its head turned.
Its glowing golden eyes locked onto them.
"Go! Go! Go!" Mark shouted, grabbing the stranger's still-bound hands. He pulled her up as his wife and children scrambled to run ahead. The predator was closing in.
From the royal balcony, Prince Navi called out softly, "Father…?"
Still watching. Still silent.
"I see it too," the King replied, his voice tight.
Navi's eyes narrowed. "No… That stranger looks familiar."
They hadn't even realized Prince Lucian had arrived until his voice joined theirs.
"Too familiar," he said, his tone dark with realization.
All three royals now watched closely as the family ran for their lives—dragging the prisoner of honour along with them.
Then it happened.
Still blinded, the Seer stumbled. Mark tried to steady her, but her balance faltered. They both fell hard to the blood-stained ground.
"Dad!" the youngest boy gasped, the first to notice. He pulled at his mother and brother in panic.
"Go! Go! Keep running!" Mark bellowed, forcing the words from his chest as he struggled to rise.
There was no time.
Another beast had spotted them. One of the black lions charged forward. The children obeyed, retreating with their mother into the far end of the arena—unknowingly heading toward a dead end.
Meanwhile, the Seer's blindfold had begun to slip. The tension snapped on her gag, tearing painfully into the corners of her mouth as it broke loose, leaving her bleeding and gasping.
She lifted her head slowly, trembling. Her eyes remained closed—clenched tightly against the light, dust, and chaos. The world around her blazed with sound and fury, but within, she was still trying to see again.
The moment her head tilted upward, something in the arena shifted.
From the balcony, the King and his sons lowered their binoculars all at once, their expressions stunned.
And then—Prince Levi staggered a step back, breath stolen from his lungs.
His voice rang out like a bell through the hush that followed.
It shook the guards.
It startled the announcer.
Even the butler dropped his tray.
"That's my wife!"