"Always stay close to your father. Don’t take any unnecessary risks, and keep sending letters every day," Aestra said, hugging Taranis tightly in her arms. The young prince had already reached his mother’s shoulders, having grown astoundingly in just two and a half years.
"I...I will miss you, Mother," Taranis murmured, wrapping his arms around Aestra’s waist.
The small yet gentle gesture from Taranis—so fitting for his innocent age—instantly burst Aestra into tears.
"I...I will miss you too, my precious son," Aestra said unsteadily, repeatedly kissing Taranis’s head.
Once Taranis parted from his mother, he turned toward his promised bride, the little Snow Goddess, Nyria, who stood beside Aurelion near Aestra, her eyes reddened with tears.
While crying, she drew a golden chain from her space ring, a beautiful locket embedded with a white gem hanging from it.
Wrapping her arms around Taranis’s neck in a hug, she placed the chain around him.
"What is it?" Taranis asked softly.
"Mama said I should give you sothing that would make you miss , so I handcrafted this locket," Nyria replied, wiping the tears from her cheeks.
Taranis raised the locket in his hand and carefully opened it, finding a small, adorable painting of Nyria smiling brightly—the sa smile that had completely bewitched the young prince’s heart. On the other side was a painting of Taranis himself, a handso smile tugging at his lips.
"Did you draw these?" Taranis asked, his saddened expression brightening.
Nyria nodded proudly. Though her tear-soaked face still glistened, her lips curved into a faint yet sincere smile.
The poor goddess must have cried the entire night while preparing this gift for her promised husband—a testant to how deeply she had already fallen for him, despite not yet fully understanding those feelings.
Taranis bent down on one knee before Nyria, took her hand, and gently kissed it.
"Thank you for this precious gift, my lady. I will treasure it more than my life, and I will miss you every mont my eyes rest upon this locket."
"Stupid Taranis!" Nyria hissed. "Nothing is more important than your life!"
"I understand," Taranis replied with a gentle smile, rising to his feet as he turned toward Aurelion.
"Take care, father-in-law," he said, offering a bow.
"Prince Taranis, I am not your father-in-law yet," Aurelion replied steadily. "Nyria has never cried as much in her life as she has these past few days because of you."
"Father..." Nyria whimpered, tugging at Aurelion’s sleeve, silently pleading with him not to bla Taranis for her tears.
"I am aware that I lack in many aspects and that I hurt Nyria through my immaturity," Taranis said, his voice firm yet respectful. "But I assure you, I will return as a man Nyria can be proud of."
After bidding farewell to everyone, Taranis turned toward the array at the base of Heaven’s Last Step, where Voltrex waited, having already said his goodbye to Aestra.
The mont Taranis stepped into the array, Nyria moved forward and waved frantically, a forced smile tugging at her lips—the decision she had made to send Taranis off with a smile proving far more difficult than she had imagined. The agony of separation from soone she had grown so deeply attached to weighed heavily on her heart.
With a smile on his face and a faint, almost negligible shimr in his golden eye, Taranis waved back before disappearing into thin air as the duo teleported out of the Hundred Sky Mountains.
The duo reappeared on the ground outside the boundary of the array that surrounded every Sky Mountain within it.
Taranis raised his head, casting one last glance toward his ho in the sky—a place he would not return to for the next three years.
"Do you hate , Taranis?" Voltrex asked, resting a hand on Taranis’s shoulder.
Since the previous day, after sentencing Taranis to exile, Voltrex had not t him, allowing him to spend as much ti as possible with Aestra.
Taranis shook his head and replied, "You did what a king must do, Father."
"But I chose the responsibility of a king—which demanded your punishnt—over the duty of a father who should have praised you," Voltrex said, guilt lacing his voice.
Aestra’s breakdown had deeply wounded his heart. He knew of the loneliness she felt in his absence, yet he had never imagined it ran this deep. Bearing the colossal weight of kingship, Voltrex had unknowingly neglected his family for far too long.
"I do not hate you for that, Father, nor do I bla you. My heart is only troubled for Mother, who will be left alone here without both of us," Taranis murmured, his golden eyes half-lidded with sadness.
"So you already understand her at such a young age... and yet I...I am a complete failure as a husband," Voltrex muttered inwardly, his fists clenching, his anger directed at no one but himself.
"Father, we should end the war quickly so Mother won’t be alone anymore," Taranis said, touching Voltrex’s hand on his shoulder—the hand he had been unconsciously gripping too tightly.
"Yes, you are right," Voltrex replied, pulling himself together. "Let’s put an end to this damned war."
With a sweep of his hand, Voltrex pulled a golden chariot from his space ring—the sa chariot the Five Wardens had used to escort Nyria to Heaven’s First Step.
The duo entered the chariot, and with a single flick of Voltrex’s finger, it surged into the air, moving at a blinding, light-like speed that blurred the surroundings around them.
The outer shell of the chariot was enveloped in an invisible barrier, ensuring that neither air pressure nor external forces affected the chariot or those inside it.
"How much ti will it take to reach the frontlines, Father?" Taranis asked, seated opposite Voltrex.
"It will take us three days to reach the Sentinel Line," Voltrex replied, his legs crossed in a lotus position.
"Three days at this speed?" Taranis gasped, finally understanding why his father rarely returned. "But what is the Sentinel Line, Father?"
"Oh, right. You don’t know anything about the war or how it began," Voltrex sighed, opening the eyes he had closed in ditation.
"Let brief you on this war between the Human and Demon Clans of the Western Continent."
User Comments
0 comments from readers