Third Person’s POV
Her words were honeyed, her deanor deferential, and her every movent tailored to please.
She was none other than the shapeshifting vampire Rina, who had turned into a bat to et Ethan the previous night.
A faint smile curved across Altheria’s lips.
"You always know exactly what to say, Rina," she chuckled lightly.
Then, a louder, more amused laugh escaped her.
"You are right... hahahaha... what could those fools possibly do to or the people I choose to favor?"
Her crimson eyes glinted with confidence.
"After all, were they able to do anything to little Ethan?
Even now, they can’t openly bla for sending Little Raven, especially when that big buffoon Solomon was acting so recklessly and selfishly."
She paused briefly as she tapped her chin with slender fingers.
"Now, would you care to do sothing for —"
Before she could finish, her voice cut off abruptly, and her playful expression vanished.
She slowly turned her gaze toward a distant, ruined section of the castle, and her brows furrowed slightly.
For a fraction of a second, she had felt sothing, a faint ripple, an almost imperceptible disturbance in the fabric of space itself, and her vast soul sense that was always spread around her had been triggered because of it.
To others, it might have seed like nothing, but to her, it was significant, as beings at her level did not sense things by accident.
Their intuition was sharpened by centuries of battle, politics, and survival, and if she felt sothing amiss, it was almost never wrong.
Her expression grew grim, and silence fell over her as she focused her awareness.
Her crimson gaze grew distant as it pierced through layers of reality and scanned the area with quiet intensity.
But it was then that a thought flashed through her mind like cold lightning.
’Is it her...?’
Her lips pressed into a thin line.
’It must be... otherwise, who would dare spy on Nyx and so brazenly and do so openly in a span of only two days?’
A subtle tension coiled in the air around her, and though she said nothing aloud, her entire presence shifted, from a playful ruler to an ancient, calculating predator who had lived through countless wars.
Sowhere in the distance, unseen eyes were watching, and Altheria was no longer smiling.
She blurred into a vague crimson silhouette and flashed toward that location like a streak of blood colored wind.
Space seed to ripple where she passed, and in the blink of an eye, she appeared at the exact spot she had sensed that strange ripple.
Yet to her mild irritation, there was nothing there, no secret presence, no lingering aura, or any other disturbance in the fabric of reality that could prove the feeling of a presence she felt a second ago.
However, Altheria did not allow disappointnt to take hold inside her.
Her expression remained composed as she closed her eyes slightly and expanded her vast soul sense, letting it seep into the surroundings like an invisible tide.
She focused intently and scanned every layer of space, air, and shadow for even the faintest irregularity.
Monts later, she detected it again, a tiny, almost imperceptible fluctuation far in the distance, like a barely visible ripple on a still lake.
Without hesitation, her small figure dissolved into red mist and shot forward like a specter gliding through the world, and soon, she was no longer within the castle walls.
She had crossed its shattered outer sanctum, passed over the scorched ruins of the forest around it, and entered the dense, lush forest that surrounded the Abyssal Sanctum.
Towering ancient trees stretched toward the sky, their massive crowns intertwining to form a natural canopy that swallowed sunlight and plunged the forest floor into deep, shadowy gloom.
Thick vines hung from branches like curtains, and the air was heavy with the scent of moss, damp earth, and rich traces of wood and earth elental energy, making her have a calm and fuzzy feeling.
The strange fluctuation continued to flicker in and out of existence as it vanished and reappeared in erratic patterns that made it difficult to track.
After a few seconds of pursuit, realization dawned on Altheria, and her eyes narrowed as she finally realized that this was not an accidental loss of control over the unknown entity’s hiding spell.
Instead, the unknown entity was deliberately leading her away from the Sanctum.
It was baiting her.
Realizing this, a flicker of annoyance crossed her delicate features that was followed by a trace of frustration as she disliked being manipulated, especially when the culprit thought themselves clever in front of her.
Yet, she quickly reined in her emotions and reminded herself that this being had not only hidden from her but had also managed to obscure itself from Nyx the day before.
It had even forced Nyx to reveal a portion of her true power earlier in anger and had even managed to dodge Nyx’s attack and vanish thereafter.
And that factalone proved that this entity was not trivial, and if its specialty were concealnt and deception, then attacking in anger would only result in her playing into its hands.
With that thought, her irritation faded and was replaced by calm composure.
By now, they had traveled far from the castle, and the forest here was even denser, with colossal ancient trees whose roots twisted through the earth like buried serpents.
Their overlapping crowns blocked nearly all light, casting everything beneath them in shifting patterns of shadow.
Birdsong was absent, and even the usual hum of life seed muted, as if the forest itself sensed the presence of sothing unnatural.
But Altheria was unbothered by the eerie atmosphere as she descended gracefully and landed atop a slender tree branch that creaked softly beneath her weight.
Her small figure stood perfectly balanced in the dim light as she crossed her arms over her chest and gazed forward with a calm, placid expression, her crimson eyes steady and unreadable.
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