"They’re alive."
Aria’s words had barely left their mouths when the first figure erged from the darkness of the tunnel.
A veteran.
Then another.
And yet another.
They all looked like they had been through a war.
Which, technically, was true.
Blood.
Soot.
Wounds.
Empty stares.
Exhaustion etched into every movent.
Cherry appeared soon after, completely broken physically and emotionally, her hair plastered to her face by the mixture of rain and sweat.
Seeing the two waiting at the entrance, she imdiately pointed behind her.
"Before anyone asks..."
She took a deep breath.
"It was worse than it looks."
Aria observed her state.
Then she looked at the ruined mansion in the distance.
Then she looked back at Cherry.
"That doesn’t reduce the possibilities much."
"Fair enough."
More people began to appear. Veteran survivors.
Ingrivid.
So wounded n being carried.
Duke Arven.
Morgana.
Elizabeth.
And then...
Ester finally saw Damon.
For a second, she simply stopped breathing.
The world seed to shrink around her.
Everything else disappeared.
The rain.
The mansion.
The people.
The tunnel.
None of it mattered.
Because sothing was profoundly wrong.
Much more wrong than any injury.
Much more wrong than blood.
Much more wrong than exhaustion.
She saw the ice.
Not the visible ice.
Not the small crystals that occasionally appeared on her clothes.
She saw what was behind them.
The signature.
The flow.
The circulation of energy.
Ester was probably the greatest living expert on glacial techniques Damon knew.
She had studied it for decades.
Maybe more.
And that’s precisely why horror imdiately struck her face.
Her face completely lost its color.
She turned white.
Literally white.
Aria noticed it instantly.
"Ester?"
No answer.
The woman was already running.
Without saying a single word.
Without even realizing she had started running.
Elizabeth saw Ester approaching even before she arrived.
But, from her expression...
Elizabeth already knew.
She knew exactly what the reaction would be.
Because she herself had been observing it the whole way.
And the more she observed...
The less she liked it.
Ester practically crossed the last few ters.
She arrived in front of Damon.
She stopped.
And stared at him. She just stared.
Damon slowly raised his eyes.
He looked too tired to even feign normalcy.
"Hi."
It was a terrible choice of words.
Because Ester’s reaction was imdiate.
"WHAT DID YOU DO?"
The voice ca out so loud that even so veterans turned around.
Damon blinked.
Once.
Then again.
"It’s good to see you too."
"No."
She pointed directly at him.
"No. Don’t do that."
Another point.
More aggressive.
"WHAT. DID. YOU. DO?"
Even Cherry was silent.
Which was rare.
Very rare.
Elizabeth approached.
"I was expecting that reaction."
Ester turned imdiately.
"Explain it to ."
Elizabeth didn’t waste any ti.
She summarized quickly.
The battle.
The Duchess.
The ritual.
The collapse.
The explosion of energy.
The cold.
The loss of control.
As she spoke, Esther remained watching Damon.
But not with her eyes.
With her perception.
Feeling.
Analyzing.
And the more she analyzed...
The worse it got.
Much worse.
When Elizabeth finished, Esther remained motionless for a few seconds.
Absolute silence.
Then she closed her eyes.
Took a deep breath.
Opened them again.
And said sothing that made everyone’s stomach sink.
"He’s going to die."
The silence that followed was imdiate.
Heavy.
Complete.
Even the rain seed more distant.
Morgana raised her head instantly.
"What?" Ester ignored the question.
She kept staring at Damon.
"You idiot."
Her voice was now much lower.
Much more dangerous.
"Didn’t you notice?"
Damon answered honestly.
"I noticed sothing’s wrong."
"Sothing?"
She let out a humorless laugh.
An extrely rare laugh.
"Your veins are freezing."
That made several faces change imdiately.
Elizabeth frowned.
"Physically?"
"No."
Ester shook her head.
"Worse."
She pointed to his chest.
"Internally."
Then she pointed to his head.
"There too."
Another pause.
"The mana flow is completely out of control."
Now everyone was paying attention.
Even the Duke. Until Morgana.
Until Cherry.
Ester continued.
"Normally, icy Qi travels through specific channels."
Her voice had taken on the tone of soone explaining an inevitable execution.
"There is circulation."
"Control."
"Pressure."
"Balance."
She looked directly at Damon.
"In your case..."
A pause.
"...there is no more balance."
The storm wind blew through the tunnel entrance behind them.
No one spoke.
No one interrupted.
Ester continued observing his face.
Then his arms.
Then his hands.
Small ice crystals involuntarily ford on his skin.
External signs.
But they weren’t the problem.
The problem was what she could feel.
The energy.
The pressure.
The circulation.
It didn’t feel like a flow.
It felt like a flood.
A frozen flood trying to break through a container too small.
"Your body isn’t distributing the energy."
She crossed her arms.
"Your body is trying to survive it."
The sentence hit everyone.
Especially Damon.
Because, for the first ti since the battle...
He saw genuine fear on Ester’s face.
Not worry.
Fear.
Ester rarely showed fear.
Rarely.
Which made it much worse.
Elizabeth spoke first.
"Is there a solution?"
Ester didn’t answer imdiately.
Which was also terrible.
Very terrible.
Finally she sighed.
"I don’t know."
The answer made several faces harden.
"But I know what’s happening."
She looked back at Damon.
"Your Qi has changed."
Damon stood motionless.
Because he already suspected that part.
But hearing it from Esther was different.
Very different.
"It’s not just out of control."
She narrowed her eyes.
"It’s behaving differently."
Another pause.
"As if it’s not the sa anymore."
The silence beca almost suffocating.
Elizabeth imdiately rembered the conversation inside the tunnel.
The feeling.
The presence.
Sothing responding.
Sothing taking over.
Esther noticed it from her expression.
"Has he said anything?"
Elizabeth nodded slowly.
"And said he felt like sothing else had taken over."
That made Esther pale even more.
What seed impossible.
But it happened.
"Shit."
The word ca out imdiately.
Aria blinked.
"Do you wish to elaborate on this extrely reassuring reaction?"
Ester ignored him.
Completely.
She approached Damon.
Very slowly.
Observing every detail.
Like a doctor examining a disease he’d never seen before.
Or perhaps sothing worse.
Finally, she reached out her hand.
But stopped before touching him.
Because the cold was absurd.
Even for her.
Even for soone like Ester.
The absolute expert in glacial techniques.
It simply didn’t make sense.
And that scared her.
She turned her eyes to Damon.
For the first ti, there was sothing close to urgency in her voice.
"Did you feel anything besides loss of control?"
Damon took a few seconds to answer.
Because he was thinking.
Trying to organize fragnted mories.
Sensations.
Monts.
Things difficult to explain.
Finally, he answered.
"Cold."
Ester rolled her eyes.
"Excellent observation."
Cherry nodded.
"I agree."
"I’m not talking to you."
"Fair enough."
Damon ignored them both.
He continued.
"It wasn’t mine."
Now Ester was motionless.
Completely motionless.
"Explain."
"It looked old."
Silence.
"Old how?"
Damon breathed slowly.
Steam escaped his lips.
"Old like sothing that was sleeping."
Ester remained motionless for several seconds after that answer.
The rain continued to fall around them. The wind blew through the trees while, in the distance, the last fragnts of Arven Mansion still crumbled amidst fire, smoke, and ruins. But, at that mont, no one paid attention to the mansion.
Everyone was looking at Ester.
Because she seed to be thinking very fast.
Too fast.
And that was never a good sign.
Damon watched her expression change several tis in a few seconds. First worry. Then reasoning. Then sothing very close to denial.
As if she were trying to fit so impossible piece into sothing she knew.
Finally she closed her eyes.
She took a deep breath.
A long one.
When she opened them again, she had regained so of her usual control.
Not much.
But enough.
"We’ll talk about this later."
The voice ca out firm.
Direct.
No room for discussion.
Damon raised an eyebrow.
"That sounds like a threat."
"It’s a promise."
Cherry imdiately pointed at Ester.
"Oh, great. She’s using the serious voice."
"I always use the serious voice."
"There’s a difference between your normal serious voice and your ’soone did sothing catastrophic’ serious voice."
Ester didn’t even look at her.
Which was answer enough.
Cherry decided to stay quiet.
For approximately three seconds.
Then she gave up.
"So we’re officially in the catastrophic scenario."
"Yes."
Ester’s response was instantaneous.
Without hesitation.
Without softening anything at all.
Cherry closed her mouth again.
This ti for longer.
Morgana watched the exchange in silence.
She still seed distant.
Like soone who had just survived sothing too big to process imdiately.
Her father was alive.
Her house was destroyed.
Her mother was dead.
Her family had practically ceased to exist that night.
And now Damon was apparently dying.
The feeling was so absurd that her brain seed unable to keep up.
"What do we do?" she asked.
Ester answered imdiately.
"We get out of here."
She looked back at Damon.
"Now."
Elizabeth crossed her arms.
"Do you have anywhere in mind?"
"I do."
"Nearby?"
"No."
"Safe?"
"More than here."
Cherry raised a hand.
"That answer was frighteningly vague."
"Nobody asked your opinion." "I feel like this is becoming a pattern."
Ester completely ignored it.
She walked over to Damon and finally grabbed one of his wrists.
This ti she didn’t hesitate.
The contact lasted less than a second.
She let go imdiately.
Her expression worsened.
Much.
"This is accelerating."
Elizabeth noticed.
"How fast?"
Ester ran a hand through her wet hair.
"Faster than I’d like."
"What does that an?"
"It ans we need to put him in a controlled environnt before sothing happens."
Damon let out a small sigh.
"That’s still extrely vague."
"Because I still don’t know exactly what’s happening."
That caught everyone’s attention.
Because Ester rarely admitted it.
Very rarely.
She was the kind of person who usually had answers.
Or at least theories.
Now he seed to have only worries.
And that was alarming.
Aria finally approached.
She observed Damon for a few seconds before speaking.
"Can you walk?"
"I can."
"Liar."
"I can out of stubbornness."
"Ah."
She nodded.
"That sounds more believable."
Damon didn’t answer.
Because, honestly, she was right.
With each passing minute, his body felt heavier.
Slower.
The cold continued to intensify.
Not externally.
It wasn’t just the temperature.
It was sothing deeper.
Sothing circulating beneath his skin.
Sothing that seed to press on his energy channels from within.
Like a river trying to break through its banks.
And the worst part was that he didn’t know why.
The persistent feeling of that presence still lingered in his mind.
Distant.
Almost impossible to describe.
But real.
Very real.
Ester observed his expression.
Then she spoke in a lower voice.
Just to him.
"Don’t try to use any techniques."
Damon turned his face away.
"I wasn’t planning on it."
"Not even instinctively."
This made him frown.
"Do you think it’s that bad?"
She held his gaze.
For a few seconds.
Then she answered.
"Yes."
No beating around the bush.
No comfort.
No lies.
Just the truth.
And that, coming from her, was enough.
Further on, so veterans were already beginning to reorganize the march. The wounded needed shelter. The Duke needed treatnt. Cedric seed determined to stay alive by sheer willpower, but no one believed that would last forever.
Elizabeth observed the group.
Then she turned to Esther.
"How much ti do we have?"
The ice expert took a few seconds to answer.
Which reassured no one.
"I don’t know."
Elizabeth sighed.
"I’m starting to hate that answer."
" too."
The rain intensified.
The trees swayed in the storm wind.
Behind them, a distant part of Arven Manor finally gave way completely, producing a rumble so deep that even the ground vibrated beneath their feet.
No one looked back.
Not even Morgana.
Which was significant.
Because that had been her ho.
Her world.
Her entire life.
Now it was just a ruin.
She remained motionless for a few seconds.
Observing the ground.
Thinking.
Trying to feel sothing.
Anger.
Sadness.
Relief.
Anything.
But everything seed distant.
As if her mind was still trying to reach it.
Then she felt a hand touch her shoulder.
Her father.
The movent was small.
Weak.
But enough.
Morgana raised her eyes.
The Duke looked exhausted.
More exhausted than she had ever seen him. But there was sothing different now.
Sothing light.
Sothing free.
He said nothing.
He didn’t need to.
For the first ti that night, Morgana allowed herself to rest her forehead briefly against his shoulder.
Just for a mont.
Small.
Silent.
Human.
Then she took a deep breath and stepped away again.
Because there was still work to be done.
There were still survivors.
There was still a future.
Even if she didn’t know what it was.
Further back, Esther was already beginning to take control of the situation.
Sothing that happened naturally when she decided there was an ergency.
"Let’s move."
She pointed to the forest.
"There’s an old winter estate a few hours from here."
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