The domed chamber sank into silence. Only the thin, knife-like hiss of the wind slipping through the steel cracks remained, along with the deep, rumbling echoes from the forges below—like the slumbered breathing of a gigantic beast.
"Is that truly the truth?"
Julia's voice dropped, dark and heavy, like iron quenched too long in glacial water.
"Don't forget this, Aethra. The doctrines and warnings you once told me—I remember every single one."
Her mismatched eyes lifted toward the Eternal Forge. The red glow from the flames soaked into her irises, turning the gray one as if it were solidifying into stone.
"You told me not to trust the light, for even gods know how to lie."
A weighty silence fell.
Aethra did not answer. No hiss, no shift. Only a faint red gleam flickered inside the cracks of the iron bracelet, then vanished—like a breath pressed deep and suppressed.
Julia watched it, curiosity mixing with caution in her gaze.
"Silent?"
She let out a small laugh, though it did nothing to soften her expression.
"You always keep your secrets… but this time, I want to hear it from you."
To her, Aethra was both mentor and companion. Without this mysterious serpent, she might never have become the Queen of Ravennica.
That was why the two had forged a pact—and why Aethra granted her a unique ability.
It was a passive skill, one that allowed Julia to detect lies from others.
Because of this Blood Pact, her current class was the Summoner Path.
Yet unlike ordinary Beast Tamers, who controlled Familiar Spirits for battle,
Aethra claimed it was nothing like those lesser beings. Therefore, Julia's class was not Beast Tamer at all—it was Bloodbound Artificer.
While Beast Tamers merely commanded creatures, a Bloodbound Artificer intertwined their soul with the pact-bound entity. The two became a unified magical system that shared emotions, vitality, and memories.
Julia did not "own" Aethra.
They coexisted within the same current of mana.
When a Blood Pact was formed, a shard of the Artificer's soul was carved into the vessel housing the familiar's spirit—in this case, the iron bracelet.
Aethra slumbered within, becoming her Core Familiar.
When needed, she could awaken the familiar's spirit and borrow fragments of its abilities, instincts, or primal essence.
That was what Aethra had always told her.
But over the years, as Julia's knowledge and authority grew, she began noticing something fundamentally wrong with the bond between them.
She was not entirely a Bloodbound Artificer—not according to the scholars' definitions.
For in a Blood Pact, the two sides must share.
And yet, in all these years, Julia had never once felt a heartbeat, a breath, or a single memory from Aethra.
Aethra remained an untouchable mystery.
At times, she questioned whether the "pact" ever truly existed—whether it was merely a lie, wrapped in magic and the terror of the frightened child she had once been.
As the thought surfaced, a distant memory slid quietly into her mind.
The day she fled the Imperial soldiers with her little sister, stumbling in desperation toward the Ardent Rift—that was the day she found the broken bracelet.
Back then, trembling, she had asked:
"Who are you?"
The reply had come from within the bracelet—raspy, cold as soot and ash. A voice she still remembered with perfect clarity.
"Wherever light exists, there shall be the shadow of doubt.
I am the first lie Creation ever spoke."
That statement—vague, arrogant, tragic—had engraved itself deeply into Julia's memory.
Sometimes she wondered if that moment, that sentence, had been the only truth Aethra ever uttered.
Then, the iron bracelet on her wrist trembled again, pulling her mind back into the present.
Aethra stirred like something drifting uneasily into sleep. Then it lifted its head, no longer hiding anything. Its molten-red eyes stared toward the Lumer Ice Plateau, where white snow stretched endlessly into the horizon.
Julia straightened, gaze following it.
"You're looking there… Is something out in the snow?"
Her curiosity was justified—Aethra had never acted so strangely.
"It is not a 'something'…" Aethra hissed quietly.
"You, Julia, are simply not ready to understand it. Not yet. It is not time."
"So that mystery—you'll keep it hidden forever? Or give me even a single clue?"
"You may guess… but would you dare believe yourself?"
Julia's brow tightened. Her voice was calm, yet carried weight.
"If this is a mental game, I'll play it. But you do not have the right to deceive me completely, Aethra."
Aethra let out a low, cold laugh.
"What you think I once was… or who I once was… you are far from ready to comprehend."
A faint ache pulsed in Julia's chest.
She knew Aethra always guided her. But this time, the feeling was more than guidance—it felt like warning.
Aethra tightened slightly around her wrist, its voice rough and chill.
"Are you truly satisfied with the present? You never once mentioned revenge on the Empire."
Julia fell silent, but the ache inside her deepened.
Aethra continued, harsher:
"Your parents are dead… Are you truly at peace, Julia?"
The words struck her like chimes hammered directly into her mind.
The domed chamber seemed to constrict; the outside wind faded into a distant whisper.
Only the two of them remained—human and serpent—facing past, present, and choices never spoken aloud.
Julia drew in a long breath and placed her hand over the bracelet, feeling Aethra coil around her wrist.
"What is it you want, Aethra?"
Julia didn't answer directly but deflected with calm ease.
"Why do you expect me to do such a thing?"
A simple question, like a cold blade dropped between them.
Each held secrets, each held motives.
Did Julia truly want revenge?
Or was Aethra merely pushing her toward a path she had yet to recognize?
Both watched each other with patience.
This was no mere conversation, but a psychological duel—where any concession would be seized upon.
Power belonged not to the one who knew more, but to the one who remained composed.
Such was the essence of their relationship—symbiosis, companionship, and deception.
Then—after a long silence—Aethra, for the first time, lost its composure.
Its molten eyes burned intensely at Julia, flashing with an emotion it normally kept buried.
Meanwhile, Julia seemed unaffected. She simply picked up the blueprint on the table and reviewed the details, page by page.
"Perhaps…"
Aethra's voice grated in frustration,
"I have trained you too well."
Its words were both remark and warning.
A different silence filled the chamber now—not peaceful, but taut and dangerous, woven from their mutual parasitism, companionship, and lies.
Aethra's tone grew heavy, as if confessing a truth it despised:
"Time has defeated me, Julia… even my composure."
"Is that so?"
Julia scoffed lightly.
"And what made you lose it? Why have you grown… soft? This is nothing like you."
She leaned back slightly, speaking with effortless calm.
"If this is another deception you're trying to weave, Aethra…
you will be disappointed."
In Julia's mismatched eyes, she was both challenging and observing. She wanted to see how Aethra would react to her unyielding, uncompromising stance.
Aethra answered bluntly, "Why, you ask? Julia Asterfeld, because you and I are going to die in the future. Time is counting down with every passing moment… Something has awakened, and I cannot stop it. I need blood—an immense amount of blood. It would be best for you to declare war on the Empire. You get to satisfy your hatred, and I get to grow stronger on the lives taken. War is the fastest harvest of life. Only then will the fate of us both have any chance of being altered."
Her words flowed out without circling around, without metaphor, making Aethra's flaming red eyes feel as though they had come alive—scorching and merciless. Whether Julia believed it or not, the snake seemed to have said everything it intended to say.
Julia refused to yield, answering with a voice as icy as steel: "Oh? Then explain it clearly—what exactly has awakened? And how do you know? What are you hiding?"
As she spoke, she stood up and walked toward the weapon-inlaid wall. They were not complete weapons—only empty frames, representing those who never returned.
A cemetery of iron.
Julia raised her hand and brushed her fingers across the vacant slots.
Touching them felt like touching relics of fallen souls. The names weren't engraved, but she remembered every single one.
"Whether this is a scenario you made up or not," she continued, each word ringing like a hammer striking inside a forge, "the moment you open your mouth, it doesn't matter if I believe you or not… I must understand."
Aethra remained silent.
Julia turned back, her tone razor-sharp: "Aethra, I don't want to fight while being blind about my own ally. The Empire is not something to trifle with. If you want my trust, then I need to see what you're hiding."
Aethra's red eyes—usually curled into a faint, mocking smile—grew still for the first time.
"Julia… you are forcing me to say something that you… are not yet qualified to receive."
Julia didn't even blink. "Try me."
A long pause.
Then Aethra burst out laughing—a laugh like twisted metal pushed to its breaking point.
"Very well."
It coiled in on itself. Its two red eyes glowed like smoldering embers burning in silence.
"Demon God!"
Each syllable seemed to be dragged up from some bottomless abyss, tinged with a strange, unnatural resonance.
Julia froze for half a heartbeat. Her brows instinctively tightened. Her voice cut down into a sharp, icy line:
"What did you just say?"
"Believe it or don't… but I can feel one of them awakening after thousands of years. If he fully recovers, coming for me—no, coming for us—is only a matter of time."
Aethra paused intentionally, as if offering Julia a few breaths to confront the weight of what it had just said.
Julia laughed.
Not a laugh of amusement, nor sarcasm—
but the kind that slipped out when the mind strained to process the most absurd thing it had ever heard.
Her brow furrowed, her eyes flashing with both disbelief and shock.
It was ridiculous—no, downright absurd.
This was, without question, the funniest thing she'd heard all year.
It was like standing before an intense game, waiting for the opponent to reveal their trump card…
only for them to pull out a Joker.
"Are you joking? Is this supposed to scare me?"
Yet even within her laughter, her expression was deadly serious—sharp enough to cut. Julia was no fool.
Even if Aethra's words sounded insane, her instincts as a strategist refused to dismiss them entirely.
Because sometimes… reality's most terrifying truths are the ones that sound the most absurd.
"You're saying… one of the Six Demon Gods? Which Demon God has awakened?"
Julia dropped her smile, her voice lowering into a heavy, controlled tone.
"Let's assume you're telling the truth… Then why would one of the Demon Gods come for you?"
"Mol'Tharn."
Aethra answered without hesitation.
"The Immortal Mire. The sixth of the Six Demon Gods."
Its voice held no emphasis, no anger, no theatrics—only cold truth chewed and spat out.
If it were any other time, Aethra might have teased Julia, or spoken in riddles just to observe her reaction, but not now.
There was no room for games.
"In the Demon Realm, everything devours everything else. Do you understand?"
Its voice was dry, drawing out each word.
"No alliance lasts. Only the strong devour the weak. That is our only law."
Its red eyes, usually glinting with mocking amusement, flickered with a brief, razor-sharp gleam before going still again.
Aethra lowered its voice until it was nearly a suppressed snarl.
"If he truly comes, do you think you can protect this place? Ravennica will no longer be a city… It will become a living swamp, a swamp that devours all life. Compared to him, the Demon King from a thousand years ago was a joke."
Aethra's breathing grew faintly uneven, as though even it had to restrain the emotions boiling inside.
"Julia Asterfeld, I have no patience for ignorance. This time, our enemy is not humans, nations, or armies. It is an ancient demon that has awakened. A being that will not be stopped by borders, laws, treaties, or any concept belonging to this world."
The more it spoke, the more its voice drowned in something bitter and complex—not pure fear… but hatred.
It had never imagined that after thousands of years, another Demon God besides itself would still exist in this world—and worse, one close enough to curse. And the cruelest truth of all: even though it had awakened earlier than Mol'Tharn… in its current state, with its torn and fragile demonic essence… it couldn't even protect itself.
Silence fell heavy as winter snow.
Julia felt a coldness press against her chest, crawling up her spine—not from the frost outside, but from instinct, from a truth revealed too suddenly… too violently.
She understood.
She quickly pieced together the implications buried beneath Aethra's every word.
But the real question was—
Should she believe it?
Everything it said was too outrageous, too far removed from anything she knew.
Maybe… this was just another elaborate lie of Aethra's.
But could she afford to bet her life by ignoring it?
Let's say she chose to trust it—temporarily.
Following that line of thought, from the fragments Aethra had revealed—accidentally or otherwise—Julia slowly assembled the true shape of the creature coiled around her wrist.
"So then, which of the Six Demon Gods are you?"
Julia drew a deep breath, steadying herself. She asked, but didn't wait for the snake to answer. Her next words were like a blade forcing it into confession.
"Let me guess, Aethra… Or rather, I should call you Nith'Zerra, shouldn't I?
The ancient Demon God of the Void Serpent—Avatar of Deceit?"
"Yes."
Aethra answered with utter decisiveness.
"I admit this secret because I have no choice left. You and I are on the same sinking ship. If you continue hesitating like this, the tragedy from seventeen years ago will repeat itself right here in Ravennica. And this time… no one will survive."
Julia closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids, fragmented information slowly arranged itself into a clear picture.
She had to admit—she was intelligent.
But intelligence alone was insufficient when confronting a Demon God immune to truth-detection. Every word Aethra spoke had to be scrutinized piece by piece.
After a moment, Julia opened her eyes. Her gaze was sharp enough to pierce through the serpent.
"You truly awakened seventeen years ago, Nith'Zerra?"
"…Yes—"
"If you dare hide even half a word, don't expect me to believe anything else."
Julia inhaled deeply, her voice hard as forged steel.
Aethra hesitated. Its red eyes narrowed to thin slits.
"…But not exactly."
It exhaled—not out of weakness, but from the realization that this woman could not be deceived like lesser beings.
"I awakened a thousand years ago, then was sealed in the Ardent Rift. I slept until… the blood of those who died in the Ravennica battle seeped into the crack and awakened me again."
Nith'Zerra's words were not lies, but neither were they the entire truth.
"So that means… you awakened once… during the Dark Age?"
Julia drew in a slow breath. "You're making me suspicious, Nith'Zerra… Was the Dark Age itself something you helped provoke?"
She leaned back slightly, as if needing distance to fully grasp the truth unfolding before her.
"Ravennica was once the Demon King's stronghold. His armies forged weapons here… intended to strike across the entire continent…"
Julia's lips curved faintly, her eyes slicing through an invisible veil.
"Just like you… right now… trying to push me into declaring war on the Empire."
As she voiced this conclusion, Julia felt a chill run down her spine.
It was too insane—
a deduction so extreme that even she, the one who spoke it aloud, wasn't sure she wanted it to be true.