Ratu Iris sat enveloped in utter darkness, the barely perceptible flicker of a blood-rose scented candle casting haunting shadows that danced upon the walls. Her once-majestic gown lay crumpled at her feet, and her crown rested delicately to the side, abandoned like a forgotten dream. Clutched tightly in her hand was a gleaming silver dagger—an ancestral heirloom known as Silariel, a blade forged to pierce not flesh, but the very essence of noble souls.
Opposite her, Lady Ravencia remained motionless, her presence a silent weight in the dimly lit chamber. Once childhood friends and keepers of each other's deepest secrets, now she embodied a silent threat—a rival whose battle was waged not on the battlefield, but within the fragile sanctuary of Iris's womb.
No war had erupted beyond these dark walls. No coup stirred the realm's uneasy peace. Yet within the depths of Iris's being, a profound violation festered: she had been stolen from. Not just her crown or her kingdom, but something far more primal and sacred was at stake.
It was her birthright itself that trembled—something ancient and inviolate: her divine claim to be the mother of the great demon.
They shared a dream, a vivid vision that stirred the depths of their souls. It was a dream of an unborn child, whispering in the fractured language of cracks—an ethereal presence that did not kick from the womb, but pulsed alive within their very spirits. In this haunting vision, they both saw clearly:
"Two women, one demon. Two wombs, one destiny of birth."
The prophecy was cruel and undeniable: one must be destroyed before the next full moon. If not, the world would bear witness to a terror born from the collision of two women's love, a union that fate itself forbade. Serelith would come forth, forged by pain and forbidden devotion.
Queen Iris lifted her dagger slowly, her hand trembling ever so slightly. But the tremor was not born of fear—it was the trembling of a heart torn in two, for there was no fragment of her soul untouched by love for Ravencia.
"What do you feel inside your body?" Iris's voice was a fragile whisper, taut with tension and unspoken desperation.
Ravencia's dark eyes burned steadily, unwavering and deep. "I feel chosen," she said, her tone resolute. "Not as a sinner, but as a mother. The mother of something destined to be born… with or without you."
In that suspended moment, time itself seemed to catch its breath. The world fell silent, shadows lengthening as Iris swung her dagger forward. But the blade halted midair, quivering helplessly as if gripped by invisible chains.
Reflected in the cold edge of Silariel, the dagger shimmered like a distant, dying star. Yet what stared back at Iris was a vision far more profound than her own face.
Her features blended seamlessly with Ravencia's—two faces merged into one. A singular, inseparable entity. One woman bound in harmony. One womb heavy with life. One love that kindled warmth even in the coldest night.
"You cannot kill it," a voice whispered from deep within her, cutting through the heavy silence like a blade. "Because if you kill Ravencia, you also destroy the part of yourself that aches to be loved by the demon."
That night, Queen Iris remained awake, as if time itself had stalled around her. She sat motionless beside her throne bed, vulnerable and bare, her breath shallow in the stillness. Within her, she felt a persistent heartbeat of two—a relentless rhythm neither belonging to Serelith nor to Ravencia, but to Iris herself. From the tumult of love and betrayal stirring in her chest, a new life began to carve its presence into existence.
"No, this is the child of me and Fitran," Iris declared quietly, breaking through the whirlpool of conflicting emotions. Her voice was firm, a solemn vow anchoring her to a truth she refused to relinquish.
When her sobs finally emerged, raw and unguarded, no witness was there to catch her falling tears—only the bedroom mirror stood sentinel. It reflected back the sorrowful visage of another woman far away: Lady Ravencia, a mother grieving in her own shadow, two souls bound by the same consuming pain.
Outside, a thick mist crept silently across the forbidden Delphoria forest. Lady Ravencia moved among the towering, ancient trees, her cloak heavy with dew that dripped like cold tears from the leaves. Her footsteps were almost ethereal, as if the earth beneath her recoiled from bearing the weight of a woman harboring the seed of a demon within her womb.
Dangling against her chest was the forbidden holy book from the monastery, its ancient leather cover worn and etched with faded runes that seemed to pulse faintly with latent power. Within her womb, a chilling presence throbbed—a terrifying life form pulsing with a dark, unsettling rhythm. That unrelenting sensation had tormented her mind since the third night, when Queen Iris, in an act of profound mercy or perhaps inscrutable will, chose to spare this unnatural existence instead of extinguishing what should never have been allowed to exist.
As Lady Ravencia neared the forest's looming exit, stepping onto a narrow, shadowed path that marked the border between the human realm and the forgotten wilds, a figure emerged from the gloom. There, waiting patiently and silently, stood a girl—an enigmatic sentinel gazing straight ahead with unwavering calm.
The girl looked scarcely more than twenty, her slender form wrapped in threadbare garments weathered by countless storms and unrelenting exposure to the elements. Yet, despite her humble attire, her presence was anything but ordinary. Her breathing was steady and measured, as if honed through endless nights of silent meditation beneath starlit skies. Etched deeply on her forehead was a cultivation symbol—three radiant golden lines glowing and pulsing with a hypnotic, rhythmic energy that cast an ethereal halo around her. Her eyes betrayed no hint of fear; rather, they shimmered with profound compassion and understanding. Though her name was never uttered aloud, her voice broke the quiet with gentle authority:
"You have been tainted, Lady Ravencia. What you carry is not life. It is an extension of Serelith's tongue creeping into our world."
A heavy silence fell over Ravencia. Her breath caught in her throat, and her heart thundered violently, each beat straining to unravel the ominous meaning behind those haunting words.
"I... feel it. It is alive. It speaks to me. It loves me," Ravencia whispered, her voice trembling as she fought to suppress the gnawing fear clawing at her heart.
The girl shook her head slowly, her eyes dark pools of solemn truth. She lifted her palm, and in that instant, a radiant beam of pure light cascaded down, enveloping Ravencia's trembling form. The glow illuminated what lay beneath—no fragile fetus cradled within her womb, but something far more sinister.
A black, veined cord stretched away from Ravencia's solar plexus, twisting and curling like ancient roots burrowing deep into fertile soil. It snaked downwards, coiling tightly around her internal organs, each pulse throbbing with a sinister vitality, as if the cord itself whispered forbidden secrets in the suffocating stillness.
"That is not love, Lady Ravencia," the girl's voice softened yet pierced through the silence like a blade. "It is a metaphysical parasite—an illusion of motherhood, twisted and poisoned by Serelith's dark will. It exists solely to bind you, ensnaring your very soul within her inexorable trap."
Ravencia's heart shattered into a million pieces as she collapsed to her knees, her body trembling with helpless panic and crushing despair. Her head swam with the weight of dashed hopes, memories of dreams now slipping like shadows through her grasp.
"But… I want to love him. I want to feel needed. I want to be more than just an echo, a shadow cast by the Queen…" Her voice quivered, laden with desperate longing, as if begging the vast emptiness for a flicker of hope.
The girl stepped closer, her gaze locking onto Ravencia's with an unyielding intensity, as though she could peer beyond flesh and bone to the raw vulnerability beneath. In that profound silence, their souls seemed to intertwine, stitched together by the painful understanding that lay between them.
"That is why you were chosen—not for your strength, but for the clear vulnerability in your emotions," the girl whispered, her voice a gentle murmur that seemed to float through the heavy air. "Serelith seeks out women who are hungry for meaning, those whose hearts ache for purpose beyond the ordinary. She offers them a role they can never refuse: to become the mother of something greater than love itself."
Ravencia's gaze fell to her trembling hands, pale and trembling as if drained of all life. An overwhelming emptiness clawed at her soul, as though every thread of meaning had unraveled and slipped through her fingers. For the first time, she felt something far more terrifying than the curse itself—a profound awareness of the loss of meaning in the suffering she had clung to so desperately.
"What must I do now?" Her voice cracked, fragile and raw, laden with uncertainty and pain that twisted deep within her chest.
The girl knelt beside her, the soft rustle of her movements barely stirring the stillness. Her hand rested gently on Ravencia's shoulder, a delicate touch meant to steady the storm raging inside. Her eyes held both sorrow and resolve, offering comfort in the midst of chaos.
"I can sever the bond," she said, her tone heavy and hesitant, weighed with the gravity of the choice to come. "But you must decide: will you continue to believe in the beautiful lie, clinging to the illusion of hope? Or will you return to the silent world without purpose, and, from its barren ground, rebuild what has been lost?"
Slowly, as the fog began to lift and the hidden presence unveiled itself in faint outlines, Lady Ravencia let warm tears trace silent paths down her cheeks. Not from defeat, but from an awakening—a painful acceptance of the bitter truth long buried deep within her soul.
The girl guided Ravencia to a forgotten sanctuary, arriving at the heart of an ancient stone circle, its weathered monoliths half-swallowed by time and creeping moss. Sitting cross-legged at the center, the girl exuded a serene yet penetrating presence—like a concealed blade poised to sever the choking shadows. Before her, Ravencia knelt, tears streaming down her cheeks, her body trembling with the weight of awakening. She seemed to grasp that what would soon rise from within was not merely dark energy, but the fractured echoes of meaning she had once woven into that false love.
"We will begin," the girl whispered, her voice soft yet resonant, vibrating deep within Ravencia's bones as if summoning her very soul to awaken. From a worn cloth pouch, she unspooled a delicate thread of radiant gold, aged but pulsating with profound significance. This thread shimmered with an ethereal light—not born of sun or fire, but flickering with the breath of the body's first law: the unyielding authenticity of intention.
With reverent care, the girl placed the glowing thread over Ravencia's navel and commenced her chant. It was neither spell nor prayer—rather, a cultivation incantation, a pure and ancient language that resonated directly with the roots of body and soul, reaching into every hidden, sacred corner:
"From blood once pure, from breath untainted,
I call forth your form before Serelith's touch."
Each syllable thundered through the air, shaking the very earth beneath her feet. From Ravencia's abdomen, thick black smoke coiled upward, twisting and writhing like a serpent stirring from a long slumber, its mournful whispers uttered in a tongue no one had ever taught her:
"Mother... please don't let me go..."
A deep tension crept over Ravencia's face, her features tightening as if every shard of hope within her was being shattered and cast aside. Her hands dug into the soil, clutching it desperately.
The love she had nurtured—fragile and wavering, struggling against an invisible force—cried out as it was violently wrenched from its roots, torn free like a sapling ripped from the earth.
"That is only the reflection of your affection, twisted," the girl murmured, her voice soft yet unwavering, even as crimson blood seeped from the corner of her lips, stained by the crushing weight of cultivation burdening her soul.
"Do not listen. That is not your child. It is a fragment of your loneliness given voice by a demon."
The golden thread coiled within her began to glow, casting a warm, radiant light that pulsed rhythmically. It unfurled into intricate patterns resembling living veins—delicate, winding, and beautiful—before converging at Ravencia's navel, from which an eerie presence emerged…
A pulsating black womb, at once organic and illusory. It throbbed with a dark vitality, its surface dotted with small, wide-open eyes that stared up at Ravencia with a counterfeit love—desperate to cling on, yet radiating an ominous sense of death.
"Mother... don't abandon me. Without you... I would never be born..."
Ravencia fell silent, her body trembling with uncertainty, as a storm of emotions churned within her.
Then, without warning, she unleashed a piercing scream.
This long, wrenching cry was not born of mere physical agony, but from the profound loss of a role she had clung to for so long—a role that had become woven into the very fabric of her being.
Amidst her anguished cries, the girl grasped the golden thread with resolute determination, pulling it steadily. The black entity writhed and shrank, becoming encased in a radiant, shimmering purification spell. Suddenly, it shattered into droplets of thick, crimson dew that rained down, evaporating into the air moments before they could touch the parched earth below.
Silence fell, heavy and absolute.
Ravencia collapsed, her legs giving way beneath her.
Her body grew cold as if time itself had halted around her.
Yet on her face—etched with years of burden—there bloomed a faint, unfamiliar light.
Free.
Empty, but poised to be refilled with truth and renewed hope.
Exhaling deeply, the girl felt the weight of her sacrifice—a full year of her life pledged to the ritual; a sacrifice for a woman who stood as the near gateway to Serelith's birth, an offering beyond all words.
But deep within, she understood: this was not the end.
Far away, Queen Iris stirred from her slumber, sensing the bitter, unyielding passage of time. She gently cradled her belly, guarding something precious and fragile.
And for the very first time, she sensed the soft, tender voice of her child calling out to her.