Chapter 1122: The Forgotten Palace [Part 9]

Chapter 1122 – The Forgotten Palace [Part 9]

Lux crouched close, eyes narrowed.

Think.

Not force.

Fraud.

He slid one dagger beneath the vein and used the other to scrape a tiny nick into Cyrinne’s mirror. Green Envy resonance bled into the reflection. The mirror showed not the crystal as it was, but the crystal as it wanted to be, full. Stable. Obedient. Reporting success to its master like a good little parasite.

Lux guided that illusion into the seal.

The royal mark pulsed.

Accepted.

Lux cut.

The fifth siphon line detached from the coffin and bit into the mirrored loop instead.

The five crystals began feeding on each other.

Pulling. Returning. Pulling. Returning.

Plus and minus.

Debt and repayment.

An accounting circle so stupidly perfect it would keep running for a while because magical systems, like bureaucrats, preferred paperwork that looked complete.

Cyrinne stared. "How long?"

Lux stood, daggers lowering. "Maybe ten minutes before the imbalance becomes obvious. Maybe less if Kaelmor’s monitoring is sharp."

"So our ten-minute door and your ten-minute deception both expire around the same time."

"Yes."

"That is awful."

They moved to the coffin.

Without the siphon lines pulling from her, the demoness looked different already. Not awake, but less faded. Color returned faintly to her lips. The cracks along her horns glowed silver, then dimmed. Her chest rose once beneath the shadow-silk.

Cyrinne swallowed. "Now what?"

Lux placed one hand against the crystal lid.

Cold.

So cold his spirit flinched.

"We open it. Then we wake her."

The coffin did not have a handle.

Handles were for reasonable objects.

Lux studied the lid’s edge, found three royal locking points, and slid his daggers into two of them while Cyrinne placed her palm over the third. On his nod, they turned together.

The crystal groaned.

Too loud.

Both froze.

No alarm.

Lux exhaled through his nose.

Then pushed.

The lid shifted aside inch by inch, heavy even in spirit form. The air that escaped smelled like night-blooming flowers, ashes, old blood, and something sweet enough to make the back of Lux’s throat tighten.

Cyrinne’s eyes narrowed. "That scent..."

"Ancient Lust variant," Lux murmured.

"You know that?"

"I am professionally compromised."

The lid opened fully.

The demoness lay before them.

No glass now.

Only sleeping power and a body too beautiful for safety.

Lux looked at her face.

She was not young. Not old either. Ageless. The kind of face sculptors imagined and then cried because hands were too mortal to finish it. Her skin was pale with a faint moonlit gray undertone, smooth except for thin black markings along her collarbone and wrists where old bindings had burned symbols into her. Her lips were deep red, not painted, naturally dark like crushed fruit. Her lashes were long, trembling slightly. Her horns were elegant, her ears pointed, and at her throat rested a broken circlet fused into a collar of black metal.

Cyrinne whispered, "How do we wake her?"

Lux did not answer immediately.

Because this was the problem.

Waking a legendary demon was not like waking Lullaby, where one could simply offer snacks or move her pillow and accept the consequences. This woman had been drained for who knew how long, imprisoned under Kaelmor’s seal, spoken through dreams, and possessed enough power that Hell agreed to forget her. If she woke wrongly, she might be mad. If she were mad, she might split this realm open. If she split this realm open, Lux’s afternoon would become unacceptable.

"If she wakes wrong," Lux said, "she may get mad."

Cyrinne stared. "Mad?"

"Or split this realm open."

"That is a large gap."

"Both are bad."

"So?" Cyrinne’s voice sharpened, because the mirror-loop crystals were humming louder now. "You need to think fast, Lux. Our time is almost up."

Lux looked at the demoness.

Think.

What woke ancient sleeping powers safely?

Names? Lux didn’t know her name.

Power? Worse. Feeding unknown magic into an unknown demon was how people invented disasters.

Pain? Absolutely not.

Contracts? Not while unconscious. He was not Kaelmor.

Lux’s mind sprinted through curses, binding theory, soul resonance, Lust awakening rites, Greed retrieval clauses, emergency infernal medicine, old fairy tales...

He paused.

No.

Absolutely not.

That was ridiculous.

His brain, traitorous and apparently raised on mortal nonsense, presented the stupidest solution imaginable.

A fairy tale.

Sleeping princess.

Prince kissed her.

She woke up.

Lux stared at the legendary demoness.

Cyrinne looked at him. "What?"

Lux closed his eyes for one second. "I hate that I thought of this."

"What?"

"There is a stupid mortal fairy tale. It might work."

Cyrinne stared at him.

The five crystals hummed around them, still feeding from one another in that fake little accounting loop Lux had forced into existence. Red-gold light pulsed beneath the floor in slower intervals now, confused but not yet screaming.

Cyrinne’s expression sharpened. "What fairy tale?"

Lux exhaled through his nose. "Sleeping beauty."

Silence.

Then Cyrinne blinked once. "No."

"It was just a thought."

"So... Kissing?"

Lux looked at her.

Cyrinne looked back.

"That sounds stupid," she said flatly. "There is no way it could wake her up."

"Any better idea?"

Cyrinne opened her mouth.

Closed it.

Looked at the crystals.

Looked at the coffin.

Then her face twisted like she had just swallowed expensive poison.

"No."

Lux lifted a brow.

She pointed at him. "Do not look pleased."

"I am not pleased."

"You are internally smug."

"I am internally distressed."

"Good." Cyrinne stepped back. "Then... just do it."

Lux looked down at the demoness again.

Yeah.

It sounded stupid.

Painfully stupid.

So stupid his dignity almost filed a complaint.

But old magic loved symbolism. Mortal stories sometimes survived because reality had an embarrassing sense of humor.

Lux leaned down slowly.

His lips touched hers.

Simple.

Careful.

A question more than a kiss.

Then her mouth moved.

Lux froze.

Her lips softened beneath his, answering with sudden warmth. One pale hand lifted, fingers brushing his jaw. Her mouth opened, and her tongue slipped against his with slow, ancient hunger.

Cyrinne whispered, "Oh."

The demoness kissed Lux like she had been waiting centuries to finish breathing.

Then her eyes opened.

Red.

Starless.

And amused.