Chapter 230: Vultures

"They stand around in circles talking about their family lineages and how many rare spells their tutors taught them."

"They are bound by the superficial chains of society," Pollux muttered. "They lack depth. They mock those who walk the path of the true arcane."

"Yeah, they made fun of Polly last year because he accidentally set his own cape on fire trying to summon a shadow-demon," Castor laughed loudly.

"I WAS TESTING A COMBUSTION THRESHOLD!" Pollux hissed, his face turning bright red.

Seraphina listened to the boys bicker, her mind rapidly analyzing the incoming intelligence.

’So, it’s not just an adult battlefield,’ Seraphina realized, her dark eyes narrowing with intense, calculating focus. ’It’s a proxy war. The nobles fight their battles by comparing their children. They use the kids to establish social dominance, secure alliances, and humiliate their rivals.’

She looked at the midnight-blue, silver-lined dress.

She thought about her origami duck army, currently resting in the hidden compartment of her toy chest, ready for deployment.

She thought about her flawless, Grandmaster-level grasp of chess, economics, and political maneuvering.

The other noble children were bringing rare spells and fancy lineages to the playground.

Seraphina von Nacht was bringing a black hole, a terrifying warlord father, and an intellect that had driven a geopolitical scholar to tears.

’They think they are going to parade their pampered brats around and look down on the provincial stray from the North,’ Seraphina smiled, a slow, wicked, incredibly dangerous smirk creeping across her soft, chubby cheeks.

She wasn’t afraid of the Academy snobs.

She wasn’t afraid of the Emperor.

"It’s going to be fun," Seraphina whispered to herself, turning toward the dress as the tailors stepped back.

The sun began to set over the Imperial Capital, casting long, bloody shadows across the golden spires of the Palace. The carriages of the high nobility were already taking to the streets, a glittering, perfumed procession of power and venom.

But as the heavy, black carriage of the Vanguard rolled out of the Nacht Estate, flanked by knights and carrying the Reaper and his tiny Sovereign, the true apex predators entered the game.

The playground was open.

And Seraphina was ready to play.

***

The Imperial Palace did not merely exude wealth.

The grand ballroom was a gravity-defying architectural masterpiece of vaulted stained glass, floating crystal chandeliers, and polished floors cut from solid white starlight-marble.

It was designed specifically to make anyone stepping inside feel small, poor, and inadequate.

Naturally, Archduke Leonidas Valen completely ignored the intended psychological effect.

"AHAHAHA! BEHOLD! THE SOUTHERN LION HAS ARRIVED!"

The heavy, fifty-foot-tall gilded doors of the ballroom had barely cracked open before Leonidas’s booming, deafening roar echoed across the pristine hall, shattering the delicate, whispering ambiance of two thousand assembled nobles.

The Fire Archduke marched into the room, his red formal-wear practically glowing, dragging a mortified, albeit gracefully smiling, Duchess Lysandra on his arm.

Following closely behind were Castor, looking too excited by the buffet tables, and Pollux, who was desperately trying to maintain a brooding scowl while being blinded by the volume of gold leaf.

The Imperial Court paused, offering polite, slightly strained applause for the Lord of the South.

And then, the herald slammed his ceremonial staff against the marble floor.

"Announcing His Grace, Duke Kaelus von Nacht! Sovereign of the Northern Marches! And his Heir, the Lady Seraphina von Nacht!"

The polite applause died.

It did not fade; it was abruptly strangled.

The silence that fell over the grand ballroom was heavy, and thick with a toxic, paralyzing cocktail of pure terror and rabid, calculating curiosity.

Duke Kaelus von Nacht stepped through the gilded doors.

He was the absolute diametric opposite of the glittering room.

Dressed in his midnight-velvet coat and black coat, his raven hair immaculate, he looked like a walking, breathing eclipse.

The ambient temperature in a fifty-foot radius instantly plummeted.

The signature, terrifying violet glow of his eyes swept across the sea of powdered, perfumed aristocrats with a look of such homicidal disgust that several minor Barons in the front row actively took a step backward, spilling their champagne.

But for the first time in fifteen years, the Capital’s high society was not looking at the Reaper.

Every single pair of greedy, calculating, venomous eyes in the room was locked onto the tiny figure walking beside him.

Seraphina von Nacht stepped into the light.

Her midnight-blue, silver-lined velvet dress swished elegantly against her small boots.

Her dark hair was flawlessly braided and tied with a crimson ribbon. She held Kaelus’s black-gloved hand, her posture perfectly, terrifyingly straight.

’Look at them,’ Seraphina’s adult mind assessed, her dark eyes scanning the crowd with the cold, clinical precision of a shark evaluating a school of very brightly colored, very stupid fish.

’They are literally salivating. I can see the gears turning in their powdered heads. They’re calculating my political value, my marriage potential, and my gullibility.’

The whispers began, hissing through the room like a nest of disturbed vipers.

"Is that the stray? She looks entirely too composed..."

"I heard she possesses a pathetic Water core. No threat to the Imperial line..."

"Look at the Archduke. He’s practically shielding her. A glaring weakness..."

"If my son could secure an engagement before she realizes her own worth..."

A particularly ambitious, heavily perfumed Countess took a bold step forward, plastering a sickeningly sweet smile on her face, intending to intercept them and be the first to ’welcome’ the new Heir.

Kaelus did not break his stride.

He simply turned his head, his violet eyes locking onto the Countess.

He didn’t speak, merely let a fraction of his killing intent leak from his core.

The Countess froze mid-step.

The color violently drained from her heavily powdered face. Her knees buckled slightly, and she executed a frantic, terrified pivot, practically diving behind a marble pillar to escape his gaze.

"Do not look at them, Mushroom," Kaelus murmured softly, his deep voice meant only for her ears, completely contrasting his terrifying exterior. "They are vultures."