Chapter 97: Final Meeting

Roxanna stood in front of the apartment building and did not move for a moment.

This was the place where most of her married life had been spent. After graduation, after the wedding, this was the home she and Garrick had bought together.

Back then it had felt like a beginning. Now it looked like a distant memory, faded at the edges, familiar only in shape. The same lobby. The same stairwell scent. The same quiet that used to feel heavier than the walls themselves.

She stepped inside the building.

On the way up, a few neighbors recognized her at once. People on these floors had always known each other. Some stopped her in the hallway, surprised and clearly happy to see her after so long.

A woman from the next unit congratulated her on becoming SS-Rank. An older couple thanked her for protecting the city during the recent crisis. A young man simply said it was good she was safe and asked if she was visiting for long.

Roxanna answered each of them politely.

Looking at their faces, something quiet settled in her chest.

She had once believed no one truly considered her. She had thought her efforts to protect and help people lived only in her own mind, like a private promise no one else could see.

In reality, these people had always seen her as someone who stood for others. She just had not noticed it back then.

Maybe she had been too tired. Maybe she had been too trapped inside the marriage to hear anything beyond Garrick’s voice.

Now she did.

She stopped at the apartment door and pressed the doorbell.

The door opened.

Garrick stood there.

He had been waiting for her. He knew she was coming. Even so, seeing her in person was different from seeing her in news clips and videos.

She looked more beautiful, more composed, more elegant than memory allowed. More than that, he could feel the weight of her SS-Rank presence the moment she stepped closer.

This was not the same woman who had once lived constantly under his shadow. She stood before him as someone powerful in her own right, and that truth made his throat tighten.

For a second, he could not speak properly.

Roxanna did not make the moment heavier than it needed to be.

"How are you, Garrick?" she asked simply. "It’s been a long time."

She stepped past him into the old apartment and went straight toward her former room. Her books were still there, lined in the same order she remembered.

Some clothes remained folded in the drawer. Small personal things she had left behind sat where she had abandoned them months ago.

One by one, she collected them. Each item vanished into her storage ring with quiet efficiency until the space was empty of her past.

Garrick remained near the doorway, watching.

He had never seen a storage ring used so casually before. The sight alone unsettled him. Power that clean and practical made the old apartment feel smaller somehow.

When she finished, Roxanna turned.

"I want to talk with you one last time," she said. "At least now, can you listen to me?"

Garrick’s throat worked once.

"Hereafter, we are only strangers," Roxanna continued. "Listening to me shouldn’t be a problem for you, right?"

He nodded.

"Yes. We can talk."

They moved to the living room and sat opposite each other on the sofa. The same sofa. The same low table. Only the people sitting there had changed.

Garrick was the first to speak.

"You look completely changed."

Roxanna smiled for the first time since entering the apartment.

"Yes. I have. A lot of people helped me get here. I should thank them."

"And you look happier," Garrick said. "More successful too."

"Success and happiness are different," Roxanna replied. "But somehow, I managed to find both."

For a brief second, Daemon’s face rose in her mind. The way he looked at her without trying to control her. The way he trusted her strength. The smile that followed was soft and unforced.

She looked at Garrick again.

"I want you to become happy too. Try to listen to other people. Stop letting your ego decide everything. Live a good life. I even hope you find someone you can truly love."

Her voice stayed calm, steady, without bitterness.

"That is all I wanted to say in this final meeting. Don’t repeat the same mistakes. Take this as an example and live without carrying the same regrets. I forgive you for everything."

Garrick sat still.

Before she entered the apartment, he had expected the old Roxanna — the woman who hesitated, who looked confused when pressured, who lowered her head when he spoke too strongly, who never found the courage to push back.

That woman was gone. The person sitting across from him spoke with clarity and strength he had never allowed himself to hear before.

After listening to her, the truth settled hard.

He had been the reason for the divorce.

He had hurt her more than once.

He had never truly listened.

And still, she forgave him.

Garrick closed his eyes and exhaled slowly. When he opened them again, he managed a thin smile.

"Okay."

He reached for a folder on the table and handed it over. Roxanna checked the documents carefully. Everything was signed. Everything was clear. No missing pages. No unfinished lines.

"Alright," she said. "This is done."

She stored the papers in her ring as well.

Before leaving, she looked at him once more. Garrick was still seated on the sofa, gaze turned toward the window as if the city outside held answers he had avoided for years.

Roxanna stepped closer.

"Garrick," she said, "I can cure your impotence now. It would help you build a family of your own someday, if you want that."

He shook his head at once.

"No. I’m already cured."

Roxanna’s brow tightened slightly.

How?

Only someone above S-Rank should have been able to manage that kind of restoration — someone on the level of her master, Morwenna. The thought rose sharply, but she did not ask. Not here. Not when the conversation was already finished and the papers were already sealed.

She turned toward the door.

Then Garrick stood.

"Do you really love that boy?" he asked. "Daemon. Victoria’s husband."

Roxanna answered without hesitation.

"Yes. I love him. He is the love of my life."

Garrick studied her eyes, searching for uncertainty, for performance, for anything false.

He found none.

"Does Victoria know?"

"She knows," Roxanna said. "I’m staying with them."

Garrick absorbed that in silence.

Then, suddenly, he gripped her shoulders.

"I’m sorry," he said, voice dropping fast. "You have to escape this place. There are people surrounding this building. After they saw you in the news and media, they selected you for their lord. Their lord wants you too."

Roxanna froze for half a second, then tore both of his hands from her shoulders.

"Explain properly."

Garrick did not explain.

His body stretched.

Skin broke into dense fur. Bones shifted with a sound too wet and too wrong for any ordinary transformation. In moments, the man who had opened the door was gone. An eight-foot beast stood in his place, shadow falling across Roxanna’s entire frame.

Roxanna covered her mouth, eyes wide.

"Garrick... what happened to you?"