Chapter 935: Alternate Timeline: The Prophecy (1)

Kiara nodded.

"Since I could not break the seal by force," she said, "I used a Purification Stone on His Majesty."

Guinvere’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

"Purification Stone..." she murmured, tasting the unfamiliar words. "I have never heard of a stone capable of removing seals and restoring cultivation. Is it an item from a higher world?"

Her fingers tapped lightly against her sleeve while she sank into thought, and for several moments the church was filled only with the sighing wind and the distant creak of ancient wood.

Then she lifted her head.

"In that case," she said, "would you be willing to use one of your bloodline abilities?"

Kiara’s eyes sharpened.

"Bloodline?" she repeated. "You wish to confirm your suspicion of the prophecy?"

She was no fool.

The request laid her intentions bare as clearly as a sword laid upon a table.

And yet what interested Kiara more was what she might gain in return. A seer who traveled in secret, a prophecy, and a hidden objective. It had all the familiar scent of an unfolding quest.

Still, another concern rose like frost over glass.

If Guinvere could identify her bloodline merely by witnessing her abilities, then her connection to the Frost Clan might be exposed.

"Yes," Guinvere said, her voice firm. "Until I confirm that you are the one described in the prophecy, I cannot reveal any further details."

Kiara let out a slow breath.

"Not here, Miss Guinvere," she said. "I do not wish others to be caught in the aftermath of my demonstration, and I do not trust a stranger enough to follow her to some unknown location. So, with those truths laid on the table, suggest a better solution."

Her words were polite, but the meaning was unmistakable.

Guinvere considered this for only a heartbeat.

Then she lifted her hand, and her staff reappeared in a shimmer of blue light.

"I understand," she said. "I will create a spatial field around us."

The blue orb atop her staff began to glow.

Its light deepened, and blackness spread outward like ink dropped into water, forming a dome around the two of them. From outside, it appeared to be no larger than a modest chamber, but when Kiara stepped within, she felt her breath catch.

The space inside had expanded immensely.

The ruined church was gone.

In its place stretched a vast dark expanse, large enough to swallow a hundred battlefields.

The sensation reminded her of the store, that strange realm beyond ordinary dimensions, and the thought slipped into her mind like a curious bird.

Would she be capable of such a feat after awakening her second spirit path?

"So," Guinvere asked, her voice echoing faintly in the expanded space, "are you ready?"

Kiara drew herself back to the present and gave a single nod.

"Absolute Freezing, activate."

The words had scarcely left her lips when the world stopped.

Frost erupted in absolute silence.

No roaring wind.

No cracking thunder.

Only the instant appearance of ice, as sudden and inevitable as the darkness comes when the sun is eclipsed in the sky.

The black space turned white.

The air itself became rigid.

Guinvere’s eyes widened, but before she could move, the ice claimed her as well.

Outside the spatial field, the pitch-black dome transformed into a glittering shell of crystal-blue ice, and the spectators stared in stunned disbelief.

King Caleb Crescent rose so abruptly that his robes swept over the stone floor.

His breath caught in his throat as memory surged through him.

"This ice..." he whispered, his voice trembling with recognition. "It is unlike ordinary ice magic. The surrounding temperature does not affect it. There is no doubt. This is the same bloodline ability once wielded by both Lyserdar Frost and Sister Ariannan Frost. The Frost Dragon, no doubt. But they had no children besides Callista Frost..."

He stared at the frozen dome.

"Is she related to Callista Frost? I do remember Callista Frost and Xander Cross trained together in the Frost Clan. And they were so close that people often mistook them for lovers. She is not their illegitimate daughter or something, right?"

Inside the ice, Kiara felt a heavy stone sink in her stomach.

She had made a mistake.

She had assumed the spatial field would conceal everything, like a curtain hiding the stage from those in the audience.

Instead, she had lit a torch behind thin silk.

She had never intended to keep her ice abilities secret forever, but she had hoped to avoid letting others associate them directly with a bloodline.

With Gideon Crescent’s intelligence and King Caleb’s familiarity with Frost Clan, that hope had just shattered like brittle glass.

"I really stepped on my own C4 this time," she thought grimly.

Since there was nothing more to do, she remained where she stood, surrounded by unmoving frost, and waited for the skill’s duration to end.

Roughly eighty seconds later, the ice vanished as abruptly as it had appeared.

Cold mist rolled across the ground before fading.

The spatial field restored itself, looking as pristine and undisturbed as though nothing unusual had happened at all.

Originally, the skill was meant to last one hundred and twenty seconds, but Guinvere’s superior cultivation and the reinforced properties of the spatial field had shortened the duration.

Freed at last, Guinvere took two hurried steps backward.

Her breathing was shallow.

Her fingers trembled slightly against the polished wood of her staff.

There was astonishment in her eyes, but beneath it lay something colder and more honest.

Fear.

"I have read of this ability in ancient records," she said after drawing several steadying breaths, "but this is the first time I have experienced it myself."

During those eighty seconds, she had pushed her ether energy again and again against the prison of ice.

It had not yielded.

Not even slightly.

The cold had seeped through her protective aura like winter through cracks in old walls, and she knew with unsettling clarity that the temperature had fallen below one hundred degrees below the freezing point.

Had she not shielded herself in time, her frail body would not have endured.

The realization left her with the same humility one feels when standing before the sea during a storm, understanding at last how small a single human life truly is.

After composing herself, Guinvere gave a slow, solemn nod.

"The bloodline of the ancient divine beast, Frost Dragon," she said. "You are indeed the person I was searching for. Miss..."

She paused and gave a faint, embarrassed smile.

"My apologies. In all that has happened, I forgot to ask your name."

"Kiara," Kiara replied, then folded her arms once more. "Now tell me why you came."

Guinvere lowered her staff.

"Before I explain my purpose," she said, her voice turning distant as if reaching back into the corridors of history, "allow me to tell you a small story about the late leader of the Frost Clan, Lysander Frost, and his monster companion, an ancient beast named Zheng."

"Zheng?" Kiara blinked her eyes twice. "From the Eastern Continent?" She wondered.