I wanted to believe it was an illusion, but the ache in my chest was too physical to ignore. My vision blurred—then snapped into a crystalline, terrifying focus as I let the All-Seeing Eyes ignite.
A white-hot needle of pain shot through my optic nerves, anchoring itself in the back of my skull. It wasn't power; it was an invasion. The gold of the ballroom became a screeching roar of light, forcing me to squint as the world shattered into a map of raw anatomy and flickering mana.
The "Princess" in front of me was no longer a person. She was a frantic collection of muscle twitches and fractured, erratic energy. I could see the sweat forming in her pores before it broke the surface, and the hollow void where her royal mana should have been—filled now with a cheap, static imitation.
It was sickening. Everyone looked like a collection of organs and lies.
My knuckles turned white as I drew my sword in one fluid motion. The steel hissed, sounding like a scream in my hyper-sensitive ears. I leveled the tip directly at her throat.
The hall froze. To them, I was a blur; to me, they were statues held in mid-breath.
"What the—?!" a nobleman gasped. The sound of his glass shattering was an explosion in my head, sending a spike of heat behind my left eye.
"Felix—what are you doing?!" Lucien's voice was a low-frequency rumble that vibrated in my teeth.
I ignored the headache. This creature was a storm of static, nothing like the real Lilith, whose mana always flowed like a calm, deep river.
"Cut the act," I said, my voice sounding hollow and distant. "Where is Lilith?"
The impostor's eyes welled with tears. To the crowd, it was heartbreaking. To me, it was just fluid moving through ducts—a calculated release. I felt a flash of disgust, briefly wishing for the dull, simple gray of ordinary sight.
Shing.
Veltherion and Atherion drew their blades, the sound striking my senses like lightning. They leveled their steel at the girl, their auras flaring like twin violet suns.
"You really are a poor actor," the Queen's voice cut through the noise, terrifyingly calm. "Did you think I wouldn't recognize my own blood?"
The gravity in the room increased, turning the air into a thick liquid that was hard to pull into my lungs.
"You are not my daughter."
The girl's mask disintegrated. The tears stopped mid-track. I stepped forward, the tip of my sword grazing her skin as her mana turned dark and jagged. My head was spinning—a roar of information threatening to drown me. I needed to end this before my vision went white.
"Who are you?"
I leaned in, my glowing red eyes boring into hers. The pressure in my skull was at a breaking point.
"Tell me where she is," I hissed, "or find out how many pieces I can cut you into before my eyes burn out."
Yahan improved version hai:
The fake Lilith didn't scream or plead. Instead, she laughed—a low, melodic sound that felt like silk sliding over a blade.
"You know… for a human, you're quite observant."
I didn't lower my sword. My arm was a locked bar of iron, the tip of my blade still grazing the hollow of her throat.
"You asked who I am?" A slow, dangerous smile. "Let's just say… I'm a candidate for the Succubus Queen."
"That bitch." Veltherion's voice dropped to something almost reverent with disgust. His killing intent bled into the room — cold enough that frost crept, hair-thin, across the nearest window pane.
I exhaled a small, measured breath. "Sorry to tell you, but you're the one in the cage here, Miss Candidate."
Her smile didn't just falter. It died.
"What do you mean by that?"
"Isn't it obvious?" I said, my voice terrifyingly calm — even to my own ears. "We let you take her. We wanted you to kidnap Lilith."
The silence that followed was absolute. The kind that has weight to it.
Her mask cracked. The porcelain perfection of her expression twitched once, twice — something ugly surfacing beneath the borrowed face. "What…? That's impossible. You wouldn't risk her."
"We needed to know exactly where the third brother is hiding," I finished. Through the All-Seeing Eyes, I tracked the frantic, jagged spike in her mana — panic dressed up as rage. "And you just handed us the map."
{ Earlier That Morning — Lilith's Chambers }
The morning air had been thick with the scent of lilies and cold iron.
The Queen stood near the window — a golden-eyed statue, still and unreadable. Veltherion and Atherion held the walls like shadows given form. Lucien stood at my shoulder, an anchor of ancient, quiet magic.
Lilith looked between all of them, then settled on me. There was a nervousness to her fingers — the way they kept finding the fabric of her dress, pleating and releasing. "Felix… when you said you wanted to talk privately, I thought it would just be us." A pause. "Why are Mother and my brothers here?"
"Because what I'm about to say involves the crown," I said. "And it involves your safety."
Her spine straightened. Her royal blood felt the shift before her mind did.
"Tonight," I said quietly, "you aren't going to the ball. Not as yourself."
She froze. "What? Felix, the entire court is expecting—"
"You're going to be kidnapped before the music even starts."
Silence dropped through the room like a stone through still water.
"It's a setup," I continued. "We use the abduction to trace the line back to the traitor. We find your brother." I stepped closer, dropping my voice — just for her. "Lilith. Do you trust me?"
She didn't hesitate. Whatever fear had been living in her eyes quietly moved aside and made room for something harder, something I hadn't seen in her before.
"…Okay," she said. "I trust you."
The Queen stepped forward, her voice a calm command that left no space for argument. "Release a pulse of mana every hour. We will follow the trail."
"And if I'm in real danger?" Lilith asked softly.
"Release it all at once." The Queen's golden eyes didn't soften. "That will be the signal that ends the world for whoever took you."
"And the moment you do," I added — my hand briefly finding hers — "I'll come for you. Immediately."
Veltherion pushed off the wall. "And if she's far? We can't just appear there."
"Relax, Prince." Lucien's tone was almost amused — the confidence of someone who has never needed to hurry. "That's exactly why I'm standing in this room."
Veltherion's eyes sharpened. Cut to Lucien. Widened. "You're a mage, which means—"
"Teleportation," Lucien confirmed, with the faintest ghost of a smile. "Reverse summoning if needed. Whichever gets us there faster."
The room settled into the particular silence that comes before something begins. I looked at each of them in turn — the Queen, Veltherion, Atherion, Lucien, Lilith.
"Tonight," I said. "We end this."