Chapter 197: The Sisters’s Choice

"They are not yours to take."

He said, releasing his mana; his blade flared into a crimson light once again.

"They are mine."

Valdris’s expression cooled.

"You have no right over them," he said. "They are royalty. They bear the blood of an Emperor and the blood of one of the mightiest witches this age has known. You know nothing of their heritage, their potential, or the responsibilities attached to them."

His gaze shifted briefly toward the sisters.

"Do you truly believe you can raise them properly? You cannot guide them toward their rightful future when you do not even understand the world they were born into."

"I took them in knowing what they were capable of," Ulrich replied.

His eyes never left Valdris.

"Each of them possesses talent beyond anything most mages will ever have. Airam, Hermione, Esther, every one of them has power that could grow beyond the limits people believe possible."

Crimson mana continued to spread around his sword. It hissed softly against the damp night air, casting blood-red reflections across the stream.

"But power in the wrong hands becomes a weapon," Ulrich continued. "It becomes an excuse for people to decide a child’s worth before she is old enough to decide anything for herself. That is why Anna-Maria took them away from Valmoris. That is why she separated them from the covens."

Valdris’s lips curved upward.

"Wrong hands."

His voice held quiet amusement, though none reached his eyes.

"You expect me to believe your hands are good ones, Ulrich van Rubenhart?"

The commander took a slow step closer. His black sword dragged through the wet grass at his side, its edge leaving a narrow line in the earth.

"How much witches’ blood is on those hands?" Valdris asked. "How many people died in the village before you took those girls into your Estate? You destroyed their home. You killed the witches who lived there. You cut down the very people who had sheltered them before you came along and called yourself their guardian."

Ulrich did not answer.

"They will never be safe at your side," Valdris said.

He turned his attention to Airam.

"Princess Airam."

His tone changed when he spoke her name. It became gentler, almost patient, as if he were addressing a frightened child rather than a girl who had just rejected him.

"You are old enough to understand this. You have seen the truth of Skargardia. You know what this kingdom does to witches. You know what men like him did to your people."

Airam’s face remained hard, but she listened.

Valdris raised one hand toward her.

"The enemy is standing before you," he said. "The man who killed countless of your kind. The man who helped destroy the life you once had. The man whose actions led you deeper into danger and left your mother dead."

Hermione’s eyes lowered.

Esther looked at Ulrich, then at the black-armored commander. She did not seem to understand every word, but she understood enough. Her fingers began trembling around the fold of Airam’s nightgown.

Valdris extended his hand farther.

"Come forward," he said. "Your father is waiting in Valmoris. Emperor Sedhoran wants his daughters home. He wants to see you. He wants to protect you. You and your sisters will have a place beside him, where none of this suffering can reach you."

For a moment, Airam did not move.

The campfire snapped behind Ulrich. Somewhere to the left, steel crashed together, followed by the sound of a Rubenhart knight falling against the side of a supply carriage. Hendrick shouted for the remaining soldiers to hold their formation.

Valdris’s open hand remained waiting.

Airam looked at it.

Then she shook her head.

"We are staying."

Valdris’s hand stayed extended.

Hermione turned toward Airam.

For a brief instant, surprise crossed her face. Airam had always been the most cautious one. She thought before speaking. She watched every stranger closely. She worried over what might happen to Esther and Hermione if she made the wrong choice.

Yet she had answered before Valdris could finish his offer.

Hermione’s expression also turned calmer upon hearing Airam’s words.

She crossed her arms over her chest, though the gesture did little to hide the lingering fear in her posture.

"Yes," she said. "We are staying too. We have no affiliation with Valmoris anymore."

"You cannot simply abandon your blood," Valdris replied.

"We did not abandon anything," Hermione said. "We were taken away. Mother chose to leave, and we chose to stay with her."

"She is dead."

"Do not speak about her as if you cared."

Valdris’s gaze slid toward Hermione.

For the first time, his controlled expression showed irritation.

Esther swallowed. She peeked out from behind Airam, her eyes shining in the firelight.

"I..." she began.

Her voice was so faint that Airam glanced back at her.

Esther took a breath.

"I—I want to stay with Eldest Sister and Big Sister," she said. "And Lord Ulrich..."

The words came timidly, but she did not take them back.

She held onto Airam with one hand and reached toward Hermione with the other. Hermione immediately caught it, folding Esther’s small fingers into her own.

"I do not want to go with you," Esther added.

Valdris looked at the three sisters.

The patience in his expression thinned.

"You cannot remain here," he said. "You do not understand the situation. You are children, and children often mistake temporary comfort for safety. Your mother made the same mistake when she believed hiding in Skargardia would keep you beyond the Empire’s reach."

"Mother never made a mistake by taking us away from there," Airam said.

"Princess Airam—"

A crimson flash tore through the darkness.

Ulrich moved.

Valdris had been focused on the sisters for too long. He had lowered his guard by only a fraction, but a fraction was enough. Ulrich drove forward with the reinforced crimson blade held low, using the sword only to force Valdris’s attention away from the girls.

His real strike came from his leg.

Ulrich turned his hips and launched a powerful kick toward Valdris’s side.

Valdris’s eyes widened.

He raised his left arm immediately, trying to block. Ulrich’s foot struck his forearm and ribs with a heavy impact that echoed through the clearing. The force drove Valdris sideways. His coat snapped in the air as his body was thrown back.

"You heard them," Ulrich said.

Valdris resisted the momentum for a few steps, boots cutting through the grass. He reached the edge of the stream and jumped backward rather than allowing himself to fall. His feet landed in the shallow water, sending a wide spray over the stones and reeds.

He slid along the streambed before stopping.

Cold water dripped from the hem of his black coat.

Valdris straightened slowly.

His smile returned, though it had none of its former politeness.

"I had hoped to avoid killing a Count of a foreign kingdom," he said. "Especially one with ties to Arcadia. It would create inconveniences, questions, and unnecessary political discussion if found out."

He lifted his sword.

"But you leave me little choice."

Ulrich ignored him.

"Hendrick." He called.

"My lord!"

Hendrick answered from near the tent. Blood ran from a cut on his cheek, and one of his gauntlets had been split across the knuckles, but he was still standing. Two Valmorian knights lay at his feet. A third circled him carefully with a spear held low.

"Do not waste mana on them," Ulrich ordered. "Their weapons will destroy the spell formations. Use your swords. Keep them away from the tent. Take them down however you can."

"My lord!"

The Rubenhart knights heard the command and adjusted at once.

Several stopped trying to cast minor spells through their weapons. One knight who had been gathering mana in her palm closed her hand and drew a dagger instead. Another shifted his grip on his sword and met a Valmorian strike with both hands, using the strength of his body rather than relying on enchantment.

Valdris gave a quiet laugh from the stream.

"You have ordinary knights against Valmorian soldiers," he said. "My men are trained from childhood to fight mages, monsters, and armies. They have crossed battlefields your soldiers cannot imagine."

Ulrich did not answer.

The commander was correct in one respect.

The Rubenhart knights were being overwhelmed.

The Valmorian force outnumbered them. Their weapons disrupted magic. Their movements were coordinated with an ease that came from long training together. They advanced in pairs and trios, forcing one Rubenhart knight to defend against several angles at once. Every time one of Ulrich’s soldiers tried to use mana, the black weapons broke the spell apart.

Only Hendrick was holding his ground cleanly.

His swordsmanship had always stood above the others. He used the terrain, the tents, the firelight, and the bodies already on the ground. He did not waste strength trying to overpower his enemies. He waited for their mistakes and punished them.

Even Hendrick could not hold forever.

Ulrich knew it.

Still, he did not let it show.

"I will have your head," Ulrich said. "And once you are dead, the rest of your men will run."

Valdris’s smile vanished.

His eyes became dark.

"We shall see."

He stepped out of the stream.

Water fell from his boots as he rushed forward.

Ulrich rushed toward him as well.

There were no complicated answers left.

He had to kill Valdris.

Magic alone would not defeat him. The man’s sword existed to tear spells apart. Every crimson rune Ulrich created would become another weakness for that blade to exploit. He would need to fight with his body, his swordsmanship, his instincts, and every brutal lesson he had learned when he believed he had no place besides magic.

Ulrich had spent years conditioning himself.

He remembered the cold mornings in the backyard of the Rubenhart Estate. The ache in his muscles after training until his hands could barely hold a practice sword. The frustration of a broken mana core that had made him feel useless in a world where magic determined a man’s value. His father’s disappointment had driven him harder. Ulrich had trained because he wanted to become useful. He wanted to prove that he could still stand among knights and nobles, even if his mana could never develop as it should. He wanted to honor his mother.

Valdris had not trained that way.

Ulrich could see it in the man’s movements.

Valdris moved like a man shaped by an entire institution. His balance was too good. His strikes had the weight of drilled repetition, yet none of them felt stiff. He had likely trained in halls built for soldiers like him, with instructors, physicians, enchanted equipment, and opponents chosen to break his weaknesses before the battlefield could find them.

Ulrich had heard rumors about Valmorian training.

Children of military families were conditioned from an early age. Their diets were controlled. Their bodies were strengthened through methods few foreign kingdoms understood. Some spoke of alchemical serums administered to promising recruits. Others claimed the Empire altered its knights through rituals, medicines, and brutal endurance trials.

Ulrich did not know which rumors were true, but they were clearly not an excuse for him.

A life-and-death fight could be determined by details.

Their swords crashed together beneath the crimson firelight.