Chapter 541: Daddy’s Boy [Bonus - ]

Chapter 541: Daddy’s Boy [Bonus Chapter]

Up in the Bloom family tier, Seraphina Bloom’s crimson eyes dilated to the size of coins with her hands flying to the grips of her twin curved daggers and her breath hitching in her throat.

Valerius Sterling meanwhile choked on his own spit as Kara’s violet gaze drifted over them with her lips curving into a slow chilling smile that made the hairs on their arms stand up straight.

"Don’t worry," Kara called out, her voice smooth and playful, yet carrying a terrifying undertone that made the noble scions shiver. "I’m going to hold myself back a bit. I’m not going to come into the ring and one-shot everyone right away... That’d make for a terrible broadcast, wouldn’t it? I’d like to see each and every one of your powers first. So make sure you bring your best, kids~"

Valerius swallowed hard, his face turning the color of chalk.

’She’s going to play with us,’ he thought with his heart hammering against his ribs. ’She’s going to dissect us like lab rats on a global livestream.’

"Aki..."

The King’s voice broke through the murmurs with his voice sounding cold and full of disapproval.

He stared down from the dais, his sapphire eyes locking onto the small trembling girl sitting alone.

"She has no name," the King stated, his voice carrying the weight of an unmovable imperial stone. "The unawakened scions of House Castellian are not recorded on the registry... It is strictly forbidden under imperial law to bestow a formal name upon a member of the royal family who has not earned the sacred middle seal, Zel."

Kara didn’t even turn to face him.

She just strolled casually across the black flagstones with the heels of her leather dress shoes clicking rhythmically against the stone.

Click! Click! Click!

"Oh, please," Kara said, rolling her eyes toward the vaulted ceiling with an exaggerated shrug of her shoulders. "You don’t even give a damn about your own kids, so why do you care what people call her? It’s just a name... It’s not like she needs your permission to have syllables attached to her face."

She reached the lowest tier and stepped up to the small shadowed chair where the First Princess was curled in on herself.

Aki was trembling violently.

Her head was still bowed, her velvet skirts clutched tightly in her small white-knuckled fists and her chest heaving with silent breaths.

The terror of being singled out by the King, the shame of almost having to bow before Vanderbilt, and the terrifying god-like presence of the woman who had just shattered the court... it was all pressing down upon her like a mountain of lead.

Kara stopped beside the chair. She reached down with her single right hand, her fingers settling gently over Aki’s narrow trembling shoulder.

... It was warm.

"She doesn’t need to take that Zel middle name either," Kara said loudly with her voice carrying cleanly across the frozen pit toward the throne. "That name only comes with your dysfunctional, garbage family baggage anyway... Aki is more than enough."

Aki flinched, a sharp burning heat instantly rising from her chest straight into her face.

’Silas... do you have to make it embarassing~?’

A fierce brilliant blush bloomed across her pale cheeks, spreading with terrifying speed all the way to the tips of her small delicate ears, making the First Princess look impossibly flustered and unmistakably cute against the dark imposing backdrop of the hall.

Kara leaned down slightly.

She pulled her right hand back from Aki’s shoulder and extended it forward with her palm up and her calloused fingers open and relaxed.

"First Princess," Kara spoke. "I officially request to stand as your blade in the Exhibition of Succession. Will you have me?"

Aki stared at the open hand.

Her vision blurred with unshed tears with her lower lip trembling as she looked at the calloused palm, the neat cuffs of the charcoal suit, and then up... straight into those deep hypnotic violet eyes behind the clear glass lenses.

’Ah... my savior...’

And in that fraction of a second, looking deep into those glowing violet depths...

’Silas.’

Aki’s breath caught in her throat.

She could swear by everything holy and by every memory she had of Blessed Land that she could see Silas Graves looking back at her from behind the woman’s face.

’And he’s smiling too.’

Slowly, her small slender fingers reached out.

GRIP!

Her trembling hand settled into Kara’s right palm and Kara’s fingers closed firmly around hers feeling warm like an iron bracket.

With a single smooth pull that didn’t strain a single muscle, Kara hoisted the First Princess clean out of her chair, bringing her firmly to her feet on the black flagstones.

"Good girl," Kara murmured, her voice soft enough that only Aki could hear it beneath the ventilation hum.

She stepped close, her single right arm resting casually across Aki’s shoulders, pulling the red-faced princess securely against her side.

"Listen to me. There are a whole lot of pathetic people in this room who are going to try and bully you... They’re going to talk about your lack of a core, your bloodline, your standing but don’t you pay them a single second of your attention."

She squeezed Aki’s shoulder gently.

"You’re special. Remember that."

Aki’s eyes welled with hot tears spilling over her lashes and running down her burning cheeks, but she bit her lip, refusing to let out a sob.

She nodded wth her smaller hand clutching the sleeve of Kara’s charcoal suit like a lifeline.

Kara turned, dragging the First Princess along with her toward the massive double doors at the primary diplomatic exit.

As she walked, Kara raised her pinned left sleeve, waving the empty charcoal fabric back at the Grand Table with lazy mocking cheerfulness.

"Alright, folks!" Kara called out, her voice echoing off the obsidian arches. "We’re heading out to brainstorm some winning strategies! Make sure you ping us when the bracket is drawn and the arena is primed! Don’t start the party without us~!"

CREEEAK... SLAM!

The heavy star-iron blast doors groaned as the guards frantically scrambled out of their path, slamming shut behind the two women with a deafening crash that echoed down the long vaulted hallways of the Citadel.

The golden pressure that had choked the chamber evaporated completely, leaving behind only the flat stale smell of cold air and more than five hundred people who had forgotten how to breathe.

Every ruler at the table was staring at the closed iron doors in a state of disbelieving paralysis.

The Lord of Blessed Land... the miraculous untouchable Second Phase Gold Core had just bypassed all nine global superpowers, ignored trillion-credit trade offers, insulted the Supreme Monarch to his face, and formally allied herself with the nameless unawakened defect of the Royal house.

Down in the southern arc, High Marshal-President Valeria Da Silva sat with her arms crossed over her broad armored chest.

Her jaw was locked tight, her sharp canine teeth grinding together with an audible crunch that made her adjutants flinch.

Beside her, Chancellor Henri de Montmirail looked like a man whose bank vault had just been swallowed by a sinkhole, clutching his treaty papers with trembling white-tipped fingers.

The greatest martial asset of the century had just walked out the door, and neither of them had gotten a piece of her.

Yet... as Da Silva exhaled through her nose, the tension in her broad shoulders began to loosen.

A tiny smile carved itself into the corner of her dark, scarred lips.

’All of this will pay off,’ Da Silva thought, her feline eyes narrowing with cool satisfaction.

Among all the arrogant nobles and blind Lords in the capital, Da Silva had been the only one who had seen value in the First Princess from the very first day she had laid eyes on her.

While the King saw an empty vessel and Alexander saw an embarrassment, Da Silva had recognized a long-term investment... A pure-blooded royal who was starved for basic human connection.

Over the last two years, Da Silva had quietly cultivated that bond.

They spoke frequently over private, encrypted comm-channels, sharing casual messages about border logistics, court gossip, and personal feelings.

Just three nights ago, Aki had texted her a long, rambling paragraph about her anxieties.

And now?

Now, that lonely neglected little princess was walking arm-in-arm with the Lord of Blessed Land, treating her like an older sister and a protector.

’You played yourself, Julian,’ Da Silva thought, casting a cold amused glance toward Vanderbilt’s trembling frame. ’You tried to corner a stray dog, and she brought back a dragon. I don’t need to beg Blessed Land for an alliance since Aki considers me a confidante... The road to that Gold Core runs straight through that little girl’s inbox.’

Up on the Royal dais, the King drew a slow shuddering breath.

His face had settled back into an impenetrable sheet of blue-tinted marble with his fingers releasing the table as he prepared to regain control of the room.

"Scribes," the King’s voice boomed. "Record the factional adjustments. The Exhibition of Succession shall proceed with—"

"Father!"

The shout was sudden and lacking any sort of court etiquette as every head in the room jerked back toward the dais.

Crown Prince Alexander had surged to his feet without asking for permission.

His star-iron slate tumbled from his hands, clattering loudly against the stone risers as he stepped forward and his tall muscular frame was trembling with hysterical outrage.

His royal uniform was stretched taut across his broad shoulders, his beautiful face was mottled with dark furious red, and his bloodshot eyes burned intensely.

"Majesty!" Alexander roared. "This assembly has been subjected to unforgivable treason! That... that gutter-trash vagrant from Europa dared to spit upon your Royal authority! She mocked the sacred blood of House Castellian, challenged your leadership before the governing bodies of the world, and dragged our name through the mud in front of foreign delegates!"

He struck his own chest with a heavy, armored fist!

THUMP!

"You are the King of the World! You are the pillar that saved this species from the ashes of the Apocalypse! I will not stand by and allow a Gold Core to treat our court like an unranked tavern brawl!"

He dropped heavily to one knee with the joint of his boot slamming into the stone with an ear-splitting crack.

CLANG!

"Authorize my entry into the Exhibition, Father!" Alexander begged, his hands clasped over his heart and his chest heaving as he looked up at the King with adoration. "I am an Awakened Prince of the Realm! I have broken through the threshold and reached the Fourth Stage of Core Advancement! If the laws of the bracket require parity, I will voluntarily wear the Star-Iron Suppression Rings! I will seal my pathways! I will drag my rank down to the Second Stage to match her refinement phase!"

His voice cracked, a plea that laid his entire soul bare before hundreds of people.

"Let me teach her a royal lesson, Father! Let me break her in the Sovereign Realm and restore the honor of your crown!"

The chamber fell into an embarrassed uncomfortable silence.

The Crown Prince of the human race was literally on his knees, offering to bind his own soul pathways with suppression collars just to avenge a minor insult leveled at his father’s pride.

The King looked down at him.

For three long seconds, the monarch’s face was a void.

He looked at his firstborn son... the boy he had sent into the northern trenches at fourteen, the prince who had slaughtered hordes without ever receiving a word of praise and slowly, the corner of the King’s thin lips curled upward into a approving smile.

"Granted," the King murmured softly. "Stand, Alexander. You shall carry the standard of the Sovereign Throne."

Alexander’s entire body shuddered with euphoric relief.

His heart skipped a frantic beat with a sickening surge of pure warmth flooding his chest as he rose.

His eyes shining with triumphant tears as he bowed his head in deep worshipful gratitude.

"Thank you, Father," Alexander breathed, his voice trembling. "I will bring you her head."

Across the table, High Marshal Valeria Da Silva watched the spectacle with unmasked revulsion, slowly shaking her head as she leaned back in her chair.

’A grown-ass man still crying for daddy’s approval,’ Da Silva thought, her lip curling in bitter contempt. ’Thirty years old, commanding thousands of soldiers in the Sovereign Realm, and he’s still begging for a pat on the head like a lapdog that brought back a dead bird... It’s pathetic... Truly pathetic... Where the hell are the real men in this world?’

She glanced toward the closed double doors where Kara White had vanished minutes earlier, remembering the fearless casualness with which that one-armed woman had looked the King in the eye and dared him to strike.

’God,’ Da Silva scoffed internally, a dark chuckle rumbling in her throat. ’If I could find a man who had even half the balls of that woman, I would have been pregnant five years ago.’

The King’s voice rose cutting through the murmurs of the court.

"The Exhibition of Succession is hereby convened! Scribes, draft the brackets! Prime the transit corridors to the Sovereign Realm! We adjourn!"

...

Miles to the west, in the commercial high-district of Valoria City, the midday heat rose off the asphalt in shimmering oily waves.

Evelyn stood on the crowded sidewalk near the central shopping concourse with her shoulders hunched deep inside an oversized red hoodie that swallowed her petite frame down past the hem of her black cotton gym shorts.

Her messy black hair was yanked into a lopsided, loose bun held together by a scuffed plastic stylus, and dark exhausted purple bruises hung heavily beneath her eyes.

Between her dry lips rested a slim white Silver-Leaf cigarette, the tip glowing dull orange against the bright sunlight as she dragged a deep scorching lungful of menthol smoke into her chest.

FSSSSSH.

She held it for two seconds, letting the nicotine cut through the dull chronic throb behind her temples, before blowing a long thin stream of gray smoke into the humid air.

’Date my ass,’ Evelyn thought bitterly, her thumb flicking a tiny clump of ash into the gutter.

Who the hell was she supposed to be on a date with?

[Bonus Chapter]

These were the five Bonus Chapters I promised Reader VonB, all here and accounted for! Thanks for the 100 GT and for the castle as well! The six Bonus Chapters will come several hours from now though...

Glad you’re all enjoying the arc.