Chapter 568: My Niece, Tëhznarā

When she remained still, motionless beneath his foot, he finally lifted his weight, stepping back from her prone form.

Seraphina rose slowly, pushing herself up from the crater with deliberate, measured movements, turning to face him.

Her crystal-blue eyes were empty of the faint warmth they had carried earlier in Benjamin's presence, devoid of the gentle affection.

They were the eyes of a woman worn down to the bone, hollow, exhausted, and deeply depressed, the light behind them reduced to a cold, distant glimmer that barely reflected the glow of the magma.

"Ugh… It's been a while since you looked at anyone that way, with such coldness and distance." Renard stepped back into the lava pool, the magma welcoming him with a soft hiss, and drew the silent woman into his arms from behind, settling her against his chest with surprising gentleness. "I insist... Tell me what's bothering you, what has drained the life from your eyes, and has you so withdrawn."

She said nothing, her lips pressed together in a thin line.

Her body remained still in his embrace, unresponsive and rigid, only the slow rise and fall of her breathing marking that she was still conscious.

"Is it that bratty niece of yours?" he asked, his voice flowing with a note of knowing recognition.

A small, involuntary twitch ran through her shoulders, a momentary lapse in her composure that confirmed his suspicion.

"I see. You're worried she would do something crazy again like she did five thousand years ago. You fear she would repeat her past mistakes and plunge the world into chaos once more."

Seraphina's hand rose and closed around the arm Renard had wrapped across her waist, her fingers curling around his forearm with a gentle grip.

She did not push him away or pull him closer, did not acknowledge his embrace or reject it. She simply held on, her touch light and tentative, while her gaze stayed fixed on the glowing surface of the magma as it pulsed and shifted inside the basin, the liquid fire moving in slow, hypnotic rhythms.

"Let me tell you something, Sera, something you already know but have forgotten in your worry," Renard began, his voice lower now, gentle against the roar of the heat, his breath warm against her ear. "Tëhznarā is a crazy dragon, and one of the most—if not THE most—dangerous individuals in all of Elyndor, a force of nature that cannot be truly contained or controlled... But if she wanted to start another Celestial war, she could have done it by now. She must have begun the destruction a long time ago. Tëhznarā broke out of Tartarus about five hundred years ago or so, yes? But in all that time, she has done nothing but exist quietly in the shadows."

"That girl... threatened to kill me when she was only just born, barely hours old. She was only wet with the fluids of her hatching a short while back..." Seraphina finally spoke, her voice low and rough, with the weight of millennia-old memory. "And she followed through for many centuries, pursuing that threat with relentless determination... until she actually tried to do it. She made good on her promise and came for my life. Tëhznarā's absence of action, Lazarus, does not mean absence of interest. It does not indicate that she has abandoned her goals or forgotten her grudges."

Renard's arms tightened around her from behind, pulling her more firmly against his chest, his body pressing against her back in the warm embrace of the magma.

Magma lapped around them both in slow, glowing waves, the molten rock pulsing with a rhythm that seemed almost alive.

"I warned you to stop calling me Lazarus, didn't I...? Anyway, she attacked you because she wanted to prove she was stronger, to assert her dominance and establish her place in the world," he said, his voice ringing with pragmatic reasoning. "as stupid as it was. So reckless and ill-timed, launching an assault on our champion fighter in the climax of war. But she got her proof, her evidence of capability. She defeated you… I mean, she sort of beat you, came close to victory, before her father, Jöezhēdeath, stepped in and ended the conflict.

"She knows she can do it again, and that she has the power to challenge you and potentially succeed. There is no reason she would try again. There surely isn't any motivation to repeat a battle she has already won in spirit. I know this doesn't mean we should not be cautious, or that we can ignore the threat entirely. But it definitely doesn't mean we should be constantly worried and alert, consumed by fear and anxiety. She broke out of her prison and went home for a nap. That person just seems tired to me, weary of conflict and violence."

"Perhaps... Perhaps you are right… perhaps my fears are unfounded and my worries excessive."

Seraphina turned in his arms until they faced each other fully, her body twisting in the molten embrace, her movements fluid and deliberate.

Their eyes met across the short distance of heated air and rising steam, two pairs of blue locking together in the shimmering glow of the magma.

Renard's eyes were a solid, intense blue, the color of a precious stone cut with perfect edges—sharp, clear, and almost hard, as though light itself had been fractured into cold facets that reflected nothing but their own brilliance.

Seraphina's were different: a deeper, softer blue that felt like looking down at the open sea from a great height, layered with shifting currents and quiet depth, infinite and mysterious.

In that moment both pairs of blue reflected the glow of the magma, two distinct shades of the same color locked together in silent understanding.

(Note: somewhere far away, Benjamin's own eyes—round, bright, and clear like a blue diamond dropped into water—existed in the same spectrum, though neither of them was thinking of him just then, their attention focused entirely on each other and the weight of their conversation.)