Dozens of ice blades, thin as broken stalactites, hovered around Luke. They drifted in slow arcs. One gesture from Queen Rhiannon and every last one of them would tear through him. The difference in power was laid out in plain sight, suspended in the air, glittering with lethal clarity.

  Luke wore the Acolyte Assassin gear, an automatic choice, almost reflexive. He had equipped it the moment the temperature dropped, never imagining it would sabotage any chance of diplomacy. It hadn’t been a threat, not intentionally. With two throwing knives gripped tight, he faced the queen. Her posture stayed perfectly measured, poised, but her eyes moved between him and the floating blades with cold irritation.

  “Do not point your weapon at me,” the queen said. She lifted a single finger, nothing more, and the blades vibrated with renewed tension, as if waiting for one final command.

  “Wait!” Allison’s voice cracked. She threw herself forward, kneeling before the queen so abruptly that the air trembled. “He won’t do anything. Please don’t hurt him… sister.”

  Luke froze at that revelation. At the same time, the vibrating ice blades hanging in the air also stopped. The sight of Allison kneeling before the queen, and the words she had just spoken, only made everything even more confusing.

  She is the queen’s sister?

  Luke had known Allison was a princess, heir to a powerful royal family. But that the current ruler of the Rhiannon bloodline was her sister, that he had not expected.

  “Half sister,” the queen corrected, more annoyed with Allison than with him. “I did not come from the same womb as you. Do not insult me.”

  “S-sorry…” Allison whispered, eyes still lowered.

  The explanation settled quickly. They shared only a father. And looking at the queen, her bearing, her age-indeterminate presence, Luke understood. The system froze youth, extended life. She could be thirty or she could be seventy, and the face would remain polished into something timeless.

  And now it made sense why Allison had never truly considered negotiating her departure from the family. The queen carried personal hatred, not political tension. Allison was the child of betrayal, born from the affair with a household servant. The queen, daughter of the wife who had been wronged, likely carried a wound that never healed.

  Looking at Allison must have felt like staring at the mistake that ruined her mother.

  With one sharp motion, the blades dissolved, fading into the icy air as if they had never been there. The queen’s gaze settled on Luke again.

  “I do not recognize your face among the nobility,” she said. “So that outfit of yours… you must have earned it in the tutorial.”

  He didn’t answer. He didn’t lower his stance either, not fully, even knowing how pointless it was.

  “Put your weapon away. You do not point a weapon at a monarch unless you are prepared for the consequences.”

  Allison shot him a quick look, a silent plea wrapped in urgency. “Please, Luke. Put them away.”

  There was no fear in her tone, only sincerity. A quiet, stubborn hope.

  He exhaled slowly and slid the knives back into the holster.

  As Luke sheathed his daggers, a colossal shadow took form above the village. The flying ship emerged through the blizzard, drifting forward with imposing grace. Its lights, diffused by the curtain of snow, broke through the white haze and revealed a metallic hull carved with icy runes. The vessel approached slowly, steadying itself almost directly above the frost-covered houses.

  Luke didn’t know where to look. The ship’s size made the village feel impossibly small, and he felt even smaller in the face of what was about to unfold. With each passing second, as the ship drew closer, that helplessness grew.

  “You are coming with us. And don’t try anything,” the queen declared, turning her back as she and the other Rhiannons headed toward the spot where the ship projected its boarding zone.

  A harsh wind swept across the village, stirring the snow from rooftops. Luke stepped closer to Allison as she finally stood. Her face seemed different, more guarded, heavier, like she was wearing a mask just to keep herself together.

  “May I say goodbye to my friend?” Allison asked, her voice stripped of its usual brightness, barely there.

  “Friend?” the queen repeated without turning fully. She glanced back over her shoulder. “A dragon has no friends. A dragon has subordinates.”

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  Allison didn’t reply. She simply stood in place, silent, watching. The queen let out an impatient sigh, a puff of icy air escaping her lips, and flicked her hand dismissively.

  “Finish whatever you need to and get on that ship.”

  The vessel above remained suspended, not landing, just hovering a few meters above the ground, perfectly aligned over the village houses. The other Rhiannons approached and, one by one, rose gently into the air, levitating toward the illuminated deck.

  The queen stayed below, arms clasped behind her back, waiting. Snow seemed to fall without daring to touch her.

  Allison finally turned to Luke.

  “This is where our paths split, Luke.” She stepped closer.

  He mirrored the movement, cautious, still keeping one eye on the queen’s rigid silhouette in the distance, a dark shape of silent impatience.

  “Allison…” He spoke almost in a whisper. “What are you doing? You didn’t even try to negotiate.”

  Her eyes softened, tinged with sadness. “You know she wouldn’t allow it. I’m a living treasure. I carry their bloodline. They’ll never let me go.”

  Her hands settled on his shoulders, firm and warm despite the suffocating cold around them.

  “Luke, I knew, from the moment I agreed to leave the tutorial with you, that this wouldn’t work.” Her voice thinned, honest and fragile. “But at least… it was nice for a moment to imagine I could be free. To imagine what it would feel like to live in a normal family.”

  There was no lie in her expression. No hesitation. Allison had always known the ending. Still, she had chosen to run with him, even knowing it was only a temporary escape from an unbreakable prison.

  That truth made the guilt sink deeper in his chest.

  “We only know something’s impossible if we try,” he said, trying to sound hopeful even though the last threads of hope were slipping through his fingers.

  “Luke… if you try anything, she’ll hurt you.” Allison’s hands tightened gently on his shoulders. “There’s no way for us to escape. And even if there were, she would come after me. After your family. And if you think you’re abandoning me by not doing anything, you’re not.”

  Her voice wavered, just a little. “Just by stopping to talk to you here, I’m already going to be punished. If you interfere, it gets worse for me.”

  Every option he had shrank, collapsing one by one until all that remained were dead ends. He ran through dozens of ideas: distract the queen, force a retreat, make a scene, tell Allison to run, but every single scenario ended the same way: defeat, death, or something far worse.

  She knew that.

  He knew that.

  “Then what do I do?” The frustration tore through his chest like something physical. “Just stand here and watch someone I care about walk away?”

  “Yes…” Allison’s answer was brutal in its honesty. “That’s exactly what you’re going to do, Luke.”

  Her eyes shimmered, filling with a shine that made his throat tighten. “You’re going to let me go. And… forget you ever knew me. Forget we were friends. This is goodbye, Luke. We’re never going to see each other again.”

  The words struck him harder than any blade. The pain didn’t just hurt, it echoed. It opened old wounds he thought had faded with time. It was the same hollow ache, the same suffocating helplessness he felt when he lost his mother.

  A goodbye you can’t stop.

  “No… that can’t be true.” The protest slipped out before he even realized he’d spoken.

  Allison lifted something in her hand. A bracelet, nearly identical to the one she always wore. She held it out to him.

  “I want you to have this. It’s a gift.”

  She bit her lip, steadying her breath. “I know it sounds strange, asking you to forget me while giving you something of mine. But I know you. You wouldn’t be able to forget unless you at least knew I was alive somewhere.”

  She brought her wrist close to his. Both bracelets glowed, reacting to each other like two matching halves of something ancient.

  [An item has been added to your inventory.]

  One of the bracelets vanished from her wrist, transferred to him.

  “They’re a pair. Twin items.” She explained it quietly. “If I happen to die… you’ll know.”

  Luke felt his stomach drop. Cruel. Practical. Terrifying. She had bought those bracelets at the end of the tutorial. Allison had known. She had been planning this long before he ever realized.

  “After what I… almost did in the tutorial,” she went on, her voice shrinking, “you might think I want to die again. So this is to keep you calm.”

  Allison pulled him into a hug. A strong, lingering embrace that seemed to defy the flow of time. Luke wanted to freeze that moment. He wanted to think of something, anything, some impossible plan. But nothing came. His mind ran in circles like a trapped animal slamming against invisible walls. It felt like drowning in a current, being dragged forward without any control over what came next.

  Allison was precious to him. And she was leaving. Just like his mother.

  And he could do nothing.

  “I’ll keep my promise to you,” he murmured when the hug finally ended. “I’ll find a way to save you. I swear.”

  She smiled, a gentle, beautiful, heartbreaking smile, and shook her head.

  “You’re not even my blood family… and yet you treated me better than they ever did.”

  Her eyes trembled, though she fought to keep herself steady. “That’s why I don’t want you to come after me. I want you to live a life I won’t have. Live a happy life.”

  She let go of his shoulders and stepped back, taking one last look at him.

  “Goodbye, Luke Moon. And thank you for being… my first friend.”

  With those words, Allison Rhiannon turned away from him and walked off.

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