Chapter 46: Nameless Hero (1)
Pain hit her like the world had dropped on top of her. It was not all at once but worse. It came in layers.
Every wound Olivia had ignored came rushing in together, as if they had been waiting patiently for her return.
Her shoulder burned like something had bitten into the bone, her thigh screamed with every pulse of blood, her side felt split open, and her back throbbed with cold, jagged agony. Even breathing scraped through her chest like broken glass dragged slowly across her ribs.
「 Elevated stress and fear levels detected. Emotional interference reduced. 」
Misha opened her mouth, no sound came out except for a groan. Then a small, raw gasp tore from her throat.
Her fingers twitched once. That was all. She could not move, not even an inch.
How had Olivia even been standing? How had she kept fighting? How had she smiled through this?
Misha could not understand it. The pain was too much. It swallowed her whole and left nothing behind but shaking breaths and the horrible awareness that her body no longer obeyed her properly. It felt less like a body and more like a wreck she had been thrown back into.
Her vision blurred, her consciousness tilted sideways.
No...
If she blacked out here, she would die. She had not found her brothers yet.
I can’t die... No... I can’t die... Mateo... Caleb... Please...
The thought repeated inside her head, weak and desperate, yet stubborn enough to keep returning.
Yara noticed at once. The moment Misha’s expression changed, she understood. The girl could no longer fight back. A soft laugh slipped from her lips as the ice shards floating at her side turned in unison.
"That frightened look suits you," she said, her voice smooth and almost gentle. "Nyxie is dead. Gerbaut followed right after. And Elyes?" Her smile deepened. "That coward used the return stone and left you behind."
She tilted her head, green eyes gleaming coldly. "There’s no one left to save you."
The ice shards floating at her side aimed straight for Misha.
Swiish!
Then time slowed down.
Each ice shard cut through the air by a tiny measure with the frost trailing from them in delicate white ribbons. Even the blood sliding down Yara’s chest seemed to move by fractions.
Yara’s eyes widened little by little, confusion touching her face for the first time. She could barely move her body. One shoulder shifted by a breath, one finger twitched. Even the subtle recoil om her expression looked trapped inside thick glass. What was happening?
Ding!
A window burst open before Misha’s fading sight.
「 〔WARNING〕
Soulbinder condition critical.
Severe blood loss detected. 」
「 〔SYSTEM NOTICE〕
A Special Condition has been met!
Summoning Leo Constellation Soul... 」
「 〔!ERROR!〕
The Soulbinder’s body cannot withstand the power of Leo Constellation Soul.
Possession Sequence Aborted. 」
Misha held her breath.
Leo?
The word struck her harder than the pain for one stunned second.
Then gray windows kept pouring over her vision, one after another, bright enough to hurt her eyes.
「 Emergency Override Protocol Activated. 」
「 Rewriting Possession Parameters... 」
「 Possession Duration has been forcibly reduced. 」
「 Possession Duration Restricted To:
00:00:50 」
「 Possession Initializing... 」
Then Misha’s soul tore out of her body.
The sensation was violent, not like slipping free, and not like drifting. It was not even close to what it had felt with Oliva. It felt more like being seized, dragged upward by something enormous that had finally lost patience, something that looked at her broken state and decided her consent no longer mattered.
Her vision lurched so hard the whole world seemed to flip.
Then she was outside herself. Her body remained on the floor below her, broken and bloodied.
Then it began to glow.
A fierce golden light spilled through the wounds first, then beneath the skin itself. It spread in branching lines, bright as molten metal, racing through her limbs like fire finding veins. Gold marks surfaced across her body, thin and sharp and beautiful in a way that made her heart stop.
Her wounds began to close. Flesh pulled together with brutal speed, sealing enough to keep the body intact for what came next. Blood hissed where it touched the light. Torn skin knit shut in jagged golden lines before fading into smooth pale flesh that still trembled from the force of it. Bruised muscle tightened, and split tissue rejoined.
The ice shards still flying toward her slowed further under that light. Then they melted the instant they touched the golden aura, they hissed and vanished into steam.
The air in the throne room changed. The temperature rose. No, it did not simply rise. It burned.
Heat rolled outward from Misha’s body in waves so fierce that the frost Yara had spread over the room shrank back with sharp cracking sounds. Thin mist rose from the floor. The fallen banners stirred though no wind moved. The scent of blood mixed with something hotter now, something dry and dangerous, like scorched metal under a summer sun.
Yara drifted back a step on instinct. The movement escaped her before pride could stop it. The confidence she had worn so easily until now cracked. Her snake-like green eyes narrowed against the blaze. For the first time since coming to Genesis, Yara felt something she had not expected to feel here. Danger.
The golden aura thickened around Misha’s body. It was no longer light alone but something fiercer, something that moved like fire pretending to be alive. The marble beneath her blackened as heat shimmered above it. Hair lifted from her shoulders without wind as gold spread through the air in tiny sparks that vanished before they could touch the floor.
Misha could only stare from where her soul hung in stunned silence.
Her body rose from the ground, slowly. It was not like a wounded girl struggling to stand, not like a survivor clawing her way upright. It looked more like waking up. A sovereign being waking up from its sleep.
She lifted her head, golden light poured from her eyes that were no longer entirely hers.
The room itself seemed to recoil. Even the silence around changed. It no longer felt empty. It felt crowded by presence alone, heavy enough to make the throne room seem suddenly too small.
Then her lips parted and a low voice came out. It was calm enough to make the burning air feel heavier.
"So," he met Yara’s gaze, golden eyes burning with authority, "you’re the one who thought she had no one left to protect her."
