My Step-Daughters Are The Villainesses

Ulrich watched the masked demon rush toward him.

In the darkness, the figure’s outline came in fragments: the white glow of the half-mask, the dark sweep of a sleeve, the pale flash of metal clutched in one hand.

A dagger.

Or something shaped like one.

Ulrich did not believe it was the weapon from the black box.

The blade looked too ordinary. It was narrow and dark, without the elaborate runes or unnatural glow he would have expected from a demonic weapon prepared for the assassination of a queen.

Then what had been inside the box?

"Protect the Queen!" Commander Marx Lambert’s voice thundered somewhere beyond the darkness. "The Prince and Princess as well!"

"Find Her Majesty!"

"Everyone step back!"

Orders broke out one after another, overlapping with the frightened cries of nobles and servants. The panic that had begun with the shattered chandeliers spread faster. People shoved blindly through the ballroom, unable to tell friend from stranger in the dark. A woman screamed when someone seized her arm. Several guards called to one another, but their voices came from the wrong directions, distorted by the high ceiling and the confusion below.

Ulrich moved.

He took a step back, taking Kaliantha with him as the masked demon rushed across the marble. His hand remained locked around hers, while his other arm held her against his side. He did not release her.

The assassin’s dagger flashed toward them.

Ulrich shifted to the side.

Kaliantha followed the movement before she could fully understand it, her body turning with his. The blade passed through the space where her ribs had been a heartbeat earlier.

At the same moment, Ulrich sensed movement behind him.

One figure crossed through the darkness near the pillars.

Then another.

A third.

His thoughts moved quickly.

Three.

No.

Four.

So five assassins, perhaps more, moving within the ballroom.

Ulrich turned his gaze toward the direction of Marx Lambert’s voice.

What was the old man doing?

Even in the darkness, the Commander should have been able to estimate their position. Ulrich and Kaliantha had not been far from him before the lights went out. The guards should already have been closing in.

Then a shout rose from the darkness.

"There is a barrier spell!"

"We cannot reach the Queen!"

Ulrich’s eyes widened.

A barrier.

The masked demon came again.

The dagger cut toward Ulrich’s shoulder, fast enough to tear through the dark without warning. Ulrich stepped aside and pulled Kaliantha with him, twisting his body to keep himself between her and the blade.

The assassin’s weapon struck nothing.

"What is happening?" Kaliantha asked.

Her voice held strain now, though she did not panic. Her fingers had tightened in Ulrich’s hand, and her free hand had caught against the front of his coat when he moved her away from the strike.

"Assassins, Your Majesty," Ulrich said. "Please remain still."

Kaliantha’s eyes searched the darkness around them.

Ulrich lifted his free hand.

A small crimson spark formed at his fingertips, no larger than a firefly. He sent it outward through the dark, aiming past the masked demon and toward the voice of the Commander.

The spark travelled only several paces.

Then it struck something.

A translucent surface rippled into sight for an instant. Crimson light spread across it in a thin circle before the barrier swallowed the spell completely.

Ulrich stared.

It was not an ordinary barrier.

The spell’s structure became visible only for a moment, but it was enough. The mana had been layered densely, reinforced through a complicated arrangement of runes. At least a hundred. Perhaps closer to two hundred.

A Rank 5 barrier.

A prison made to cover a wide area.

And it had been constructed with designated rune points: places where certain people could enter and leave freely while everyone else remained locked outside.

The demons could move through it.

The royal guards could not.

Ulrich understood that quickly.

"I see," he muttered.

The black box had not held a weapon.

It had held the trigger.

The demons had brought a prepared barrier spell into the ballroom beneath the disguise of a musician’s case. They must have placed the runes in advance, perhaps during preparations for the celebration, perhaps through servants bribed or replaced long before tonight. The box had only needed to activate the formation when Kaliantha stood in the correct place.

The traditional dance.

That was why they had chosen this moment.

During the first dance, the royal family would stand at the center of the ballroom. Kaliantha would be distant from the walls, distant from the doors, and separated from her guards by the court’s attention and the open floor.

Then darkness.

Then isolation.

Then the Queen would be surrounded by assassins before anyone outside the barrier could reach her.

Ulrich admired the plan truthfully.

It was clever.

Far more clever than he had expected from demons who usually relied on brute strength, fear, or the arrogance of believing humans too weak to resist them.

A plan built around court custom, the Keep’s layout, and the certainty that every guard would be watching the ballroom’s entrances rather than the floor beneath their Queen’s feet.

Even Ulrich had not thought of it.

That realization did not improve his mood.

Five assassins surrounded them.

The masked demon stood in front of him, blade ready.

Four others moved through the darkness, their footsteps light over the marble. Ulrich could not see their faces. He could not yet see their weapons. But he heard the soft scrape of boots and fabric, heard the shifts in their breathing, and knew they were closing the circle.

Kaliantha tried to turn.

"Where are my children?"

Ulrich tightened his hold around her waist, stopping her before she could expose her back to the nearest assassin.

"The assassins are here for you, Your Majesty."

"That does not mean they are safe."

Ulrich could not deny it.

Albert and Camellia had stepped away from the center of the ballroom before the barrier activated. They should have been outside its range. They should have been with the rest of the court, protected by Marx Lambert and the royal guard.

Should have.

But Ulrich had not seen the edge of the barrier before it went up. He did not know whether it had enclosed only the dance floor or a wider section of the hall. He did not know whether either of the royal children had been caught inside.

And he could not lie to Kaliantha.

"I do not know," he said.

Her expression tightened.

The answer was the truth, but it did nothing to ease her fear.

Ulrich needed light.

He needed to see the five demons clearly. He needed to know where Kaliantha stood within the barrier, where its rune points were placed, and whether Albert and Camellia were trapped on the other side of the darkness.

But if he summoned a powerful light spell, everyone would see him.

The nobles outside the barrier would see crimson mana cutting through the hall. Marx Lambert would see him fighting beside Kaliantha. Zagon, if he was there, might see him actively protecting the Queen.

Ulrich’s mouth tightened.

No.

That no longer mattered.

The demons could be damned.

Zagon could be damned as well.

If Zagon blamed him for defending himself while he stood trapped inside a demonic barrier with five assassins and the Queen of Skargardia, then Zagon was welcome to descend from whatever hole he had crawled into and explain why he had never warned Ulrich about this part of the plan.

Ulrich had not agreed to become prey.

He raised his hand.

Crimson mana gathered above his palm.

A small light formed, brighter than the earlier spark. It flashed once, casting a brief red glow over Kaliantha’s pale face and the masked demon’s white half-mask.

Then it collapsed.

The light vanished.

Ulrich froze.

"What?" he said under his breath.

The crimson glow had not failed because of the Keep’s defensive enchantments.

Skargardian Keep possessed wards meant to prevent dangerous magic from being used during a royal event. Ulrich knew that. Such spells limited powerful mana within the ballroom, protecting the guests from careless nobles, rogue mages, and sudden magical accidents.

But those wards had already been disrupted.

This was something else.

Ulrich reached outward with his senses.

It was not merely a wall separating the dance floor from the rest of the hall. It distorted mana inside its boundaries. It pressed against every spell before it could take shape, weakening it, scattering its structure, and preventing anything beyond a small burst of power from forming properly.

The demons had not only trapped Kaliantha.

They had made certain that any mage protecting her would be crippled.

Complete isolation.

Darkness.

Mana disruption.

Five assassins inside the barrier.

Ulrich understood the full shape of the plan at last.

The Queen had been meant to die here.

He felt Kaliantha’s hand tighten against his.

She had understood enough as well.

The royal guards were outside.

Her children might be outside.

And within the darkness, Ulrich’s power had been restricted before he could use it properly.

For the first time since recognizing the Phoenix Heart, Ulrich regretted not leaving Kaliantha alone.

If he had stepped away before the barrier activated, the assassins would have reached her.

The Phoenix Heart would have awakened.

Its protection would have shielded Kaliantha from their blades, their spells, and whatever else they had prepared. The artifact was powerful enough that, if her life were truly threatened, it might even rupture this barrier from within.

The demons’ carefully prepared prison could have shattered around her.

Instead, Ulrich stood here with her now.