Chapter 523: Standing Up For Myself [Bonus - ]
Aki sighed, allowing herself to be herded into the expansive marble-clad bathhouse.
She knew when to pick her battles.
If she made a scene over soap, it would only raise suspicions regarding where she had spent the past week, and the last thing she needed was an audit sniffing around the coordinates of the Umbral Basin.
The bathing chamber was a sprawling temple of opulence.
Steam scented with imported vanilla, crushed lavender, and crushed pearls rose from a sunken pool carved from white calcite marble.
The three maids moved with practiced efficiency.
They reached for the buttons of her wool traveling dress, their fingers working the fastenings until the heavy garment slid from her shoulders.
"The fabric is shockingly durable," one of the maids whispered, running a thumb over the reinforced seams. "The stitching... it’s not imperial work, yet the tension on the thread is flawless."
"Set it aside carefully," Aki ordered, her azure eyes sharp. "If a single thread is frayed, I will dock your quarter’s stipend."
"Y-Yes, Highness!"
As Aki stepped out of the dress, her hands instinctively rose to the star-iron necklace resting against her collarbone.
Mira reached forward, a velvet-lined jewelry tray in hand with her fingers extending toward the star-iron clasp.
"Allow me to remove this rough piece, Highness. We must store it before the scented waters tarnish the—"
Aki’s hand clamped around Mira’s wrist like an iron band.
Her azure eyes snapped to the maid’s face, burning with a sudden freezing intensity that made the air in the steamy pavilion drop by five degrees.
"Touch this necklace," Aki said, her voice dropping to a dangerous icy whisper, "and you will spend the next three years scrubbing the sub-level filtration vents... Do you understand me?"
Mira swallowed hard, her knees buckling slightly under the sheer, unexpected pressure.
"I... I understand, Your Imperial Highness! Forgive my insolence!"
Aki released the maid’s wrist.
Her fingers gently traced the cold multifaceted surface of the raw mana diamonds resting on her chest.
The warm feeling from Silas’s core resonated through the star-iron links which was like a private untouchable anchor in the middle of this gilded cage.
She stepped down the shallow marble steps into the steaming pool, letting the hot lavender-infused water swallow her up to her collarbone.
The maids set to work with sponges, horsehair brushes, and scented soaps, scrubbing away the mountain dust from her limbs, washing and conditioning the silken waves of her blue hair until they fell in pristine liquid cascades down her back.
"Why is he coming?" Aki asked, closing her eyes as the maids combed through her damp locks. "My brother does not waste thirty minutes of travel time merely to check on the health of an Unawakened sister..."
"We do not know the full agenda, Highness," Mira replied softly, dabbing a plush towel against Aki’s shoulders. "Only that his aides sounded deeply agitated when they confirmed the security manifest. The Crown Prince was... displeased by the reports."
Aki’s lips thinned into a cold line.
’Displeased... He’s always displeased. The only thing that pleases him is seeing his name at the top of the war records.’
Once dried and perfumed, she was led to the adjoining dressing salon.
The maids worked with high speed, fitting her into a ceremonial imperial gown of layered sky-blue and silver silk.
The high rigid collar was reinforced with delicate bone stays, the long sleeves were embroidered with soaring golden phoenixes, and a pleated train trailed three paces behind her slippers.
It was a masterpiece of royal tailoring and it felt like wearing a lead sarcophagus.
"Haahh..."
They arranged her hair into an intricate braided crown woven with silver pins, leaving her long blue tresses to spill gracefully down her back.
Aki stared at her reflection in the full-length mahogany mirror.
The woman looking back was undeniably stunning, radiant with the flawless dignity of the First Princess of the World.
But her azure eyes were cold with her brow knitted in a weary scowl.
"Smile, Your Highness," Mira pleaded gently, offering a small nervous smile of her own. "You are terrifying when you scowl like that since you are the jewel of the court."
"I am a piece of painted glass," Aki murmured flatly, snapping her silk fan open with a soft dismissive clack.
A chime echoed through the penthouse intercom as a low robotic voice announced.
[Crown Royal Transport has docked at Private Pad Alpha! Crown Prince Alexander has cleared the perimeter security threshold!]
Aki drew in a slow deep breath, smoothing down the front of her silk gown, and turned toward the grand living parlor.
The double doors of the penthouse slid open with a heavy hiss.
Flanked by four heavily armored imperial bodyguards clad in black exosuits, the Crown Prince stepped across the threshold.
Alexander was tall... easily six feet two inches with the broad athletic shoulders of an active combatant.
He shared Aki’s striking, royal-blue hair, though his was cut short and slicked back with severe military precision.
At thirty years old, he carried the unmistakable suffocating aura of a high-tier Lord who had spent a decade commanding armies on the blood-soaked battlefields of the Sovereign Realm.
Aki swallowed hard as she watched him cross the plush carpet.
’Both Silas and my brother are the exact same height...’ the thought flashed involuntarily through her mind.
Yet the two men could not have felt more completely different.
Silas carried his power like a quiet slumbering mountain while Alexander carried his like an unsheathed blade held against someone’s throat.
It was loud and constantly demanding attention as well as submission, Aki gulped however Alexander did not greet her.
He unbuttoned his heavy black military greatcoat, tossed it casually onto the nearest armchair without breaking stride, and dropped his frame onto the central velvet sofa, spreading his boots wide on the carpet.
He leaned back, rubbing his temples with an expression of pure venomous irritation.
"That miserable, backwater slut," Alexander snarled, his voice a low grating rasp that made the room’s air feel heavy. "That filthy, half-blooded gutter rat."
Aki remained standing near the panoramic windows, resting her hands neatly over the ribs of her closed silk fan.
She didn’t blink as she had heard this exact rant three times this month already.
"I assume you are referring to our esteemed half-sister?" Aki asked, keeping her tone light.
"Who else?!" Alexander barked, his blue eyes flashing with violent fury. "Our father has completely lost his mind in his old age! The woman was a commoner from the lower side! A tavern girl he took to bed behind our late mother’s back before she even succumbed to her illness! And now... because the bastard happened to touch the Pillar and manifest a high-grade Purple Lord Core, Father is treating her like the second coming of the imperial lineage!"
He slammed his fist against the arm of the sofa with a muffled thud.
"A Purple Core! The same grade as mine! And now Father has plans to formally introduce her to the World Council. She’s going to be sitting on the primary strategy committee! A bastard with common blood in her veins, sitting at the table where the future of the World is decided, while she commands private detachments in the Sovereign Realm!"
He looked up at Aki, his eyes sweeping over her sky-blue silk gown with his lip curling in disgust.
"And you," he spat, gesturing aggressively toward her. "You stand there in silk, acting as if none of this affects you! If you had awakened a proper core at sixteen, we would have owned the family registry... We would have locked out every single illegitimate branch but no... you touched the stone and produced hollow nothingness! An Unawakened failure who can’t even circulate a single thread of mana to defend her own bloodline!"
Aki didn’t flinch.
She was used to the poison.
For years, she had been the family’s scapegoat.
Her father had cast her aside, her brother viewed her as an administrative embarrassment and when the half-sister had awakened her Purple Core, the imperial court had practically erased Aki’s name from the official succession ledgers.
’Even the bastard has a name,’ Aki thought, her fingers tightening around her fan. ’Every high noble, every soldier, every merchant in this city has a name. What do I have? The Nameless Scion... The Useless Princess...’
Then, a sudden memory brushed against her chest.
’Stay safe out there, Aki.’
The memory of Silas’s warm voice echoed through her thoughts.
She remembered the gentle, rough touch of his fingers against the nape of her neck as he fastened the star-iron chain.
’Aki.’
A soft uncontrollable flush rose to her cheeks.
She was not nameless anymore... In a fortified valley far beyond the reaches of this sterile metropolis, a Lord had looked her in the eyes and given her a title that belonged solely to her.
The corner of her lips twitched upward into a small secretive smile.
Alexander froze mid-breath.
His eyes narrowed into razor-thin slits as he caught the dreamy curve of her lips as the veins along his neck bulged with sudden explosive rage.
"What are you smiling about?!" Alexander roared, surging up from the sofa!
He crossed the distance between them in three heavy strides, his towering frame casting a massive intimidating shadow over her.
"Do you find the humiliation of our lineage amusing?!" he snarled, leaning his face down until he was barely an inch from her nose. "You stand there grinning like an idiot while our inheritance is dragged through the mud by common filth! You are an Unawakened parasite! If you weren’t so utterly useless, I wouldn’t have to share the family’s legacy with someone who carries gutter blood! Commoners are vermin! They are livestock bred to harvest ore and bleed in the lower trenches so people of our stature can rule! Every single one of them deserves to be put against a wall and crushed!"
The words hit the room like a hammer and Aki stood still.
𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞
In that moment, she didn’t see the Crown Prince of the World.
She saw Silas... he was a man who was a commoner and he had attended an academy on Scholarship as he told her not too long ago but this was the same person that bled for his people and who commanded devotion because he led from the front, not from an armchair.
Aki took a slow deliberate breath as she looked her terrifying brother straight in the eyes and perhaps, for the first time since she was born, she did not look down.
"You are wrong," Aki said and the silence that followed was suffocating.
Alexander’s face went completely blank with shock. "What did you just say?"
"I said, you are wrong, Alexander," Aki repeated. "Common blood does not make a person livestock and having a high-tier core does not make you a leader. Power without respect is just brute force... You sit here whining like a frightened child because a girl from the lower rim outworked you and earned Father’s attention. If your authority was truly absolute, you wouldn’t feel threatened by a commoner with a purple stone."
"You insolent little bitch!"
WHOOSH!
Alexander’s heavy right hand ripped through the air, raised high to strike her across the face but Aki didn’t close her eyes.
Her heart hammered wildly against her ribs, her breath caught in her throat, and pure terror spiked through her nervous system.
She had no mana so a single strike from a high-tier Lord’s palm would shatter her jawbone and throw her through the reinforced glass.
Yet she kept her chin raised.
Her azure eyes burned with a defiance that did not waver by a single fraction of a millimeter.
Alexander’s hand stopped three inches from her cheek as the wind from his swing whipped the blue bangs across her forehead, but the blow never landed.
The Crown Prince stood frozen with his eyes wide as he stared at his sister’s face.
In all his years, he had seen her bow, he had seen her weep, and he had seen her cower behind her silk fan.
He had never seen her look at him as if he were smaller than she was.
He looked down at his trembling, raised hand.
’What am I doing...?’ he thought, a sudden sick jolt of disgust hitting him. ’Striking an Unawakened in her own quarters...?’
He slowly pulled his hand back, clenching his fingers into a tight, white-knuckled fist.
His jaw clenched until the muscles twitched.
"You’ve grown bold, sister," Alexander hissed, his voice trembling with suppressed malice. "You spend a week locked away in your suite, and suddenly you think you understand how the world operates?"
He sneered, a cruel mocking smirk twisting his lips.
"Since you have developed such a profound appreciation for common grit and struggle... perhaps it is time you experienced it firsthand."
Aki frowned slightly. "What are you talking about?"
"Don a disguise," Alexander commanded, turning his back to her and marching toward the penthouse doors. "A simple hooded mantle and you are coming with me."
Aki tilted her head. "And if I refuse?"
Alexander paused at the threshold, glancing back over his shoulder with cold amusement.
"Then I will have the auditors freeze your household accounts within the hour. You want to speak about courage and power? Your punishment for insolence is simple... you are going to enter the ring, pick up a weapon, and face real living monsters in the pit."
Aki blinked once.
Twice.
Inside her chest, her heart did not sink.
Instead, a brilliant dazzling spark of pure adventurous excitement ignited behind her ribs.
’Real monsters...?’ she thought, her azure eyes shimmering with sudden, undisguised interest. ’Like... the ones in the basin?’
She quickly masked her expression, but Alexander caught the sudden brightness in her face.
He let out a derisive scoff.
"Sure. Keep that look on your face, sister. Let’s see how long it lasts when you’re smelling raw sulfur and rotting teeth."