Severus’s blade hovered inches from Pyrope’s heart.

  The world felt suspended—breathless, frozen, waiting for the strike that would end everything.

  Pyrope’s shadow struggled against Severus’s binding, his limbs twitching, eyes hollow with feral rage. He wasn’t thinking. He wasn’t even present. Only instinct lived behind his red-burning gaze.

  Severus leaned closer, voice soft:

  “…time to finish this, my delicious—”

  A sound cut the air.

  Not wind.

  Not thunder.

  Something sharper.

  Cleaner.

  Like a single beat of a massive drum struck directly overhead.

  Severus’s eyes narrowed.

  He looked up—

  —and the sky split.

  Not with light.

  Not with magic.

  Just speed.

  A blur dropped from above, so fast the air buckled in its wake. One heartbeat it wasn’t there—

  the next, the ground erupted.

  BOOM.

  Stone fractured. Dust exploded outward.

  The shockwave rippled through the ruins, forcing raiders to their knees.

  Pyrope’s shadow bind shattered.

  Severus’s blade jerked downward instinctively, redirected.

  And standing between them—

  towering, scaled, composed as a war monument—

  was the Dragon King.

  His coat-like garment fluttered with unnatural weightlessness, as if refusing gravity. Its patterns were simple, ancient, and wrong—fabric that did not move like fabric. Something about it bent the air around him so subtly that the world seemed to shift to make room for him.

  A cloak that should not exist.

  A cloak the King wore effortlessly, like an ordinary garment.

  Even Severus froze.

  “…You,” he whispered, voice breaking for the first time.

  The King didn’t raise his voice. He simply stood, towering above all ruin, his tongue flicking once in quiet assessment.

  “This situation,” he said calmly, “is more serious than I thought.”

  Pyrope, half-feral and half-broken, crouched behind him, claws scraping the cracked stone. His breaths were wild, rapid, animalistic.

  Severus angled the Eleventh Blade downward, expression sharpening into something between caution and calculation.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  Then—

  The King didn’t look at Severus.

  He looked past him.

  “Rhaikor.”

  A ripple of pressure swept the streets.

  Then the raiders began to drop.

  One by one—silently, instantly—as if struck by an invisible force. Faint thuds echoed across the ruins, each spaced so precisely it felt like a rhythm.

  A heartbeat apart.

  A guardian’s rhythm.

  Under thin veils of chameleon camouflage, Rhaikor Duskscale flickered into and out of sight—eyes split in two directions, targeting, analyzing, striking. His blows were so efficient the raiders collapsed before realizing they had been attacked.

  He moved like a shadow among shadows.

  Rowan’s limp body vanished first.

  Then Lira’s trembling form.

  Then Tidewhisper, bruised but conscious.

  Then Anatolian dragged by his collar, screaming in fear.

  Rhaikor didn’t stop moving until every caravan member was gone—spirited away into safety.

  Severus’s eye twitched.

  He sensed them disappearing one after another, and yet…

  he couldn’t track a single movement.

  He clicked his tongue, irritation flashing across his scarred mouth.

  “Troublesome little lizard…”

  But the surprises weren’t over.

  Because from the broken houses, from the shadows beneath collapsed beams—

  Rabbits stepped out.

  Dozens.

  Warriors with clawless hands hardened by training.

  Each wrapped in combat gloves.

  Bodies low, movements coordinated.

  The Rabbit Kingdom had not been wiped out.

  They had been hiding.

  Waiting.

  And they moved now with vengeance.

  A raider lunged—

  three rabbits pinned him down.

  Another raised his weapon—

  a rabbit warrior smashed his knee sideways.

  In seconds, raiders fell into submission, groaning, trapped, or unconscious.

  “there you are, no wonder I can’t find you,” Severus whispered.

  Severus’s expression finally cracked.

  He stared at the ruined street as his numbers dwindled.

  His perfect control disrupted.

  His prey stolen piece by piece.

  For the first time—

  Severus looked angry.

  But when he glanced back at the King, that anger cooled into something else.

  Calculated fear.

  His Eleventh Blade trembled—not from weakness, but because he squeezed the hilt too tightly.

  He whispered, almost to himself:

  “Even my blade… leaves no scratch on you.”

  Silence pressed in.

  Pyrope snarled from behind the King, body shaking, pupils dilated to thin slits. The moment his legs freed, he lunged again—straight toward Severus.

  “Pyrope!” Rowan’s distant voice cried.

  The King turned, catching Pyrope’s wrist midair with one steady hand.

  But Pyrope wasn’t thinking.

  He wasn’t listening.

  He twisted, claws scraping against the King’s scales, trying to break free.

  Severus saw the opening.

  His eyes sharpened.

  “…enough for today.”

  And just like that—

  he vanished.

  No flash.

  No smoke.

  No trail.

  One moment present—

  the next gone, as if he stepped behind a curtain no one else could see.

  The King’s eyes narrowed.

  “He got away.”

  Pyrope roared at the empty air, thrashing wildly, nearly losing control again.

  The King tightened his grip gently but firmly.

  “Calm him first,” he said.

  Rhaikor reappeared beside him like an echo, breathing steady.

  Pyrope’s body trembled, rage pulsing through every vein—stronger than before, dangerously close to breaking him apart.

  The King lowered his voice.

  “This boy… will tear himself open if we do not act quickly.”

  Pyrope screamed again.

  The King struck the side of his neck—

  and Pyrope collapsed, unconscious, teeth bared.

  And the chapter ended on a single, heavy truth:

  Severus escaped.

  But right now, calming Pyrope was the only thing that mattered.