A minute or two passed and Chad and Alianna began to gradually calm down, soon feeling embarrassed about their overreactions. Alianna even started to blush a little as she let go of Chad and took a couple steps away from him.
It was always like this. They knew that they were overly protective of each other and even a small offence to one of them would provoke the other, but they couldn’t help it.
Chad coughed into his hand before forcibly relaxing his body and putting on a comfortable smile. “Er, my apologies, 9 Flame. Please do not take offence to my actions.”
The 9 Flame Queen’s lips twitched, amused but also annoyed by the obnoxious facade. This guy really knew how to act. She stared at him with narrowed eyes for a moment before turning her body around and looking at the sky.
“All is well, but focus now and do not be distracted again. That thing in the sky is not to be taken lightly.”
Chad and Alianna frowned before they too started to stare at the sky again. Actually, although they looked at the sky as if they could see what they were vaguely detecting, that simply was not true at all.
Yes, Chad and the 9 Flame were in the 4th Realm, and they also had astonishing foundations that made them even greater than their peers. But it was definitely not enough. To peer at the 15 peaks of the Dragon Mountain from the ground (using Spirit Sense or not) was just not possible for people like them, talk less of Alianna who was in the 3rd Realm.
But that being said, the cause of the malevolent aura was so great that its aura had descended down the mountain to a point where all 3 of them could sense it. So although they could not sense the cause in the slightest, they could sense its aura, and the vicious brutality within it caused them to worry greatly. The Creature or object that could emit such a thing was definitely not to be taken lightly.
“Hmm… Phoenix, don’t you think that this Aura possesses similarities to that of your brother’s?” 9 Flame suddenly spoke out.
Chad’s face twisted. “Don’t you dare call that- that, that… person, my brother.” He wanted to say something a whole lot worse than ‘person’, because that heinous cretin did not qualify for that term at all, but because of how intune he was with Alianna, possessing the ability to notice each of her movements and sometimes even her emotions, he quickly recognised that her head was downcast and felt a flash of sadness that wasn’t his own.
Having heard the cruel stories about her Father, Alianna had come to hate him like anyone else. But at the end of the day, she was still his daughter. But make no mistake, the sadness that she felt was not because of some small amount of filial piety that upsetted her any time her father was insulted, not at all. What she felt was great, great shame.
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Although the Phoenixes back home had warmly accepted her in the beginning, happy for the changes that she had brought within their King, it only took 5 or so years for people to get used to the fact that the King was once again an ‘all-benevolent’ one, and that her presence, for all intents and purposes in their view, had achieved its purpose.
They felt that there was no longer a need for them to respect her as they did before. Now of course, that didn’t mean that they suddenly treated her badly. A lot of people had come to know her and like her, regardless of her high status. But there were also the people who Chad liked to call spiteful and jealous right before he killed them, that would say things that she had to admit, hurt her feelings.
‘Daughter of evil, impure schemer, pretender, weakling’. Things like that. But the ones that hurt her the most were the references to the relationship between her and her father, mostly because that was the only statement that was true, something that she could not make a rebuttal against.
The resentment she had towards her father only continued to grow.
Noticing Alianna’s plummeting mood, Chad had to prevent himself from gritting his teeth and glaring at 9 Flame. It… was not her fault that what she said had inevitably hurt Alianna’s feelings. He said that over and over again in his mind before he felt the fire within him calming once more.
Taking a glance at Alianna, he noticed that she had raised her head again with a somewhat indifferent face, and secretly sighed.
‘Good girl.’ He thought. If she wanted to be a true Queen and not rely on him, then she needed to be strong in both mind and body, possessing a will that burned for all to awe... But he swore, each and every time she was hurt, he felt it with 2 times the effect.
He could only hope that by the time Alianna became the Queen that she wanted to be, he would still be in one piece.
Reluctantly returning his attention to the 9 Flame Queen, who was looking at him with a worsening mood that he, at this point, could not care less about, he spoke out with a pensive tone. “That person is not my brother, but you are right. I too have noticed the similarities in their auras. They both somehow give off the vibe of both a Beast and a Monster… quite similar to you actually.”
The 9 Flame Queen’s eyes narrowed even further. At this point, she was going to end up closing them altogether.
“But it’s more than that. Something intrinsic to their Mana is so much higher in quality than yours, or anyone else's I’ve seen.” Then his eyes widened as a thought struck him. “...Anyone apart from the so-called Dragon goddess, that is.”
“You mean…”
“That’s right. That bastard may have become something similar to a god.” Chad said with a bit of a growl in his voice.
“This is all speculation. We need answers. Don’t make such ridiculous assumptions before then.” The 9 Flame Queen said with a huff before returning her attention to the sky, but both rulers of the Phoenix race noticed that her luscious tanned skin had paled. They weren’t much better either.