"Master, your nose is bleeding."

  Ra Sol tapped his nose, then glanced down at the crimson smudge on his fingertips. "Ah. So it is."

  He smiled at the young woman with the bobbed platinum white hair across from him. She did not return the smile. Her arms were crossed, and her large hooded eyes stared at him, clearly displeased.

  Ra had known Harley Whitmore for over a decade, ever since he had taken her under his apprenticeship as a child. And in all that time, her expression had rarely shifted far from the narrow range between indifference and discontent.

  Which was precisely why he could tell—without a shadow of a doubt—that she was pissed.

  But she's doing well to control herself. She has grown a lot.

  He pulled out a cotton handkerchief and pressed it against his nose.

  "I suppose I have overexerted myself," he muttered and gazed out the carriage window.

  Beyond the glass, the landscape blurred as they sped away from the carnage he had left behind in Genise.

  He felt like he was fleeing the scene of a crime. The horses even had speed magic cast on them to make the getaway faster.

  But I did what was needed. For everyone's future. Not just my own.

  He knew that no formal repercussions would follow—not with the untouchable status granted to him by Adovoria's crown, no less. But power, even the kind that allowed him to set cities ablaze, did not mean freedom. There were always hidden strings, unseen hands that could twist his existence into something unbearably complicated. He knew this better than most, having relied on unseen and hidden help to safeguard society against the clutches of evil.

  And this realm is brimming to the top with evil.

  He had long accepted his own death the moment he chose to remain in this evil-filled realm rather than return to his own. But his daughter's life was another matter entirely.

  He couldn't allow her to be caught in the crossfire again.

  Thus, before striking against the Freys, he had ensured she was hidden away—sealed within a magical tower that no spell, no force, not even the greatest magic of this world could breach.

  He exhaled slowly, his cold fingers tightening around the bloodstained handkerchief.

  This mortal body is weak.

  He frowned as the carriage entered the twisted, blackened forest, mutated by dead mana.

  And this realm is weak.

  Mana-starved and stifling, it shackled him, reducing him to a mere fraction of what he should have been. His abilities seemed awe-inspiring to the people residing in this realm, but that was only because they had never witnessed true power. Not in at least a couple of centuries. He felt like a whale splashing in a pond.

  Had I been allowed to swim in an ocean of mana rather than flounder in this stagnant pond….

  His gaze slid toward Harley.

  It's a miracle she is as powerful a mage as she is, given the destitute conditions of this realm.

  Twelve years ago, he had discovered her at a private auction run by the Spiders Syndicate. Beyond the evident potential as a mage, he liked her defiant look, with her head held high despite the restraints on her. Unlike most other child mages up for auction, Harley had a surname: Whitmore.

  Few in this realm bothered maintaining second names unless they had a lineage worth remembering. And Harley's past, however tragic, was one of some significance. She had been born into a minor noble family—one that had vanished when Queen Yadana Daylan razed their homeland to the ground. An entire nation was wiped from the continent, and its people were either slaughtered or sold into slavery at the whims of a war-loving ruler.

  With the fury of what had come to pass to her loved ones and people, Harley had the perfect background to be a magnificent fire mage.

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  "You let your emotions get the better of you," Harley said, her eyes still staring at him.

  Ra Sol dabbed at his nose with the handkerchief and chuckled. "Perhaps."

  Fire mages were known for their explosive tempers. But that was inevitable; the capacity of their fire abilities lay in tune with their emotions. Or, to be precise, anger. Sparks could only be emitted if the mage felt sparks fly within. Thus, a monk could never become a fire mage. Rage and fury were much-needed flint and oil.

  That said, fire mages did not lack control. Quite the opposite.

  A fire mage had to check their emotions constantly, or they risked reducing their surroundings to ash due to some stary flicker of idle irritation.

  Harley had learned this the hard way.

  As a child, she had once burned down a tea shop in West Genise after overhearing some Daylan nobles sneering about her lost homeland. Five years ago, she had incinerated the very carriage she was traveling in, all because she had opened a letter bearing unpleasant news.

  Ra Sol had watched her grow as a fire mage, tempering her flames with discipline and training. He was proud of her progress and self-control. It had been at least two years since her last unexpected explosion. The further he trained her in the art of fire, the more dangerous she became. Not just to her surroundings but to herself.

  Luckily for Harley, her anger never seeped into her skin. It was entirely and utterly outward. Harley remained unharmed, no matter the size of the inferno she might produce.

  She was the exception and not the rule, however.

  Ra had once attempted to teach his precious daughter fire magic. Due to their blood relation and her being his next of kin, Rana's mana reserves were vast, and she had the potential to wield immense power. But unfortunately, she lacked the emotional balance necessary to control the blaze.

  Their first lesson had ended in disaster. She produced a flame of considerable capacity, but she lost control almost immediately. The fire consumed her right arm down to the bone, and she had nearly died.

  It was nothing short of a miracle that Ra had found someone capable of restoring the limb, albeit he found them utterly reprehensible. Luckily, Rana had passed out before the worst of it and woke up believing she had suffered only a minor injury, with just a scar remaining. She never remembered the extent of the agony she experienced and just how close life was to being blown out like a candle.

  However, Ra remembered. It was the second worst day of his life, with the worst being the day he lost his beloved wife, whom he loved so dearly that he had given up immortality for and accepted living out his days in this evil-filled realm.

  Ra pulled the handkerchief from his nose and studied the dark red stain.

  "I suppose I pulled too much anger this time," he murmured.

  Just as fire mages had to suppress their emotions to prevent unintended destruction, they also had to summon rage at a moment's notice, igniting flames even when they felt nothing at all.

  The greater the fury, the greater the fire.

  But Ra had let his anger run unchecked. He had let it consume him, and in doing so, he had achieved something remarkable—the most devastating inferno he had ever unleashed in this realm. However, the mana expenditure was too much for his mortal body.

  The strain of it still lingered in his veins, in the throbbing ache behind his eyes. The nosebleed was the lone visible sign of mana over-expenditure.

  At least I didn't throw up blood.

  Harley's gaze remained fixed on him, her arms still crossed. "Whatever happened to keeping that family in check from the shadows? You always said you preferred to move the right people into place rather than getting directly involved. So why did you go yourself?"

  Ra sighed, pressing the handkerchief back to his nose. "I may have been too hasty."

  His network spanned Genise, with enlightened guardians from every walk of life—some deeply embedded within syndicates, others mere servants in noble households, all bound together by a common purpose. They worked in secret, performing charitable deeds while undermining corruption and evil.

  The greatest threat to world peace—the one the Guardians of Luminal had worked tirelessly to contain—was none other than the Frey family.

  The Guardians of Luminal had even managed to infiltrate their household, planting an informant within their ranks. A loyal agent who had been enlightened to the evil of the family he served. Charles fed the Guardians crucial intel and worked discreetly to undermine that wretched family from within.

  And then, a little over a week ago, that man had been discovered and killed.

  Shortly after, an attack came—one that struck at the heart of Ra's world.

  His one and only daughter.

  Undead soldiers had been sent for her. He had arrived in time and turned them to ash before they could so much as breathe in her direction.

  But what if I hadn't?

  "You don't even have any evidence that it was them behind the attack on Miss Rana," Harley stated, seemingly reading his mind.

  "No, perhaps not." His voice was quiet yet edged with certainty. "But who else could it be?"

  Ra Sol didn't have all too many enemies in this realm. Aside from protecting Adovoria's royal family from undue harm two decades back, he had otherwise kept a low profile the entire time that he'd resided in this realm. Only one individual despised him with every fiber of his being—someone whose hatred ran so deep it could split the world in two.

  But Ra had made sure that he was incapacitated. Permanently.

  "Besides," Ra continued, his voice low, "that family needed to be dealt with eventually."

  For the sake of my daughter and everyone else in this realm.

  His gaze drifted beyond the carriage window toward the twisted, blackened landscape. This realm was already scarred and disfigured by forces beyond mortal comprehension.

  This world is fractured enough.

  At the very least, he would not allow the Freys to bring about an apocalypse like the one that had consumed his old realm.

  Feeling the nosebleed subside, he tucked the bloodstained handkerchief away.

  "What if they somehow survived your wrath?" Harley asked.

  Ra inhaled through his nostrils and exhaled deeply through his mouth.

  "If that family managed to survive my greatest inferno to date, perhaps the apocalypse is inevitable," he said.

  As the misfortune told predicted.

  However, he didn't bother mentioning the second part aloud.

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