"Zaliyah... for you, I would unleash my true potential."
The scandal had transformed overnight into a nightmare, surviving only as scandalous gossip traded in the mortal markets.
"Have you heard?" one merchant asked, leaning over a crate of withered apples, his eyes darting around the crowded market.
"Heard what?" his neighbor replied, wiping sweat from his brow.
"The boy. The taboo. Zaliyah," the first merchant whispered, looking over his shoulder as if the name itself might summon a storm. "They say he sold his soul to Malachi, the Messenger of the Dead. He has been a puppet of the underworld this entire time."
A scoff followed from the iron merchant. "He had it coming. Such a fine upbringing in the RuoHan mansion, cherished as if he carried their own blood, and he chooses to bite the hand that fed him. You can't turn a filth-born demon into a human, no matter how much gold you wrap him in."
[ Eighteen Years Earlier ]
It was an unholy truth, whispered in terror and disgust. A celestial being and a demon breathing the same air was a recipe for chaos; a love affair between them was an atrocity. For centuries, the two realms had traded loathing for limitless abhorrence. Some claimed the Prince of the demon realm had gone mad over a rejected heart, waging a bloody war meant to reduce the Celestial species to ash.
But history meant nothing to Lilith. The only thing that existed was the fragile infant pressed against her chest.
Lilith staggered down a dark corridor, she clutched a bundle of ruined, bloody sheets against her torn silks, her breath coming in shallow hitches.
"My baby... my poor baby," she sobbed, the sound muffled by her wet cloths. "Everything will be okay. Mummy has you."
She pulled the infant closer, gripping him desperately, as if she could force him back into her womb—the only place in all the realms where he was safe.
The air inside the ruin was filled with the stench of shattered souls, and stagnant rot. High above, cold water dripped from the ceiling, wetting the stones below. Lilith limped onward, her leather boots catching against the exposed, cracked ribcages of long-dead hell-hounds.
A sliver of pale grey light pooled at the corridor's end. Exhaustion pulled at her limbs like ten boulders were attached to her legs but she forced her body toward that light, praying for an exit.
"Lilith, are you truly so desperate that you would crawl through the dirt to save this abomination?"
Lilith's knees gave out. She hit the stone hard, the dread settling over her like a shroud before she even lifted her head.
Standing in the shaft of light at the end of the hall was Mephisa.
She was a towering pillar of ashen skin and malice. Long, deep-red curls cascaded down her back like a frozen waterfall of blood, framing a sharp face bisected by a scar across her left eye. Two massive horns hummed with dark energy, and her wings cast a shadow that devoured the entire room.
"Mother... please," Lilith rasped. Her voice stripped raw by days of screaming and crying. "I've tried... they won't stop coming for him. Please, speak to the Council. Mother... my son is all I have left. I don't want them to kill him. I am begging you... please, help me."
Mephisa took a step forward, the tips of her claws dragging against the wall. Her gaze shifted down to the bundle shivering in the stained sheets, her lip curling into a sneer of pure resentment.
This child was a curse. It had not only tarnished her name and dragged the bloodline into disgrace, but it had drained her daughter's strength. It wasn't a child—it was a parasite.
"I pleaded with the Council," Mephisa said, her tone as cold as winter frost. "Your life has been spared."
For a fleeting second, the dullness in Lilith's swollen eyes vanished. Her red irises blazed with a desperate hope. "Mother? Do you... do you mean it? My son is safe? We don't have to run anymore?"
"No, Lilith," Mephisa cut in, her voice devoid of warmth. "Your life was spared. The abomination will be dealt with here."
The hope died immediately,
Lilith's hands shook as she released her hold on the sheets just long enough to draw the broadsword strapped to her hip. The steel scraped against the stone floor as she aimed the point directly at her mother's chest.
"To touch my son," Lilith whispered, "you will have to destroy me first."
Mephisa's expression hardened. Never in her centuries of living had she imagined this moment: her own flesh and blood drawing steel against her for the sake of a celestial bastard. Lilith had chosen a half-breed over her own lineage.
Mephisa stepped forward until the tip of the blade rested directly over her heart. "As you wish."
With a flick of two fingers, a shockwave of dark magic erupted from Mephisa's hand. The impact caught Lilith in the chest, launching her backward through the air. Her body slammed into the wall with a crack that echoed down the hollow ruin.
"You have broken several ribs. How tragic," Mephisa scoffed, stepping through the dust. "We will have the royal physicians mend you once we return to the Palace."
Lilith collapsed sideways onto a rotting wooden table, her arms still locked tightly around the baby. Blood welled from a gash on her forehead, dripping into her eyes. Under normal circumstances, a noble demon's body would knit such flesh wounds shut in seconds, but three days of continuous fighting had left her mana reserves bone-dry.
The sudden impact shattered the slumber spell Lilith had painstakingly woven around her child.
Tasting a little of Mephisa's dark aura, the baby jolted awake, He let out a piercing cry that shattered the tense quiet of the room.
Mephisa's face paled before flushing a deep crimson. She loathed two things above all else: weakness, and the sound of a sniveling child.
An orb of unstable red lightning materialized in Mephisa's upturned palm, crackling loudly as her massive wings flared, kicking up a gale of dust and loose debris.
Summoning the last reservoir of her spirit, Lilith raised a trembling hand. A flickering ball of white light flared to life in her palm, and with a desperate scream, she hurled it at her mother's face.
The two magic spheres collided midway—red chaos against desperate white light—erupting into a violent thunderclap that blinded the corridor and shook the very foundation of the tower.
Mephisa didn't even flinch. She reached out, caught the explosive energy within her bare fist, squeezed until it dissipated into sparks, and redirected the concentrated blast right back at her daughter.
Lilith watched the crimson beam tear through the air toward her. She forced her arms upward, trying desperately to weave a defensive barrier, but her fingers twitched uselessly. Her mana was gone. One, two, three times she tried to spark her magic, but nothing came.
She looked down at the screaming child in her arms. Clasping him close to her chest, she pressed her bloody cheek against his forehead.
"Shh... shh, don't cry, my little one," she whispered, her voice cracking. "Everything will be okay... Mummy is right here."
"Disgusting," Mephisa spat.
The blast struck Lilith full in the back.
The force tore the infant from her grip, sending the bundle rolling across the uneven floor into the shadows. Lilith hit the ground hard, spitting out and choking on black blood, she raised a trembling hand touching the liquid leaking out of her eyes and ears. It was black blood. She looked at the bloody hand in horror the her eyes fell on her child who was now lying on the floor.
"It's... it's okay, little one..." Lilith wheezed, her vision darkening at the edges. She dragged herself forward using only her elbows, her blood painting a dark trail along the floor. "Please don't cry... I'm right here... don't be scared..."
Mephisa watched the display with cold detachment. Before Lilith's outstretched hand could reach the bundle, Mephisa brought her steel-plated boot down directly onto Lilith's fingers.
The sound of bones flattening echoed through the hall.
Lilith threw her head back and screamed—a raw, agonizing sound of utter ruin that carried out of the crumbling tower, flushing flocks of black ravens into the sky in a frenzy of beating wings.
Yet even as she whimpered, trying to pull her crushed hand free, her eyes never left her child, who lay wailing in the dust just out of reach.
Mephisa leaned down, staring into the face of a daughter she no longer recognized. The formidable warrior who had brought endless glory to the Demon Realm was gone, replaced by a pathetic, broken mother crawling in filth.
Unable to stomach the sight any longer, Mephisa reached down and pressed a clawed thumb against Lilith's forehead.
"Sleep."
The world snapped to black instantly. Lilith's body went limp, her forehead hitting the floor as unconsciousness took her.
Mephisa let out a long sigh, brushing a strand of crimson hair from her face. "I should have done that hours ago."
With a snap of her fingers, an unseen telekinetic force lifted the wrapped infant into the air. Mephisa turned on her heel and glided toward the shattered opening of the tower.
Outside, the mountain air was whipped into a frenzy by four colossal black waterfalls that cascaded down the cliffs, vanishing into an abyss of endless, swirling mist. The scent of dark magic hung in the wind.
Mephisa walked to the very edge of the precipice. With a slow gesture, she lowered her hand, bringing the floating bundle to eye level directly over the chasm.
She stared down at the crying child one final time: silver white hair, striking purple eyes and no horns. There was not a single trace of demonic heritage in his features.
"May your soul be shattered into a thousand pieces," she muttered cold-heartedly.
She released her magic.
The baby fell. His tiny cries pierced the violent rush of the waterfalls, growing fainter and fainter until the sound was swallowed by the roaring mist below.
"Finally," Mephisa whispered to the wind.
Without looking back, she turned and flew back into the ruined tower. She seized her unconscious daughter by the neck, snapped her wings wide, and flew into the dark sky.