Within the subterranean laboratory of Ivy Rose College, the scent of damp earth and ancient
fragrant wood permeated the room. Filled with climate-controlled glass cases as soft UV light
gleamed over a myriad of plant species. Many unnamed in the old databases, some of which were
remnants of the old world before it tore itself apart.
A woman with ginger hair, half tied back, wore a look of intense concentration as she jotted
down notes. Her eyes were fixed on a specimen under her microscope. The petals of this particular
plant, gathered from a ravine near a detected NoA core energy wave which had reacted to the core's
power field during its bloom cycle.
"This is beyond its neuro-stimulant properties during reversion to one's base form," the fox-lady
murmured.
"It's as if it's calling something back to it." She pursed her lips together in thought, her elegant hands
never ceasing their furious note-taking as another pair of eyes watched her every move.
"Are you saying this flower has elements directly linked to a pure NoA core, Rose? We'll probably
need to extract its properties and run a joint test with the Cardio unit" said another fox-woman in a
lab coat.
"Do you have any ideas on that, Miguel?" The ginger-haired woman's eyes sparkled with excitement
behind her squared-off circular glasses as she looked at her best friend and trusted lab partner.
"I think we should request a specialist from the North to oversee this experiment. A heart doctor
with experience in caring for and treating power cores." The short-haired woman's words made the
girl with jade-green eyes go wide.
"Let me guess, you have the same name in your head that I do, Miguel."
"Of course Primrose. It has to be Dr. Aiden—your father's personal physician."
Primrose spun her chair away from the microscope and shot up, walking briskly towards her friend.
"Don't tell me…"
"That's right. You have to be the one to ask him for us, Rose. I'll handle the paperwork; you handle
the recruitment."
Primrose could only sigh and lower her head, accepting the duty. After all, she was the one
who could approach him most easily.
Chapter 1: Gunpowder in High Heels
Evening fell, bringing with it the promise of a well-deserved rest. Primrose stretched as she
walked out into the subterranean parking garage. The groan of a sliding metal gate was accompanied
by the familiar footsteps of her closest friends, making the fox-lady whip her head around toward the
sound.
One was in a familiar air force uniform and sunglasses, his arms laden with an absurd
number of gift boxes. But what truly caught her eye was the man beside him. His hair a striking mix
of blond and rust-red.
"I wonder if my little sister missed me?" came the soft, deep and warm voice of Eros Connery Ropert,
Primrose's older brother.
He waved with a half-hearted playfulness that was in his sister's eyes utterly infuriating.
"The mission on the northern border is… well, not completely finished, but I managed to steal
enough time to visit my beautiful little sister before her birthday." The work-skipper, she thought.
He shrugged, and the carefree gesture suited his playful nature perfectly.
If the higher-ups hadn't ordered it, this lazy hound wouldn't have gone in the first place. He
made her want to mess up his hair.
"As long as your gifts don't explode, I'll consider them all good." Primrose said, her smile laced with
the trademark sarcasm of a family raised by an old wolf like Kyrus. She mimicked her brother's shrug
and took some of the gift boxes from Caleb, who stored the rest within his NoA core.
"Don't worry. I'm definitely keeping the explosive ones for myself." Said Eros with an infuriating
smirk.
The three of them laughed and talked, a reunion half a yearlong over-due.
However, deep down the thought that her returning to that dangerous place made Rose's
heart ache all over again. She knew he was brilliant when it came to fighting with his Noa. But close
combat was another story, Eros was hopeless at it.
Glancing at the notebook she always carried, Primrose was pulled back to her childhood. To
her first combat training session. The one who taught both her and Eros was their father, Kyrus. She
vaguely remembered that he had once been a frontline soldier against the North, long before he
took over the college from their grandmother after her passing.
She knew little else, only that her father was a master of every discipline—swordmanship,
marksmanship, dagger, self-defense, and boxing. Kyrus could do it all, and he passed his knowledge
on to them without holding anything back.
As for their mother, her origins were a mystery. All they knew was that she came from the
eastern lands. After their youngest sibling Hyacinth was born, our mother vanished on a stormy
night. Leaving them with memories, lessons on how to control their Noa cores, a necklace that
protected against negative energies, a journal of medicinal plants, and a mirror that recorded happy
memories. Eros, the eldest, received the necklace. Primrose got the journal and Hyacinth, the
youngest, was given the mirror.
"We're at the training grounds." Eros's voice snapped the fox-lady back to the present. Just as she
nearly tripped on the entrance steps.
On the way home, Caleb had challenged her to a sparring match to brush off the dust and
reminisce with Eros volunteering to referee.
"Okay, I'm going to go change my outfit." she said sweetly, pointing a thumb towards her private
changing room.
The training grounds were adjacent to the greenhouse of their home—or more accurately,
their mansion.
Soon, all three gathered in the center of the training grounds, clad in form-fitting turtleneck
bodysuits and specialized training pants.
Primrose's was black, Caleb's gray, and Eros's white.
"I'm sitting this one out," Eros announced.
"I just got back; my body isn't ready to fight with monsters like you two." He pointed out.
"I'll warm up at the practice targets over there. You two just try not to kill each other please. Meet on
the platform in ten minutes."
Rose looked at Caleb, who simply shrugged. She then nodded at Eros and they split off to
warm up.
Eros practiced his defense, his NoA core manifesting as a golden shield to deflect stones shot
from a nine-directional training dummy.
Caleb focused on evasion and marksmanship, summoning a weapon with his own Noa to
fire at moving targets.
Primrose warmed up her body, focusing on her legs, before practicing with her daggers, a
skill in which she was supremely confident in. She used her Noa to immobilize one dummy before
throwing her blades at them, then launched herself forward, aiming a powerful kick at a dummy's
head.
Then she took a short break, watching the other two. The nature of NoA cores was truly
bizarre. Not everyone could use them, most Megamal inherited their power through their bloodline.
Eros's power is to create shields of light to envelop himself or others within a ten-meter
radius.
Caleb could store any non-living object smaller than himself in a mysterious dimension and
recall it at will.
Primrose's own power is to control nearby plants, summoning vines from the earth or forcing
roots to grow where she can manipulate the location freely, although there are limits. She believed
she inherited this power from her mother, who could turn flower petals into a storm of knives.
Hyacinth, well, he seemed to have inherited his power from their grandmother, able to make
his drawings real with a magical brush.
"Hah," Primrose sighed, lost in thought.
"Hey, what are you thinking about?" Caleb had approached silently, placing a large hand on her head
and making her jump. Her long claws unsheathed instinctively.
"Whoa, are we starting already, Rose?" Realizing what she'd done, she lowered her hand.
"Sorry, you snuck up on me. I was just analyzing your powers." Rose said with a playful grin, raising
an eyebrow tauntingly at the tall man beside her. Teasing him was practically a daily routine for a
mischievous fox like her.
"Vicious." he chuckled.
"Well, since you're taking this so seriously, how about we make a bet on the outcome?" Caleb's offer
made her raise a curious eyebrow. An idea was already forming in her mind. He had been so
secretive lately.
"Alright... how about this, whoever loses has to tell the other their next important work assignment.
Deal?"
Now it was his turn to raise an eyebrow. He met her gaze, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
"Okay, Deal." Their eyes locked, as if ready to devour one another. They walked briskly to the sparring
platform.
Primrose not forgetting to tuck several throwing daggers into the specially designed slots of
her suit.
As they stepped onto the platform, Eros watched from the stands above.
"If you two get too rough, I'm stopping this immediately," he called out, his voice firm. The threat
sent a shiver down both their spines.
Family Rule #54: Don't make Eros angry.
"I'm going to win, Caleb. How can a herbivore possibly beat a carnivore like me?" Rose declared,
dropping into a fighting stance, claws ready.
"You're all talk pip-squeak, one of my hooves could knock you over with one hit." Caleb retorted,
hands on his hips instead of assuming a ready stance, deliberately provoking her.
"...Now I'm mad. You're really good at getting under my skin." Rose wrinkled her nose.
"It's just that you have no patience pip-squeak." He made a pinching gesture with his fingers to mock
her.
"Small but mighty, you rotten apple." Caleb's eyebrow twitched at the name only the two of them
understood.
He froze for a moment—and a moment was all the fox-lady needed. She closed the distance
and aimed a kick at his torso, which he barely managed to block.
"You're still hung up on that, aren't you?" Caleb asked, his face falling. He moved in, his strong arms
wrapping around her waist, forcing her to face him.
"Forever. And I stand by what I said. We can never go back to that time."
"I'm sorry, Rose."
"You did this to yourself." His violet-blue eyes wavered. In his moment of hesitation, Rose wrenched
herself free. Using her superior speed, she circled behind him and threw a dagger at his back. But
Caleb was fast enough to summon a pistol and shoot the dagger out of the air. Seeing her attack fail,
Rose quickly retreated.
"I don't want to hurt you…" Caleb said, lowering his gun and running towards her.
"Hypocrite." Primrose spat, leaping away and throwing more daggers, all of which Caleb expertly
deflected. It seemed she would have to resort to her baser instincts.
"You know I can't bring myself to do it," he said, still closing in. Right into her trap.
Primrose feigned backing up until she was at the very edge of the platform.
"Oh no," Primrose gasped, pretending to lose her balance and fall backward. Just as Caleb lunged to
catch her, she spun back onto the platform with a triumphant grin.
"Checkmate."
"Huh?" Before he could react, thick vines shot out from a nearby window, ensnaring him completely
as Primrose stood before him, claws extended.
"Primrose wins." Eros announced.
"You tricked me?" Caleb asked, his voice laced with confusion.
"Yes. Just like you tricked me into waiting for you at the station for half a day. I sat there in the rain
for almost an hour," Primrose said, retracting the vines.
"If your friend hadn't told me, I would have been a complete fool, thinking you were eventually going
to show up."
"Rose, Jerica was hurt. She's my friend, too. I had to help her."
"Oh, a 'friend' She must have been in so much pain for you to be so concerned that you had to kiss
her to comfort her.
Caleb stared at her trembling back, his hand reaching out but stopping short of touching her.
"And the apple tree we planted together—I guess I was mistaken about that being ours as well. In
the end, you used every single apple and give it to her, and you just let the roots rot until it died on
the branch."
"I didn't mean to let it die, Rose."
"Right. And I didn't mean to like you either. I was going to tell you how I felt that day, under that
apple tree. Who knew I'd walk into such a heart-wrenching scene instead?" She laughed to cover her
pain, wiping the tears from her face before walking straight to the changing room, leaving him
standing there, frozen.
In the soft chair of the changing room, Primrose let the tears she thought had long since
dried up fall silently. They say first love never lasts, and it seemed to be true. But it was for the best.
At least their friendship hadn't vanished. And it was good that he didn't like her back, otherwise they
wouldn't have been able to face each other during the three years they were apart.
After that incident, he never gave her an answer. The next thing she knew, he had been
stationed in the North for a year. He tried to explain himself when he returned, but his words were
so different from what she had seen. Or maybe she was just too vengeful.
Still, even as she lied to herself that she was over him, she sent purple primroses to his house
every year on his birthday, knowing full well he'd never see them before they wilted. And for herself,
she would plant a red primrose every time she thought of him and her mother, praying that she
could learn about love, a real Love.
Once her heart had calmed, she was ready to face him again.
"I'll walk you to your car," she said, her eyes fixed on the floor.
"You don't have to—"
"I'm here to get my prize. When are you going back to the border?" she cut in, getting straight to the
point.
"Your birthday. I don't have the exact schedule yet—whether it's before or after the party." Primrose
met his eyes and nodded in understanding before looking away.
"We're here. This is as far as I go. See you around." She gave a formal Eastern bow and turned back
toward the training grounds where her brother was waiting.
"Eros, let's go back inside." Eros nodded, studying his sister's face with concern. As they were about
to part ways on the second floor, Primrose tugged on his sleeve.
"Thank you, Eros. Not just for today, but for what you did five years ago… when you rejected Caleb
family's betrothal offer on my behalf." Eros froze, then placed his warm hands on his sister's
shoulders.
"It's what a big brother should do for his sister." he said.
"And I thank myself for making that decision. I know Caleb's a good person, and he can take care of
you. But he doesn't look at you like a lover, or anything more than a friend or a bodyguard. Deep
down, I think he knows his own status clearly."
Just then, an old owl flew in and transformed back into a man.
"Young Miss, the Master summons you," the butler said, his timing impeccable.
"Well, let's drop this topic," Primrose said with a chuckle, breaking the tension.
"Wong, could you carry me? I'm exhausted." With that, she slowly reverted to her original form. She
had used too much energy today.
"Of course, Young Miss," the strong, elderly butler said, scooping the small, fluffy fox into his sturdy
arms.
"Okay, see you at the dinner table." said the wolf, waving goodbye to his sister as she was carried
away. Disappearing into his own room as soon as she was out of sight. The little fox lay still in the
butler's arms, the day's fatigue making her drowsy, but she wouldn't be allowed to sleep just yet.