Lisa arrived three seconds before Jaden died.
Her spell—an unstable crimson bolt—pierced the Glitchspawn's shoulder, giving Jaden enough space to breathe. She stepped forward, hand trembling, eyes locked on him with an intensity that didn't make sense.
"Jaden! Focus!"
Their eyes met.
For the briefest moment—one single heartbeat—something in Jaden's outline changed.
Not physically. Not visibly.
But real. Ancient. Dreadful.
Lisa's mind glitched.
The dungeon flickered white, and she saw a man she had never met—
Seated on a throne of white flame.
Crowned in burning memory.
Eyes like collapsing stars.
Aethon.
The Aethelian King.
Lisa stumbled back, breath hitching, heart pounding like she'd witnessed a forbidden truth. Her hands shook violently as the vision bled out of existence.
She blinked.
Reality returned.
Jaden was just Jaden again—weak, bleeding, terrified.
But Lisa no longer saw an F-Rank burden.
She saw a shape that her lineage remembered.
A destiny buried under centuries of silence.
Her dormant Aethelian Queen blood pulsed once.
Just once.
Enough to whisper:
"He's waking up."