Chapter 139: Chapter 139: Welcome To The Conspiracy.
Here, there was no impossible choice, no treasonous mother, no secret brother. There was only the fight.
After defeating the last Vorthak simulation, Viora collapsed to her knees on the crystal floor, her body a screaming chorus of overexertion.
Her breath came in ragged, burning gasps. The cold rage had burned itself out, leaving behind a cold, hollow emptiness.
Viora finally looked up, her ice-blue eyes no longer blazing with fury, but cold and clear as a winter sky. Training always helped her deal with emotions, and this time it did the job as usual. She could feel that the emotional storm had passed, and now she was calm.
She rose back to her feet and left.
She walked to her room, her footsteps echoing in the empty corridor. The anger that had burned white-hot in her chest earlier had cooled to embers, but the guilt? That remained, heavy as armor she couldn’t shed.
An innocent person was suffering because of her. Because she’d been stupid enough to think she could outmaneuver her mother.
Kessa’s face flashed in her mind—pale, drained of all color, eyes wide with the kind of terror that came from suddenly realizing your entire life had just been upended. Viora had used her. A pawn in a game she hadn’t even known she was playing. And now that pawn was being punished in her place, exiled to some desolate wasteland outpost where the sun barely rose and nothing grew.
Viora’s hands clenched at her sides. This wasn’t just about pity. This was about honor. Her honor. She’d made this mess, she would fix it.
She crossed the room in quick strides and activated her private holo-console, her fingers flying across the haptic interface as she keyed in the command frequency for the Barren Sectors Monitoring Station.
The hologram flickered to life, resolving into the sharp-featured face of a woman in military uniform. Dark brown hair pulled back in a severe ponytail. Commander’s insignia glinting at her collar.
"Commander Leslie, Barren Sectors Command," the woman said crisply. Then her eyes widened, just a fraction. Her posture shifted—straighter, more deferential. "Oh. Princess Viora." She dropped into a quick curtsy, the motion awkward through the holographic projection. "This is... an unexpected honor, Your Highness."
Viora didn’t smile. Didn’t return the pleasantries.
"Commander, you have a new transfer. A cleaner named Kessa." Her voice was flat, businesslike. "I want her released and returned to the Capital immediately."
Leslie’s professional mask slipped for just a moment, a tightening around her eyes, a slight press of her lips. She took a breath before responding.
"Princess, with all due respect..." She paused, choosing her words carefully. "That’s not possible."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.
"What do you mean, ’not possible’?" Viora’s voice was silk over steel. "She doesn’t belong there. She has no qualifications for that posting."
"I understand, Your Highness." Leslie’s tone remained firm, though respectful. "But my orders are explicit. Princess Athea herself issued the directive. Kessa is to serve at this station as punishment. I don’t have the authority to countermand your mother’s direct order."
Viora leaned forward, her hands pressed flat against the console. Her ice-blue eyes burned with a cold, dangerous fury that made even the holographic projection feel oppressive.
"Commander Leslie. Let me be perfectly clear." Each word was precise, deliberate. "That girl is now under my protection. You will place her on the next transport back to the Capital." She paused, letting the silence stretch. "Or I will teleport to your very isolated outpost myself."
The threat hung in the air like a blade.
"And when I arrive, and I will arrive. I will not be in a diplomatic mood. Do you really want a Tier 2 Lumina princess tearing apart your command station over a petty, non-strategic punishment detail?" Viora tilted her head slightly, her expression glacial. "Choose your next words very, very carefully, Commander."
Commander Leslie went still. Viora could see the calculation happening behind her eyes, the mental math of risk versus reward. A remote disciplinary posting versus a direct confrontation with a royal who could literally teleport through walls and level buildings with a thought.
The silence stretched for five long seconds.
"I..." Leslie’s shoulders sagged, just slightly. Her resolve crumbled like sand. "I understand, Your Highness. There’s a supply transport departing in three hours. I’ll personally ensure Kessa is on board."
"You will," Viora confirmed. Not a question. A certainty.
She cut the connection. The hologram vanished, leaving her alone in the sudden, heavy silence of her chamber.
Viora walked to her bed and collapsed onto it, staring up at the vaulted ceiling. The ornate molding. The soft glow of the bioluminescent panels.
She’d done it. Rescued the pawn. Directly countermanded her mother’s order.
And she didn’t care.
Athea had lost her respect. It was hard to reconcile this flawed, vindictive woman with the mother she’d idolized for so long. The perfect princess. The strategic genius.
How had she never seen it before?
She’d thought that discovering her mother’s secret might bring them closer. Shared understanding. Common ground.
Instead, it felt like she’d just fired the opening shot in a war.
She stripped off her outfit, a custom made garment that blended the flowing elegance of a princess’s gown with the reinforced plating of a Warlady’s armor, tailored exclusively for her dual role.
She let it fall to the floor in a heap, exposing her beautiful athletic form,pale skin, curves that spoke of both grace and strength, and long limbs honed for battle. Viora was stunning in the effortless way of someone who commanded attention without trying, her beauty a weapon as sharp as her ice magic.
Sighing, she walked into the shower. A scalding torrent, washing away the grime of the arena. As the water sluiced over her skin, Viora’s mind, now scrubbed clean of emotion, began to work with the chilling precision of a battle computer.
The variables were clear.
One: Her mother was a traitor.
Two: Her aunt was an accomplice.
Three: Her grandmother, the Queen, was a silent prisoner of the secret, her power checkmated by the risk of familial annihilation.
Four: The anomaly. Zaeryn. The source of it all.
She shut off the water, the sudden silence deafening. Putting on a robe, she stood before the mirror, her reflection staring back, a stranger with her own eyes. Her mother had lied all this time.
She had even tried to lie to her own daughter despite being caught, with the skill of a master strategist, constructing a plausible fiction about a state-secret project.
It was a good lie. A brilliant lie. But it had crumbled under the weight of one simple, overlooked detail: Aphrodite.
Viora had won the confrontation. She had forced the truth from Athea’s lips. But what had she truly gained in the end? Nothing but a burden. A secret that now implicated her, too.
Calyra was right about one thing: exposing this would burn their entire family to the ground. Hell, forget about getting removed, they would probably get worse.
Viora’s loyalty was to the Queendom, but she could not be the one to light the pyre that would consume her own family.
So, the Tribunal was not an option. Not yet.
Her gaze hardened. If she couldn’t rely on the law, and she certainly couldn’t trust her mother or her aunt, then there was only one path forward. She had to assess the threat herself.
This ’Zaeryn’ wasn’t just a secret brother or a political time bomb. He was an unknown quantity on the battlefield of their lives. Athea claimed he posed no threat, that he was raised in isolation. But Athea was a proven liar.
The fact that he was accepted into vitae school, meant that he was not some normal male. And if he wasn’t normal, then what was he? A threat? Yes, he could be that.
Viora moved to her private console again, her fingers flying across the holographic interface.
She didn’t search for state secrets or classified files; her mother would have locked those down tighter than a Vorthak’s shell. And more importantly, Zaeryn was a secret, so he wouldn’t be in any official database, registry, or bloodline log.
She searched for something simpler.
"Access public records. Stellan Innovations. Sector Seven," she commanded the system.
A stream of corporate data, news feeds, and personnel files flowed across the screen. She narrowed the search. "Cross-reference all entries with ’Zaeryn’."
The console chimed. A single line of text glowed on the holographic interface.
[NO MATCH FOUND.]
Viora stared at the words, her jaw tightening. Nothing. No visitor logs, no security stills, no stray data points. It was as if he had never been there. A ghost.
Of course he was a ghost. A secret kept by her mother, by her aunt, and now, apparently, by her now. She was also complicity.
She swiped a hand through the air, dismissing the console with a sharp, angry gesture.
Viora walked to her bed and collapsed onto it, staring up at the vaulted ceiling. She was checkmated. For now. She closed her eyes, relaxing.
Just then, her personal space’s integrated AI, Aura, spoke, its voice a calm, melodic chime.
"Your Highness, you have a visitor at the door."
Viora’s eyes opened. She didn’t move, her gaze remaining fixed on the ceiling. She wasn’t in the mood for company.
"Who is it?" she asked, her voice flat.
"It is Princess Athea, Your Highness."
Viora let out a slow breath. Her mom was visiting her? Well that was a new.
She knew it wasn’t to hang out with her daughter, no, that was so beneath Athea, she would never do that. She was here to make sure Viora doesn’t expose her.
"Let her in."
The crystal doors slid open. Princess Athea stood in the doorway, wearing a deep midnight-blue gown that seemed to absorb the light around it. Her posture was perfect. Her expression: serene maternal concern that didn’t reach her eyes.
Viora watched her walk in from the bed. She didn’t sit up.
"I was worried," Athea said, gliding to the edge of the bed. "You left the gallery so abruptly. I wanted to make sure you were alright."
Viora finally pushed herself up, "I’m fine."
Athea’s smile was warm, practiced. "Are you? You seem distant." She reached out as if to brush hair from Viora’s face, a gesture of intimacy she hadn’t offered in years.
Viora leaned back. Just an inch. But it was enough to show Athea that she would rather not be touched.
Athea’s hand dropped awkwardly.
Something cold flickered behind Athea’s eyes. "Viora, I know this is difficult to process. But the decision I made... it was to protect him. To protect us all."
"Was it?" Viora’s voice was quiet. "Or was it to protect yourself?"
Athea’s composure cracked. Barely. "That’s unfair."
"Is it?" Viora stood, pulling the towel tighter. She began to pace. "You hid him. Lied to everyone, your family, the Queendom, me. You let Aphrodite believe she was your daughter. You let me believe it." She stopped, turned.
"The only person you were protecting was yourself. From the consequences."
"I did what I had to do!" Athea’s voice rose, losing its silk. "You think I wanted this? To live in constant fear? To watch my own son grow up without me?"
"I don’t know what you wanted," Viora said, her voice dropping back to ice. "But I know what you did. And now, so do I."
She walked past her mother toward the wardrobe, her back turned. "The secret is safe. For now. Not because I want to protect you, but because I won’t be the one to burn this family down."
Her hand rested on the wardrobe door. "But make no mistake. This changes everything between us. You’re no longer just my mother."
She paused.
"You’re a traitor. And I’ll be watching you."
She didn’t look back.
"Good."
The single word from behind her was not pleading or defeated. It was cold, sharp, and laced with an unnerving, triumphant calm.
Viora froze.
Athea’s voice followed, smooth as polished obsidian. "You’ll watch me. You’ll watch him. You will watch everyone who comes near this secret." She moved, her steps silent until she was standing just behind Viora, her presence a suffocating weight.
"You were seeking the truth, daughter. Congratulations, you’ve found it. But what you’ve really found is a chain. You wanted to be the judge? The arbiter of the law?" Athea’s voice dropped to a whisper right beside Viora’s ear. "You have just appointed yourself his final shield. His protector. The secret is now yours to keep."
Athea gave her daughter a kiss on the cheek, before she stepped back with a faint smile, her authority fully restored, the brief moment of vulnerability erased.
"Welcome to the conspiracy, Viora. I’m so glad to have you on my side". She paused, letting her gaze sweep over Viora’s frozen form before adding the final, perfect twist of the knife. "And I’m sure Zaeryn will appreciate having his sister watching his back. After all, you’re family."
With that Athea walked out of the room, having confirmed that Viora didn’t have the heart to expose her.
Normally, Athea would have been disappointed, even disgusted by such sentimentality. Weakness had no place in the Lumina line. But this time, that weakness was a tool, the perfect lever to ensure Viora’s silence. It had worked out for the better. For her.