Lady Nisha just stared at me and nodded. "Alright, you won. But you are still too young to understand that a mother’s heart will always find a way to hope, even in the absence of her son." A sad smile touched her lips. "Some things, even logic cannot extinguish."
...I knew it all too well.
Many stories were latered with such devotion - mothers who waited decades for sons lost to wars, never accepting their death. Parents who searched endlessly for their missing children, clinging to the smallest hope that they might still be alive. Keeping an extra place at dinner for a child who might never return.
The list could go on.
Perhaps it was because of my stubbornness that made this decision so agonizing.
The part of me that wanted to protect them warring against that part that longed to return.
I couldn’t tell which was impulsive and which was noble anymore.
Just as I opened my mouth to give her my final answer, I felt it. A subtle loosing across my head, like ice beginning to crack under spring sun.
My blood turned to frost.
The Veil of the Nameless was dissolving, its powers unraveling thread by thread.
When I looked up, Lady Nisha’s expression had transformed entirely. Gone was any trace of playfulness or mystery. In their place was something far more devastating - raw pity, profound sadness, and an understanding so visible it made my soul feel naked.
Her hand rose slowly, fingers trembling slightly as they touched my cheek with gentleness one might show a wounded animal.
"Or perhaps," she whispered, "you fear they might not recognize you at all."
The words hit me more than any physical blow.
My entire body locked in place, every muscle seizing as if turned to stone. For a moment, my mind went utterly blank - a white void where thoughts should have been.
Her thumb traced across my skin, and I realized she was mapping the damage that had been hidden beneath the layers of illusion.
"It must have been... painful." Her whisper was so soft, yet it felt like a thunderclap in the silent space.
I couldn’t respond. My voice was trapped somewhere deep in my throat, a prisoner of shock.
She saw through everything!
This secret... Nobody knew the full extent of it. Even Master could only sense the fragments, or just chose not to talk.
While this woman... She saw through the illusion and easily broke it as if it were made of glass.
I forced air into my lungs, drawing upon every lesson in composure I’d ever learned.
"No, I don’t care about this."
I replied steadily. And decided to use the chance.
"You have already seen everything. So, you don’t want to marry your daughter to me now, do you?"
I knew how it sounded, petty, manipulative, like I was trying to twist her pity into an escape. Giving her an easy way out, a convenient excuse to withdraw the engagement offer.
But her expression didn’t change the way I expected. Instead of agreement or disgust, her eyes were filled with a mix of disappointment and pity.
"Is that what you think?" she said, her hand still resting against my cheek. "Do you truly think this would change my mind?"
I stared at her, not willing to answer.
"You think that this makes you unworthy?" She shook her head slowly. "It is the proof that you survived something terrible. It shows your strength and resilience. Any sane mother would be proud to have someone like you protect their daughter. And my daughter..."
"She would see the same way I do, if not even better than I."
"How can you be so certain?"
Her eyes glinted with that familiar, mysterious light. "Because she already has."
"...I see." So I was right after all.
"Besides, this is not exactly something to worry about." Her smile deepened. "This mother-in-law of yours can help you take care of it."
Before I finish my sentence, black flames suddenly erupted from her hands, engulfing my entire body from head to toe in an instant.
I braced myself for that familiar searing pain, for the agony of being burned alive, but instead, I only felt a strange, tingling sensation.
The flames didn’t hurt. Though they danced across my skin, my body and clothes remained unharmed. Instead, they slithered like liquid night, seeping into my scars, my pores, and so on.
I could feel them working, doing something I could already guess.
The sensation was weird, neither pleasant nor painful, like invisible hands reshaping clay. The black flames seemed to seep deeper, and I felt a foreign aura invading my insides, creeping through my veins.
My body reacted instinctively, every muscle tensing as it tried to resist the intrusion. My defenses began to activate automatically.
"Relax," Nisha’s voice cut through my panic, calm and reassuring. "Don’t resist it. Use it to your advantage instead."
"I..." I wanted to refuse, but something in her tone made me pause.
Instead of hesitating any longer, I nodded and sat down cross-legged, and started guiding my aura, letting the energy flow through my meridians instead of fighting it. As I did, I could sense her observing me with what felt like professional interest.
"Oh," Nisha’s voice carried a note of genuine surprise. "How interesting..."
"Your skin is remarkably resilient. Your whole body must have been tampered with a lot."
Well, she was right, it was all because of Master’s ’special’ teachings.
"Your inner system is amazing too," she murmured in fascination. "Your aura is already incredibly pure for someone your age. You have three loci, huh? Indeed, you are the only one... They don’t just coexist, they sing together. Three distinct resonances woven into perfect harmony."
I kept my breathing steady. But her words made me curious. Getting evaluated by a powerful figure other than Virion was an incredibly rare chance after all.
"Your meridians and veins are far stronger than they should be at your current level," she continued. "It’s as if they’ve been tampered with and evolved. That snake did a really good job nurturing you."
Yep, he really did. Except for the fact that he goes a bit overboard sometimes. But how did she know about Virion? Were they acquaintances?
"This level of foundation... It’s not something that can be achieved through normal training after all." She added thoughtfully. "No wonder you survived what would have killed most others."