Episode-713
Chapter : 1405
She had come to the manufactory to bring Lloyd a report on the estate's finances. A peace offering. An attempt to be the useful partner she promised to be.
She had arrived just as the workers were leaving for lunch. She had walked to the door, intending to knock. But then she heard the laughter. She heard the soft voices.
She peeked through the small glass viewing port.
She saw them.
She saw Lloyd hanging upside down. She saw Mina wiping his face. She saw him kiss her hand. She saw the look in his eyes—a look he had never, not once, given to her.
Rosa stood frozen. The report in her hand crumpled as her fist clenched. Frost began to spread from her boots, creeping across the stone floor.
It wasn't the rage of a betrayed queen. It was the heartbreak of a woman who realized she had lost the race before she even knew it had started.
"So," Rosa whispered, her voice trembling. "Just as I suspected.."
She had told herself that Lloyd's distance was because of their past. Because of her betrayal in the early marriage life. She thought if she worked hard enough, if she proved herself, she could win him back.
But now she saw the truth. He wasn't distant because he was angry. He was distant because he was in love with someone else. And that someone was her own sister.
The pain was blinding. It was cold and sharp, like a shard of ice in her heart.
She turned away from the door. She didn't barge in. She didn't scream. That would be undignified. That would be messy.
Rosa Siddik did not do messy. She did cold. She did calculated.
She walked down the hallway, the temperature dropping with every step. The workers she passed shivered and stepped out of her way, sensing the aura of absolute zero radiating from her.
"You want a war, Lloyd?" Rosa thought. "Fine. You can have a war. But this time, I won't be the spy. I will be the enemy."
That evening, Lloyd returned to the estate. He was whistling. He felt good. The suit was progressing. His relationship with Mina was... progressing. Life was complicated, but good.
He entered his study. Rosa was waiting for him.
She was sitting in his chair behind his desk. The room was dark, lit only by a single candle. The fire in the hearth was dead. The room was freezing.
"Rosa?" Lloyd asked, stopping in the doorway. "Why are you sitting in the dark? Are we doing a dramatic reading?"
"Close the door," Rosa said. Her voice was flat. Dead.
Lloyd closed the door. He felt the hair on his arms stand up. This wasn't normal Rosa. This was the Ice Queen.
"What's wrong?" Lloyd asked, walking towards the desk. "Did the Envoy do something? Did he bring more elephants?"
"I went to the manufactory today," Rosa said.
Lloyd froze. "Oh. Did you? I didn't see you."
"I know," Rosa said. "You were busy. With your... consultant."
Lloyd's heart hammered. "Mina? Yes. We were working. On the suit. It's very complex."
"Is kissing her hand part of the engineering process?" Rosa asked. She looked up. Her eyes were dry, but they burned with a cold fire. "Is gazing into her eyes a requirement for alchemical synthesis?"
Lloyd opened his mouth, then closed it. There was no point in lying. She had seen.
"Rosa," Lloyd said quietly. "It's not what you think."
"Do not insult my intelligence," Rosa snapped. The candle flickered. "I saw you. I saw the way you looked at her. You look at her like she is the sun. And you look at me like I am a winter storm you are trying to survive."
"I care about her," Lloyd admitted. "She is... important to me."
"She is my sister!" Rosa shouted. She stood up, slamming her hands on the desk. "She is my flesh and blood! And you... you are courting her right under my nose! While I am fighting for us! While I am trying to fix what I broke!"
"You broke us, Rosa!" Lloyd yelled back. "You broke us in the first life! You can't just fix that with a few good deeds! Trust doesn't grow back overnight!"
"But love does?" Rosa countered bitterly. "You love her. Don't you? You love her in a way you never loved me."
Lloyd looked at her. He saw the pain beneath the anger. He saw the lonely girl who had been sold to demons.
"It's different," Lloyd said. "With her... it's easy. It's clean. With us... it's a battlefield."
Chapter : 1406
"Then end the battle," Rosa said. Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Choose me. Fight for me. Stop this... this affair. Send her away. Send her back to the South."
"I can't," Lloyd said. "She is my partner. I need her for the project."
"You need her for your heart!" Rosa accused. "Admit it!"
"Fine!" Lloyd shouted. "Yes! I have feelings for her! Are you happy? Is that what you wanted to hear?"
The silence that followed was deafening. Rosa stared at him. The hope in her eyes finally died.
"No," Rosa said softly. "That is not what I wanted to hear."
She straightened up. The vulnerability vanished. The mask slammed back into place.
"Listen to me, Lloyd Ferrum," she said coldly. "This is my ultimatum. You will end this 'distraction' with Mina. You will stop the flirting. You will stop the touches. You will treat her as a consultant and nothing more."
"And if I don't?" Lloyd challenged.
"If you don't," Rosa said, "I will burn your world down. I will tell the Envoy about your infidelity. I will tell the King that you are unstable. I will use every ounce of my influence, every connection my family has, to make your political life a living hell. I will block your funding. I will sabotage your alliances. I will make sure you never build that suit."
"You would destroy everything?" Lloyd asked, stunned. "Just to keep me?"
"If I cannot have your love," Rosa said, walking around the desk to stand in front of him, "I will have your duty. I will have your name. And I will ensure that no one else has you."
She leaned in close. Her breath was cold against his cheek.
"Make your choice, husband. The Scholar... or your Future. You cannot have both."
She walked past him and out the door. The room remained freezing.
Lloyd stood there, shivering. He was trapped. Again.
He had thought he was winning. He thought he was building a new life. But the past refused to let go. Rosa refused to let go.
"A new war," Lloyd whispered to the darkness. "A personal war."
He looked at the empty chair where she had sat. He realized with a sinking feeling that of all the enemies he faced—Firefly, the Seventh Circle, the Golem—his wife might be the most dangerous of them all. Because she knew exactly where to strike to hurt him the most.
His heart.
Lloyd sat in his study, nursing a glass of strong whiskey and a migraine that felt like a goblin was mining in his skull. The ultimatum from Rosa hung over him like a guillotine blade. End it with Mina, or lose everything. It was a brutal choice.
He was trying to formulate a counter-strategy—maybe he could bribe the Envoy? Maybe he could fake his own death again?—when there was a frantic knocking at his front door.
It was late. Past midnight. Guests didn't knock at midnight. Assassins knocked at midnight. Or ghosts.
Lloyd drew a dagger from his desk drawer and walked to the door. He checked the peephole.
It wasn't an assassin. It was Headmaster Valerius.
The old mage looked terrible. His usually pristine robes were disheveled. His white beard was uncombed. His eyes were wide and bloodshot. He looked like a man who had seen the end of the world.
Lloyd opened the door. "Headmaster? It's late. Unless you're selling cookies, go away."
"Lloyd," Valerius gasped. He didn't wait for an invitation. He pushed past Lloyd into the hallway. "I need you. Now."
"What's wrong?" Lloyd asked, holstering the dagger. "Did the students summon a demon again? I told them, no summoning on school nights."
"Worse," Valerius said. He grabbed Lloyd's arm. His grip was shaking. "It's a curse. A new one. It's... eating the Academy."
Lloyd guided the old man to the study and poured him a drink. Valerius downed it in one gulp.
"Talk to me," Lloyd said, switching into crisis mode. "What kind of curse?"
"It started a week ago," Valerius explained, his voice trembling. "Small things. A student's wand backfiring. A protection amulet failing. We thought it was just bad luck. Or bad craftsmanship."
"But?"
"But then the artifacts started changing," Valerius said. "The enchanted armor in the hall? It constricted around a guard and crushed his ribs. The healing fountain? It started pumping poison. The magical lights? They drain the mana of anyone who walks under them."
"Corrupted artifacts," Lloyd muttered. "Converting beneficial magic into harmful traps. That's sophisticated."
"It's insidious," Valerius said. "It doesn't attack people directly. It turns our tools against us. The students are terrified to touch anything. They are scared to use their wands. The Academy is paralyzed."