(Narrator POV)
Yuuta smiled.
It wasn’t the smile of a hero who stood tall against despair, nor the grin of a warrior mocking death. It was clumsy, fragile, almost foolish. And yet—it was the sa smile he had always given her.
Awkward, yes. But warm. Human.
Blood slid down his chin. His body trembled, too battered to even stand, and yet he forced that sa familiar curve onto his lips. As if to say, even in ruin: "I’m okay. Don’t grieve."
To others, it was idiotic Smile.
To Erza, it was everything.
Her breath caught in her throat. That smile—the one she had painted in her Kingdom during countless lonely nights, the one she longed for in silence—appeared before her again. But not in peace. Not in joy.
Now it ca drenched in blood, weighed down by agony.
Her chest tightened until it hurt. Her aura, which had been raging like an uncontrollable storm, faltered for the first ti.
And Elga saw it.
The beast-warrior turned, her predatory eyes narrowing as she caught sight of Erza clutching her temples, trembling under the weight of emotions she could no longer contain. A slow, vicious grin spread across Elga’s lips.
"Special Commander," she growled, her voice low and guttural, heavy with pride. "This prey is mine."
The words rang across the chamber, sharp as steel. Soldiers and guards froze. To them, Erza’s suffocating aura had not been grief or rage—it was hunger. They thought she, too, had been fighting the urge to claim the demon king contractor beneath Elga’s fist. And now, seeing her shake with frustration, they mistook it for envy.
They believed she was not mourning. She was disappointed.
Disappointed she had not struck first Yuuta.
That poisonous thought spread through the chamber like fire, infecting every mind.
And Elga, feeding on that illusion, lifted her fist once more.
Her glare locked onto Yuuta’s eyes. Not his broken body, not the blood dripping from his lips—only his eyes. Those eyes that unsettled her, that burned with sothing she could neither na nor crush. They made her chest quiver, not with respect, but with fear she could never admit.
To her, they were filth. A stain. An abomination.
But to Erza... they were her entire world.
Elga roared, and the sound shook the walls like thunder. Her fist descended, swift and rciless, like a falling star. Its target: Yuuta’s swollen, bloodied eye—the one that refused to close, that still clung to life only so it could et Erza’s gaze.
The chamber shook.
A deafening boom split the air as Elga’s fist ca crashing down—but before it could et Yuuta, the floor beneath them erupted. Stone split apart like paper. Dust and debris exploded upward, drowning the scene in a choking storm of smoke and shattered fragnts.
Gasps filled the chamber. Soldiers staggered back, weapons raised in confusion.
"Wh–what was that?!" soone stamred.
They had all heard it—the terrible impact, the sound that should have been Yuuta’s skull breaking under Elga’s blow. But sothing was wrong. Sothing didn’t match.
As the smoke thinned, shapes erged. And then silence fell like a blade.
Elga was no longer crouched over her prey.
She was slumped against the far wall, her body mangled as though she had been struck by a charging Truck. Bones jutted at unnatural angles. Blood dripped from her lips. Her chest heaved with ragged, shallow gasps. She tried to rise, but her arms quivered uselessly, betraying her.
She didn’t even understand what had happened. That was how fast it had been.
The soldiers’ eyes darted to the center of the chamber—and froze.
There stood Erza.
Her aura swirled around her like a storm barely restrained, frost snaking across the broken ground. In her arms lay Yuuta, limp and bloodied, cradled as though he were a fragile treasure that the world had no right to touch.
Her lips brushed his ruined face, tenderly, almost desperately. She licked away the blood that stained his skin, as if she could erase the violence done to him with her own touch.
No one dared breathe. Their training urged them to raise weapons, but their instincts scread at them to stay perfectly still.
Erza’s face was unexpectedly gentle as she looked down at Yuuta, her eyes soft despite the chaos around them.
Yuuta’s lips curved into a faint, relieved smile. She hasn’t fallen into grief... she isn’t the murderous queen yet. "I knew... I knew you’d overco it, I am so Glad.." he murmured, his voice strained but full of warmth.
From a distance, everyone watched the scene in stunned silence.Betrayal. How could Erza lift Demon king master with such care, holding him as if he were part of her own body, while her aura still radiated danger? Shock and disbelief rippled through the crowd—no one could reconcile this gentle act with the destructive force they had feared.
" My que...Special Commander...!" Sara’s voice finally cut through, sharp but shaking. Her blade trembled in her grip as she leveled it toward Erza. "What is the aning of this? Explain yourself!"
But Erza did not glance her way. Not even once.
Her entire being—her aura, her heartbeat, her trembling breath—was fixed only on the broken man in her arms.
Sara grit her teeth, trying to steady her voice, when another voice ca from the side.
"Chief... don’t..." Erika’s voice trembled, barely above a whisper. Her hands fidgeted at her sides, betraying the weight of the secret she carried. "He... he’s Erza’s younger brother."
Sara froze. Her heart skipped a beat, and for a mont, all sound seed to vanish. She turned sharply to Erika, eyes wide with disbelief.
"Younger brother?" she repeated, her voice rising despite herself. "That’s... impossible! Erza has a younger brother? No—this is absurd! It can’t be real!"
Erika’s expression remained calm, almost matter-of-fact. "Chief... it is true," she said quietly, her gaze steady.
Sara’s eyes narrowed, disbelief and frustration warring inside her. "Don’t be stupid! How... how could he be beaten like that if he’s her brother? He should be—" Her words faltered, swallowed by the confusion twisting in her mind.
Erika’s gaze held firm. There was no hesitation, no flicker of uncertainty. "It’s true," she said simply.
Sara’s mind raced. Erika might not have known Erza’s full nature, but Sara did. Erza wasn’t just a dragon—she was a Royal Dragon, a direct descendant of the Primal Dragon. If Yuuta was truly her brother, then he wasn’t human. He was a Royal Dragon too... soone who should be unstoppable, soone who could have obliterated Elga without a scratch.
Yet here he was—beaten, bleeding, human in every visible way. The contradiction twisted Sara’s thoughts, sending a chill down her spine, Because she too sense dragon scent on him.
Her lips parted, a thousand questions threatening to spill out, but no words ca.
Yuuta lay in her arms, broken and bleeding, his body trembling with exhaustion. Erza pressed her lips to his, tongue brushing his in a careful, deliberate rhythm. The mont their mouths t, a soft glow spread across him, like a sunrise over a storm-tossed sea. Her mana flowed into him, weaving through torn flesh and shattered bones, knitting him whole.
Relief washed over Yuuta as the agony ebbed from his body. "Sleep, my mortal," Erza whispered, her voice steady and gentle. "You’ll be healed."
Yuuta’s lips moved, forming words so faint they barely stirred the air between them. Even Sara and the others, straining to catch a single syllable, could not make sense of it. Not even the heavens—or the author of this story—knew what he whispered into Erza’s ear.
Her eyes widened for an instant, then softened. She gave a small, resolute nod, as if sealing a silent pact only the two of them would ever share.
Yuuta’s eyelids fluttered, heavy with exhaustion. The sharp, tearing pain that had wracked his body monts ago ebbed away, swallowed by a gentle warmth. It was as though light itself cradled him. With a faint smile, he let go of his struggle and drifted into the quiet embrace of sleep.
Erza watched him, her eyes softening for just a heartbeat. Then, with precise control, she raised her leg and summoned a shield of ice. It enveloped him, crystalline and unyielding, a barrier that would protect him from anything. The shield shimred like a Cocoon, making sure nothing in the room could harm him while he slept peacefully.
Her attention shifted to the chaos around her. The guards, the agents, even Elga—they all froze under her gaze. There was no rcy in her expression, no hesitation. Only the cold, unflinching aura of a warrior ready to strike.
Sara felt it imdiately. That look—the infamous, rciless calm that could unnerve the strongest kingdom—made her blood run cold.
"Everyone... leave this room!" Sara shouted, trying to force the fear from her voice, but her words trembled.
Erza didn’t move her gaze from the intruders. Her sword lifted, the legendary blade gleaming in her hand. It was a weapon that had tasted the blood of countless enemies, a weapon that demanded respect and fear.
In that instant, she was no longer just Erza. She was the rciless blade of Atlantis, a storm personified, a force that could tear anyone apart who dared oppose her. Every inch of her radiated power. Every heartbeat scread warning.
The chamber fell into silence, broken only by the faint hum of the ice shield around Yuuta. Captians and agents froze, knowing instinctively that one wrong move could be their last.
Sara’s eyes widened, fear surging through her chest. She finally understood why Erza had been called the rciless Blade of Atlantis. That title wasn’t just a na—it was earned, bestowed only upon those who had achieved sothing so dreadful, so absolute, that even lower Gods whispered their deeds with caution.
The title itself was proof. Proof that Erza wasn’t rely powerful, but a lord-class threat—an existence beyond anything Sara could hope to confront.
And standing there now, watching the faint tremor in the air around Erza, Sara knew one truth with chilling clarity: she couldn’t deal with her at all.
The chamber had grown unnaturally still. The cold wasn’t the simple bite of winter air—it was suffocating, heavy, the kind that crawled beneath the skin and froze the blood from within. Every breath burned like needles scraping through the lungs.
And at the center of it stood Erza.
Her heel pressed softly against the floor. The sound was delicate, almost too faint to notice—yet the world answered as though struck by a hamr.
A wave of frost exploded outward.
It moved like a living thing, racing across the stone in a furious tide, swallowing everything in its path. Walls paled, weapons froze brittle, and the very air shimred with ice crystals. The guards barely had ti to scream before the cold devoured them whole. Their bodies froze mid-motion, trapped in gleaming prisons of ice, their eyes wide with horror.
Even the captains—Sara’s handpicked elites—were helpless. Their training, their strength, none of it mattered. They were alive inside the ice, yet powerless to move, their frozen expressions forever twisted in terror.
Only Sara and Allen, caught at the far edge, were spared from being completely consud. Even so, frost coiled at their boots and fingertips, a warning that they stood only a breath away from sharing the others’ fate.
The sound of cracking ice echoed like bones breaking. The chamber itself seed to groan under the weight of Erza’s fury.
And through it all, she remained calm.
Her sword glimred faintly in the dim light, the edge sharp enough to cut the silence itself. When she finally spoke, her voice was steady—too steady. Cold, unshakable, and rciless.
"Anyone who stands between and her," Erza said, her words cutting like a blade across stone, "will die by my hand. Elga wounded what is mine. And she will repay it."
The declaration hung heavy in the air. It wasn’t a warning. It wasn’t a threat. It was absolute.
The words were not a threat. They were a decree. A final law that none dared to test.
No one spoke. No one even breathed too loudly. They all understood the truth: the ice was not just ice—it was a prison with teeth. Struggle against it, and the cracks would spread, tearing through flesh and bone alike. To fight was to die in agony. That was the cruelty of her power. That was why she had earned her na—the rciless blade who gave no second chance.
To resist her was not bravery. It was suicide.
Sara, who had always t violence with venom, felt sothing unfamiliar coil in her chest—fear.
Erza began to walk. Slowly. Each step pressed into the glacier, and the sound echoed like a death knell. She didn’t rush, didn’t falter. There was no doubt in her stride, only inevitability.
And there, sprawled on the frozen floor, was Elga.
Elga dragged herself up from the floor, her limbs trembling, her body cracked and battered from Erza’s fist. Every breath rattled through her broken ribs, but her pride—fierce, stubborn, lion-like—refused to bow. Blood spilled from her mouth, yet her eyes still burned with defiance.
Her roar split the silence. It was raw, guttural, like a beast cornered yet unwilling to submit.
"Have you forgotten the laws of this Agency?" she spat, her voice thick with rage and pain. "No one dares steal another’s prey, not even you Erza!"
The chamber trembled with her cry. But Erza did not flinch.
She stood still, her blade gleaming faintly, her presence colder than the glacier underfoot. When her lips parted, her voice carried no anger, only certainty.
"That is not your prey," she said, each word sharp enough to cut. Her gaze never wavered. "That man... is my husband."
The room froze, more than it already was.
Erza’s tone deepened, her words striking like a blade of truth.
"Do you understand what he is to ?" Erza’s voice was low, every syllable deliberate. "He is the man I would burn the world for. He is the man I would stand against gods for him. That is how precious he is."
She stepped closer, violet eyes cold as polished steel. "And you... you touched him as if he were nothing." The words were soft, but they carried the promise of ruin.
A ripple of shock ran through the soldiers and captains trapped in ice. None of them had known. None had even imagined their Special Commander—the infamous rciless Blade of Libeus Agency—had a husband. And worse, that he was this human which they had beaten him brutally.
Sara’s breath caught. The truth clicked together—the faint dragon scent clinging to Yuuta, the strange aura that felt earlier familiar. He hadn’t been cursed. He hadn’t been marked. He was bound. He was Erza’s mate along.
And among dragons, a mate was not re affection. It was sacred. To harm them was to defy destiny itself.
Elga watched Erza walk toward her like the shadow of death incarnate, each asured step folding the distance into inevitability. In the hollow between heartbeats, a mory crawled up from the dark—Yuuta’s voice, ragged and defiant the last ti she’d silenced him. "If you kill , you will regret."
At the ti she’d laughed in rage—how could she not? He had been a broken, trembling thing then: a human, small and fragile. What threat could he possibly pose to her? She had written his words off as the bravado of the desperate.
Now, watching Erza approach, the truth carved itself into her bones.
Panic rose like acid in Elga’s throat. She felt the lie of her own certainty peel away, exposing the cold, awful fact: she was not the hunter here. She was prey. And the hunter coming for her wore frost and steel and the patience of an executioner.
Elga’s body trembled, yet a broken laugh escaped her. Whether it was madness or pride, no one could tell.
"Fine," she growled, her voice hoarse but steady. "If I must die here, so be it. Then let us fight once more, Commander. I have grown stronger since last ti. Strong enough to—"
Her words cut off.
Erza tilted her head slightly, her gaze colder than steel. "To fight ," she said, her tone quiet but rciless, "you would need claws Elga."
Elga frowned, confused. Then her body convulsed. A hot wave of pain surged through her arms. She looked down—
Her claws were gone. Both hands severed. Blood poured freely, staining the white ice crimson.
A scream ripped through her throat, high and desperate. She staggered, eyes wide in disbelief, before turning her head.
Erza stood behind her. One hand gripped her bloodied sword. The other held Elga’s severed claws like discarded trophies.
The chamber fell silent.
Tears spilled from Elga’s eyes, streaking her face as agony and fear overwheld her. She hadn’t even seen the strike. She hadn’t understood. Only now did the truth sink into her bones.
She had never been Erza’s equal. Not then. Not now. Not ever.
And when she t Erza’s gaze, her pride shattered. Those rciless eyes allowed no plea, no forgiveness. They belonged to the woman that her world called—
The rciless Blade of Atlantis.
And rcy was sothing she had never promised.
To be continued.
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