Even Prince Kael’s composed expression cracked for the first ti. His pupils tightened almost imperceptibly.
He had suspected many things.
But not this.
The mystery that he had been unable to uncover, no matter how deeply he investigated, suddenly ford a completely different outline.
At that mont, he finally understood why every trace of her past felt unnaturally blank.
Not because it was hidden...
But because it didn’t belong there at all.
He looked at her again, and this ti, his gaze carried sothing entirely new.
Shock.
And a dawning realization that the woman before him might be carrying secrets far greater than he had ever imagined.
Prince Kael did not answer imdiately.
At last, Prince Kael exhaled slowly and said, choosing his words with care, "It brings to a story I heard about House Griffin. Years ago, House Griffin officially announced that one of the heirs of the family, Lucien, had betrayed the family, killed a bunch of elders, violated ancestral laws, and fled in fear of punishnt. And when he fled with his wife, they had a newborn baby child. Based on the tiline, the baby’s age will be the sa as yours right now."
Zora’s heart skipped a beat as she said. "Do you think it is ?"
Kael nodded, "If this jade pendant is from your mother’s, then it is likely that it is you."
His eyes then darkened as he added. "But why did they kill... for what they did... No one actually knows..."
Zora’s heart sank inch by inch in revelation.
"If they were truly traitors," she said softly, "why would they flee with a newborn child? Why would they destroy my core?"
Prince Kael’s fingers tightened slightly at his side.
"That is exactly the strange part," he said. "Destroying a child’s mana core is not killing them, but it is worse than death for a martial’s family. It strips away the future while leaving the body alive."
A chilling thought surfaced in both their minds at the sa ti.
Silence fell again.
Finally, Prince Kael spoke, his voice low and heavy.
"There are only two possibilities. Either your parents truly offended a power so terrifying that even House Griffin could not protect them... or..."
"Or House Griffin itself wanted you erased," Zora finished quietly.
Kael shrugged and added as an afterthought, "Or all of this was just a giant coincidence, and you had nothing to do with them."
The room fell into utter stillness.
Her evenly breathing chest betrayed nothing on the surface, but inside her mind, waves crashed violently.
Once the idea was planted in her head, Zora could no longer believe that it was a coincidence.
Prince Kael then let out a low breath, his fingers unconsciously tightening at his side as he looked at Zora under the dim candlelight.
"At that ti, I was still young," he said slowly, his voice carrying a trace of reminiscence and gravity. "I had heard rumors about that incident in House Griffin, but I never truly paid attention to it. The information that circulated outside was extrely limited, and no one dared to probe too deeply into the core of the matter. As for the real details of what happened between your possible parents and House Griffin... even now, I cannot say for certain."
After a brief silence, his gaze sharpened.
"I will send people to investigate this properly. This ti, I will not just touch the surface. I will find out the whole truth."
Zora lifted her eyes to look at him. The emotions in her gaze were complicated, but in the end, they settled into a quiet calm.
"Thank you," she said gently.
She did not refuse his help.
At this mont, she understood clearly that her current strength was still far from enough to touch the level of a peak martial family like the House Griffin. If she wanted to uncover the truth of her origins, relying on her alone would be painfully slow. Prince Kael’s intelligence network and influence could at least help her cut through part of the fog.
But inside Prince Kael’s heart, a heavy pressure had already ford.
If Zora’s identity truly matched their speculation, then what stood behind her was not rely a conflict within a noble household, nor even a power struggle of a single country.
It was an enormous ancient martial family that stood at the peak of the Holy Mystic Continent.
And he also understood her temperant too well.
Once the truth was confird, once the hatred was verified... Zora would never choose to retreat.
She would choose revenge.
Even if the opponent was the House Griffin.
That night, neither of them truly slept.
Zora sat quietly by the window, the moonlight spilling onto her face as she stared at the jade token in her palm. Although the investigation result had not yet co out, after hearing the na "Lucien," a strong intuition had already taken root in her heart.
After all, Lucien’s na was pretty much popular all over the continent, known to have the potential to beco the Next Half-Deity but gone missing for nearly two decades...
She did not believe that such a powerful man would inexplicably betray his family.
There must have been sothing he could not endure.
Sothing that forced him to leave the House Griffin with his wife and child, to flee while being hunted, and to finally be forced into a desperate corner.
Originally, she had only thought that her parents were ordinary people, perhaps crushed by fate and circumstance.
But now she knew that they had once stood at a terrifying height.
Which ant that their fall... must have been equally horrifying.
If they could, how could they ever bear to abandon her?
Even without concrete proof, just imagining that scene made a cold tightness spread through her chest.
On the other side of the room, Prince Kael also remained awake until dawn. The more he traced back the shadows of that old incident, the more unsettled he felt.
If Zora truly carried the bloodline of the House Griffin, then everything about her life until now suddenly beca far more dangerous than it appeared on the surface.
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