Primordial Villain with a Slave Harem

Chapter 891: The Vael Family’s Drama

A choked sob, distant but sharp.

Quinlan’s face turned grim.

Feng’s pout vanished, replaced by wide-eyed worry.

Serika gasped.

The joy of victory dissolved into silence.

And their gazes turned toward the sound.

There, in the shadows cast by still-smoldering debris, lay Rykar.

The man who had once been a towering pillar of dignity was now reduced to a broken, crumpled figure. His once-proud form leaned helplessly over a charred body, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs.

The heat of Venthros’s fury had melted away his prosthetic limbs, leaving only cauterized stumps. The ancient warrior who had once trained Quinlan with cold detachment, demanding perfection without showing an ounce of kindness, now knelt with no limbs to catch himself, his head bowed low in devastation.

He was crying.

Not the silent, stoic grief of a man hardened by pain.

But the raw, soul-shattering weeping of a father.

His forehead pressed against the blackened, blistered shoulder of the dying woman in his arms.

Lysandra.

Once divine in poise and beauty, her jade-toned skin had been burned raw. Her once-flowing blue hair had been scorched to ash. Patches of exposed flesh wept beneath the ruin of Venthros’s retaliation, her lungs wheezing with every scorched breath of oxygen she managed to inhale.

And yet her expression bore no signs of pain. Only quiet resignation.

Wry amusement, even.

”...I don’t remember you being so soft-hearted...” she rasped at Rykar, a whisper torn from shredded lungs. Her smile twitched through cracked lips, half-joking. ”You do realize I tried to kill you, right?”

Rykar couldn’t speak.

The great titan of a man, who had once faced down Sovereigns without blinking, could only sob harder.

Again.

And again.

Hot tears streamed down his ash-smeared cheeks and splattered against the ruined skin of his daughter. His lips moved, but no sound came.

Lysandra’s head lowered, unable to look at the sight of her father any longer. She simply couldn’t bear it.

The man who had once stood like a mountain now knelt in the ash, ruined and weeping. Weeping over her, of all people. Even now, after everything she had done, Rykar still looked at her like she mattered. Like she was someone worth crying over.

A fierce tide of guilt surged through her broken frame.

She had hated him. Blamed him. Tried to kill him.

All because he had disowned her, forced her to leave home as a young child. But it hadn’t been out of spite. It had been to set her free. She always understood this and accepted it. ᚱÂ𐌽ȱ𝔟Ê𝐬

The extreme feelings of spite she held for this man came from when she rose to power in Naryssia... when she stood tall as the Water Sovereign, with a kingdom behind her and no one left who could question the alliance between her and Vulkaris... he could have reached out.

He could have looked for her.

She had waited for him to do exactly that. She told herself it was abandonment. That he had truly cast her aside as if she were a defect. That he never loved her. That she was lying to herself when she insisted inwardly that he did it all for her. After all, why not look for her now that she had all the power of a Sovereign? There was no political turmoil in Naryssia, no opportunists waiting to undermine her authority.

So she waited, year after year, with bitter pride and fragile hope, clinging to the foolish idea that someday, somehow, he would call her his daughter again. That he’d show up, even once, just to acknowledge her. To ask her if she was happy.

But he never did.

And now... dying in his arms, she finally understood why.

He hadn’t come because he believed her disownment meant she had the right to build her own life. Because Rykar had always been a man who respected strength, and she had become strong. A Sovereign. The queen of a strong, stable nation.

She was no longer a daughter waiting for permission. She was a woman who had carved her place into the world. And he must’ve thought that reaching out—after taking his hand away—would only cheapen what she had become.

He never called for her again... not because he hated her.

But because he didn’t feel like he had the right to anymore.

And that truth... that quiet, brutal truth... was what crushed her the most.

The clearer her emotions became, the heavier her heart grew.

It felt like her chest weighed a ton, like the guilt and grief were trying to bury her before death could.

Her voice finally escaped, low and raw. Bitter with self-hate.

”I’m the worst daughter in all of existence, aren’t I?”

Her cracked lips parted to let go of a broken laugh.

”I betrayed everything... twisted everything. I told myself you abandoned me, but I never reached out either. I just sat there, waiting like a fool for a father I’d already disowned in my own heart. I let the silence rot into resentment. And now I’m here, dying in your arms, and I still can’t stop hurting you... I’m forcing my father to bury his child’s corpse...”

Her voice cracked at the end, trembling like a string ready to snap.

”I’m sorry... I really am...”

But Rykar shook his head violently, as if rejecting the very notion itself.

”You’re not the worst of anything!” he croaked, voice strangled with emotion. ”You’re my daughter.”

His eyes, red and wet, met hers.

”And that... will never change.”

”You made mistakes, but so did I. You are not evil. You are not beyond forgiveness. You are not—” his voice faltered for a moment before he gathered his mental strength, ”—beyond love.”

He leaned closer, resting his brow gently against hers, despite the searing heat of her charred skin.

”I should have called for you,” he whispered. ”I should have tried.”

And with one final, breathless tremor, he finished.

”Forgive me too... Lysandra.”

A single tear slid down Lysandra’s soot-smudged cheek.

It hissed to steam soon after it touched her scorched skin.

With great effort, she raised one trembling arm, shaking, barely more than a twitch, and brushed her fingertips against the stump of Rykar’s left arm. Her touch was feather-light, a ghost of a caress against ruined flesh.

Then, sensing motion at the edge of her vision, her gaze shifted. Slowly. Heavily.

To her.

To Serika.

Her twin. Her mirror. The woman who had been her best friend and greatest ally. Yet she was also the woman Lysandra had tricked, manipulated, and deceived for her own emotional fulfillment. The one who had nearly killed her for it once she confessed to her crimes.

Serika stood just a few paces away. Her face was unreadable.

No fury, no tears could be observed. Only calm stillness. Such an emotional distance coming from the woman who represented fire itself told Lysandra all she needed to know about Serika’s stance on her.

She had warrior’s eyes. Watchful. Wary. Not cruel. Not soft. Just... quiet.

As Serika slowly stepped forward, her shadow stretched long beside Rykar’s trembling body. The weight of her presence fell heavy, yet Lysandra didn’t flinch.

Instead, she let out a dry, raspy laugh.

”So... are the celebrations over for today? You were quite loud, you know? Screaming such lines with your boyfriend and love-rival in tow... I honestly thought I’d already passed for a moment.”