Chapter 426 Sorayas Lost Spirit
For Lucian, the arcane spell broke in less than a second.
The completed power tore through every false memory and every seal Valerius had placed inside him.
He remembered Earth.
He remembered his real family.
He remembered Zara dragging him through one disaster after another, calling him a rich fool, trying to inherit his property, and pretending not to care whether he lived or died.
He remembered loving her before he understood that was what the feeling meant.
He also understood what she had just done.
Zara was falling through the storm, her body already dissolving into fire.
Lucian moved before the last fragment of false memory disappeared.
He caught her hand.
It was ice cold.
Zara looked up at him without recognition.
"You gave me everything," he said quietly.
Then he forced the power out of his body.
It resisted him for only a moment before flowing back toward its true owner.
Zara's body ignited.
The fire did not consume her. It rebuilt her.
A vast shadow appeared behind her, larger than the Snow Dragon and brighter than the stars. Wings formed from constellations spread across the heavens, and the entire Divine World trembled beneath the return of its oldest power.
The Snow Dragon slowly lowered its head. "Welcome back."
Zara opened her eyes.
They held the light of countless stars.
But when she looked at Lucian, her first words were entirely familiar.
"You'd better not have damaged my inheritance papers."
Lucian laughed.
She was still Zara.
Zara remembered the Snow Dragon the moment her full power returned.
She remembered racing across the early Divine World with him and the other ancient forbidden-zone rulers.
She remembered stopping the first war between humans and mystic beasts.
She even remembered hiding the Snow Dragon's pearl beneath Wyrmrest Wilds after warning him that someone would eventually be foolish enough to steal it.
She had not expected that person to be Lucian.
The Snow Dragon returned to his smaller form and landed on Zara's shoulder.
"You chose a human over me."
"I chose to stop you from destroying half the world."
"You gave him your entire power."
"He gave it back."
The Snow Dragon fell silent.
That was the only reason he had not attacked Lucian again.
Cyranth arrived with Soraya shortly afterward.
The little girl had lost consciousness. The crimson patterns beneath her skin had spread across her arms and neck, responding violently to the Wyrmheart Pearl.
Cyranth looked at Zara. "Can you retrieve her spirit now?"
Zara placed one hand against Soraya's forehead.
With her memories restored, she finally understood what had happened a thousand years ago.
When Moonveil was sacrificed, Soraya's spirit body had shattered. Most of it had been drawn into the Wyrmheart Pearl because the pearl was the nearest object capable of preserving a soul.
The rest had remained sealed inside Soraya's body, preventing her from dying but leaving her trapped in the form of a child.
"The spirit is still there," Zara said. "But bringing it back won't be easy."
"What do you need?"
"Your life-bound essence."
Cyranth answered without hesitation. "Take it."
Zara looked at him. "Do you understand what that means? If the spirit rejects the body, the backlash could destroy both of you."
"I understand."
"And if she wakes up with all her memories, she may hate you for failing to save her."
Cyranth's face tightened. "Then she may hate me."
Soraya stirred weakly in his arms. "Mom..."
Zara sighed and took the child from him. "Don't call me that in front of your actual husband. It makes everything weird."
Lucian coughed.
Cyranth gave Zara a cold look.
"She is three."
"Exactly."
The Snow Dragon stared at them. "Can we focus on the spirit?"
They descended into the deepest part of Wyrmrest Wilds, where the Wyrmheart Pearl rested beneath the roots of an ancient tree.
The pearl was larger than Zara expected, glowing crimson inside a chamber of ice. Shadows moved within it like memories trapped beneath glass.
Zara placed Soraya before the pearl.
Cyranth stood behind her and released a thread of his life-bound essence.
The entire chamber darkened.
Soraya screamed.
Her body lifted from the ground as images flooded the air around them.
A young woman in white robes.
A city where humans and mystic beasts lived together.
Cyranth standing beside her beneath a moonlit sky.
Then fire.
Blood.
The screams of an entire city.
Soraya had watched everyone she protected die. The Upper Realm and a powerful mystic beast clan had sacrificed Moonveil to create a weapon capable of killing a legendary mystic beast.
They had turned Soraya into that weapon.
Cyranth saw everything.
His control broke.
Darkness surged from him, cracking the ice chamber and shaking Wyrmrest Wilds.
"I will kill every one of them."
"They've been dead for centuries," Zara snapped. "And if you lose control now, you'll destroy the spirit you're trying to save."
Cyranth's hands trembled.
Soraya's child body convulsed as the memories continued.
Zara wrapped her power around her.
"She doesn't need to experience all of it again."
The images dimmed.
Inside the Wyrmheart Pearl, a pale figure appeared.
Soraya.
Not the child in Zara's arms, but the woman she had been a thousand years ago.
Her spirit floated behind the crimson surface with her eyes closed.
Cyranth stepped forward.
"Soraya."
The spirit did not respond.
Zara pressed both hands against the pearl.
The power of the stars moved through the chamber, opening a path between the spirit and the body.
"Call her," Zara told Cyranth.
He looked at the woman beyond the pearl.
For thousands of years, he had imagined what he would say if he saw her again.
In the end, only one sentence came.
"I'm sorry I was late."
The spirit opened her eyes.
The Wyrmheart Pearl shattered.
Light filled the chamber.
Soraya's spirit moved into the child's body, and the force of the union threw everyone backward.
Cyranth reached her first.
Soraya lay motionless in his arms.
The crimson patterns faded. Her breathing became steady, and warmth returned to her skin.
After a long silence, her eyes opened.
They were no longer entirely childish.
She looked at Zara first. "Mom?"
Zara's shoulders dropped. "Still me, apparently."
Then Soraya turned toward Cyranth.
He did not move.
Her gaze remained on him for a long time.
"Cyranth," she whispered.
His expression shattered.
Soraya lifted one small hand and touched his face. "I remember you."
Not everything had returned.
Her spirit and body would need time to fully merge. As they did, she would gradually recover her original form and memories.
Until then, she remained both the child Zara had raised and the woman Cyranth had lost.
Cyranth did not ask her to resume their old relationship.
He only held her hand.
"Come with me," he said. "We can return whenever you wish."
Soraya looked at Zara. "Can I?"
Zara nodded. "You can always come home."
Soraya wrapped her arms around Zara's neck. "I'll come back."
"You'd better. After everything I've spent on you, you don't get to disappear on me now."
Soraya giggled.
Cyranth opened a passage to the Mistveil Expanse.
Before stepping through, Soraya looked at Lucian. "Take care of Mom."
Zara immediately protested, "I don't need him to take care of me."
Lucian answered calmly, "I will."
Zara glared at him.
Soraya smiled and disappeared through the passage with Cyranth.
For the first time in a thousand years, Cyranth did not leave alone.