Extra's POV: My Obsessive Villainous Fiancee Is The Game's Final Boss-Chapter 122: The Chains Of Fate

Present day.

Ren stood still for a moment, blinking as he absorbed what his mother had just told him.

She was basically a wyvern-riding princess of one of the barbarian forest tribes. She'd met their father, who sounded like a mostly confused noble from Albion. And here they were today. His head tilted in awe.

"Wait... is that how you married Father?" He asked, his eyes widening in disbelief. "We had a trade deal with the Tribe of Three? Then, why are they always attacking us now?"

Maria smiled, brushing a hand over the now completely bloomed flowers. "Oh, no. We didn't get married then."

She chuckled as she turned to Ren. "The negotiations broke down not too long after that. My father and Lord Ross were both too stubborn to find a middle ground. The Ross soldiers packed up and left back to Albion."

Ren blinked. "Then how... how did you both end up together? How did we end up with them trying to invade Albion?"

His mother had somehow given him more questions than answers. What was going on?!

Maria chuckled softly, her eyes sparkling with nostalgia. "That's a story for another day, Ren. One best told over warm tea and a quieter evening."

Ren opened his mouth to protest, but her expression stopped him. Her gaze turned distant, thoughtful, as she turned her face up toward the sun.

"I can feel the energy around you, Ren." She said, her voice softer now, lower. "The threads of fate are thick, wrapping around you less like a blanket and more like chains. They twist and tangle in your path."

Ren stared at his mother, mouth open. First his father and now, his mother. What's next? Felix? "What does that mean?" He managed to ask.

Maria turned back to him, her expression serious. "You and Lilith... you will be each other's anchors."

"Through the storms to come, the burdens of the world will try to tear you apart, but you must hold on to each other. Never let go. You will need her more than you can imagine. And she, you."

Ren didn't know what to say. His mothers words kept rattling around in his head like a pinball. There was just something in the way she said it that made him know that she wasn't joking. She was as certain as she would ever be.

He exhaled, opened his mouth to say something—he didn't know what—when his father's voice cut through the silence, shutting him up.

"Terence."

His head snapped up to see his father approaching from the pathway leading to the back of the castle, his posture as straight as ever, arms behind his back, and a stoic expression on his face.

For a moment, his brain struggled to reconcile the image of the man before him with the one he'd heard from his mother's story, before giving up. It just didn't make sense.

"Yes, Father?"

"Come. You're to inspect the Bloodbinding defenses. The wards surrounding the castle and the village need to be checked today."

Ren nodded, glancing one last time at his mother, before turning to leave. "Yes, father."

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The sound of the clip clops of their mounts filled the air as Ren and Thorn rode side by side down the dirt path toward the village.

The breeze was gentle, stirring the trees and carrying with it the smells of late afternoon cooking.

Ren had told Thorn everything. His mother's heritage. The fact that she'd ridden a wyvern. The negotiations. The stubborn pride of two old men. What she'd told him about Lilith.

And it ended with both of them wondering how it had all come down to this. How fate and stubbornness had somehow come together to create his family.

Thorn let out a low whistle as they entered the village, following the path that led outside it. "So that's how it started."

Ren nodded. "Apparently."

Thorn leaned forward in the saddle, resting his forearms on the horn. "Do you think your mother can see the future?"

Ren gave him a sidelong look. "I don't think so. She said she could feel something. Like an energy around me. But no, not the future."

Thorn grunted. "Still sounds pretty close to me. Why else would she know you and Lilith needed each other. From what I can see, you need less of each other right now."

They reached the outskirts of the village and veered toward the line of old Bloodbinding pillars that encircled it like a quiet, invisible fence.

Set far apart, each pillar was embedded with lines of glowing script and a small crystal core. They pulsed faintly, as if sleeping. The grass around them grew slightly greener, as if the pillars encouraged life in their silence.

Ren dismounted, and Thorn followed. Together, they moved from one pillar to the next, checking to see if the etchings were fading and if the cores were stable.

Time passed and the sun dipped further behind the trees as they worked.

"Do you know what scares me the most about all this?" Ren asked.

"Lilith?" Thorn raised a brow, a half smile on his face.

"Failing." Ren answered. "What if after everything we do, every life we take, we still fail?"

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Thorn said nothing, sensing that this was serious.

"I'm not doing this to be a hero. I certainly do not care about the faceless masses of the world whom I've never met before. But if this world gets destroyed, we'll most certainly get destroyed with it. And I most certainly want to live a full life."

They climbed their horses and moved to the next pillar in silence, halfway through circling around. It was almost a minute before Thorn spoke.

"Do you think these things will ever get used?" He asked, adjusting his gloves as he squatted beside the pillar. He peered at the fine carvings, brushing off a patch of moss.

Ren paused, his mind going through the present dangers.

There were the barbarians in the north, planning something huge. The future was not set in stone. No one knows if they'll ever get past the border.

And then, there was the Red Plague to the west. Will he get there on time? Should he start the journey now? Ahead of schedule?

Unfortunately, he couldn't. His father had agreed to let him go, but not a day before he was sixteen.

So, he turned to Thorn with the only answer he was able to give.

"Honestly? I don't know. But I have a feeling…" his gaze turned to the horizon where the fields met the Greythorne Forest, "that might need them."