Valeria tilted her head slightly. "Care to explain, Emperor?"

Zen didn’t respond immediately. He let a few seconds to pass before he did.

"Explain?" he asked in a cold, sharp voice, cutting right through the roaring heat of the room.

Without stepping back or showing a trace of fear, he walked right up to the Goddess of War, never once blinking even in the face of the terrifying, blinding light of her golden magic.

"You want an explanation, Valeria?" Zen asked, his voice growing louder. "Look at me."

Valeria’s crazy, glowing eyes snapped to his face. She was breathing heavily, her golden armor humming with deadly power.

"I was dying in that dungeon," Zen said coldly. He pointed a finger at his own chest. "A boss monster ripped me open. I was bleeding out on the cold stone floor. My core was shattered. My heart was stopping."

Valeria’s golden aura flickered. The murderous rage in her eyes shifted for a second.

"You were right there, Valeria," Zen continued, caring that authority of an Emperor. "You were standing right over me. You are my Vanguard, the Goddess of War. You hold my Body Fragment, which gives you the strongest physical force in the entire world."

Zen took another step closer. He was now standing right in front of her.

"But what did your infinite strength do for me when I was dying?" Zen asked harshly. "Did your golden armor close my wounds? Did your raw power fix my broken core?"

Valeria opened her mouth, but no words came out. Her hands started to shake.

"Nothing," Zen answered for her. "Your strength was completely useless at that point. You couldn’t save me. You had to drag a terrified, low-level academy healer over to my bleeding body because you were powerless to stop my death."

The words hit Valeria harder than a physical punch.

"Maya had to step up," Zen continued, pointing down at the crying girl. "She had to cut her own hand open. She tied her soul to mine using an ancient Blood Pact just to keep my heart beating. She shared my magical signature because your muscles could not keep me alive. She bled for me when you couldn’t."

The jealous anger in Valeria’s eyes instantly shattered, and was instantly replaced by a crushing wave of guilt.

He was right. Her Emperor had been dying right in front of her, and her S-Rank strength had been completely useless. Another woman had to tie her soul to him just to fix what Valeria could not protect.

Nyx saw Valeria hesitate, and The Spymaster smiled a cruel, dark smile. She did not want to let this perfect chance slip by.

"He is right," Nyx mocked. She walked forward, her sleek purple armor glowing in the room. "You call yourself a Vanguard? You hold his Body Fragment, the ultimate physical power. But what good is it? You let a mindless monster tear him apart." 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

Valeria gazed down at her golden hands, her breathing shaky and shallow.

Nyx tilted her head, her purple eyes flashing with cruel delight. "You spent five hundred years waiting for him, Valeria. You cried for him. You threw tantrums. You destroyed entire armies in his name. But when he finally came back to you... you just stood there and watched his heart stop."

"Stop..." Valeria whispered in a trembling voice.

"You are nothing but a loud, useless brute," Nyx sneered, taking another step. "Your golden fists cannot stitch a single wound. You had to let a weak little academy rat bleed for him to do your job. And look at her now. She shares his magical signature. She saved his life. She is closer to him right now than you will ever be."

Valeria’s head snapped toward Nyx. The guilt vanished, swallowed instantly by explosive, blinding rage.

"Shut up!" Valeria roared.

The fight started in a fraction of a second as Valeria launched herself at Nyx.

The floor completely melted into hot slag under her boots as she moved. She swung a massive, golden fist aimed right at Nyx’s head. The punch carried enough physical force to level a whole building.

But Nyx was the Spymaster. She did not fight fair.

Nyx instantly faded into the dark shadows of the room, turning completely invisible. Valeria’s golden fist hit empty air. The shockwave from her punch blew a massive hole in the far wall of the penthouse, sending chunks of concrete falling into the city below.

At the same time, hidden panels in the ceiling snapped open, dropping six heavy defense drones. They locked onto Valeria and fired thick, red laser beams right at her back.

Valeria did not even flinch. Her physical durability was insane. The red lasers hit her golden armor and simply bounced off, leaving no marks at all on the divine metal.

"Show yourself, you coward!" Valeria screamed. She turned around, her eyes searching the shadows.

Nyx appeared right behind her, instantly stabbing a blade of crackling purple lightning hard into the small gap between Valeria’s shoulder armor and her neck guard.

The purple electricity scorched the golden metal. Valeria grunted in pain as the lightning shocked her skin. It was a perfect, clean stealth hit.

But Nyx was too weak to finish it. She was missing over half of her Shadow Fragment. Her mana network was still unstable and rerouting. The purple lightning flickered and died in her hand before it could do any real, lasting damage.

Valeria turned her head. She looked at Nyx with glowing, furious eyes.

"My turn," Valeria hissed.

Moving with blinding speed, Valeria reached out and seized Nyx by the throat. The Spymaster gasped and kicked her legs in desperation, but Valeria’s grip remained as tight. With a brutal, effortless swing of her arm, she hurled Nyx across the massive room.

Nyx flew through the air like a broken doll. She crashed violently into a heavy row of computer servers. Sparks exploded everywhere. Nyx fell to the floor, coughing hard and clutching her chest.

Valeria did not chase Nyx. She slowly turned her head and looked back at Maya.

The little healer was crying. She pressed her hands tightly over her ears to block out the terrifying noise of the fight.

A dark, psychotic thought formed in Valeria’s broken mind.

"The Blood Pact," Valeria whispered to herself. Her golden eyes widened as the crazy obsession took over again. "It ties her to you. It shares your magical signature."

Valeria took a heavy step toward the overturned couch. The heat from her armor set the ruined curtains on fire.

"Val?" Zen warned. His voice turned dangerously low. "Valeria, stop right there."

"I know how to fix this," Valeria said, not listening to him. She was completely feral now. She stared at Maya with murder in her eyes. "If I kill her, the pact dies. The connection is severed. You will not have to share your soul with a weak rat anymore. You will belong only to me again."