THE GENERAL'S DISGRACED HEIR

[Previously]

When David had extended the Nightveil Embrace to envelop his companions, the experience had been as disorienting as it was fascinating. One moment they stood in Veylith's transformed tavern, the next they were pulled into a realm that existed in the spaces between shadows and substance.

Luna had merged seamlessly with David's own shadow, her golden eyes the last thing visible before she became one with the living darkness that clung to his form. Vespera had simply dissolved, her ethereal essence flowing into David's body like mist drawn into a vessel, seeking the quiet rest that her recent exertions demanded.

But Elara and Vivian found themselves standing in something far stranger.

The shadow realm stretched around them like a dark mirror of the physical world, familiar yet alien in its twisted reflection. Where Veylith's tavern had warm burgundy furnishings, here stood furniture of polished obsidian and flowing shadow-silk. The crystalline chandeliers became formations of crystallized darkness that cast no light yet somehow made everything visible in stark, ethereal detail.

The air itself felt different.... thicker, more substantial, as if they were breathing liquid starlight. Every surface rippled with subtle movement, shadows flowing like water across walls that seemed both solid and insubstantial. It was beautiful in an unsettling way, a realm crafted from the collective unconscious understanding of what lay beyond the edge of sight.

Elara stood transfixed, her tactical mind struggling to categorize what she was experiencing. "This is..." she began, then stopped, lacking words for the impossible architecture surrounding them. Her crimson eyes, disguised though they were, tracked the flowing movements of shadow-matter with fascination. "Vivian, have you been here before?"

"No," Vivian replied, though her comfort with the environment was evident in her relaxed posture. She moved through the space with casual familiarity, her own black combat suit seeming to pulse with sympathetic energy. "But I know what this is. David's artifact power, the Nightveil Embrace."

Elara's gaze sharpened, focusing on the way Vivian's suit responded to their surroundings. The material seemed alive, tiny tendrils occasionally extending from its surface to taste the shadow-charged air before retracting. "That bodysuit you're wearing," she said, understanding dawning, "that's also Nightveil Embrace, isn't it?"

Vivian nodded, pride evident in her voice. "David can give part of the Nightveil Embrace to whoever he chooses. It's permanent once bonded." She gestured to her suit, which rippled in response to her attention. "The artifact doesn't just create this realm, it becomes part of you. Like having a piece of living shadow as a companion."

As if to demonstrate, a portion of Vivian's suit extended outward, forming a dark, flowing substance. The goo-like material writhed for a moment before attaching itself to a nearby shadow-wall, establishing a connection that allowed Vivian to sense the realm's boundaries through her suit.

"It's symbiotic," Vivian explained, noticing Elara's expression. "Not parasitic. The Nightveil Embrace enhances rather than consumes. Though I'll admit, the bonding process is... intense."

Elara smiled awkwardly, her mind immediately jumping to questions about where David had acquired such a powerful artifact. Ancient texts spoke of living weapons and symbiotic armors, but most were theoretical constructs or long-lost relics of fallen civilizations. For David to possess something so sophisticated...

"Elara?" Vivian's voice cut through her speculation, accompanied by a pointed cough. "You're doing that thing where you overthink tactical implications instead of dealing with immediate concerns."

Heat crept up Elara's neck as she realized she'd been staring. "I was merely... analyzing the strategic applications," she said stiffly, composing herself with the practiced ease of a general who'd learned to mask personal reactions behind professional assessment.

"Right," Vivian grinned, clearly not buying the explanation but choosing not to press. "Well, while you were 'analyzing,' I've been monitoring our extraction point."

Elara blinked, refocusing on their current situation. They needed to return to the De Gror Manor, and David had entrusted them with the Luminvoid Translocation Array for that purpose. She reached into her coat, withdrawing the disc-shaped device that shimmered with its characteristic ethereal light.

The moment her fingers touched the central activation rune, the device responded. Magic circles erupted around both women's wrists, intricate patterns of light that scanned their magical signatures with meticulous precision. The sensation was like having ice-cold fingers trace every nerve in their arms, cataloging their essence for transportation purposes.

"Spatial coordinates locked," Elara announced, feeling the device's confirmation through her connection to its systems. "Are you ready?"

Vivian's grin widened. "Always ready for David's toys."

Elara pressed the center of the array.

The transition was unlike anything either had experienced. Where traditional teleportation felt like being torn apart and reassembled, the Luminvoid Array created the sensation of space folding around them like origami. Reality bent, twisted, compressed, and suddenly they were falling upward through a tunnel of pure starlight while simultaneously standing perfectly still. The genuine article resides on M|V|L&EMPYR.

Colors that had no names flashed past their vision. Sounds that were felt rather than heard resonated through their bones. For a heartbeat that lasted eternity, they existed in the space between destinations, experiencing the universe from the perspective of light itself.

Then they were standing in the familiar meeting room of the De Gror Manor, their arrival announced by the soft chime of the array powering down.

The scene that greeted them was both domestic and surreal. Litty paced back and forth across the polished floor with military precision, her agitation evident in every sharp turn and measured step. Her half-elven features were drawn tight with worry, ears slightly pointed with stress as she muttered calculations under her breath.

In stark contrast, Yue sat at the conference table with a bowl of what appeared to be chocolate ganache cake, savoring each bite with the focused intensity of a scholar conducting crucial research. Her childlike features were serene, completely unbothered by her daughter's obvious distress.

"Mother!" Litty's voice cracked like a whip as she spun to face the diminutive alchemist. "How can you just sit there eating cake when David and the others went to confront the Mistress of the Creed? They could be dead, captured, or worse!"