All eyes turned to Kairo.
The crimson-eyed boy didn't step forward immediately. He stood silent, his expression calm, almost detached. Then, slowly, he raised his head toward Lady Eryndor.
"I don't have an element," he said plainly. "No flames. No storms. No illusions." His gaze shifted briefly toward Igron before settling again on the throne. "What I have is mana… and something I've only begun to touch."
The air shifted. His hand lifted.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then—like cracks spreading through silence—the ground shivered. White fragments erupted upward, jagged and unnatural, bending as if called by an unseen law.
Bone.
Pale, spiked constructs burst from the marble at his feet, arching outward like a cage of death. They groaned as they grew, stretching until the very throne room trembled. It was not polished, not beautiful—raw and imperfect—but its presence carried weight.
Several attendants stumbled backward, gasping at the sight. The man stiffened, his eyes wide with recognition of something that wasn't human. Even the Hound's helm tilted, as if studying carefully.
Kairo lowered his hand. The bones froze, suspended like white monuments under torchlight. His voice was steady, almost cold.
"It's crude. I don't know enough of it yet."
A pause. His crimson eyes narrowed faintly.
"…But it's mine."
The silence that followed was heavier than mana.
Lady Eryndor leaned forward, her lips curling into something between fascination and hunger. She tapped the throne's armrest once, the sound echoing through the chamber.
"Mana vast as oceans. A forbidden art for flesh and bone. You may lack an element, boy… but what you hold may devour the world itself."
Her eyes gleamed brighter. "Yes. Yes, I see it now. The Eryndor name will not die with me."
The bone cage loomed silently, a reminder of the strange path Kairo walked—one no element could define.