Neo woke to silence that felt too clean to be a prison.
The room was vast, white stone veined with gold mana lines. No chains bound her, yet her power lay muted, folded inward like a sleeping tide. She sat up slowly—and froze.
A crest was carved into the ceiling.
She knew it.
Her breath caught.
Footsteps echoed. Two figures entered, their presence heavy enough to bend the air. Both were tall, broad-shouldered, their auras disciplined but immense. One wore armor scarred by battle. The other carried himself like a strategist, calm and watchful.
"Little sister," the elder said softly.
The word struck harder than any spell.
Neo's memories fractured—then surged.
She remembered halls of marble. Tutors whispering about limitless mana. Priests arguing over prophecy. Nobles bowing too low, eyes sharp with hunger.
"You are the Fourth Princess of this nation," the second brother said. "Neo Valencrest."
Her hands trembled.
"No," she whispered. "I was… hidden."
"Yes," the elder replied. "Because people kept trying to kill you."
Her mana had been too much. Too pure. From childhood, it had drawn attention—mages attempting siphoning rituals, cultists trying to bind her as a living core. Just like Vesa, she had been marked.
So they moved her.
Again and again.
Different estates. Different borders. Each time, the attacks followed.
Until the king made a final decision.
"He sent you away," the strategist brother said quietly. "To another nation. With servants loyal enough to abandon everything."
Neo remembered them then—faces she had thought were villagers. A woman who scolded her gently. A man who forbade magic, even when Neo cried that it hurt to hold it in.
Never use your mana. Never stand out.
They had lived as commoners by royal order.
"And the slumber?" Neo asked.
Silence stretched.
The elder brother's jaw tightened. "That was no accident."
The evil organization couldn't take her mana outright. So they tried to seal it. The potion. The curse. The eternal sleep.
"To keep you alive," the strategist said, "but unusable."
Neo closed her eyes.
Ark's face flashed through her mind. The warmth. The way he never feared her power—only worried for her.
"They meant for me to disappear," she said. "Quietly."
"Yes," her brother answered. "And they almost succeeded."
Neo's gaze hardened.
"But I woke up."
The room trembled.
Mana stirred—not wild, not explosive—but vast, controlled, royal.
Somewhere far away, Ark felt it.
And for the first time since her capture, Neo smiled—not as a hidden girl, not as a weapon—
—but as a princess who had finally remembered who she was.