NOVEL WEB Chapter 31: When Old Wounds Speak
The aqueducts had gone silent.
Where once the echo of battle roared, now only the gentle dripping of water remained—distant, indifferent. The air still shimmered faintly, disturbed by the remnants of Minus's spellwork. Her sigils had long since vanished, but the warped mana refused to settle. The ancient stone walls breathed with a strange tension, as though they too remembered what had transpired.
Bodies littered the floor—not dead, but broken.
Wolf lay with his limbs scorched from the inside, breath shallow, his flesh still twitching from the afterburn of Verhallene Glut. Clematis had not moved since her fall. Routine clutched at her ribs, struggling to maintain consciousness. Radaal's nose bled freely, and Iris knelt beside her, shaking uncontrollably. None dared rise.
The only one standing was Lowe.
His stance was ragged. Blood had soaked through the bandage over his reopened eye. That old scar—inflicted during his original battle with Minus—now burned fresh again. A cruel reminder.
His fingers were trembling—not from fear, but something worse: recognition.
She didn't just survive.
She evolved.
And he hadn't seen it coming.
Minus stood at the far end of the aqueduct, the broken archway behind her revealing faint starlight filtering through the cracks above. Her staff pulsed faintly with residual mana, a rhythmic, cold heartbeat. Her white hair moved as if caught in an invisible wind.
She tilted her head slightly, watching Lowe as though amused.
"You thought I'd die with dignity," she said, voice quiet but heavy, cutting through the tension like glass across skin. "But I was reborn for vengeance."
Lowe grit his teeth, keeping his blade raised despite the pain in his side.
"You were dead," he spat. "I made sure of it."
"You only delayed the inevitable," she replied. "Serie's spell gave me time—and I used it better than she ever could."
Lowe narrowed his eye. "Then she really did… resurrect you?"
Minus didn't answer right away. Instead, she approached the edge of a collapsed stone platform, peering down into the dark waters that churned below.
"When Serie tried Ars Finita," she said at last, "it consumed her. Her mind fractured. She was afraid of it. That's why she gave it to me with a warning."
She turned back toward him. Her smile was cold.
"She thought I might end up like her."
"And didn't you?" Lowe asked, gesturing at the carnage. "This isn't power. This is madness."
She laughed. "No, Lowe. What Serie lacked was control. I walked into the same storm and came out whole."
She extended a hand toward him.
"And you're still here. Still bleeding. Still trying to figure out if the witch you killed is real or memory."
Lowe didn't answer. He lunged.
But Minus didn't move to strike.
Her staff simply twitched in the air—barely a flick—and the Ars Finita residue coiled like a serpent around his blade arm, dragging memory and pain from within him.
The image of a battlefield. The smell of burning elfwood. The sound of Milirade's voice.
Don't do this, Lowe. You don't know what she really is.
He flinched.
Minus's voice dropped to a whisper. "Even now, her voice still haunts you."
Lowe roared, breaking free, his blade slicing through the memory field. The aqueduct shook again as he poured raw mana into a retaliatory strike, his blade slamming into the stone as Minus vanished into shadow.
His swing met only air.
Silence returned.
Above.
Serie sat alone, deep within her private sanctum beneath the Spire.
A crystal orb floated before her, suspended in a matrix of mana woven from elven threads and imperial sigils. Its glow was faint now—the fight was over.
She closed her eyes.
"She didn't go too far," she murmured. "Not this time."
Her voice lacked warmth, but there was no mistaking the thread of pride within it.
Behind her, a first-class mage stood uncertainly in the doorway.
"They said there were casualties," the mage said. "Not fatalities, but… close."
Serie didn't look back.
"She showed restraint."
The mage hesitated. "Lowe saw her."
"I expected that," Serie replied flatly.
"He'll warn the others."
"Let him."
Her tone left no room for further discussion. The mage bowed and left.
Alone again, Serie opened her eyes. The orb darkened, then flickered—showing, just for a moment, Minus's silhouette disappearing beneath a crumbling arch, staff slung behind her shoulder.
"She's back, and she's stronger than I dared imagine," Serie whispered.
And maybe, just maybe… more dangerous than even she had hoped.
Elsewhere, in a chamber carved from memory and magic—
Minus leaned against a carved altar deep within a forgotten elven chapel, half-buried in roots and faded glyphs. The air smelled of old incense, dust, and rainwater. Milirade's body had once rested here. Now, it housed Minus's soul.
She lowered herself to the floor, legs folding beneath her, arms resting against her knees.
The backlash of Ars Finita still throbbed behind her eyes.
For all her control, it had come close.
The spell fed on memory. On pain. On the parts of her she didn't always admit were still raw.
Milirade. The Empire. Frieren's mercy. Serie's judgment. Lowe's sword.
All of it resurfaced. But she had held it all together.
Serie couldn't.
And she had.
She chuckled.
"What did you think would happen, Serie? That I'd play cautious just because you fell apart?"
Her smile faded.
"I am not your heir. I am your successor."