SOULBOUND: THE ABYSS WITHIN

Chapter 84: Thunder Without Mercy

The night over Lafrosa was torn open by a trail of black lightning that split clouds and silence alike. It was unnatural—pure rage shaped into speed, cutting toward a target that should have been unreachable.

Muna Ikemba had found her.

In the outskirts of Lafrosa, amidst an abandoned watchtower cloaked in silence, Mira Hawthorne stood, pale yet defiant. Her obsession still burned, untamed and shameless. But her heart faltered when the air changed—when the storm came not from above, but within the earth itself.

The tower exploded in a bolt of black destruction, throwing Mira backward.

There stood Muna, her form wreathed in writhing arcs of pure lightning, her face locked in a terrifying expression between grief and homicidal clarity.

"Muna—wait—!" Mira started, fear finally creeping into her voice.

But Muna didn't speak.

She raised her hand, crackling with fury, and Mira's legs collapsed under the sheer weight of the pressure—her Soul Energy caged, smothered by Muna's monstrous presence.

Then, salvation arrived—or so Mira thought.

Three carriages bearing the Hawthorne crest screeched to a halt.

Guards burst forth. Elite escorts of Michelle Hawthorne, clad in midnight-blue armor and Soul Art runes glowing faintly.

One of them—an older woman with kind eyes—stepped forward, arms open in desperation. Mira's childhood nanny.

"Lady Muna, please—your wrath is heard, but this is a child—"

"She laid hands on mine," Muna said without turning. "Again."

"Mistress Mira has been misguided! But she's still a girl—"

Muna's body pulsed.

One breath later—a black lightning storm erupted from her skin, vaporizing the air in a kilometer radius. The guards didn't scream. They didn't fight. They were simply erased.

Even the nanny.

The old woman's eyes locked with Mira's one final time before she was consumed—burned to white ash before Mira could blink.

Mira screamed.

The ground trembled.

Muna's eyes finally turned toward her prey.

"You should've stayed in your cage," she said.

Steps echoed behind them.

From a gate of blue mist stepped Michelle Hawthorne, her eyes blazing with authority and fury—no longer the composed Grand Council member, but the True Head of the Hawthornes.

Her voice cracked through the night like shattering glass.

"Muna. Stop."

Muna didn't. Her hand rose again.

Michelle raised hers too. Two High Soulbornes, two mothers, two warriors—colliding wills under a night charged with death.

The sky split once more.

Only this time, Lafrosa trembled with the weight of a storm that might not stop.