Lloyd looked at her. He looked at the pain in her face. He wanted to lie to her. He wanted to tell her it was just propaganda, that the Altamiran government had brainwashed its people, that it was all just a misunderstanding. It would be the kind thing to do. It would let her sleep at night.

  But Lloyd respected her too much for that. She had walked into the lion's den with him. She had faced danger and death to save her friend's sister. She wasn't a child anymore. She was a soldier in his army, whether she carried a sword or not. And soldiers deserved the truth, no matter how ugly it was.

  "You want to know why they hate us," Lloyd said, his voice flat. It wasn't a question.

  "Yes," Jasmin said. "I need to know. The history books... the ones they teach us in the Academy or the ones in the library... they say we are the liberators. They say Bethelham brings order. But the way those people looked at us... that didn't look like liberation."

  Lloyd let out a short, dry laugh. He reached out and tapped the stack of books in front of him. "History books," he said with a sneer. "History books are written by the people who won, Jasmin. They are the trophies of the victors. They aren't interested in truth. They are interested in justification. If you want to know why a man hates you, you don't ask the man who punched him. You ask the man with the black eye."

  He stood up and walked over to a shelf deep in the shadows of the archives. He ran his finger along the spines of the books until he found one that was covered in a thick layer of grey dust. It was an old book, bound in black leather that was cracking with age. There was no title on the spine, just a faded symbol of a four-headed hydra.

  He pulled it out and walked back to the table, dropping it with a heavy thud. Dust puffed up into the air, making Jasmin cough.

  "This," Lloyd said, placing his hand on the cover, "is the truth. It's not the truth they teach in schools. It's not the truth the King likes to talk about at banquets. It's the truth that is written in blood. And trust me, there is a lot of blood."

  Jasmin looked at the book with a mixture of curiosity and fear. "What is it?"

  "This is the history of the world before there was a Kingdom of Bethelham," Lloyd said. "This is the history of the United Front of Babylon."

  "Babylon?" Jasmin repeated. "I've never heard of it."

  "Of course you haven't," Lloyd said, sitting back down. "They tried very hard to erase it. Babylon wasn't a kingdom. It was an Empire. A massive, unstable, glorious, and absolutely horrific Empire that covered almost the entire continent. It existed about a hundred years ago. And it was ruled by four families."

  He opened the book. The pages were yellow and brittle. He turned them carefully until he found a map. It was a map of the continent, but the borders were all wrong. There was no Bethelham. There was no Altamira. There was just one giant, sprawling mass of land divided into four colored sections.

  "Look here," Lloyd said, pointing to the map. "You see these four territories? They represent the four pillars of Babylon. The four nations that made up the Empire."

  He pointed to the north. "The Nation of Ferrum. That's us. Or rather, that's what we used to be."

  He pointed to the west. "The Nation of Austin. That's my mother's family."

  He pointed to the east. "The Nation of Garcia. That's where I went to get the cure for Rosa's mother."

  And finally, he pointed to the center. "And the Nation of Throne. They don't exist anymore. Not really."

  Jasmin leaned in, her eyes wide. "Four nations? But how did they work together? The Ferrums and the Austins... we are so different."

  "They didn't work together," Lloyd said with a dark smile. "That's the joke. It was called the 'United Front,' but there was nothing united about it. It was a nightmare of politics. The way it worked was simple, in theory. Every ten years, the leadership would rotate. One family would become the Emperor family, and the other three would be vassals. They would rule the entire continent for a decade. Then, when their time was up, they would step down, and the next family would take the throne."

  "That sounds... fair?" Jasmin ventured, though she sounded unsure.

  "Fair?" Lloyd laughed. "Jasmin, imagine you have absolute power for ten years. You can do anything you want. You can take any land, kill any enemy, tax any peasant. And you know that in ten years, your rival is going to take that power away from you. What do you do?"

  Jasmin thought about it. "You... you try to keep the power?"

  "Exactly," Lloyd said. "Or, you spend your ten years looting the country so thoroughly that when your rival takes over, there is nothing left for them to rule. You spend your ten years killing anyone who might challenge you later. You spend your ten years building armies to protect yourself when you step down."

  He looked at her, his expression grim. "Cruelty wasn't a bug in the system, Jasmin. It was the only common language. Every decade was a race to see who could be the most brutal, the most efficient tyrant. Because if you were weak, even for a moment, the other three families would eat you alive."

  Jasmin shuddered. "It sounds horrible."

  "It was," Lloyd agreed. "It was a meat grinder. And the people who got ground up weren't the lords or the ladies. It was the common people. The farmers. The merchants. The people who just wanted to live their lives. They were just resources. Cattle to be used by whichever family happened to be wearing the crown that decade."

  He tapped the map again. "And that brings us to Altamira. Or rather, the place that would become Altamira. Back then, it didn't have a name. It was just a region. A very special, very unlucky region."

  Lloyd paused, looking at Jasmin to make sure she was ready to hear this. He was about to destroy her image of his family, of the noble House Ferrum. But she had asked. She wanted to know why they were hated.

  "You asked why it's personal," Lloyd said quietly. "It's personal because we didn't just conquer them, Jasmin. We owned them."

  Lloyd watched Jasmin process the concept of the United Front of Babylon. It was a lot to take in. The idea that the stable, relatively peaceful world she knew was built on top of such a chaotic system was jarring. It was like finding out your house was built on a graveyard—which, in a metaphorical sense, it was.

  "So," Jasmin said slowly, trying to piece it together. "Four families taking turns being tyrants. And the Ferrums were one of them."

  "We were one of the worst," Lloyd corrected her. He didn't sound proud, but he didn't sound ashamed either. He sounded factual, like he was reciting the specifications of a machine. "The Ferrums have always been warriors. We believe in steel. We believe in strength. When it was our turn to rule, we didn't use diplomacy. We used the sword. We turned the Empire into a military camp. We conscripted farmers, we burned villages that didn't pay taxes fast enough, and we crushed dissent with iron boots."

  He turned a page in the dusty book. It showed a woodcut illustration of a massive army marching under a banner that looked suspiciously like the Ferrum crest, but jagged and crueler.

  "And the Austins?" Jasmin asked. "Your mother's family?"

  "They were different, but not better," Lloyd said. "The Austins deal in the Void. They deal in magic and secrets. When they ruled, it was a time of shadow police, disappearances, and magical experiments. People didn't get executed in the town square; they just vanished in the middle of the night. It was a reign of terror, just a quieter one."

  He pointed to the map again, specifically to a large, green area in the south-west.

  "Now, look at this area," Lloyd said. "This is what we now call Altamira. But back then, in the days of Babylon, this region was known as 'Tiamat.'"

  "Tiamat," Jasmin whispered the name. "It sounds... ancient."

  "It means 'Mother of Life' in the old tongue," Lloyd explained. "Tiamat was the breadbasket of the Empire. It was a vast, fertile agricultural region. The soil there was so rich you could drop a stick in the ground and it would grow leaves by the next morning. It produced the grain, the fruit, the meat, and the cotton that fed and clothed the entire Empire."

  He looked at Jasmin. "Do you know what happens to the people who produce everything in an Empire ruled by tyrants?"

  Jasmin shook her head slowly.

  "They get nothing," Lloyd said. "Tiamat was the richest land, but its people were the poorest. Every grain of wheat, every cow, every apple was taken. It was shipped north to Ferrum, west to Austin, east to Garcia. The people of Tiamat were allowed to keep just enough to not starve to death, so they could keep working. They weren't citizens, Jasmin. They were livestock. They were assets."

  He traced a line down the middle of the Tiamat region on the map.

  "And because Tiamat was so valuable," Lloyd continued, "it was the prize. The four families fought over it constantly. Eventually, they split it. Half of Tiamat was placed under the direct administration of the Ferrum family. The other half was placed under the Austin family."

  Jasmin’s eyes widened. "So... our ancestors..."

  "Our ancestors were their wardens," Lloyd said brutally. "My father's ancestors ruled the eastern half. My mother's ancestors ruled the western half. And they didn't rule kindly."

  He leaned forward, his voice dropping low. "This is the part that isn't in the royal library. This is the blood. The Ferrum lords of that time... they didn't just tax the people. They used them. They believed that the strong had a right to consume the weak. They saw the farmers of Tiamat as a resource for their Void powers."

  "What do you mean?" Jasmin asked, her voice barely a whisper.

  "Blood Steel," Lloyd said. "You've seen me use it. I make chains from the void. But in the old days, the technique was... cruder. To forge the strongest weapons, the old Ferrum lords believed they needed blood. Vitality. They drained the life force of the Tiamat peasants to fuel their wars. They worked them to death in the mines and the fields, and when they were too weak to work, they used them as... batteries. Sacrifices to strengthen their iron."

  Jasmin looked sick. She put a hand over her mouth.

  "And the Austins?" Lloyd continued relentlessly. "They were mystics. They needed test subjects. They needed people to experiment on to understand the limits of the Void. The western half of Tiamat was a laboratory. They twisted people, broke their minds, tried to breed magical affinity into commoners. The Orchid House you saw? That wasn't a new idea, Jasmin. That was an old Austin tradition that the Altamirans learned from us."

  He sat back, letting the horror sink in.

  "So when you ask why they hate us," Lloyd said, "understand this. It's not because we are a rival kingdom. It's not because of trade routes or borders. It's because every person in Altamira has a grandfather or a great-grandmother who was a slave to my family. They remember the Ferrum whip. They remember the Austin cages. They don't see me as Lloyd, the guy who makes soap. They see me as the descendant of the monsters who drank their blood and stole their children."

  The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Lloyd looked at his hands. "The hatred is generational trauma, Jasmin. It's in their bones. To them, the Kingdom of Bethelham is just the same old monsters wearing a new mask. They think we are just waiting for the chance to put the chains back on them."

  Jasmin was silent for a long time. She looked at the map, at the lines that divided the world. She looked at the symbol of the hydra.

  "But..." she started, her voice shaking. "But Arch Duke Roy... and Duchess Milody... and you... you aren't like that. You saved Risa. You fight the Devils. We aren't them."

  "No," Lloyd said softly. "We aren't. But we share their blood. And we inherited their sins. That's the unfair thing about history, Jasmin. You don't just inherit the castle and the gold. You inherit the ghosts, too."

  Lloyd opened another book, flipping past the section on crop rotations and tax levies until he reached a series of detailed geographical surveys. He smoothed the page down. It showed a relief map of the region that was now the Kingdom of Altamira.

  "Look closely," Lloyd commanded, tapping the parchment. "Forget the political borders for a second. Look at the land."

  Jasmin leaned in, squinting at the fine ink lines. "It looks... green," she said. "There are a lot of rivers."

  "Exactly," Lloyd said. "This is the Tiamat basin. It's a geological miracle. Two major mountain ranges—here and here—act as a funnel for rain clouds. The water flows down into this central valley, creating a massive network of rivers and lakes. The soil is volcanic, brought down from the mountains over millions of years. It is, without exaggeration, the most perfect farmland on the continent."

  He traced the path of the largest river. "In a sensible world, the people living here would be the richest, happiest people on the planet. They have everything. Water, sun, soil. They should be fat and happy."

  "But they weren't," Jasmin said, her voice quiet.

  "No," Lloyd said. "Because in the logic of Babylon, value didn't belong to the person who created it. It belonged to the person who could take it. Tiamat was the 'Breadbasket.' That’s a cute name, isn't it? It sounds nice. But a basket doesn't get to eat the bread, Jasmin. A basket just holds it until the master is hungry."

  He moved his finger to the northern border of the Tiamat region. "Here. This is the Ferrum border. My ancestors looked south and they didn't see people. They saw a granary. They saw a supply depot. The Ferrum Nation was mountainous. It was cold. We had iron, we had stone, but we didn't have enough food. We were always hungry. So, we looked at Tiamat and we took it."

  Lloyd’s voice took on a narrative quality, like a bard telling a grim tale around a campfire. "The division of Tiamat was the result of a war between Ferrum and Austin. Neither side could conquer the whole thing, so they drew a line right down the middle. This river, the 'Serpent’s Coil,' became the border."

  He pointed to the eastern side of the river. "This half went to Ferrum. We set up a system of 'Overseers.' These were minor Ferrum lords, the ones who weren't important enough to stay in the capital. They were sent south to manage the harvest. They were bitter, ambitious men who wanted to prove their worth to the main branch. And the only way to prove your worth was to send more grain north than the guy before you."

  "So they pushed the people," Jasmin guessed.

  "They broke them," Lloyd corrected. "They set quotas that were impossible. If a village produced one hundred tons of wheat one year, the Overseer would demand one hundred and twenty the next. If they failed? The Overseer would burn a house as a lesson. If they failed again? He would execute the village elder. It was a machine of extraction. The Ferrum philosophy of 'Steel is Truth' was twisted into 'Strength takes what it wants.' The farmers were weak, so they deserved to be taken from. That was the logic."

  He pointed to the western side of the river. "And over here, the Austins. My mother's people. They weren't hungry for food. They were hungry for knowledge. They were obsessed with the Void. The Austin territories in Tiamat weren't farms; they were harvesting grounds for something else."

  Lloyd paused, looking at Jasmin. "You know how rare magic is? How rare Spirit users are?"

  "Yes," Jasmin said. "It's a gift."

  "The Austins believed it wasn't a gift, but a science," Lloyd said. "They believed that the people of Tiamat, living in such a life-rich environment, had a higher potential for magic. They thought the land itself changed the blood of the people. So, they collected them."

  Jasmin’s face paled. "Collected?"

  "They took children," Lloyd said bluntly. "Anyone who showed even a spark of talent. Anyone who had a strange dream or moved a pebble with their mind. The Austin lords would come, take the child, and tell the parents it was an 'honor.' They said the child was going to be trained in the capital. But they never went to the capital."

  He tapped the map, right in the center of the western region. "They went to places like this. The 'Tower of Silence.' It was a research facility. They tried to extract the magical potential from the blood. They tried to graft spirits onto unwilling hosts. They tried to breed better mages. It was a factory of horrors, Jasmin. And the fuel was the children of Tiamat."

  Lloyd sat back, his expression weary. "That is the history of Tiamat. For two hundred years, they were crushed between the Hammer of Ferrum and the Scalpel of Austin. They were bled dry to feed our armies and our spells. They didn't have a name for themselves back then. They were just 'subjects.' But in the dark, in the slave quarters and the fields, they started to call themselves something else. They started to call themselves 'The Children of Tears.'"

  Jasmin looked at the map, at the green valley that looked so peaceful on paper. "And that's why they hate us. Because we are the children of the Overseers and the Wardens."

  Chapter : 1565

  "Yes," Lloyd said. "When you looked at those people in Saber, you saw shopkeepers and officials. But they looked at you and they saw the ghost of the man who whipped their grandfather. They saw the ghost of the woman who stole their baby. Hate isn't something you can just talk away, Jasmin. It's not a political disagreement. It's a survival instinct. To them, we are predators. And you don't make peace with a predator. You kill it before it eats you again."

  Lloyd walked over to a large map pinned to the wall of the archive. It was faded, the ink turning brown with age, but the lines were still clear. It showed the political boundaries of the old world, a patchwork of territories that made no sense to modern eyes.

  "Let's talk about the man who started the fire," Lloyd said, tapping a small, insignificant dot on the map. "Liam Bethelham. You see this? This little speck of land? That was the County of Bethelham."

  Jasmin stood up and walked over to the map. She had to squint to see it. "It's tiny," she said. "It's mostly rocks and... is that a swamp?"

  "A bog, actually," Lloyd corrected. "Very scenic if you like mud and mosquitoes. This was the powerhouse that challenged an Empire. It’s laughable, really. If you looked at the numbers—gold, soldiers, land—Liam should have been crushed before he even started. But Liam had something the Emperors didn't have."

  "Magic?" Jasmin guessed.

  "Perspective," Lloyd said. "Liam was a visionary. That word gets thrown around a lot these days. Usually, it just means someone who has a lot of money and wants to build a big statue. But Liam... he actually saw the world differently. He looked at the Empire of Babylon—this massive, unbeatable machine—and he didn't see strength. He saw fragility."

  Lloyd traced the borders of the four great nations. "He saw that the Empire was held together by fear and greed. And fear is a brittle mortar. It cracks. Greed is a hungry beast; it eventually eats itself. Liam realized that the Four Families spent so much energy watching each other for betrayal that they had stopped watching the people. They had stopped watching the foundation."

  "So he started a rebellion?"

  "Not immediately," Lloyd said. "He was smart. He was a scholar before he was a soldier. He started by traveling. He went to Tiamat. He went to the mines. He went to the ports. He didn't give speeches. He listened. He sat in taverns and listened to the merchants complaining about taxes. He sat in fields and listened to farmers complaining about the quotas. He gathered the anger. He collected it, drop by drop, until he had a bucket full of rage."

  "And then?"

  "Then he built a network," Lloyd said. "He knew he couldn't fight the armies of the Empire with peasants and pitchforks. He needed knights. He needed soldiers. So he looked for the disillusioned. The second sons who would never inherit. The knights who had seen one too many massacres and couldn't sleep at night. The minor lords who were being squeezed by the Great Houses. He found them, one by one, and he offered them something dangerous."

  "Gold?"

  "Hope," Lloyd said. "He offered them a different kind of world. A world where the law mattered more than the bloodline. A world where a man could keep the fruit of his labor. It sounds simple to us, Jasmin, because we live in that world. But back then? It was a radical, insane idea. It was heresy."

  Lloyd smiled, a genuine expression of admiration. "Liam was charismatic. They say he could talk a starving dog out of a bone. He gathered this ragtag army of dreamers and outcasts in his swamp. They called themselves the 'Sons of Dawn.' It was romantic. It was noble. And it was completely doomed."

  "Doomed?" Jasmin asked, frowning.

  "Mathematically doomed," Lloyd said. "Liam had maybe two thousand men. The Empire could field a hundred thousand. If he marched out of his swamp, he would be annihilated. He knew it. His generals knew it. But he also knew that the Empire had a fatal flaw. The rotation of power."

  Chapter : 1566

  Lloyd walked back to the table and sat on the edge of it. "It was the ninth year of the Ferrum rule. The Ferrum Emperor was old and paranoid. The Austin family was preparing to take over the next year. The transition of power was always the most dangerous time for the Empire. The families were maneuvering, hoarding resources, spying on each other. They were distracted. Liam knew that if he struck right at the moment of transition, he might—just might—cause enough chaos to survive."

  "But surviving isn't winning," Jasmin pointed out.

  "Smart girl," Lloyd said. "Exactly. Liam didn't want to survive. He wanted to win. He wanted to burn the system down. And to do that, he needed a weapon that the Empire couldn't defend against. He needed a traitor. He needed someone on the inside who could open the gates."

  "Imagine the scene," Lloyd said, setting the stage. "A hunting lodge deep in the Whisperwood forests. It's neutral ground, technically, but in reality, it's a place where nobles go to do things they don't want their wives or their spies to know about. It's winter. Snow on the ground. Cold enough to freeze your breath."

  Jasmin nodded, picturing it.

  "Liam Bethelham sits at a table. He's alone. No guards. That was the condition. If he brought guards, the deal was off. He's risking everything. If the man he's meeting decides to kill him, the rebellion ends right there. Liam is just a minor count with a head full of dangerous ideas."

  "And then the door opens," Lloyd continued. "And in walks Malachi Ferrum."

  "Your grandfather," Jasmin said.

  "My grandfather," Lloyd affirmed. "But not the old man I remember. This was Malachi in his prime. He was twenty-five years old. He was a giant of a man. They say he could bend a horseshoe with one hand. He was the Crown Prince of Ferrum, the heir to the most powerful military machine on the continent. He walked in, shaking the snow off a cloak made of black bear fur. And he was also alone."

  Lloyd leaned forward. "Think about the risk Malachi was taking. If his father, the Emperor, found out he was meeting with a rebel leader? Malachi would be executed. Flayed alive. The Ferrums didn't tolerate treason, not even from their own blood."

  "Why did he go?" Jasmin asked. "Why risk everything?"

  "Because he was tired," Lloyd said. "He was tired of the blood. Malachi was a warrior, yes. He loved battle. But he hated slaughter. There's a difference. His father... his father was a butcher. The Emperor believed that terror was the only way to rule. Malachi had spent his youth leading 'pacification' campaigns in Tiamat. He had burned villages. He had killed farmers. And it ate at him. He looked at his father, at the corruption, at the endless cycle of cruelty, and he realized that it wasn't going to change. Not unless he changed it."

  Lloyd held up two fingers. "There was another reason. His son. My father, Roy. Roy was just a boy then, maybe five years old. Malachi looked at his son and realized that if the Empire continued, Roy would grow up to be just another monster. He would be raised in blood and terror. Malachi wanted to break the cycle for his son. He wanted Roy to grow up in a world where he could be a man, not just a weapon."

  "So they talked?"

  "They talked all night," Lloyd said. "They drank bad wine and they argued. Liam talked about justice and law. Malachi talked about strength and order. They didn't agree on everything. Liam was an idealist; Malachi was a pragmatist. But they agreed on the one thing that mattered: The United Front had to die."

  "And the pact?" Jasmin asked.

  "The Pact of Blood," Lloyd said solemnly. "They cut their palms and shook hands. A bit dramatic, but effective. The deal was simple. Liam would launch his rebellion in the spring. He would attack the Austin and Garcia borders. He would make a lot of noise. He would draw the Empire's attention. He would be the bait."

  "Bait?" Jasmin looked worried.

  "He had to be," Lloyd said. "The Empire would send its legions south to crush him. And when the Ferrum armies marched out of the north... instead of joining the Austins and Garcias to crush Liam, Malachi would turn them around."

  Chapter : 1567

  Lloyd made a slashing motion with his hand. "Malachi promised that he would seize control of the Ferrum military. He would kill his father, the Emperor. He would purge the loyalist generals. And then, with the might of the North behind him, he would march south—not to fight Liam, but to join him. They would catch the Austins and Garcias in a pincer. The Rebel Hammer and the Traitor Anvil."

  "It was a brilliant plan," Jasmin admitted.

  "It was a suicidal plan," Lloyd corrected. "It relied on a thousand things going right. It relied on Liam surviving long enough for Malachi to win his civil war. It relied on Malachi being able to kill his own father, a man who was a Transcended Spirit user of immense power. It relied on the soldiers following a traitor. But they did it. They shook hands in that cold lodge, and they decided to burn the world down so they could build a better one from the ashes."

  Lloyd looked at the portrait of Liam again. "That is the origin of our kingdom, Jasmin. Not a divine mandate. Not a holy prophecy. Just two men in a room, deciding that enough was enough. One gave his honor, the other gave his blood. And between them, they killed a god."

  ________________________________________

  Lloyd closed the book on Liam Bethelham and walked back to the shelf where the Ferrum family records were kept. These books were different. They were bound in iron-reinforced covers, heavy and menacing. He pulled one down with a grunt. It was black, with the Ferrum lion embossed in silver on the front.

  "Now comes the ugly part," Lloyd said, placing the heavy tome on the table. "Liam went south and started his war. It was glorious, in a way. The underdog fighting the giants. He won battles he shouldn't have. He rallied the people. Songs were written about him. He was the hero."

  Lloyd opened the black book. The pages were thick vellum, filled with names and dates written in sharp, aggressive calligraphy. Many of the names had red lines drawn through them.

  "But while Liam was playing the hero in the south," Lloyd said, "Malachi was playing the butcher in the north. The Ferrum Civil War wasn't a war, Jasmin. It was a purge. It was a knife fight in a locked room."

  "The King... your great-grandfather... he was strong?" Jasmin asked.

  "King Ironheart," Lloyd said the name with distaste. "That's what they called him. He was a monster. He was a Sovereign-Level dual Transcended user. His spirit was a Behemoth, a creature of pure physical destruction. He ruled the north with absolute terror. He had spies everywhere. He had the 'Iron Guard,' elite soldiers who were fanatically loyal. Taking him down wasn't just about strength; it was about surgery."

  "Surgery?"

  "You have to cut out the heart before the body knows it's dead," Lloyd explained. "Malachi couldn't just challenge his father to a duel. He would have lost. And even if he won, the Iron Guard would have killed him. He had to dismantle his father's power base first."

  Lloyd turned the pages, pointing to the crossed-out names. "It started quietly. A general dying in a hunting accident. A loyalist lord succumbing to a sudden illness. A treasury shipment disappearing. Malachi spent six months weakening the structure. He turned lieutenants against captains. He bribed who he could, and he killed who he couldn't."

  "That sounds... like what you do," Jasmin said softly.

  Lloyd paused. He looked at her, then gave a short, bitter nod. "It runs in the family, Jasmin. We are good at breaking things."

  He continued. "When the moment came... it was swift. Liam had just won a major victory in the south. The Emperor was furious. He ordered the full mobilization of the Ferrum legions. He gathered all his high lords and generals in the Grand Fortress at Ironhold for a war council. He was going to lead the army south himself to crush the upstart Count."

  "And that's when Malachi struck?"

  "That's when he struck," Lloyd said. "Malachi was at the council. He stood at his father's right hand. The Emperor was giving a speech about burning the south to the ground. Malachi waited until the Emperor was at the height of his rage, distracted by his own power. And then, Malachi drew his sword."

  Lloyd didn't need to describe the violence. The silence in the archives was heavy enough.

  Chapter : 1568

  "He didn't just kill his father," Lloyd said quietly. "He signaled his own loyalists in the room. In ten minutes, half the high command of the Ferrum nation was dead on the floor. It was a massacre. Malachi stood in a pool of his own family's blood and declared himself the new Arch Duke. He declared the Empire dead."

  "But... not everyone agreed," Jasmin guessed.

  "No," Lloyd said. "The Iron Guard fought back. The loyalist branch families fought back. The fortress turned into a slaughterhouse. It took three days of room-to-room fighting to secure the castle. Malachi fought on the front lines the whole time. They say his armor was red by the end of it, not from paint, but from blood. He earned the name 'The Lion' that day. But he also earned the hatred of the survivors."

  "And that," Lloyd said, tapping the book, "brings us to Rubel."

  Jasmin leaned forward. "Viscount Rubel?"

  "The very same," Lloyd said. "Rubel's grandfather was the Emperor's younger brother. He was a loyalist. He believed in the old ways. He believed in the divine right of the Ferrum to rule over the weak. When Malachi launched his coup, Rubel's grandfather fought against him. He led the counter-attack in the lower wards."

  "What happened to him?"

  "Malachi killed him," Lloyd said simply. "Personally. In single combat. Rubel's father—who was just a child then—watched it happen. He watched his father die at the hands of his cousin Malachi. He watched his family's status be stripped away. The main branch—Malachi's line—took everything. The loyalist branches were given a choice: kneel or die."

  Lloyd sighed. "They knelt. But they never forgot. Rubel grew up on stories of that night. He grew up believing that Malachi was the villain. That Malachi was the traitor who stole the Empire and replaced it with a weak Kingdom. In Rubel's eyes, my father Roy is the son of a usurper. And I am the grandson of a murderer. He believes the Arch Duchy belongs to him by right of blood and loyalty to the old ways."

  "So his treason..." Jasmin started.

  "In his mind, it's not treason," Lloyd said. "It's restoration. He thinks he is the hero of the story, trying to take back what was stolen. That's the tragedy of civil wars, Jasmin. They never really end. They just go quiet for a generation or two."

  Lloyd closed the black book. The sound echoed like a gavel.

  "Malachi won the war," Lloyd said. "He marched south, joined Liam, and together they crushed the Austins and the Garcias. They forced the creation of the Kingdom of Bethelham. They wrote new laws. They freed the slaves of Tiamat. They did good things. Great things."

  He looked at the shelf of books, rows and rows of recorded history.

  "They rebranded House Ferrum. We stopped being the 'Iron Tyrants' and became the 'Lions of the North.' We became the defenders of the realm. We became the shield. And for the most part, we have been true to that. My father is a good man. He protects his people."

  "But?" Jasmin prompted.

  "But you can't build a house on a foundation of bones and expect the ghosts to stay quiet," Lloyd said. "The river of blood that Malachi shed... it's still flowing. It flows through Rubel. It flows through the memory of the Altamirans. And it flows through me."

  He looked at Jasmin, his expression tired but resolute.

  "That is why this war is personal, Jasmin. We aren't fighting a new enemy. We are fighting the consequences of our own history. We are fighting the ghosts our grandfathers created. And the only way to end it... is to be better than they were. Not stronger. Better."

  He sighed, the sound heavy in the quiet room. He reached for the lantern, intending to extinguish it and finally head back to his chambers. The story was done, or so he thought.

  "Master Lloyd," Jasmin said, her voice cutting through his motion. She hadn't moved. Her eyes were fixed on the map again, specifically on the green valley of Tiamat.

  "Yes?" Lloyd asked, pausing with his hand on the brass dial of the lamp.

  "You said Malachi and Liam won," she said slowly, piecing the final part of the puzzle together. "You said they crushed the old families and built the Kingdom of Bethelham. They freed the slaves. They wrote new laws."

  She looked up at him, confusion furrowing her brow. "But... if they freed Tiamat... why isn't Tiamat part of Bethelham? Why is there an Altamira? If we were the liberators, why did they run away from us?"