Darklore — Snake's Tribe.

It had been months since Inara had fooled her mother to train her in controlling her presence, her aura. She thought that, with her current talent and her being the sole heiress of Echidna, it would be an easy task to do.

But it was exactly because of her newfound status that it became difficult.

She had inherited too much power in a short amount of time that she was unconsciously overwhelmed by it, unable to control it efficiently.

That was what her mother, Medusa, noticed immediately.

Inara was clumsy with her body, as if she was not born with it. Her steps were unbalanced, her movement sometimes felt forced, even her own breathing was weird, as if forcing herself to suck the air inside her lungs.

She looked like someone who had just obtained a new body, trying to master it in only days.

Medusa at that time had looked at her daughter suspiciously. Things were getting more and more weird, and a nagging feeling of danger crept into her every time she looked too deeply into her daughter.

Those feelings, those thoughts kept her from properly training Inara, and the latter noticed it.

She realized that if she wanted to use her power at its maximum potential, then she needed someone who can guide her, someone who won't look at her like a nefarious monster — even if she was — to be killed at first sight.

So she opened up to her mother, the one who didn't abandon her when she was just a pitiful little snake girl devoid of talent worthy of being her heiress.

She didn't tell her about Echidna, she simply told her that she had received a legacy of a being who can control monsters.

Only control, not create.

She didn't want to scare her mother away because even with the simple fact she controlled monsters, Medusa looked at her daughter with wide eyes filled with earthshaking shock.

That's when she understood the dread she felt about her daughter, and weirdly it immediately lessened it, making it even disappear.

Managing the fear of something you know and understand was always easier than managing the fear of the unknown.

That's why, a wide excited smile split on Medusa's face, as she embraced her daughter in a tight hug, happy that she finally had the strength to take care of herself even if one day she died or something happened.

She then warned her to never tell this to anyone, her eyes were extremely serious as her green slitted eyes narrowed to small needles.

Inara found it unusual for her mother to act like that. Her voice was filled with a note of worry, her hands tightly wrapped around hers.

That was only when she noticed how her mother always seems to put her apart from the other snakemen in her tribe.

Doubt began to spread.

But she didn't show it at that moment, and continued her training, showing her mother her five green leeches.

Days and weeks and months passed in intense training sessions where Inara and her five leeches improved dramatically.

Her aura was now controlled, comfortable and at ease in her new body, with her leeches stronger.

Now one step would not make them explode into a burst of vicious, slimy substance.

Well, depending on whose step it was.

Now Inara was in her green chamber, sitting on the edge of her bed covered in green bedsheets with snake patterns on it, as she looked at her five leeches in front of her.

They had grown a little bit bigger, and distinctions started to show between them. Inara thought it was time to give them names, but first…

"…so all of this was happening here and I was unaware of it?" She muttered, her eyes narrowed.

Since feeling something wrong with her mother, Inara had tasked her five leeches to scout their territory and listen to the conversations of the people.

She put them in many different parts, and even in the houses of the high-ranking snakemen.

And she discovered something she never thought would happen in this place.

Something that was more seen in human's society, but it looked like snakes too can be good at that.

"These fuckers wish to take my mother's place." Inara cursed, irritation ignited inside her heart like a gas station caught in fire.

Why would they want to do that?

Her mother never did anything wrong. She treated everyone in this tribe with fairness and respect.

She never used her authority to impose her beliefs and even went as far as to create a council with high-ranking snakemen to share the authority, showing her character of someone not blinded by power. But someone who thinks first and foremost of her tribe.

So why?

Inara didn't understand and she didn't need to.

She was no longer the same weak girl who would have been terrified and helpless in this situation.

They want to take down her mother?

Perfect.

Let's them try.

It just so happened that she had monsters to feed.

"Disgusting bastards, just fucking wait." Inara growled as she clenched her fists tight, scaring her cute five leeches.

They looked at each other, then, in their own mysterious language.

"Hey, mother is angry." One of them said, the fattest one. Clearly, the favorite of Inara.

The other four looked at him with disdain.

"Well, aren't you a fucking genius?"

"What a dumbass."

"Shut your mouth, we can see it!"

"A damn idiot."

They all kept swearing at him — like their mother — but the man himself just looked at them, smugness full on his slimy face as he mocked.

"You just mad because you ain't the favorite. Hahahah!" He laughed, causing the other four to directly jump on him, ready to tear his irritating smile off his damned face.

A fierce battle followed, making Inara lose her concentration and what followed was not something young people should hear…

Inara's mouth was truly sacrilegious.

…

Fokay — Moonborne Trial's Realm.

Kaden sluggishly opened his hazy eyes. He blinked, making him able to clearly see his surroundings.

He was in a small cramped cave — barely enough for two people — with frost all over them, from the walls to the floor. On the ceiling, there were jagged spikes of ice with sharp tips pointed downward on them.

He was laying on his right side, then slowly tried to stand up, his numb arms failing him a couple of times, before leaning his back on the frosted wall.

In front of him sat Sora looking at him with her golden eyes still burning with her usual fiery glow, between them a golden fire flickering softly, giving them fire in this winter hell.

No one spoke for a moment before finally…

"We are even now." She said, making Kaden tilt his head slightly in confusion.

"About?" He asked.

"You saved me, I saved you." She said, a note of embarrassment as she said the first words, "now we are even."

Kaden held her gaze then, "I saved you two times. The second one you almost killed me with your foolishness." He said, "and you… you saved me once. We are not even yet."

"I didn't ask you to do it." She hissed, the fire between them flickered erratically.

"You would have died if I didn't."

"I am an Asterion, no meager beasts and storms can kill me. I would have survived either way." Her voice was overflowing with deep unfathomable confidence.

"Then next time I will let you by yourself, golden voice. You die or you live…"

Kaden shrugged.

"…that will be your own responsibility."

"It has always been my responsibility, no one asked you to do it." She growled, looking ready to pounce on him.

Kaden looked at her neutrally before tilting his head and asked, curiously and innocently, "do you have anger issues?"

Sora immediately stood up, about to claw the face of Kaden, she struck an icy rock with her feet, then fell on the ground weakly, her face first.

Her body was still not in its top form.

She slowly raised her head, and saw Kaden's mocking grin.

"Careful, golden voice. You are not in your golden castle with celestial carpet here."

Her face began to flush red as embarrassment took hold of her being. She gritted her teeth and slowly stood up and took back her previous position.

She didn't say anything, she just sat, turned her head away from Kaden and looked at the flickering golden flame with eyes looking like about to cry.

Kaden then looked through the mouth of the cave, and noticed the full moon in the sky.

By this time, he already guessed how this dungeon worked.

He realized that they could only progress in this trial during the full moon phase, and try to stay alive during the other two phases.

He sighed heavily as he put his head on the wall, his thoughts racing.

Soon, a tense and uneasy silence swelled inside the cave as the two of them sat in stillness.

Golden hair flickering like the light of a sun. Raven-black hair gleaming like the depths of a bottomless pit of despair.

The sun's heiress and the heir of death, face to face, trapped inside the cold… with the moon as their only witness.

…what a strange, surprising world.

—End of chapter 211—

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