Chapter : 701

“I won’t,” he promised, accepting the heavy, cold book. The weight of it felt significant, a physical manifestation of the dangerous path he was now walking.

He gathered his chosen tomes, a heavy, precarious stack in his arms. It was a strange arsenal—atlases of the body, guides to herbs, and treatises on forbidden magic. But for the war he was about to fight, these were the most powerful weapons he could have asked for.

He followed his mother back down the stairs and into the fading sunlight of the solarium. She did not ask him about his plans, about Zakaria, about the “certain fate” that awaited him. She seemed to understand, with her quiet, ancient wisdom, that he was on a journey he had to walk alone.

She simply placed a gentle hand on his cheek, her touch surprisingly cool. “Be careful, my son,” she whispered, her eyes filled with a fierce, maternal love that was more powerful than any ducal army. “The world is a much larger and more complicated place than your maps would have you believe. Come home safe.”

“I will, Mother,” he said, his voice thick with an emotion he rarely allowed himself to feel.

He departed with the heavy books clutched to his chest, his preparations now truly complete. He had his mission, his shadow, his new powers, and now, the knowledge to wield them. He was as ready as he would ever be. The scholar’s journey was over. The warrior’s was about to begin.

The pre-dawn light was a thin, grey wash against the tall windows of the ducal suite. It was the liminal hour, the quiet, breathless moment between the last of the night’s shadows and the first blush of the new day. For Lloyd Ferrum, it was the perfect time for a departure. It was an hour for ghosts and soldiers, an hour that belonged to the quiet, decisive actions that shaped the world while the rest of it slept.

He moved through the opulent suite with a practiced, economical silence. His travel bag was already packed, his attire chosen. The sturdy, dark leathers of the traveling scholar felt more like a uniform to him now than the fine silks of the ducal heir. He performed his final checks with the ingrained muscle memory of a soldier preparing for a mission. His purse of gold was secure. The small, hidden pouch of System-converted emergency rations was in place. His practice sword, a simple, unadorned blade of good Ferrum steel, was belted at his hip.

Everything was in order. Everything was ready.

He stood for a moment in the center of the vast sitting area, the invisible line that demarcated his territory from his wife’s. On his side was the sofa, its cushions still bearing the faint impression of his form, a testament to months of his self-imposed exile. The small table beside it held a stack of his new medical texts, their ancient leather spines a stark contrast to the room’s pristine, modern elegance.

On her side was… everything else. The grand, masterfully carved writing desk where she spent her evenings, the plush divan where she sometimes read, and, looming at the far end of the room like a fortified citadel, the massive, canopied master bed.

He could hear the faint, steady sound of her breathing from within its silken fortress. She was asleep, lost in the quiet, orderly world of her own dreams, blissfully unaware of his impending departure.

A flicker of old habit, of ingrained social programming, surfaced in his mind. He should leave a note. It was the proper, courteous thing to do. A simple, formal message informing her of his journey, a fulfillment of his duty as the husband she had never wanted. He had even composed one in his head the night before, a few sterile, impersonal lines that would satisfy the demands of etiquette without crossing the emotional arctic circle that separated them.

He walked over to the writing desk, her desk, and picked up a clean sheet of heavy, cream-colored parchment. He dipped a quill in the inkwell. The nib hovered over the page, the black ink a perfect, pregnant drop, ready to form the words of a polite, meaningless farewell.

And then, he stopped.

What was the point?

Chapter : 702

What was the purpose of this empty gesture? He was performing a ritual for a relationship that didn't exist. He was showing a courtesy to a woman whose primary form of communication was a silence so profound it could freeze fire. For months, he had been the one to try, however feebly, to bridge the gap. He had brought her his soap. He had made his awkward, idiotic jokes. He had attempted to engage her in conversation. And every single attempt had been met with a wall of ice, a cold, clinical indifference that made it clear his presence was, at best, a logistical inconvenience.

He had been playing by a set of rules she had never agreed to, in a game she had no interest in playing. He had been the one expending the energy, the one maintaining the facade of a shared existence. And for what? To be treated as a piece of furniture, a "fluctuating variable," a strange, inconvenient anomaly in her perfectly ordered life.

The memory of her reaction to Faria’s visit surfaced, a sharp, clear image. He remembered the flash of something in her eyes, something that looked almost like jealousy, quickly masked by a cold, political lecture on appearances. Even her emotions, it seemed, were tools of statecraft.

No. He was done.

He was done being the one to extend the olive branch, only to have it freeze and shatter in his hand. He was done playing the part of the dutiful, if awkward, husband to her role as the untouchable Ice Princess. If she wanted silence, he would give her silence. A true, absolute silence. The silence of absence. The silence of being completely and utterly ignored.

It was a petty move. A childish one, perhaps. But it was also a tactical one. It was a shift in the dynamics of their cold war. For months, he had been a passive, reactive force in their shared space. Now, he would be the one to act, or in this case, to pointedly not act. He was sending a message, and the medium of that message was a profound and deliberate void. He was a general making a strategic withdrawal to a new, more defensible position.

With a slow, deliberate movement, he placed the unused quill back in its stand. He pushed the clean, unmarked sheet of parchment away. The note would not be written. The goodbye would not be said.

He turned and walked away from her desk, crossing the invisible border back into his own territory. He picked up his travel bag and the heavy stack of medical books, their weight a comforting, tangible burden.

He gave the silent, curtained bed one last, long look. He felt a strange, fleeting pang of something that was not quite sadness, but a sort of weary resignation. It was the quiet death of a hope he hadn't even realized he'd been holding onto—the faint, foolish hope that one day, the ice might thaw.

With that final, unspoken farewell to a future that would never be, he turned and walked to the door of the suite. He opened it without a sound and slipped out into the corridor, closing it gently behind him.

Ken Park was waiting for him, a silent, unmoving statue in the dim, pre-dawn light. His bodyguard’s face was, as always, an unreadable mask, but his dark eyes missed nothing. He saw the books in his lord’s arms, the travel bag, the new, hard set of his jaw. He saw the quiet finality of the closed door. He saw everything and said nothing.

“It’s time, Ken,” Lloyd said, his voice a low whisper in the sleeping palace.

Ken gave a single, sharp nod. He took the heavy stack of books from Lloyd’s arms without a word, his own strength making the massive tomes seem as light as a handful of feathers.

Together, the lord and his shadow walked away down the long, silent corridor, their footsteps making no sound. They left behind them a closed door, a silent room, and a message that was all the more powerful for having never been written.

The journey from the private ducal suites to the main courtyard of the estate was a walk through a mausoleum of memories. The torchlight flickered on the polished marble floors, casting long, dancing shadows that seemed to writhe and twist like ghosts. They passed under the stern, painted gazes of Lloyd’s ancestors, generations of Ferrum warriors and lords whose portraits lined the grand hallway. In his youth, their silent judgment had been a heavy, oppressive weight. He had felt like a profound disappointment to their legacy of steel and fire.