The Moonstone Powder in the nursery glowed with a ghostly blue light, while Ailya's silver hair, soaked in cold sweat, clung to her neck like a dying snake.
She stared at the wedding ring that had rolled to the center of the Blood Rose pattern, hearing the sound of small shoes kicking against the carved wooden door outside.
"Mother!" Luna's baby voice called out, laced with a whimper, as half of a small shoe adorned with a pearl button peeked through the door gap.
Aelia trembled violently, her throat corroded by poison as she rasped, "Don't come in!" The noise outside abruptly ceased, leaving only the Moonlight Grass on the windowsill trembling softly.
Leonard's Xu Ying let out a low laugh from the dome, and twenty-nine poison beads shrank by half an inch. Aelia's collarbone instantly burst open with spiderweb-like bloodstains.
Suddenly, she knelt before Xu Ying, her frostbitten knees cracking the moonstone ground beneath her. "Spare her; I will give you the Frosted Crown and the Star Compass."
"When you wore the Ice Crystal Crown and crushed my Family Crest back then, did you ever think you would one day beg like a dog?" Xu Ying's arms cradled a purple swaddling baby that suddenly opened its crimson pupils. Aelia realized it was not a baby at all but a writhing mass of Contract Potion.
She vomited blood mixed with ice shards and trembled as she reached for the scorching wedding ring.
As the wooden door burst open, Luna's snow-white Lei Silk Stockings were already stained with Blood Pearl.
The three-year-old girl stumbled toward the scattered moonstone shards on the ground, her Anti-Magic Spider Silk Bib embroidered with wisteria torn open by Magic Turbulence. "Mother hurts..." she sobbed, tears bubbling up as her pupils exploded with light spots from the Star River Flow.
Leonard's Xu Ying suddenly materialized, his right hand gloved in black gripping Aelia's throat. "You actually taught this little brat to play mute for three years—" The curse halted abruptly as he saw Luna’s saliva-smeared little hand pressing against the Blood Rose pattern, where the incomplete Star Trail began to fill itself in at a terrifying speed.
"Don't! Bully! Mother!" With each word Luna spoke, stardust erupted from her mouth, causing all mirrors in the nursery to shatter simultaneously.
The poison beads around Aelia's neck suddenly reversed direction, and twenty-nine beams of cold light pierced Leonard’s chest.
The man grunted as he staggered back, his solid form shattered against the colored window by the magic of a three-year-old child.
Aelia lunged at her daughter with a frenzy, but the moment she touched Luna, she was met with the icy grip of Ailina's Burn.
Surrounded by a Guardian Spell of Great Mage caliber, the little girl was enveloped in a cascade of stardust that fell from her floating silver hair. Her lips, which should have been pink, now displayed an eerie ice blue. "Luna, look at this..." she hurriedly tore apart the remnants of the pearl chain around her neck, weaving the blood-stained Moonlight Grass into the shape of a hopping rabbit.
Leonard wiped the corner of his mouth and stood up, his pupils suddenly constricting to needle-tip size.
He gazed at the Xing Hui gradually dissipating around Luna, while the Contract Magic Pattern on the back of his right hand began to glow with an unusual purple-gold hue.
The moonlight from the dome twisted into a vortex, pulling the man into an ecstatic void of exploration, leaving only a fragment of Hei Yu drifting down at Luna's feet.
"Little Moon, sweetie, bring your magic back..." Aelia hummed a broken lullaby, cradling her daughter's neck with her poisoned palm.
As the starry river in Luna's eyes slowly extinguished, she slumped into her mother's embrace, and her wrist emerged with a fleeting Hexagram Mark.
Outside the window, the sound of wisteria flowers rapidly wilting echoed like a mournful cry from Fate's Gear abruptly halting.
Shattered colored glass cast kaleidoscopic blood shadows on the velvet curtain. The moment Leonard broke free from the rift in space, ice cracks suddenly emerged across the nursery floor.
The purple-gold Magic Potion lingering on his military uniform collar ravenously gnawed at his silver-thread embroidered shoes but froze into crystalline ice upon touching the Xing Hui radiating from Luna.
"The Star Trail Completion Technique of the Ancient Elf Clan..." The man swallowed a shattered ice shard with a rolling Adam's apple as his right hand’s finger bones emitted a painful click.
His military boots crushed the moonstone powder scattered across the ground, and blood seeped from his torn shoe soles with each step, branding the ground with a burning wisteria pattern. "So it turns out that the Star Child in the prophecy is you, you little bastard!"
Aelia's poisoned fingertip clawed five icy blue blood marks on her daughter's back as the broken lullaby suddenly escalated into a screech.
The family portraits hanging on the nursery walls flipped collectively, and tears of Hei Xue streamed from the eyes of the Twenty-Ninth Fortress Master.
The Hexagram Mark on Luna's wrist erupted with blinding light, melting Leonard's newly formed thorned chains into molten iron.
"Father is bad." Luna's body curled up in her mother's arms suddenly stiffened, her eyelashes trembling as they brushed against blood pearls.
Her exquisitely sculpted ankles emerged from the ice crystal shackles of Xu Ying, as the moonlight cascading down suddenly coalesced into a tangible Star Compass.
The toxic beads on Leonard's military uniform burst open one after another, revealing a writhing Contract Magic Pattern at the heart—strangely mirroring Luna's wrist mark.
Ailya's silver hair stirred without wind, the frost at the tips coiling like a venomous snake aimed at her husband's face. "Dare to touch her!" Her roar, enveloped in an Ice Crystal Storm, bizarrely vaporized just as it reached within three inches of Leonard.
The man's left eye split into twin pupils, and within the purple-black Magic Flame rising from his palm floated a baby's skull. "Do you think I let those bastards stay quiet for three years by chance?"
Luna suddenly broke free from her mother's embrace, barefoot stepping onto the melting moonstone ground.
With each step she took, layers of crimson wallpaper peeled away from the nursery walls, revealing dense spells inscribed by Mama.
Just as Leonard's Magic Flame was about to reach her hair tips, the girl abruptly tilted her head and emitted a screech that was anything but human.
The entire foundation of the Magic Castle let out a terrifying roar, and all the hanging Magic Lanterns exploded simultaneously into powder.
Leonard was horrified to discover that his shadow was being forcibly stripped away by some unseen force—the dark mass twisted and expanded, taking on the grotesque visage he had worn twenty years ago when he slaughtered the Frost Elf clan.
His prideful Dragon Blood Sword trembled violently within Jian Qiao, and the Contract Gem embedded in its hilt suddenly cracked into dust.
"Impossible... this power..." The man's frenzied scream froze in his throat as his limbs were constricted by invisible Star Trail Chains tightening in reverse.
Luna's pupils, swirling with galaxies, suddenly halted; her delicate fingers made a grasping motion towards the void—instantly, an ice-crystal outline of a heart emerged from Leonard's chest, with twenty-nine veins racing wildly along the blood vessel network.
When Aelia lunged forward, she knocked over a gilded candelabra, and burning whale wax painted eerie totems on the ground.
Her poisoned left hand pressed firmly on her daughter's shoulder while her right hand tore apart a pearl chain that suddenly floated into a circular magic array. "Look, Luna! The little rabbit wants to eat moon grass!" The blood-stained Moonlight Grass grew wildly under the curse's influence, instantly wrapping around Leonard's crystallizing right leg.
From deep within the Magic Castle came the ancient roar of a pendulum, as all shattered lenses in the nursery suddenly flowed back into their lattice.
Luna's Fingertip, infused with the God-Slaying Curse, was forcefully redirected at the moment it touched Father’s throat, altered by Aelia's hauntingly incomplete Requiem.
The girl’s nape revealed the Secret Pattern of the Frost Elf Clan, as boiling Killing Intent transformed into a tangible storm of Stardust, hurling Leonard violently against the cursed ceiling.
"This is mine... this is mine..." the man screamed as he fell, his military uniform tearing away to reveal a writhing Contract Magic Worm at his spine.
The monsters that fed on Children’s Bloodline were frantically fleeing, only to be burned to Ashes by Luna's Purification Spell unleashed without Awareness.
As his body crashed into the shards of the Colored Window, the entire Glorious Demon Fortress's Defensive Barrier emitted a dying wail.
Aelia's trembling lips brushed against her daughter's scalding forehead, discovering that a mark of the Emerging Frost Crown was forming at Luna's collarbone.
Her Pearl Chain, stained with Hei Xue, suddenly wove itself into a sealing bracelet, but when it was placed on the girl’s wrist, it was severed by Xing Mang.
A tremendous crash echoed from outside the Nursery as the Wisteria Arbor collapsed, like a countdown to fulfill some Ancient Prophecy.
Aelia's poisoned Fingertip spasmed into claws on her daughter's back, as a Lullaby mixed with Xue Mo squeezed from her throat.
The curses seeping from the Nursery's walls released black water, but upon touching Luna’s surrounding Stardust, they hissed and burned.
The galaxy within the girl’s pupils began to collapse, delicate marks of Dark Purple emerging from her neck in Frost Chains—those were the Sealing Spells Aelia had planted three years ago.
"Little Moon, be good and look at Mother’s pearl..." Aelia suddenly bit her tongue, pressing the bloodied pearl against her daughter’s Mei Xin.
A rabbit woven from Moonlight Grass suddenly came to life, nibbling on the remnants of the God-Slaying Curse wafting through the air.
Luna's wrist Hexagram Mark dimmed abruptly as boiling Stardust transformed into fine snowflakes that fell softly.
Leonard's broken body suddenly morphed into countless purple butterflies, carrying the scent of Contract Magic Pattern as they surged toward the Window Lattice. "Your blood will ultimately return to the Frost Throne..." His voice twisted and contorted in the rift of voids, until half of a Hei Yu pierced through Luna’s hair, transforming into dark purple Luna.
The little girl suddenly convulsed violently, her ice blue lips spitting out the curse condensed by Xing Hui.
Aelia hurriedly unwrapped the swaddling cloth, discovering her daughter’s heart emerging with a miniature Star Compass—the pointer was frantically striking against the sealing barrier.
All the shattered mirrors in the nursery suddenly reflected a snowy night from three years ago: baby Luna stared with eyes swirling like Xing Hui, while outside stood twenty-nine shadowy figures.
“Mother... cold...” Luna's tearful murmurs pierced Aelia's heart.
She tore apart the last three strands of silver hair twisted into a Soulbinding Knot, and the ice crystal blood pearls seeping from the tips painted a fragmented Guardian Array on her daughter's forehead.
As the last petals of wisteria shattered against the windowsill, the starry river in Luna's eyes finally extinguished, turning into two pools of trembling tears.
Moonstone powder suddenly surged upwards, piecing together a broken Star Map within the dome.
Aelia's poisoned left hand began to crystallize, yet it still clung tightly to the frost secret pattern at her daughter's nape.
Outside the nursery, Qin Si's terrified footsteps echoed, while on Luna's curled back, a tattoo depicting a panoramic view of the Magic Castle quietly emerged—the tower's position was seeping fresh blood pearls.
When the first ray of dawn pierced through the colored window remnants, Luna let out a faint snore in her mother's embrace.
The dark purple Luna in her hair felt slightly warm, unaware that deep within her mind sea, an Ice Crystal Castle was collapsing—the blood starshine on its spire matched perfectly with the cracks on the real barrier of the Magic Castle.
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