A Cold Left Arm
She had said it, and it was final. No one in that room had the will or the strength to defy her.
She froze Zrek’s great sword in place, rendering him unarmed. Yet despite this development, he was still determined to fulfill his duty to protect the slimy count.
He ran to his protection, but Reina wasn’t going to kill the count.
Not yet.
She simply turned around and faced Zrek, who—in Reina’s eyes—was struggling pointlessly. He could see that she was beyond his reach, that he could never defeat her.
And yet he still resolved to face her head‑on.
This would have been admirable to Reina, if only Zrek had been protecting someone worthy of such protection and loyalty.
“Ice magic,” she spoke quietly. “Wave of the Frozen Princess.”
The words hung softly in the air for a moment, before the ground in front of her began to rumble.
Then a wave of ice arose from her feet, heading in the direction of Zrek. It was more frost than ice, but the spell surged forward and crashed into him as he approached.
He grimaced and covered his eyes, still moving through the wave. But then, his lowered body began to freeze over.
Despite this, he still moved—just a little. He forced one foot forward, then the other. But it was no use resisting the ice.
Slowly, it crept to his upper body.
“Forgive me, my lord,” he said as he reached for Reina with his right hand. “I was unable to keep you safe.”
The ice reached his lips, but he forced one last word.
“Run.”
That was it. After that, his body froze solid and he became still, like a stone sculpture.
A glorious one.
The room fell silent for a moment as Reina stared at the warrior’s iced face.
“Your strength was admirable,” she said to the ice statue before her. “But your resolve was sullied by the person you swore to protect.”
As she spoke to Zrek’s frozen form, the last echoes of cracking ice faded—and the sound of frantic movement took their place.
Reina felt it before she heard it.
Something was wrong.
Behind her, objects were being thrown aside with careless desperation. Wood scraped against stone. Metal clattered across the floor.
When she turned, Count Juliq Herlon stood there, no longer hiding behind his table.
In his trembling hands was a cup.
It was gray, almost colorless, as if the world itself had refused to decide what shade it should be. Black carvings crawled across its surface like scars that had never healed, and from within those grooves seeped a thin, unnatural aura—dark, slow, and suffocating.
The air around it felt empty.
Totally empty.
Mariada barely lifted her head, but Reina noticed the change instantly.
Her eyes narrowed.
“…Hmm?” Reina murmured. Then, more seriously, “Is that—”
She stopped herself.
“The Void Cup,” she said.
For the first time since entering the room, Reina’s posture shifted.
It was subtle.
But real.
“Where did you get such a thing?”
Count Juliq was sweating heavily, his fingers shaking so badly that the cup rattled softly in his grip. Yet when he saw Reina hesitate—when he saw uncertainty flicker across her face—his fear twisted into something else.
Hope?
No—arrogance.
His lips curled upward, his old pomp returning like a disease that refused to die.
“Surrender to me now,” he said, his voice still trembling, “and I’ll allow you to become my personal pet.”
Reina stared at him, silent.
Her mouth was slightly open.
Not in fear.
In caution.
The Void Cup was real.
And that meant one mistake could kill everyone in the room.
She stayed still.
The cup itself drew her attention next.
It had a mouth.
An animal’s mouth, crudely formed, with teeth set at wrong angles and a tongue that lolled slightly from within. It looked less like a vessel and more like something pretending to be one.
That single detail eased Reina’s tension.
“Haa…” she sighed. “You almost had me for a moment.”
“What?” Juliq snapped.
“You really had me questioning things,” she continued calmly.
She repositioned her stance without urgency. The count frowned, confused by her sudden composure.
“Hey! Didn’t you hear me? I said—”
“I heard you.”
Her tone was flat and dismissive.
His frustration boiled over.
Why is she not afraid? Juliq thought.
“If you don’t surrender right now, I will use this artifact!”
Reina met his gaze directly.
“Then use it.”
She even beckoned him forward with her fingers.
"…!”
Juliq’s teeth ground together.
"Fine!” he screamed. “I command you, Void Cup! I offer you twenty years of my life! Now take that woman’s mana and give it to me!”
The room fell silent.
Then—
The mouth on the cup laughed.
Not a normal laugh.
It cackled like a starving beast that had finally been fed, its sound scraping across the walls and burrowing into the ears.
Juliq grinned, convinced of his victory.
The price came first.
His body convulsed.
Wrinkles tore across his face as if carved by invisible claws. His hair turned white, his posture collapsing inward as years were ripped from him in seconds.
He groaned in agony.
But he didn’t stop smiling.
The cup drank deeply.
Then it turned its hunger toward Reina.
Mana tore itself from her body unwillingly, streaming into the cup in thick, glowing currents. Reina dug her feet into the ground, bearing the pain with clenched teeth.
It wasn’t as agonizing as it could have been.
But it was wrong.
The cup continued to drink.
And drink.
The inside filled with glowing blue liquid, like some kind of elixir, rising toward the rim.
That wasn’t supposed to happen.
Juliq was too lost in his hysteria to notice.
“Yes! Yes!” he screamed. “Die, Reina!”
The cup began to shake.
Violently.
The contents inside boiled and spilled slightly over the rim.
Its mouth stretched unnaturally wide as a piercing shriek filled the chamber.
“What—what’s happening?!” Juliq panicked. “Why is it doing this?!”
Reina roared.
She released more mana.
The cup screamed louder.
“What are you doing?! Stop that!!” Count Juliq barked orders at her.
Silence—except for Reina’s continued roar.
“I said stop that!!”
The blue liquid inside froze.
Ice bloomed outward from the cup, spreading over its surface, then creeping onto Juliq’s fingers.
“Aaah!!” he shrieked as frostbitten pain tore through his hands.
The cup slipped from his grasp and hit the floor with a hollow clatter.
Reina cut off her mana.
Silence returned.
Juliq collapsed backward, clutching his hands and wailing. His plan failed.
In fact, it backfired on him.
Reina exhaled heavily, sweat clinging to her skin.
“You brute! You’re gonna pay for this. You’re gonna pay for hurting a noble like me!” he cried.
Reina didn’t care. She was smiling—not because Juliq was in pain, but because she had bested the artifact.
She had conquered the Void Cup.
That was close, she thought grimly. Any more, and I might have cut it way too close to death.
Count Juliq’s ramblings were not exciting.
But they did have their modicum of pleasure.
For one, the bringer of suffering to others was suffering himself.
“How are you still standing?” Count Juliq asked.
Reina looked down at him.
“You can never best me using a defect,” she said.
“What… defect…?” he gasped.
She rested a hand on her waist.
“You were so blinded by greed,” she said coldly, “that you traded twenty years of your life for nothing. You should have traded fifty—then you might have stood a chance at defeating me.”
She leaned closer.
“Pathetic. Look at you. You’re like a shriveled orange left too long in the sun.”
“Why you—”
She squatted down to Count Juliq’s level.
“You want to know why you really lost?” she asked, rhetorically. “You have powerful men, but you lack the will to motivate them. You spend all your time sitting around and stuffing your face.”
She paused, letting the words sink in.
“Count Juliq Herlon,” she continued. “You’ve lost this time, and there’s no coming back from this.”
“…You think you’ve beaten me! I am a noble. I have connections all over the kingdom—”
“I doubt there’s anyone who would help you,” she replied. “You—a noble without an estate.”
"..."
Juliq stared at Reina with deep dissatisfaction.
She spoke the truth. A noble like him, involved in those kinds of businesses, was bound to be left to die by his so‑called connections. Without his estate, he was useless to them. No one wants to associate themselves with trouble.
Reina leaned in.
“Now—time for payback.”
Count Juliq’s eyes widened. She wasn’t joking. He was going to pay for everything he had done.
She reached for his left arm while he was still reeling from frostbite.
Her hand closed around his bicep. Juliq’s gaze slowly shifted from Reina’s eyes to the hand gripping his arm.
“Feel the same pain I did.”
She let the chilling words hang in the air.
Then she froze his arm solid.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
He tried to flee, but her grip was ironclad. Ice continued to engulf his arm.
He screamed. He wailed. But she didn’t stop.
When the arm was completely frozen, she snapped it off.
Cleanly.
Removing his left arm to nearly the same length as when Marcus had taken hers in the Zeus Woods.
Instead of crying, Juliq stared at the detached limb in disbelief.
Then his mouth slowly opened, terror dawning fully.
Reina stood and left him to wail on the floor.
“Now we’re even,” she said coldly.
She took the severed arm and pressed it against her missing side.
She twisted it, adjusted it, until it clicked into place—ice sealing it to her shoulder.
Then she moved it.
The fingers responded.
The arm moved.
But the ice remained.
Her left arm was blue.
And frozen.
She turned—and the Void Cup caught her attention.
“I’ll be taking this as well,” she said, crouching to retrieve it.
She walked toward the wall of ice protecting Mariada and touched it.
The ice dissolved slowly.
Inside, Mariada was barely conscious. But the fight was over.
“Sorry for keeping you waiting so long,” Reina said softly. “Let’s go home. Krai is worried about you.”
She smiled gently.
Mariada returned the smile, faintly.
Reina lifted her like a princess and carried her from the chamber, leaving the count behind.
She wouldn’t have been able to carry her with one arm.
So she found a purpose for Juliq’s.
I need to get back to training, Reina thought. I can’t let myself be bested by a knockoff magic artifact.
They hurried down the hallway, Reina still unsettled by how close the Void Cup had come to claiming her.
It didn’t sit right with her.
As they moved, a sudden surge of pressure rippled through the air.
Reina stopped and turned toward the window.
A violent, unfamiliar heat clashed against the cold she carried, and before she could react, a blast of crimson light tore through the hallway windows.
The walls began to dissolve.
“What the hell?!” Reina shouted, leaping forward.
She landed at the far corner just as the mansion split apart. The ground rumbled violently, debris collapsing in waves as searing heat scorched everything in its path.
The structure groaned, half of it collapsing inward.
Reina adjusted mid‑air and landed cleanly, shielding Mariada with her body. Despite the chaos, her movements were precise and careful.
She carried precious cargo after all.
She stared at the destruction, stunned by the sheer scale of it.
The heat.
The mana residue.
The unmistakable violence of the spell.
“…Who could—”
Her eyes widened.
“Krai.”
The name left her lips softly.
Then she laughed, a short, disbelieving sound.
There was no way.
And yet… There was only one person reckless enough—and powerful enough—to cause this much damage.
She shook her head, still smiling faintly.
