Dmitri could feel the despair and misery in Adrianna's heart the entire day she had been participating in the competition. He could feel the fury in her and all the negativity that she had to deal with. He hadn't left his house, wondering whether or not he would have to go and get her. At this rate, she won't be able to cope. He felt like extracting her from the competition and bringing her back to his side. The feeling was writhing at his soul. By the end of the second day, when dusk fell, he could feel that she wanted to be with him - that she wanted to repair the dents that had marred her soul.

He knew that she yearned to be with him, so when he saw the portal open, he stood in front of the portal and received Adrianna in his arms. As soon as she was in his arms, he picked her up and kissed her passionately on the lips.

​​

She responded and kissed him urgently. She wanted to vent out all of the pessimism and gloom that had surrounded her for the past two days. As she kissed him, she cried, her tears rolling out of her eyes. In her anxiousness, she kissed him fervently and bit his lips, making them bleed a little, but he didn't complain; it was normal for werewolves to pour their feelings into each other.

When she finished, she circled her hands around his neck and dipped her head in the crook of his neck. Her cries turned into sobbing.

"I… I killed Zola…" she spoke in between her cries.

"Hush…" he stroked her hair as he sat down on the bed and positioned her to sit on his lap.

"I warned her before and wanted her to leave the area, but she was too consumed in her hatred for me… I could see it in her mind… I knew that Lia already hated me to the point of no return, but Zola…

"Lia had been feeding her own daughter with her poisonous thoughts…"

Dmitri held her tightly and said, "You are not responsible for how others feel about you, but you can always take action if you feel your life is in danger. Don't - even once - feel sad about it. You did what was right. Okay?"

Adrianna didn't answer. The path to claiming the throne was nothing like what she had expected it to be; it wasn't a bed of roses, but rather a bed of thorns that continuously pricked at her feet, her body, and her soul.

When her sobs subsided, he gently brought her to the bathroom to give her a long warm bath. It was the perfect antidote to all the stress she had been dealing with, and he intended to give her a long one. He had already arranged fragrant candles all around. Gently. he removed her clothing and asked her to step into the bathtub before stepping in after her. He picked up the luxurious scrub, and started softly cleaning her. Once done, he warmed up some of the body scrub between his palms, and then using gentle circular strokes, he massaged it onto her chest, her neck, her back, and her thighs. The essential oils in the hot water was helping her relieve her stress. He sat behind her and gave her a tension-relieving shoulder massage using his fingertips. He stimulated the points behind her ears and then moved slowly downwards towards her thighs.

He worked his hands in between them and softly circled her sweet spot. Adrianna relaxed and put her head on his shoulder as he sat behind her; she let him do whatever he wanted. He took his hands to her breasts and kneaded them. She felt cathartic with his hands on her body.

They finished taking a bath and Dmitri carried her right into the bedroom, placed her onto the bed, and brought clothes for her to wear. In the next few minutes, she was covered with a blanket and dozed off.

---

Ziu was in charge of fishing out Zola's body from the lake. When he arrived, he saw that the divers were having a lot of trouble extracting the body.

"There are a lot of fish blocking our way. We think her body has already been eaten," they reported.

"No, it can't be," he replied.As if on an impulse, he, himself, dived into the depths of the lake. However, as he reached the location of the body, he watched as the fish surrounding the body cleared and made way for them. The divers were surprised, but were able to easily extract the body.

The entire exercise took no more than an hour.

"How come the fish cleared the way for you? We were sure that they would have eaten the body by now," said one of the divers.

Even Ziu couldn't answer. Understanding Adrianna's world was difficult for him. He couldn't understand as to why he had dove in; it would have been easy to believe what the divers had said about Zola's body having been eaten, but he just had a feeling otherwise.

In the evening, he attended a dinner with the people from the ministry.