He didn’t know why or how, but for the longest time Theodore had always been able to sense Lyrria’s approximate location. It was like he had a metaphysical map etched within his mind with the Dragoness being the only landmark, so when he instinctively looked to his far left, he wasn’t surprised to see the bewitching figure of the Fire Dragoness as she flew stationary in what could only be considered as the VIP section, and unlike when he looked at the impossibly beautiful goddess, naughty thoughts that mainly consisted of pinning and thrusting immediately flooded his mind.

But he was quite used to such things occurring whenever he looked at her, and it didn’t take long for him to take back control of his thoughts.

Surrounding her was her family and the other VIP families of the Dragon race. He could see her older sister, Minerva, her younger half brother, Jericho, her father Osmont, and her new step mother, Yoorin.

Minerva and Osmont were full blooded Fire Dragons just like Lyrria, however, their younger brother was a new type of Dragon that had never been seen before. A Sand Dragon.

No one knew the reason for this occurrence, but when the Supreme Fire Dragon, Osmont mated with his new wife, an Earth Dragoness, it resulted in the birth of Jericho, the first and only Sand Dragon. He was an extremely talented youth with affinities with Fire, Earth and Sand (something that they had never encountered before but had taken in stride), and was treated almost as nicely as the Royal Family and the Destruction Dragons.

Thanks to this, even though he was younger than Lyrria, he had surpassed her 6th Stage Magic Beast cultivation and was in the 7th Stage, something that Theodore knew secretly irked Lyrria.

However, even though many people adored him, just as many people were puzzled by his existence. After all there were many mixed raced matings every day but none of them had ever resulted in a hybrid like Jericho, so as a result of this, many people were very interested in the 2 parents, and waited patiently for them to give birth to another child, wanting to see if they would ever give birth to another powerful hybrid like Jericho.

But because of this, many people who weren’t in the know found out about the history of Osmont’s wife, Yoorin. (Something that Theodore had already known thanks to Lyrria)

It turns out that in the last war with the counterfeit Dragons, which was 20 or so years ago, Osmont’s first wife, Vivian, who was an Elder Dragon that was almost as strong as her Supreme Dragon husband, was killed. (Most people already knew this) And as a result of that, the Supreme Fire Dragon, Osmont, went CRAZY!

He would always attempt to bring forces to initiate another war after the war that took his wife was already over, but was always stopped by the King who wanted to recuperate from their losses. So since he couldn’t defy the King even if he wanted to, he decided to take his anger out on the Western Forest, laying waste to many lives and even causing a few extinctions, so once again he was stopped by the King (who was being quite lenient because of his pity).

Because of this, Osmont had to bottle up his anger, and no one heard from him for about 6 months.

But then one day, Osmont had flown out in a rage, unable to handle the wrath that he was unable to suppress, and launched an attack on the Eastern Dragons by himself. Which was clearly a suicidal attack.

But somehow, he had been able to come back alive, even if with serious injuries and possible crippling, making him a hero that many revered till this day. But what most people didn’t know was that he hadn’t come back alone, and was instead accompanied by a beautiful young Earth Dragoness.

In the war that had occurred before the latest one, a few Dragons had been kidnapped and enslaved by the counterfeit Dragons (which caused the True Dragons to respond in kind). And the Earth Dragoness that Osmont had somehow saved was a descendant of one of those slaves.

The specifics weren’t completely known, but apparently, Osmont had liberated the enslaved True Dragons that were trapped in the Eastern Forest, and started another war right in the enemies home court. (It was because of this that the Dragon King ensured that the counterfeit Dragon slaves were all killed, not wanting the same to happen to them.) Of course, many of the liberated slaves died in the war, but the rest were able to flee in all directions, including Osmont and the Earth Dragoness.

Later on, when the 2 had returned to the Dragon Mountain, the Earth Dragoness had slowly nurtured back the Supreme Fire Dragon’s broken and restless heart (which had worsened after the [Battle of Liberation] because of the death of many True Dragons that he was unable to save during the war, and his ability to bring the ones that were able to escape back to the Dragon Mountain) and had somehow even gotten him to break his vow to take no other wife after his first one had died. (Which Theodore knew Lyrria had mixed feelings about).

Theodore thought it was quite the beautiful story, but he couldn’t stop the jealousy that he felt when he thought about the super talent that they had given birth to.

‘If only my parents were like them, I wouldn’t…’ Theodore thought then sighed with self-pity.

However, when he looked back up, his eyes lit up as they collided with Lyrria’s mischievous gaze. Technically, her entire face was emotionless, albeit filled with noble grace; but Theodore would never mistake the twinkle in his eyes for anything else.

His heart bloomed with an indescribable emotion, and he just barely managed to stop himself from smiling. Lyrria nonchalantly looked away in the next moment, but even though it caused him a twinge of pain, he understood.

They had to keep up a facade in public… and it was all his fault.

“Haah…~” Theodore sighed once more as the fuzzy feeling in his chest began to fade away. But just as he too was returning his focus to the goddess, he caught sight of something that sent his heart back into the abyss.