I couldn’t speak.

  My mind was spinning, overflowing with questions I couldn’t even begin to form. My chest tightened so hard I genuinely thought I might have a heart attack. Kyle’s words echoed like a thunderclap in my skull.

  I managed to ask the only thing that made sense at the moment.

  “If my brother truly carries the Heavenly Flame Dragon Spirit… then why did he lose his cultivation?”

  Kyle’s eyes darkened.

  “He didn’t lose it,” he said, voice low and serious. “Two years ago, Queen Riva discovered that a 14-year-old boy had inherited the Flame Dragon Spirit. That boy… was your brother.”

  He paused, letting the weight of that truth settle in.

  “To protect him,” he continued, “Queen Hai Ri sealed his cultivation herself. She erased every trace of his spirit energy so no one—not even Riva—could track or harm him.”

  The room seemed colder now. The idea that Ravel had been protected, not abandoned by power, shattered everything I thought I knew.

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  “But,” Kyle went on, his voice shifting into something darker, “if you think we’re safe because Riva was injured and Hai Ri has vanished… you’re wrong.”

  He looked at me sharply.

  “The real threat now… is Erwin Alther.”

  I frowned. That name—unfamiliar, yet immediately unsettling.

  “Erwin who?” I asked.

  “A shadow,” Kyle said grimly. “A man who emerged from nowhere. He’s Riva’s right hand. And though no one knows the full extent of his power… I’ve faced him.”

  Kyle paused, then slowly rolled up the sleeve of his robe.

  A massive, jagged wound stretched across his arm—deep, dark, and pulsing faintly with residual energy. It wasn’t healing, even with his power.

  “I fought him when Hai Ri battled Riva,” he said. “And I lost.”

  The silence that followed was heavier than anything I’d felt all night.

  Kyle—the third most powerful being alive, Hai Ri’s personal disciple—had lost.

  “Badly,” he added, quietly.

  I felt like I was sinking into the floor.

  If Kyle had been defeated, what hope did the rest of us have?

  He looked at me with burning determination in his eyes.

  “Before disappearing, Hai Ri gave me one final order—to take Ravel to her castle. There, she will break the seal and awaken the dragon spirit inside him.”

  I swallowed. “And when it awakens…?”

  Kyle’s voice dropped to a whisper.

  “Then… Ravel’s power will be unimaginable. A force the world hasn’t seen in centuries.”

  He stepped forward, the flame-shaped pendant around his neck glowing softly.

  “It’s the only way we stand a chance against Erwin Alther… and Queen Riva.”

  Suddenly, a violent shockwave of soul power ripped through the air.

  Kyle instantly steadied himself, his aura flaring like a barrier—but I was thrown backward, falling out of my chair and gasping for breath.

  The surge was so strong, so raw, it made the very stones of the castle tremble.

  Kyle turned sharply toward the source, eyes wide.

  “…It’s coming from Ravel’s room,” he said.

  And in that instant, we both knew—

  Something had awakened.