My Shard Bearer System - Elias's Legacy-Chapter 231: Wrenching Moments

Giselsin ran on steel and guesswork.

And somewhere buried in that difference... was the truth.

A blast of Fire lit the grove.

It hit wide—barely more than a spark. A boar shrieked as its flank sizzled, hide blackening just enough to enrage it.

The hunter cursed, breath sharp. "Focus, damn it."

His gem flickered at his wrist, pulsing weakly beneath cracked glass. The conjuring wasn’t enough.

Another hunter—a veteran, slower—raised a hand. Wind stirred the dirt around his boots, pushing dust toward a fleeing shape.

The gust caught a trail, then scattered. Too weak. Too late.

His shoulders sagged. No breath left to conjure more.

This was the Wardens’ task—every season, every coin. Cull the wildthorn boars before they uprooted the crops, before the patrols noticed.

Each carcass fetched fifty coins at market.

Fifty coins to keep the terraces fed. Fifty coins to keep the blue-faces out.

Gavric reached Torren and slowed. His hand wrapped around his son’s shoulder.

The grin he gave wasn’t wide this time. Just quiet. Measured.

"Swing hard, son," he said. "Fear’s just noise."

Torren didn’t answer. His jaw clenched. The gem on his wrist pulsed again, dim and shaky.

The words lingered.

Veyren could feel Gavric’s heartbeat through the sling—strong, steady, unfazed by blood or failure.

He lives for this.

Cradle Planet didn’t break him, Veyren thought. Not fully.

But it tried. Plasma fire. Falling cities. A father screaming over comms before silence cut in.

The dig sites loomed behind them—stone ridges and humming engines, the legacy of the blue-faces still embedded in clay.

Forty-five years ago, blades like Gavric’s had failed.

A hunter nearby wiped blood from his axe. "Fifty coins, no less—boar’s prime," he muttered, haggling over a corpse while the others stacked kills.

Veyren’s shard pulsed again, sharper this time.

If I chase this mission...

He looked down, felt his tiny hand tighten.

...does Gavric’s legacy disappear with it?

The sling’s leather creaked under his grip.

They returned at dusk, with Gavric’s laughter echoing down the path.

His axes were still crusted in blood. His boots tracked dust into the foyer. He shouted like a man returning from war.

"That’s how Kaelithars feed the Banquet!"

Seraphine didn’t even flinch. She stood at the table, arranging wicks for the spirit lamps, wax staining her fingertips.

"Clean up before the moons rise, Gavric." Her tone was dry. "The square’s waiting."

Gavric just chuckled, already setting Eldrian down. The boy scampered off after Jitter, his sticky hands reaching for the feraline’s tail.

Torren stood taller, chest puffed. Gavric ruffled his hair, pride easy in his touch.

"We’ll shine brighter than the moons tonight," he said.

Veyren stayed silent.

Seraphine reached for him, her hand brushing his cheek as she lifted him from the sling. Her fingers were warm, but tense.

Her eyes flicked across the task list on the table—lanterns, meat crates, conjuring stones, banners sewn with the twin-moon crest.

The manor buzzed.

Maids hauled barrels. Cooks stoked the hearths. Voices rose and overlapped, the energy building for what came next. ƒrēenovelkiss.com

The Banquet of the Twin Moons.

And in the noise, Veyren’s shard hummed once more—deep and cold beneath the warmth.

The manor welcomed him. Fed him. Named him.

But the mission stirred beneath it all, pulling at the thread of who he was meant to be.

A secret with no shape.

Only pulse.

Kenosha Shibuya’s market square pulsed with sound and motion.

Hundreds crowded beneath the open sky, packed tight between lantern poles and food carts, their faces lit by the twin moons—one silver, one amber—gliding in tandem above the terraces. Music drifted between stone alleys and archways, soft but persistent, layered beneath footsteps, laughter, the occasional bark of a merchant raising his price.

Spirit lamps dangled from the stalls, their crystal cores flickering with uneven glow. Some sputtered, dimming as the conjurers feeding them grew tired. Energy cost more than coin now. Effort was its own currency.

Water was conjured and cooled in clay mugs, steam curling off the rims before settling into beads of condensation. Earth reinforced the legs of makeshift tables, stacked with fire-grilled boar skewers, thick slabs of glazed tuber, and charms carved from dull-cut stone—each etched with a faint glyph. Fire gems nestled inside them flickered with textbook spells, a child’s grasp of power encased in tradition.

House Kaelithar’s banner hung high above it all.

Twin moons embroidered in black thread gleamed faintly against navy silk, the crest stiff from age but impossible to miss. Lesser families gathered nearby, their own sigils tucked between poles, but none reached as high. Since the hero’s death forty-five years ago, House Kaelithar had guarded this tier of the city like a knife at the throat of the mountain.

Seraphine moved slowly through the crowd.

Her arms cradled Veyren with quiet firmness, the folds of her robe brushing his face with every step. The fabric smelled of wax and old ink, her sash twisted tightly in one hand. Each nod she gave was measured. The smile behind it didn’t reach her eyes.

"We welcome all under the moons," she said to a merchant offering dried fruit wrapped in leafskin.

Her voice was steady. But her fingers trembled.

Like saying it out loud—welcoming everyone—was a toll she had to pay.

Torren trailed just behind her, head tilted down, words barely audible.

"Blue-face thieves."

The phrase came bitter. Sharp-edged.

His gem sat dull on his wrist, no light rising from it. His eyes flicked toward a boy standing near another house’s booth—half a head taller, wrapped in brighter cloth. The boy’s gem gleamed. So did his smirk.

Neither spoke. They didn’t need to.

Eldrian bounced from Gavric’s shoulders, one hand waving a half-eaten skewer through the air. Grease dripped onto his father’s armor, but Gavric didn’t flinch. He moved through the crowd like the festival belonged to him.

Jitter weaved between legs and baskets, darting in and out of crates, her small body a blur as she snatched a fallen crust of bread and bolted under a table.

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