My Taboo Harem!-Chapter 262: The Fulfilled Prophecy

Seiryū blinked. Once. Twice. Like his brain was buffering.

"...What?"

"You heard me, Azure Daddy." Dravenna’s voice stayed light, almost playful, but her eyes were dead fucking serious. "That one. The tiny dragon with the better jawline. When he’s grown, he’ll come crawling to me on his knees. And I’ll make him my mate. Collar and all."

Silence hit like a guillotine.

Then Seiryū threw his head back and laughed — full-bodied, tears-in-the-eyes, that made birds scatter from nearby trees like they’d just remembered they had somewhere better to be.

A laughter that said he’d either just heard the funniest thing ever or the most terrifying.

"Dravenna—" he wheezed, clutching his ribs, "—he’s THREE."

"And? I’m immortal in bitch years. I am patient. What’s your point?"

"You turned me down! Spectacularly! With witnesses! Now you suddenly have the hots for my son."

"Exactly." She leaned forward, elbows on knees, grin sharp enough to draw blood from a distance. "I skipped the beta version. Went straight for the DLC with trauma buffs, daddy issues, and that delicious dragon blood upgrade. Look at him."

She nodded toward Phei, who was now posing like a victorious warlord on his tiny conquest’s shoulders. "Already better posture than you at twenty-five. Kid’s got range."

Mei-Lin had abandoned Melissa’s half-finished braid entirely, doubled over in giggles so hard she nearly face-planted into the blanket. "You can’t—that’s not—Dravenna, you can’t just claim someone’s toddler!"

"Watch me, sweetheart. I’ve got fourteen years, a color-coded seduction timeline, and zero moral compunctions. I’ll groom him with affection, high-thread-count sheets, and existential dread. It’ll be beautiful."

"He’s going to grow up and marry some nice girl his own age," Seiryū managed, wiping actual tears. "Probably that Kozuki girl—the way they’re going, they’ll be signing prenups by middle school. You’ll be old and grey and he won’t even remember your name."

"Old and grey?" Dravenna scoffed, voice dripping disdain. "Please. I’ll be vintage. Dangerous. Expensive. And he’ll remember. Dragon blood doesn’t do amnesia—it does obsession. It does mine."

Dragon blood calls to dragon blood.

"That’s not a thing."

"It’s absolutely a thing. You’re just too domesticated to admit your spawn is going to grow up feral and fuck like he’s trying to avenge something."

"Dravenna." Seiryū was still grinning, shaking his head like he couldn’t decide whether to be horrified or impressed. "You’re insane. Genuinely, certifiably, ’needs-a-handler’ insane."

"Insane people don’t know they’re insane. I’m visionary. Big difference."

Melissa finally cracked an eye open. "Wait. What did I miss? Why is everyone cackling like hyenas on molly?"

"Dravenna just betrothed herself to the baby," Mei-Lin wheezed, still giggling.

"The baby baby?"

"The baby baby Phei."

Melissa stared at Dravenna for a long, considering moment.

Then she grinned — slow, wicked, delighted in that way only someone who’s already halfway to hell can be.

"Honestly? I support it. Someone’s gotta keep the family curse spicy, and you’re the only bitch dramatic enough to pull off a fourteen-year grooming arc without getting arrested. Or at least without getting caught."

"See?" Dravenna jabbed a triumphant finger at her. "Validation from the chaos enabler herself."

"I was being sarcastic—"

"Too late. You’re my witness now. When Phei Tiamat shows up on his knees, begging for collar and consequences, you’re swearing under oath that this was consensual prophecy."

"Oh, my fucking god."

"Swear it."

Melissa was laughing now too, the four of them dissolving into the kind of helpless, breathless giggles that only happened when you were young and happy and convinced that the future was nothing but endless summer afternoons and zero consequences.

"Fine! Fine, you psycho—I swear on my worst decisions I’ll back your pedo-prediction when it inevitably comes true—"

"Perfect."

Dravenna reclined again, hands behind her head, staring up at the sky like she’d already won the war and was just waiting for the surrender papers.

In the distance, little Phei had finally conquered the blue-haired girl. She’d collapsed dramatically; now they were both rolling in the grass shrieking with laughter, sticky with juice and innocence, completely oblivious to the curse that had just been laid over their tiny, doomed heads.

"Fourteen years," Dravenna murmured, mostly to herself.

"You’ll forget this by dessert," Seiryū said.

"I forget nothing that tastes like future depravity."

"You forgot my birthday last month."

"Like I said... I never forget anything important."

He lobbed a grape at her face.

She caught it between her teeth. Bit down. Purple juice burst across her lips like blood.

All four of them dissolved into that golden, stupid, sun-drunk laughter — the kind you only get when you’re young enough to believe death is something that happens to side characters.

None of them knew.

None of them knew that two of the laughers would be ash and twisted metal in less than four years.

None of them knew the "joke" would metastasize into prophecy.

None of them knew the crazy dragoness on the blanket was serious and would one day collect on the debt — with interest, compound trauma, a body count, and the kind of sex that leaves bruises on the soul.

The memory of their death still hurt.

Even now, standing in her office with the taste of his son still clinging to her lips like a stolen sacrament, the old wound throbbed as if it had never scarred over.

The way they’d dismissed her. The way Seiryū had looked at her—half amused, half pitying, like she was a child throwing a tantrum over a toy she could never have. That single glance had lodged in her ribs like a splinter of glass, and no amount of time or power had ever quite pulled it free.

Her eyes stung.

She blinked it away. Hard. Tears were for women who still believed the world could be kind.

They’re dead now, she reminded herself.

Her heart was still crying but forced herself on the present.

Seiryū and Mei-Lin both. Gone. Ashes and polite obituaries and the kind of memorial services where everyone wore black and pretended to mourn while calculating inheritance.

But their son remained.

And their son had just kissed her like she was the only thing in the universe worth touching—like she was oxygen, like she was gravity, like she was the center of gravity he’d been orbiting without knowing it.

"It has been years," she murmured to the empty air.

To Seiryū’s ghost, who probably still thought her declaration had been a joke.

To the man who’d laughed at her self-made prophecy like it was the punchline to a bad dinner party anecdote.

"And we’ve already taken the first step."

She turned from the window.

Caught her reflection in the mirror—silver hair disheveled from his fingers, lips swollen and red from his teeth, eyes bright with something that hovered viciously between triumph and the kind of ancient, aching loneliness that could curdle milk.

"Your son came to me, Seiryū." Her voice cracked. Just slightly. "Just like I said he would. And he tastes like I’ve been anticipating."

She pressed her fingers to her lips again.

Phei.

He was probably halfway down the hallway by now. Probably wondering if his newfound charms were just that powerful, or if the Dean was simply desperate and hungry after four years of celibacy and administrative boredom.

He had no idea.

No idea that she’d been waiting for him since before he was even brought to the academy. No idea that the prophecy she’d spoken in a garden fourteen years ago had been more than wounded pride—it had been a vow.

A promise she’d made to herself, to the universe, to whatever indifferent gods would listen.

Since I do not want the father, I’ll have the son.

And I’ll have him forever.

She hadn’t held back today.

Hadn’t pretended. Hadn’t played coy or maintained distance or done any of the things a Dean should do when a student walks into her office and kisses her like he owns the room.

Because she’d been waiting years for this.

Years of watching from a distance. Years of tracking his growth, his suffering while she was leached to do anything for him, his slow transformation from broken child to something magnificent while she played Dean while she was in slavery... waiting.

Years of patience that would have driven lesser women mad—or at least into therapy with hourly rates higher than most people’s salaries.

And now—

Now the waiting was over. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

"The prophecy I created myself," she whispered, and her smile was sharp enough to cut glass, sharp enough to draw blood if she smiled any wider. "Impossible, they said. Insane, they said."

She laughed.

It echoed off the marble walls, off the gold accents, off the empty throne where she’d just been devoured by a boy who had no idea what he’d started.

Who’s laughing now?

Because the joke was finally on everyone else.

And the punchline had purple eyes and tasted like dragon.