Demonic Dragon: Harem System
Chapter 517 - 517: A little bit of the sisters' past

The metallic sound of blades clashing filled the training ground like repetitive, merciless music. The midday heat made the stone floor almost glow, reflecting the fire dancing on the apprentices' swords. Above, red flags bearing the coat of arms of the Duchy of Blazer waved lazily in the dry wind.

Stella Blazer, only sixteen years old, was flawless.

Her posture was firm, her wrist movements calculated, and magic flowed naturally through her blade: a constant orange glow, intense and steady, like a living extension of her body. Her golden eyes were fixed on the training target—an enchanted dummy with reinforced resistance—and in a single movement, she split the figure's head in two. Fire crackled around the blade for another two seconds before dissipating.

"Perfect, Lady Stella." The instructor nodded, her eyes hard but satisfied. "Absolute control of the ignition. Ten more repetitions with lateral variations."

Stella just nodded, serious. Sweaty, but focused. She was already used to the routine.

A few meters away, Samira trembled.

At only ten years old, she was short, her body still thin and awkward. The training armor was heavy for her, her shoulders hunched from the effort, and her sword looked like a clumsy stick in her small hands. Her red eyes were fixed on the blade. She whispered the words of the spell, once, twice, three times...

Nothing.

The blade remained dull, cold as ordinary iron.

The instructor crossed her arms, her stony countenance becoming impatient.

"Again, Samira."

"I... I'm trying, ma'am."

"Don't try. Do it."

Stella paused her own exercises for a moment to watch. Her face was slightly furrowed, her eyes analyzing her sister—and there was something there, something that wasn't just frustration. It was judgment. Cold. Silent. A pure reflection of her father's mentality.

The instructor approached, taking the baton from her back and slamming it on the ground next to Samira, making the girl flinch.

"You are a Blazer. Fire is in your blood. You need to control the ignition with instinct, not effort. If your blade remains cold, it is because you are weak."

Samira looked at the floor, her eyes filling with tears. She did not cry, but she bit her lower lip until it almost bled. Her body trembled, but she remained standing. In silence.

The instructor sighed.

"You won't even be able to defend your title, let alone carry on the name of your lineage, like this. How old are you? Ten? When Stella was ten, she could already keep the flame steady for more than five minutes."

The words were spoken like knives. Samira felt each one sink deep.

She looked at Stella, who was still watching her. But her older sister didn't approach her or say anything. She just stared at her with an expression of silent contempt. As if she were... ashamed of her.

Her father's gaze. The same harshness. The same disappointment embedded in his eyes.

Samira turned her face away, trying again. She channeled everything. She remembered the way Stella moved her hand, the way she controlled the energy... she tried to imitate her, tried to force the heat out from within.

For a moment, the blade glinted. A faint, almost invisible spark.

And then it went out.

The instructor showed no mercy. She slapped Samira's ribs hard with her baton. The girl fell to her knees, panting, her face against the ground.

"Get up. Weakness is not accepted in this family."

Samira did not respond. She stayed there, knees in the hot dust, hands clenching the ground. She was shaking. But she didn't cry. She didn't ask for help. She didn't even look at Stella.

Stella just turned her face away and went back to her training, as if the scene had lost its interest. Her father had taught her not to feel pity. Not to carry the weak. The "cleansing of fire" began with the elimination of doubt — and at that moment, doubt had a name and a face: Samira.

The instructor gave a few more curt orders and walked away. The training continued.

But Samira remained on the ground.

Alone. In silence.

With a sword without fire.

And a heart beginning to accumulate the ashes of everything she would never be.

A constant buzz filled her ears, drowning out any sound around her.

The pain came first—a heavy, throbbing pain, hammering the center of her head as if something were trying to split her skull from the inside out. Stella groaned softly, her eyes still closed, and tasted the metallic taste of dried blood in her mouth. Each breath seemed to scratch her throat. When she tried to move her arm, a spasm ran through her spine.

"...hnngh..."

She finally forced her eyes open.

Dim light. A cracked wooden ceiling. The boards were poorly fitted and old, and a thin layer of dust trembled with the wind coming in through a half-open window. The room was simple—too rustic for someone like her. A small straw bed under a rough sheet, a bucket of water in the corner, a chair leaning against the wall. No decoration, no markings. Cold. Impersonal.

Stella brought her hand to her head, pressing her forehead. "Where...?"

The pain exploded again, and she clenched her teeth, breathing deeply. Nausea rose in her throat, but she managed to swallow hard. It took her a few seconds to sit up—and even then, every muscle felt three times heavier than normal.

She looked around more carefully. The door was closed, with no visible lock. The window was too small to escape through. Everything seemed... too safe to be a prison. But uncomfortable enough to be isolation.

And then, the memory came back.

Her heart almost stopped.

"Samira..." she murmured, the name coming hoarsely and haltingly from her cracked lips.

The images returned in fragments, like a broken puzzle being violently reassembled.

The devastated square. Scarlet laughing. The siege. The tension. Samira walking toward her, her gaze empty, her expression neutral as ice beneath a volcano. And then...

The roar.

The roar that was not human. That was not natural.

The transformation.

Red flames like the sun bursting around her younger sister—or what was left of her. Clothes being torn by scales that grew like living blades. Eyes burning orange. Wings emerging like demonic sails, the heat distorting the very air. A jaw opening with ivory fangs, sharp enough to break walls.

And then...

The scream.

The colossal roar of an ancient dragon being unleashed inches from her face.

Stella trembled.

She remembered the sound, or rather, the vibration. The way the roar pierced her skin, her chest, her bones—as if the universe itself were screaming at her. The heat was so extreme, so absolute, that her consciousness simply shut down. The last thing she saw was Samira's eye—reptilian, fiery, monstrous—watching her like a distant shadow watches a speck of dust before deciding whether to destroy it or ignore it.

"She... wiped me out," Stella murmured, frightened by her own realization.

She had never fainted because of a roar before. She had never been defeated so completely without even raising a hand. Samira—the same sister she had thought weak, incapable of controlling fire magic on a blade at the age of ten—had knocked her down as if she were just another child.

And she didn't even need a fight.

Stella rested her elbows on her knees, her head throbbing with confused, hurt, bitter thoughts.

"What... have you become?" Silence answered.

But deep down, she knew: whatever Samira was now, it was no longer something that could be brought back home with words. Not with orders. And perhaps not even with love.

She had lost her.

Or... she had never really known her.