Monsters aren't born... they're created...

"The princess had finally woken up your majesty," a guard suddenly says entering the garden.

"Hmmm, I do sense something else is a miss though," Baiyue replies sipping her cup of tea calmly. Even the king knew she was right.

The guard faltered, "Uhm well the princess she seems not to be taking well to her new surroundings,"

The king sighs, "What has she done now?"

It seemed as though even the king was getting tired of the situation.

"She isn't responding to us. She's been like this for a while. She's not talking, eating, or taking any of her medicine."

Baiyue hummed standing up, "are you saying that she's behaving as a normal caelestian?"

The soldier bowed afraid. The King also made his way with Baiyue to the other side of the Castle.

Situated where the sky is always black and red. At the darkest side of a well-guarded barred prison was a side of the castle that no one was allowed to venture. The strong thick black miasma surrounded the long pillared bars that appeared like a cage.

The guards wore protected armor so that they don't turn into black ash. The only caelestian that could ever live and breathe in such darkness was only of royal blood. And of course, those who are permitted inside such grounds.

The blackish-red sky burned as the clouds covered the light. It struck a different kind of atmosphere. The king knew of everything that was situated in every part of the castle but one thing he knew that never should have belonged here was the flower that was in Serah's palms.

The Abyssal Lily flower

Serah was sitting on her window sill staring at the flower twirling in her palm swirling with her darkness. Her black obsidian eyes now had flecks of gold swirling in her eyes. And if that wasn't enough, the King recognized the look Serah had on his face. It struck a cord in him.

The same look just like her mother...

She closed her palms crushing the flower turning it to dust and dropping it over the ledge. The plants that lay at the bottom were incinerated as soon as the black ash touched them.

The king knew immediately that something was wrong with Serah. He marched inside while Baiyue stayed put at the bottom. This was a family matter after all.

"Aren't you going up there?" Dante asked walking up to her. The miasma didn't affect him as much as it did to Baiyue.

"I think it's time for William to speak with his daughter and get everything out straight to her," She hummed, "it would be good if she came to the mountains,"

"Oh hell no! I am not going to be her senior," He suddenly raised his voice.

"It was only a suggestion, no need to be flustered about it," she sheepishly replies fanning herself.

Dante shook his head while his darkness cackles inside of him. He looked up at the window. Serah was looking at them and then she turned away.

•°•°•

Serah was still sitting by the window when she felt her father step inside the premises. It hadn't been long since she had woken up. Merely a week now. But she laid low not alerting anyone until the servants had come earlier that morning to check on her.

Of course, they were so surprised that they dropped everything and were so scared they ran as soon as they saw her. Serah could only look at them in pity. She may have been a powerful caelestian but she was after all a child. The wound still ached whenever she moved her body.

'You shouldn't be moving around so much,' Darkside manifested herself in front of her. Her shadowy darkness took the form of her.

"What difference does it make?"

'Do you not want to survive?'

"I want to die,"

The king heard those words that Serah said to her Darkside. He opened the door, stepping inside.

Serah didn't pay any attention to her father. She continued to create the abyssal lilies. She created them and then she destroyed them, letting the ash fall onto her dress.

"Did you come here to stare at me all day or did you want something, Father?"

Her voice was like venom, low and dark. Full of anger and resentment towards her father and this kingdom. The second she saw those pillared bars outside her window. The miasma had grown stronger.

"Is that anyway how I raised you?"

Her eyes flashed, "Raised me? Father, you have not raised me since I was 4 years old. Since you had abandoned me to the council."

Serah scoffs, his gaze wandering to her palm, with little concentration, a little orb of light appeared.

The king was bewildered, shock was an understatement.

"You unlocked your light essence..."

Serah hummed, "Light essence," immediately her darkness shot out of her body eradicating the light.

"Tell me, Father, why can I control the light?"

The king then sat on her bed, his strength seemed to have left him at the sight of her newfound power. With furrowed eyes, he gazed at his daughter.

"You are just like your mother,"

"I knew from the beginning that mother was never Athena, so tell me father, how is it possible for me to have light essence." She begged.

After all, she needed answers, and no one wanted to grant her what she wanted. It was always a battle to survive in this wretched realm.

The king gave her one final look before his head hung low. "Your mother... your mother was from Avarice."

"Avarice? The realm of light," she stood up from the window sill.

The king nodded, "your mother was an Angel,"

Serah could not believe her ears.

Avarice was the realm of the light. A realm of goodness, of everything truthful. Avarice was the realm of the sun. Of sunrises and sunsets. Many different caelestians resided there. Avarice and Iracundia have always been at war with one another for thousands of years. The Angels and the Demons hated each other. They both wanted the other dead.

"Fifteen years ago, I met your mother on the battlefield. Obscurum and Solis were at war at the time. One of their warriors had shot me with a cursed arrow laced with the primordial spell that was on the blade that Zecane stabbed you with,"

"Your mother, she was the one that saved me and nursed me back to health. She was the one that sought equality between the realms. She fought for peace even though her kingdom wanted war."

The king gestured for her. Serah was unsure... she was hesitant but she needed answers. She took her father's hand sitting down next to him.

"You look just like your mother you know. We had to put a seal on your body when you were born that's why your hair color was black than silver white."

It was the first time she had seen her father so calm. The first time in so many years that he finally acknowledged that she was his daughter. He rubbed circles on her palm as if trying to calm himself down more than his daughter.

"When you unlocked your essence, you unlocked that creature within you, and in turn, it brought out your mother's essence, that's why your hair is silver white," he touched the ends of her hair.

After so many years of wanting answers. It took a simple orb of light to get him to tell her the truth.

"Is that why you hated me? Is that why you locked me up? Just because I look like the woman you once loved. Was I just a reminder of your sins?"

Tears filled the brim of her eyelids, threatening to fall but she held it clenching her fists.

"Serah... you do not understand, a lot has happened-"

"Yeah, a lot has happened to the point where you had to lock your daughter up. Do you want to know what they did to me? Do you know that the caelestians you trust so much were also the ones that laid their hands on me?! Do you know how much it hurt every time they did stuff to me?! Do you know how many scars are on my body?! Do you know how much I have lost in these years?! And yet you still want me to live..."

She couldn't control her tears, her eyes were blurry while she looked at him. But he could not say anything.

"You were never my father, you only care about power, you only care about this kingdom, if you truly loved my mother then she would have been here. And you know what there's no reason for me to hear the rest of your pathetic story when you can never hear my own."

The King's eyes widened. The little girl standing in front of him. Was she his daughter? For such fierce words from her. A child that is so mature. Serah's eyes glowed with golden hues mixing more with her obsidian eyes.

"You know what's funny is that you want your flesh and blood, the crown princess to be the bodyguard of the crown prince, a boy that is not your flesh and blood. What does that say to everyone in the kingdom?"

The miasma had begun to manifest around the room wrapping them up in a cocoon.

"I needed you... I needed my dad... my father... not a king, not this kingdom, I just needed you. I was scared and broken when Darkside showed up instead you abandoned me to the council. You left me to rot in a cell. You left me to be your warmaker. All I wanted was for you to love me but all I got was hatred that matched the scars that plagued me."

Serah stumbled back, slowly getting consumed by the miasma.

"I thought that even a slight affection from you could mean something but now whenever you try to get close to me or even show me that you care... all I ever do is become so frightened. I'm still a child... a child that had to mature so quickly!"

The king had his head down. What could he even say to his daughter? There were no words... he was a king, a grown-ass man but his daughter, at age ten, could be so mature. Her words stung, to him it felt like the arrow that had stabbed him all those years ago.

"Monsters aren't born, they're created, something you have achieved. But let's get one thing clear 'Dad' this monster will no longer play your games! I am leaving, and if you want me to stay then you have to kill me!"

The king looked up at his daughter, regret etched on his features, "I'm so sorry little Luna,"

Those five words had silenced everything, the miasma had stopped overflowing through the palace.

Little Luna

A nickname that her father had created ever since she was a baby. The name he had given to her when she would run to play under the moonlight. When she would learn to dance the way the Gods used to dance.

And all it took was 5 words to stop a child from destroying everything.

Footsteps erupted into the room and Serah's hands were bounded by chains. Hands were on her shoulder and then a piercing, burning-like feeling shattered her body as it started from her neck. She couldn't make out who it was but the caelestian behind her was a Vampyre.

A Vampyre that was sucking her blood. A Vampyre that was draining her. She let out a whimper, this was her first time experiencing this. Her darkness couldn't lash out with the chains.

Serah collapses from the blood loss as the King catches her.

"You got here too late," he tells the young boy.

Daemeon wiped the blood from his mouth, his eyes bloodshot. A glare on his face. This time, the king knew he could trust him. For this time, he had the features of a villain. A true Caelestian that wanted power.

And this time the king knew that he could win.