The Death-Chosen Daughter Chapter 09
In just five days, the once proud elven royal court had descended into a living hell
With the fall of Death’s true emissary, her heart filled with bitterness, the lifeblood of the World Tree was completely severed.
Starting from the abyss, the curse of the wither crept steadily upward.
The lower roots rotted on a massive scale. Countless commoner elves contracted the Black Death, their wails echoing day and night. The Lower District had already erupted into three bloody riots that nearly broke through the upper level’s defenses.
Meanwhile, inside the estate of the Vaelen family, a nauseating stench of blood permeated the air.
Nyssa went mad.
To stave off her rotting appearance, she resorted to extreme measures, secretly draining the magic of three low-rankling maids in the dead of night.
But even so, she could barely maintain a human shape for a few hours before reverting to a foul-smelling monster.
As for Caelum, he had become a walking corpse.
For these five days, he had not drank a drop of water, nor had he closed his eyes once.
He wandered the underground black markets like a lunatic, spending countless rare treasures and royal gold coins to buy back the belongings Elowen had been forced to pawn.
A Starlight gown, half-scorched by fire. A Verdantleaf Bow with a snapped string. A silver thistle hairpin, mostly burnt black,
with only a small piece left.
It took him three whole days and half the treasures in the royal vault to track these items down one by one.
Yet with every item he retrieved, it felt as though a new blade was driven into his chest.
He could only lock himself inside the cold side room where Elowen used to live. Day and night, he buried his face in the fabrics that still carried her faint scent, apologizing over and over.
But he could not get even a single word in response.
At noon on the fifth day, the elven royal family was forced to convene an emergency council of the High Elves.
Inside the grand council hall, the atmosphere was oppressive to the extreme.
Lord Vaelen stood in the center of the hall. Facing the accusations of the nobles, he wiped away cold sweat and attempted to shirk responsibility.
“My lords, Elowen was always withdrawn and rebellious since childhood. She hid it from us… We truly did not know she was the emissary!”
“Enough!” the high priest interrupted angrily, his face livid. “What is the use of saying this now? The World Tree’s anger nuust be appeased, or the entire elven continent will be destroyed!”
After a fierce argument, the elders reached a profoundly cruel decision.
“To appease the Tree God and the Underworld, we will select one hundred commoners from the Lower District and sacrifice them alive at the Abyssal Shrine. We will use their flesh and blood to replace the absent emissary.”
Sitting in the corner, eyes hollow, clutching a memory crystal he was desperately trying to unseal, Caelum suddenly snapped his head up.
A raw, ragged sentence tore from his throat. “You would sacrifice the very people she bled to save!”
But the elders ignored the broken prince.
“Executioner, go down to the Lower District and seize them at once!”
Just as the executioner bowed to accept the order and turned around.
A deafening crash shattered the air.
The hall’s impenetrable crystalline canopy suddenly exploded without warning.
It was not shattered by magic, but physically ripped apart by a crushing, physical darkness.
The glaring midday sun was swallowed instantly, plunging the entire court into a darkness like an eternal polar night.
The temperature in the air plummeted to freezing. The magical elements of all the High Elves were instantly frozen solid.
From the very center of the hall’s canopy, a silent darkness tore open a massive tift.
Countless unseen, formless souls condensed from pure black nether mist drifted into the hall through the rift, hovering silently
above the heads of the elders.
The sacrificial scroll in the high priest’s hand abruptly burst into flames.
A long staircase of bone, glowing with an eerie blue light, unfurled all the way down from the abyssal rift, landing right in the center of the hall.
Everyone froze in place.
Some tried to draw their swords, but their hands trembled too violently to lift them.
At the very top of that long staircase of bone, a figure slowly descended.
She wore a magnificent gown woven from the entirety of the stars and the dark night. The long train dragged along the bone stairs, and with every step she took, a spectral blue flower of the Underworld bloomed upon the steps.
Her hair, the color of pure night, radiated a subtle divine light. Upon her brow sat a crown forged of black-gold and netherfire, exuding a terrifying, crushing pressure.
Her eyes burned with blue netherfire, devoid of any warmth.
“It is… It’s her…”
An elderly elven councilor’s legs gave out, and he collapsed to his knees.
“It’s the eldest daughter of House Vaelen…”
“No.” Another elder shook his head, trembling with tears in his eyes. “That is no longer the daughter of House Vaelen.”
“That is the Emissary of the Underworld.”
I walked down the bone staircase, step by step.
Inside the hall, the nobles who had mocked and sneered at me for eighteen years collapsed, one after another.
My father, Lord Vaelen, stood frozen in place.
His face, which had just been wearing an expression of “righteous indignation,” was now ashen.
I did not spare them a single glance.
My gaze fell to the farthest corner of the hall, where Caelum sat. His cheeks were sunken, his eyes hollow. He looked absolutely nothing like the noblest prince of the elven realm.
He was still clutching one of my old dresses in his armis.
The moment he saw me descend the stairs, Caelum trembled violently, as if he were seeing an illusion.
He quickly tumbled out of his chair, desperately shoving aside the elders in front of him, and stumbled toward me.
His usually immaculate blonde hair was a tangled mess, his noble attire stained with dirt and dried blood. With bloodshot eyes and tears streaming down his face, he looked like a fanatic who had just witnessed a miracle.
“Elowen!”
“You’re alive, you’re not dead! Thank gods, I knew you wouldn’t abandon me…”
He practically crawled to the bottom of the stairs, humbly reaching out with trembling hands, trying to touch the hem of my
dress.
I stopped on the stairs, looking down at him from above.
Looking at this face I had once loved to the marrow of my bones, a face that now only filled me with nausea, I felt not a single ripple of emotion.
I lifted a fingertip slightly. A cluster of blue netherfire silently flared up, landing directly on the back of the hand he extended
toward me.
Skin and flesh sizzled.
The sheer agony of being instantly scorched made Caelum instinctively recoil his hand, only to find the flesh on the back of his hand had been burned black, deep enough to expose the bone.
But he did not cry out in pain.
He just stared at me fixedly, tears falling one by one.
“Elven prince.”
I finally spoke, my voice ethereal, carrying the undeniable law of the Underworld as it echoed through the great hall.
“Looking directly at the emissary, attempting to touch the body of a god.”
“Confess your crime.”
