Azalea floated just above the stone floor, her long hair drifting slightly in the still air. I stood nearby, my gaze locked on her, waiting.
She finally spoke, her voice quiet but steady.
"The mountain range," she began, "was once the heart of my greatest experiment."
I listened without a word.
"I had built my lab deep inside that forest, far from my castle and other Nagas roaming the realm. I needed the quiet. The secrecy. It was where I planned to fuse completely with the Phantom soul fragment."
I nodded as I knew the story from Lily.
She nodded.
"I had studied the soul fragment for a long time. I believed that if I could suppress the Deathmist and isolate its core, I could harness its power without being consumed.
That kind of fusion could've granted me control over both Essence and the anti-Essence properties of the Phantom—something no one had ever done."
She paused, her eyes darkening with memory.
