Chapter 21 – The Arcane Proliferation of Lyta ChessWithin the grand, velvet-draped halls of the Holloway estate’s outreach annex—where echoing laughter was often exchanged over contracts and political maneuverings—a strange and noble silence fell. A council of esteemed gentlemen, garbed in finely woven tunics and mana-stitched cravats, were now locked in intellectual warfare.Their attention was utterly captivated the moment Christabel, ever graceful in her maid’s uniform subtly lined with whisperthread enchantments, unveiled nine additional sets of the enigmatic game that had seized their collective soul: Lyta Chess.Like storm-hounds chasing phantasmal prey, the gentlemen lunged forward, each staking claim to one of the newly unveiled boards. The ritual began again—rivalries reforged, destinies decided through the shifting of rooks and queens across checkered battlefields of enchanted pine.Each time a challenger fell, laughter would erupt like wildfire in the chamber. The victor w

Chapter 23: Inheritance of the Vaelorian Flame“I bring favorable news, Young Sovereign,” Christabel said as she dropped to one knee upon the polished obsidian tiles of the solar terrace, her voice delicate but edged with triumph. The wind danced through her hair as the twin suns of Falconridge cast golden spears across the rooftop.“Each and every artisan guild that once toiled in the alchemy of soap has pledged themselves under the banner of the Reborn Consortium.”Elias, draped in loose silver robes threaded with arcane glyphs, reclined upon a crescent-shaped lounge forged from moonsteel and sunwood, basking in the glow of his dominion.“Hmm. That pleases me,” he said with a casual flick of his fingers, a conjured fragment of mist twisting into the shape of a chess piece before dissolving.Christabel rose and continued, her voice almost trembling with reverence.“According to the projections from Nexus-1 and my own calculations, our production of cleansers and essence-shampoos has

Chapter 25: The Verdant Prodigy and the Pipe-Dream InventionThe grand gates of the Holloway estate creaked open like the maw of a slumbering beast awakened. From its mouth stepped Elias, not with regal fanfare or youthful eagerness, but with the calm gait of a sovereign who had nothing left to prove.“Oh, Mother. Father. You’re here,” Elias greeted, his tone unbothered, as if four and a half months of their absence were as weightless as a leaf on the wind.Bernice Holloway blinked, stunned by the audacity of such composure. Bob Holloway, however, pointed a sharp finger toward the anomalous additions now sprawling across their estate—chimneys billowing steam from stone-borne bathhouses, copper glinting from the sunlight, and strange channels of metal threading through their ancestral land.“Explain this… all of this,” Bob demanded, gesturing as though the entire world had shifted underfoot.Elias gave a half-smile. “Well, that’s going to take a while.”And so it began—a procession not

Chapter 26: Chronos and Steam — The Clock that Bends the HoursBob nearly collapsed where he stood when Elias unveiled the towering chrono-mechanism that loomed with elegance in the grand atrium of the Holloway estate. The intricate dance of spirit-forged gears, pulsing aether-pendulums, and rune-etched cogs spun in hypnotic harmony, each tick humming with the echo of arcane precision. It was not merely a device—it was a sermon to time itself, a hymn written in metal and mana.The complexity of the construct staggered him. Even the most advanced runic incantations or mana-weaving theories paled in comparison to this arcano-mechanical marvel.At first, Bob struggled to grasp the significance. A glowing lumen-crystal faucet that poured clean water? A heatstone toilet that flushed waste into the abyss of a miniaturized spatial rift? These were obvious boons to daily life. But a clock? A mere keeper of hours?Then Elias, ever the scholar-visionary, explained: the entire span of a day, fro

Chapter 28: The Stone That Defies FlameThe Holloway estate no longer slumbered in quiet elegance. Since Elias had unveiled his prodigious affinity for magic—a full mastery over the four primordial elements—its atmosphere had shifted, pulsing with a strange, reverent energy. Servants treaded lightly, as though wary of awakening something greater than themselves. Every whisper carried his name. And at the center of it all, Elias was enduring an entirely new ordeal: morning sessions of relentless magical drilling under the steely eyes of his mother, Layla."Fufufufu... You're soaking it all in so fast. As expected of my glorious little genius," she cooed with maternal pride laced in manic competitiveness.These early dawn hours were now consumed by grueling Earth magic lessons, her determination to make Earth his dominant element turning into a near-obsessive pursuit. She treated it not merely as an advantage—but as a war to be won. Fire, Water, Wind? All were rivals in her mind. Earth