Beast Gacha System: All Mine

"Who is it?"

"What?"

The journey to Angela’s cell began at the surface, in a corner of the Iondora Empire Palace where the marble floors gave way to rough-hewn stone and the gilded chandeliers were replaced by flickering torches that spat and hissed in the damp air.

A single iron door opened onto a spiral staircase that corkscrewed downward into the earth.

Tap—

As they descended the stairs, Damon asked Stevan.

"You don’t know?"

"Again, what is this about, Your Majesty?" Stevan asked back.

The steps were narrow and uneven, worn smooth in the center by centuries of footsteps. Wardens, prisoners, executioners... all descending into the same cold dark.

"The woman my sister planned to be my consort," Damon said. "Perhaps you know?"

Stevan looked at him dumbfounded.

The air changed as one descended. The dry, polished atmosphere of the palace above gave way to something thicker, wetter, heavy with the mineral scent of ancient stone and the metallic tang of rust.

The torches here were spaced further apart, their pools of light shrinking until the darkness between them seemed to swallow the stairs whole.

"Your Majesty, Her Highness doesn’t discuss things with me," Stevan said.

"Even now?" Damon turned to him, eyes narrowed.

At the bottom of the spiral staircase, a long corridor stretched into the gloom. It branched, full of crossroads, easy to get lost in.

The floor was uneven, puddled in places with dark water that had seeped up from somewhere deeper still. The torches along this corridor were fewer, their flames struggling against the damp.

"My lord, what do you mean ’even now’?" Stevan asked.

The two looked at one another.

After taking some turns, at the end of one of the corridors, stood a door. Unlike the rough stone around it, this door was a stark thing. It was solid metal, riveted and reinforced, its surface marred by scratches and dents that spoke of violence long past.

Beyond it lay not the general dungeon, where common criminals and political prisoners awaited their fates, but something more isolated. More private. More final.

"Do you still want her to suffer in this dark place, waiting for your so-called loyalty to waver?" Damon asked.

"Your Majesty, my loyalty lies in your hand and the Empire," Stevan said.

"So, if I order you to become hers, would you abandon everything and do it?" Damon asked.

"I..." Stevan frowned. Sometimes he wondered who was imprisoned in this place.

Was it her?

Was it himself?

"I can only protect her if she’s in here," Stevan suddenly said.

Damon widened his eyes.

Ha.

So that was the real reason.

And this man was already Angela’s man through and through.

The metal door swung open on protesting hinges, and the space beyond was almost disappointingly ordinary.

A small guardroom, perhaps forty feet square, with a scarred wooden table and three mismatched chairs arranged around it. A lantern hung from a hook in the ceiling, casting a steady yellow glow over a deck of worn playing cards abandoned mid-game.

Two wardens sat in the chairs, their uniforms rumpled, their eyes sharp despite the late hour. They looked up as the door opened, their hands moving instinctively toward the weapons at their belts, then relaxed when they recognized the visitor.

"Leave," Stevan ordered, and the two bowed and walked out after bowing their bodies to the two men.

At the far end of the guardroom, set into the back wall, was a cell. The bars were iron, thick and black and flecked with rust, running from floor to ceiling with barely a hand’s width between them.

Beyond those bars, in the dim, wavering light of a single candle, was a narrow cot, a thin blanket, and a small table with a ceramic cup.

And sitting on the edge of the cot, her dark hair loose around her shoulders, her violet eyes calm and unsurprised, was Angela. She looked up as the metal door closed, and smiled.

"Stevan~!" Angela greeted her favorite warden first, her voice bright and warm despite the cold iron bars between them. She leaned forward on her cot, her violet eyes softening as they found the tall, dark-haired man.

He didn’t smile back, but the tension in his shoulders eased.

"Angela."

But it was Damon who stepped forward, his boots echoing against the stone floor as he moved past the wardens’ table and stopped before the bars of her cell.

"Brother, get out. I’m missing my Stevan very, very much," Angela said, waving a dismissive hand at him without looking away from the warden.

"We need to talk, Angela."

Angela huffed, exasperated. She turned back to Stevan and smiled, her expression softening. "You’ll accompany me tonight, right?"

Stevan felt conflicted. His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. He didn’t want to answer her in front of her brother, the Emperor.

"He’ll accompany you tonight," Damon said flatly.

Stevan flinched. Somehow, it landed like a direct acknowledgment. Or perhaps a blessing, a permission to be with her.

He didn’t know how to feel about it.

"Fine," Angela sighed, finally turning her attention to her brother. "What do you want this time, Brother?"

"Answer me," Damon said, his voice dropping low. "I didn’t know the woman you chose as my consort was someone Cecilia knew."

Angela’s eyes widened with surprise. "Oh, no, she didn’t know," she said quickly. "But if you’re saying that, it means she found out and agreed with me. That’s good."

"You haven’t given me the promised instruction to meet her," Damon pressed. "I think it’s time to start. Before long, we’re going to reveal Father’s assassin and the people who paid for his death."

"You want it now? I still think it’s too quick. Let’s wrap this assassination scandal first, alright?" Angela said, her tone shifting from playful to serious.

"We have no time, Angela."

"Why?" Angela blinked, her violet eyes sharpening.

Damon frowned. His younger sister should have known already. Her information network was the best in the world, spies and informants threaded through every court, every guild, every shadowy corner of the empire. She should have known.

"Ivy... Ivy wants to..." Damon forced the words out, knowing Angela must have already heard and understood, already prepared one of her infuriatingly sharp jabs.

"You suddenly want to escape from Princess Ivy?" Angela narrowed her eyes. A mischievous smile bloomed on her face. "Oh, Brother..."

"Just tell me who the woman you want me to marry," Damon said, refusing to take the bait. "Let’s arrange our meeting soon before things become dangerous."

"You know that Princess Ivy is better than any other candidate I’ve prepared, right?" Angela asked, her smile fading into something more serious. "Do you want to ignore my advice again?"

"Angela." Damon’s voice was raw now, stripped of its imperial authority. "She wants a marriage with love. You know I can’t give her that kind of marriage."

"The problem is, you convince yourself you can’t," Angela said. "Are you sure you can’t?"

Damon didn’t know. He was afraid he truly couldn’t.

No matter how he thought about it, Magnus Karas was far better at giving Ivy what she wanted.

"Ivy knows I can’t."

Angela stood, rising from the edge of her cot. She stepped closer to the bars, looking up at her brother through the rusted iron. Her violet eyes, so like his own, held something that was not quite pity and not quite disappointment.

"She’s right," Angela nodded. "You can’t."

Maybe in another world, another circumstance, Damon could have been the man Ivy deserved. Maybe in a world where he wasn’t Emperor, where enemies didn’t circle his throne like vultures waiting for a corpse...

Maybe there, he could have learned to love her the way she wanted to be loved.

But here, now, he couldn’t.

"I will arrange the meeting soon. But she’s still out of my reach right now. She’s very busy," Angela said.

Damon nodded. "When?"

"Just focus on cleaning up Father’s death first. Princess Ivy..." Angela’s expression softened. "I’m sure she won’t pester you so much."

"She’s already pestering me too much."

"Well, hang on there."

***

The sky stretched endlessly above the coastline, a vast canvas of pale blue brushed with thin, wispy clouds that caught the morning light and turned it gold.

The sea below glittered in answer, a mirror of infinite facets, and the wind was alive, roaring and laughing and singing through the empty air.

Suddenly, a green dragon tore across the sky like an emerald lightning bolt.

"WOAHHH!!!"

Bessa screamed in pure joy.

Her voice was snatched away by the wind almost before it left her lips, but she didn’t care.

She was finally getting used to riding on top of dragons. Finally learning to trust the great beast god beneath her, to lean into the turns rather than fighting them and to keep her eyes open when the ground tilted and spun far below.

"Lord Jenggala! This is soooo fun!"

"Yeah?" Jenggala chuckled, his deep voice rumbling through the scales beneath her.

The green dragon didn’t usually fly either. He preferred to stay on the ground, in the jungle, studying the earth and the plants and the insects and the animals, even sometimes the ancient ruins that slept beneath the canopy.

But flying like this, with the wind in his wings and a laughing woman on his back, could be fun too.

"Hold tight!" He folded his wings and plunged. The world became a blur of blue and green and gold, the sea rushing up to meet them, the wind screaming past Bessa’s ears, and she squirmed with a joy so pure it felt like light pouring out of her skin.

"AAAHHH! AHAHAH—"

They landed on the beach with impossible smoothness, the transition from breakneck speed to perfect stillness so seamless that Bessa barely felt the sand beneath the dragon’s claws.

She laughed, breathless and giddy, her heart still racing from the dive.

As she turned to slide down from the dragon’s back, her new prosthetic leg caught in the soft sand. "Ah!"

GRAB!

But she didn’t fall.

Jenggala, already transforming into his humanoid form, held her waist from behind.

Bessa’s heart fluttered. She turned to look up at him, her cheeks flushed from more than just the flight.

He smiled down at her. "Are you alright?" Then his gaze dropped to her leg, assessing the prosthetic. "It seems we’re ready for Leg 4.0."

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