Chapter 565: Mother Dragon Apologizes
“You talk as if you wouldn’t do the same,” she retorted. “All of you would melt like that if Strax held you like that. Let’s stop pretending we’re immune.”
Monica, with her hair tangled and one cheek swollen from where she had been magically slapped, muttered:
“I melt just seeing him take off his shirt. Imagine hugging me after a scolding like that.”
Bellatrix, who had a growing bruise on her left eye, chuckled. “I melt just thinking about being scolded. Did you hear the tone of that voice? That was a royal command. I think even my runes responded reflexively.”
Cassandra, finally regaining her mobility, rubbed her temples and muttered, “That woman almost killed Mom… and yet here we are feeling jealous of a hug. We need therapy.”
“Or just more Strax,” muttered Xenovia, half buried in a bush.
Frieren, now completely healed, watched everything with a more restrained air, although the tip of her demonic tail was restless. “She loves him like a mother… but she didn’t see him grow up. Her mind still lives in that time, in that void. Seeing him… so different… was too much.”
Rogue wiped his sword with a cloth and commented, without looking up: “It’s strange to think that perhaps the most unstable among us… is his own mother. But… I think that’s how it is. The pain of losing time with those you love never really goes away.”
“And she had centuries to hold on to that pain,” added Xyn, already healing himself with his gentle flames. “Centuries alone, feeding that love… without any balance.”
Kryssia, with her hair messy and one wing partially damaged, laughed weakly. “Well, at least now we know where he got that absurd authoritarian aura from. The woman almost destroyed reality out of pure maternal instinct. What the fuck.”
Scarlet, still lying down, coughed up some embers and slowly raised one of her hands. “Start getting ready… she’s going to be a competitor. I don’t give her a month before she’s desiring him as a man… The thin line between maternal love and possessive love is already almost broken.”
Beatrice choked. “D-don’t say that, Mother.”
The women began to look at that scene and… They all nodded. Because none of them doubted the bond Scathach had with Strax anymore. Was it sick? Maybe a little. But it was also… undeniable… the future was already stamped on Scathach’s face…
In the distance, Strax finally pulled away from the embrace. Scathach wiped her eyes, trying to maintain a shred of dignity. Her shoulders were still shaking, but her face was beginning to compose itself.
He said something to her—the women didn’t hear what—but soon after, he turned to face them all.
All of them.
Twelve women, wounded, scratched, singed… but there.
Scathach hesitated behind him, uncomfortable. She knew her attack was irrational. She knew she had gone too far.
Daniela was the first to stand up and cross her arms.
“So? Are you going to apologize or do you want another round?” she said defiantly, but also with a slight smile.
Scathach sighed and took a step forward. Her posture was still haughty, but her eyes no longer lied.
“I… got carried away,” she said. “I was selfish. And irrational. But I… I just saw all of you around him, and something inside me… screamed. It wasn’t anger. It was fear. Fear of losing him again. Fear of not having space.”
The silence that followed was brief but dense.
Cassandra broke it with a simple comment: “Welcome to the club.”
Beatrice nodded. “We feel that all the time. The difference is that we don’t try to obliterate each other. Well… most of the time.”
“Yeah. Sometimes,” Monica corrected, laughing.
Strax ran his hand through his hair, exhausted but relieved. “I think everyone can breathe now.”
“We can,” said Scarlet, half collapsed, “but if my wing doesn’t fully regenerate by tomorrow… I want a day alone with you. Exclusively. And I’ll leave your mother tied up in the basement.”
Scathach opened her mouth to reply, but Strax glanced at her sideways, with a warning look.
She closed her mouth immediately.
“Understood,” she said softly.
Scathach took a deep breath, still feeling the remnants of shame burning in her chest—a heat that did not come from magic, but from something much more human. She had gone too far. She had almost killed several of those women. All for a feeling that, although sincere, had become corrosive after centuries of isolation and longing.
She closed her eyes.
Runes began to appear around her, dancing in the air with precise elegance—there were hundreds, perhaps thousands, each vibrating at its own frequency, like a silent orchestra.
The ground around her glowed. Mystical lines ran through the earth, like veins of golden light, spreading in all directions. The women—some standing, others still lying down—felt their bodies tingle as the energy passed through the air and entered their skin, unimpeded.
Scars closed.
Bruises disappeared.
Fatigue melted away like mist in the sun.
Scarlet looked at her own abdomen—where she had been pierced by a spear of pure runes moments before—and found only clean skin. Not a mark.
Beatrice felt her dislocated arm snap back into place and let out a sigh of relief.
Yennifer, still stunned, blinked as her lungs filled with air again with ease. “Is this… healing magic? It’s the most powerful I’ve ever seen…”
“No,” Frieren murmured, watching the runes fly through the sky and dissolve one by one. “It’s something… above that. This is primordial magic.”
Scathach moved her hands with unnatural grace, controlling the flow like a ritual choreography. The surrounding plants began to grow again. The grass, once scorched, turned jade green. Crooked trees straightened. The skies opened, letting the golden afternoon light shine through the clouds—now serene, clean, as if the world had just… taken a deep breath and decided to forget.
The craters in the ground disappeared.
The air, once heavy with smoke and wild energy, became light, fresh, almost fragrant.
It was as if time had been rewound.
In seconds, the garden was as it had been before Scathach’s arrival — perhaps even more beautiful. Nature responded to her presence as if it recognized one of its matriarchs.
Monica looked around and whistled. “Wow. I want a rune like that to clean the house… things would be easier.”
“If you know how to write one, I’ll teach you,” Scathach murmured with a small smile—and for the first time, genuinely restrained.
Scarlet, still lying down, turned on her side and muttered, “Now yes… maybe she can get in line for good.”
Daniela raised her eyebrow. “Line?”
“The harem line,” Scarlet grumbled. “At least now she understands that she needs to behave.”
Scathach chuckled softly and shook her head, but did not reply. There was still pain there, still discomfort. But now there was also understanding. And, above all, acceptance.
Strax crossed his arms as he observed everything around him. He did not smile—his face was calm but thoughtful. There were many conversations to be had. Many emotions to sort through. But at that moment, he just watched.
Scathach finally approached him again, now without dancing runes, without an explosive aura, without hysteria.
Just… mother.
“I hope… this makes up for it a little,” she said, her voice low, still containing the weight of what she had done.
Strax looked at her sideways.
“It’s a good start,” he said bluntly. “But the trust you broke will only come back with time. If you really want to be part of my life… you’ll have to live as part of it. Not as its owner.”
Scathach nodded slowly, feeling the words sink in. Like spears… and also like healing.
“I’ll try.”
“And no invisible tracking runes on me,” he added, turning to her with a serious look.
She opened her mouth.
She closed it.
Then she muttered, “…Okay.”
Samira, from afar, laughed loudly. “She was going to say ‘but’ again. I saw the rune flashing in her eye!”
“It was a reflection,” Scathach defended, crossing her arms, but already with flushed cheeks.
Strax let out an amused sigh. “Let’s go inside. Everyone needs to rest.”
“Or take a shower,” Kryssia muttered, fanning her singed hair.
“Or therapy,” added Cassandra, already walking toward the mansion.
The women began to move slowly, resuming a strange routine — as if the chaos that had just happened was just another normal event in their lives. Maybe it was.
…Little did they know what was walking toward Vorah…