CHAPTER 601: CHAPTER 602: ISHANA

Those were very ominous words, however her somber tone made Damon quiet. What did she mean when she said she had killed her mother?

Lilith hardly ever talked about her mother. In fact, this was the first time she had ever mentioned her. She had spoken of her father a few times, but when it came to her mother, there had only ever been silence.

She took pride in her family name and never once had she shown any reason to doubt the Astranova legacy.

Lilith Astranova.

"Did your mother die at childbirth?"

Lilith took a deep breath, her gaze shifting to the strange biome around them as the once-bright sunset dimmed into a dark world. The heavenly bodies above spun unnaturally fast. Stars shifted, and the twin moons rose high into the sky, their movement unnervingly visible to the eye.

It was as if the slowed time of this place had finally aligned itself with the world beyond the white barrier.

She opened her mouth a few times but ended up closing it again, her lips trembling with hesitation.

Damon glanced at Matia, who slowly sank back into his shadow, leaving him alone with Lilith.

He was about to say something when he noticed a soft ripple across the white barrier in the distance. His eyes narrowed, ready to move, when Lilith finally took a deep breath and spoke.

"No. I killed her.... I don’t mean at birth. I..."

Lilith exhaled slowly, her expression tightening. She began to walk forward, tilting her head slightly toward him.

"This will take a while, so let’s talk as we move."

Damon narrowed his eyes, sighing softly.

He nodded. If they stopped to talk, they might miss their objectives, and he knew time was important.

With a wave of his hand, he risked the possibility of being spotted. From his shadow, a large lesser demon emerged. Its massive form towered before them, yet its presence was entirely subdued under the power of his [Demon Dominate].

Lilith glanced at it with wariness, but Damon only gave her a faint smile.

"Don’t worry. I’ll just kill anyone who sees us."

She narrowed her eyes. "Wouldn’t it be better to not be seen?"

He chuckled softly. She was right, but if they wanted time, this was the only way.

The lesser demon lowered itself slightly at his command. Damon pulled her up in front of him, settling her carefully before wrapping an arm loosely around her waist. The faint scent of gardenia filled his senses—something he had long since come to associate with Lilith Astranova.

That fragrance had become linked to safety, trust, and, more than anything else, companionship.

As the demon began to stride through the darkened forest, crushing shrubs and low monsters beneath its scaled limbs, Lilith finally spoke again.

"A few hours after I was born... my mother, who had endured a difficult labor, wanted to hold me."

Damon held her silently as the lesser demon moved through the night. Moonlight slipped between the trees, glimmering faintly against its scales.

"The midwives said the air split open like glass, and when it closed... my mother’s head was gone."

Damon’s eyes flickered. He hadn’t expected such a brutal truth.

Lilith leaned back against him slightly, his arm firm around her waist.

"You see, my mother was not particularly powerful. In fact, she was just a young noblewoman my father had met a few years before. For whatever reason, he had a fondness for her...."

Her voice trembled, but she continued.

"I suppose you could say she was naive. She only realized her husband was a duke after the fact. But she was pure-hearted, if nothing else."

She bit her lip.

"That was why she was so weak. She barely reached the first class."

Lilith closed her eyes for a moment, trying to imagine her mother’s face. The features were blurred, yet she tried to picture what the woman would have looked like in that final moment.

"My red hair... I got it from her. She was breathtakingly beautiful. How else could her naive charms have worked on a duke?"

She shook her head faintly, smiling with a touch of sadness as Damon’s arms tightened around her. The demon lumbered over a fallen tree, carrying them forward.

"As you can imagine, my father was heartbroken. What should have been a joyous day became a nightmare."

Damon pressed his lips together. He expected her to say her father resented her, that he had treated her coldly.

But Lilith’s words surprised him.

"My father was in grief, yes... but his grief did not overcome his love for his newborn daughter."

The wind brushed her face as she turned her head slightly, her crimson hair glinting in the moonlight.

"If he was resentful, he did a good job hiding it."

Her body trembled slightly, as if she wanted to push away the emotions boiling inside.

"However, I know he was. He had to be. After all... he couldn’t even bring himself to give me the common courtesy of a name."

Damon could understand. For a man to lose his wife in what could only be described as a freak accident—no matter how he tried to hide it, resentment would inevitably take root.

"My father showered me with love and affection. He gave me jewels, wealth, and all the material things anyone could want. I had the best teachers, the best servants...."

She paused as the wind howled around them, the lesser demon picking up speed across an open flatland. Small monsters were trampled beneath its claws as if they were nothing.

"What he didn’t give me was his time. I can count the number of times we had dinner together, or when he spoke to me in person."

Her lips trembled.

"It’s like... when he sees me in person, he doesn’t actually see me. So he always keeps it short. But when he calls or writes... he has so much to say. So much to ask."

A single tear slid down her cheek.

"When I’m speaking to him through a pager, it’s like I’m actually talking to my father. But in person... I’m just with a grieving husband who can’t forget his wife."

Lilith shook her head with a soft sigh.

"But this isn’t really about him, anyway. When he wasn’t there, I had someone... someone who was like my mother."

She glanced at Damon.

"When I wasn’t given the courtesy of a name, she gave me one. She thought of the most venerated one she could."

Her lips curved faintly, her eyes softening.

"My nanny, Ishana. She gave me the name Lilith."

Lilith bit her lip, her voice trembling as she revealed the rest.

"She was my father’s most trusted servant, having spent years as his maid."

Then she said something that shocked Damon.

"Lilith... the name Lilith is actually a demon’s name. She named me after a queen of demons."

"What."