The Queen Who Tamed the Storm (嵐を飼い慣らした女王 / Arashi o Kainarashita Joō)

The morning light filtered through the canopy in thin beams, cutting across the trio's path like silent warnings. Dew clung to the ferns, and birds sang in cautious bursts. The forest had changed overnight and felt thicker and more watchful, as if it had listened to Izumi's story.

Hajime walked ahead now, his boots crunching on fallen petals, while Rei trailed behind with his sword slung low. Izumi moved in the middle, her fingers brushing leaves that curled toward her touch like cats.

No one spoke for an hour until Hajime finally broke the silence.
“Your mom, what was her name?”

Izumi's step faltered, and a white petal drifted from her sleeve.
“Hana,” she replied. “It means flower.”

Hajime nodded but didn't press for more.

Rei glanced back.
“Is Eve quiet today?”

Izumi closed her eyes and listened.
“She's thinking.”

Eve murmured inside her.
About the boy with the gold-silver light.

Izumi felt her cheeks warm.
“She's a bit distracted.”

Rei smirked.
“Old flames never die.”

Izumi swatted the back of Rei’s head.

“Shut up.”

But she smiled.

The path narrowed, and roots arched overhead like cathedral ribs. Izumi's voice returned, low and steady.

“I'll tell you guys the rest of my story. After Kagerou, I wasn't a kid anymore. I was an unhinged monster.” 

Nine Years Earlier, The Deep Veil, Three Days After Kagerou...

Izumi tore through the forest like a plague unleashed. She was eight years old, her robes shredded to ribbons, and her eyes blazed a toxic emerald.

Seiki leaked from her skin in wild green fire, uncontrolled and rabid. Roots whipped behind her like jagged tails in a frenzy. Trees exploded in her wake. Animals dropped mid-flight, spines snapped by invisible thorns.

A wolf pack charged. She didn’t even look at them. Vines flayed them to the bone in seconds, and blood misted the air.

Eve’s voice cracked inside her.
Rin, STOP. You’re destroying the forest!

Izumi screamed, and the sound wave shattered a cliff face. Rocks rained down as she punched the ground. Roots erupted fifty feet high, coiling and thrashing like they were starving.

A deer bolted across her path. Thorns impaled it mid-leap, and its guts spilled like wet rope.

She kept walking, sobbing and screaming, destroying everything around her. Then the forest fell quiet. 

A single footstep echoed, calm and unhurried. Queen Sylvara emerged from the greenery, wearing no armor and no crown. Living bark fused to her skin like a second skeleton. Her hair cascaded in hues of autumn fire, and her eyes held the deep, merciless green of ancient rot. Her Seiki glimmered, pure emerald with no traces of alloy.

Sylvara stopped ten paces away and watched the child rage. She didn't flinch when a root the size of a tree trunk lashed at her face. Sylvara caught it with her bare hand and crushed it to splinters, causing ash to rain down.

Izumi snarled as roots swarmed in dozens and then hundreds, thorns dripping venom in a storm of relentless green death. Sylvara sighed and raised one hand, palm open.

The storm ceased. Every root froze mid-air, cracked, shriveled, and fell to the ground as dust. Izumi gasped, trying to summon more power, but nothing came. Her Seiki choked off inside her.

Sylvara walked forward, slow and deliberate, before grabbing Izumi by the collar and lifting her off the ground like a feral stray. The girl thrashed, kicked, and bit, screaming until her throat bled. Sylvara let her struggle for ten seconds, then twenty, then thirty.

Finally, she slammed Izumi into the dirt, not out of cruelty but necessity. As the girl’s face hit the soil, roots tried to rise again, but Sylvara pressed her foot between Izumi's shoulder blades. Cold, crushing Seiki poured into the girl, overwhelming her power.

Sylvara knelt beside her and spoke in a voice as calm as deep water. “Done?”

Izumi spat blood, tears, and snot.
“…Fuck you.”

Sylvara smiled, small and sharp.
“Good. Anger’s useful. Now learn to aim it.”

She hoisted the child over her shoulder and started walking. The forest parted, roots bowed, and leaves whispered.

**Eryndral, The Rootbound Arena**

Izumi woke, chained to a living tree, with roots wrapped around her limbs like iron. Sylvara stood opposite her, weaponless and just herself.

“Rule one,” Sylvara said. “Power without roots is cancer.”

She snapped her fingers, and the arena erupted into chaos with roots, wind, fire, and flood. It was a hurricane of pure green.

“Try to stop it.”

Izumi tried. Her Seiki surged, wild and sloppy. Roots clashed with Sylvara’s, and feedback ripped through her veins. Izumi screamed and then threw up blood.

Sylvara didn't blink. Her storm swallowed Izumi’s power, compressed it, and forced it back inside.

Izumi collapsed, gasping and broken.

“Again.”

Weeks bled into months as Sylvara beat control into her, both physically and emotionally. Seiki slammed into cracked ribs. Roots pinned her for hours. Trials left her pissing herself.

She adapted and overcame.

One dawn, Izumi stood unbroken, with Sylvara opposite her, and the arena was finally silent.

Izumi raised her palms, and the forest obeyed. It moved with control, lethal and beautiful.

Sylvara nodded once. “Good, you’re ready. Now meet the pack.”

**The Emerald Vanguard, Heartwood War Room**

Takahiro Izanami, Commander, stood with the Staff of Eden across his back and scars like lightning across his skin.
“So this is the border demon. Don’t make me regret this.”

Masanori Shigure, Wielder of Elijah, leaned against the wall, with Flame Chariot idling behind him while the horses snorted embers. He grinned.

“Kid has teeth. Let’s see if she bites.”

Ayumu Hayate, Wielder of Noah, rested his gauntlets that hummed with power and knelt to meet her eye level.

“You’re home, Rin. Don’t worry about them.”

They threw her into border wars against Crimson Bloodforge cults and Thorned Pact infiltrators. Izumi learned to kill with flowers and heal with thorns.

At just fourteen years of age, the Crimson Legion attacked the village of Thornmere. Bloodforge Overdrive Titans surrounded them on all sides. She used her Forbidden Fruit Art, Nature-Drowned Avatar, towering fifty feet over the battlefield. Petals fell like guillotines, and the siege ended in one strike. The Eidarus Tree roared its approval.

Sylvara summoned her to the throne with no ceremony, just truth.
“You are a Lord now. Protect the Veil, or I will prune you myself.”

Izumi bowed with blood on her robes and lotuses in her hair.
“Thank you so much, your grace. It's an honor.”

**Present Day, One Mile from Sylva’s Hollow**

Izumi’s voice cut off as the forest thickened into a wall of glowing trunks. Roots arched into a gate, and faint lantern lights flickered in the distance. The air carried the smell of bread and wet earth.

It was the village of Sylva’s Hollow within the Verdant Veil territory.

Hajime exhaled. “Smells like home.”

Rei’s hand slipped from his sword. “I'm starving!”

Izumi stepped forward as lotuses bloomed in her footprints, slow and deliberate. The gate creaked open on its own.

A child’s voice echoed from the dark. “Lord Rin? Is that really you?”

Izumi smiled, tired yet sharp and alive. “Yeah, kid. I'm back.”