The Diamond grimoire shimmered before me, its surface refracting the light like the facets of a perfect crystal. I stared at it, breath catching in my throat, as though blinking might shatter the fragile reality of its presence. A Diamond grimoire. It was something that existed in legends and dusty archives, not in the hands of someone like me.
For a moment, my mind spun back to childhood—back to a little girl with grand dreams, before those dreams were clipped and trimmed by the cold shears of reality. I had stopped dreaming of this long ago.
And yet, here it was. Real. Mine.
The hall had gone silent. Not just quiet, but the kind of silence that pressed on your ears, making every heartbeat thunder like a drum. Moments ago, the air had been thick with whispers about Kael's Gold grimoire and the majestic dragon he had summoned. Now those whispers were gone, swallowed by the impossible sight before them.
"I… I'm a Diamond-grade summoner," I murmured. The words sounded strange, foreign, as though they belonged to someone else entirely. Me? A Diamond-grade summoner? The first in the Kingdom of Thane?
This was the stuff of history books, not the awkward younger sister who had spent her life living in Kael's shadow. My pulse quickened. Excitement surged within me, giddy and terrifying all at once.
But I pushed it down. This wasn't over. Not yet.
The grimoire was only the beginning. The true test lay ahead.
I forced myself to breathe deeply, to focus. The familiar—the being that would emerge next—would define everything. A Diamond-grade grimoire would summon an Eterna being. That much was certain.
But Eterna beings were a broad and varied lot. Some were legends incarnate, their names whispered in reverence across the ages. Others, while still powerful, hovered just above the Luminara grade, their full strength requiring time and cultivation.
Still, even the weakest Eterna would surpass anything summoned by a Gold-grade grimoire. Stronger than Kael's Prime Luminara dragon. Stronger than anything my father, with all his power, had ever commanded.
My lips twitched into a small, treacherous grin. 'This is it. This is my moment.'
The mana circle beneath me flared to life, a vortex of power spinning faster and brighter with each passing second. My heart raced, anticipation clawing at my chest as the light swirled and coalesced into a single, glowing form.
And then the brilliance faded, leaving behind…
…a little girl.
My thoughts skidded to a halt, my expectations crashing like glass shattering against stone.
Standing where my legendary summon should have been was a petite figure, her frame slight and delicate. Her long black hair cascaded down her back, catching the faint glow of the mana circle as though it drank the light around her. Her face was doll-like, too perfect, with a serenity that felt unnatural.
But it was her eyes that froze me in place.
They were dark, fathomless, and utterly still. Like twin pools of ink, they threatened to drown anyone foolish enough to stare into their depths. They held no malice, no kindness, no warmth—just an unyielding quiet that made my skin prickle.
Her dress, flowing and black, seemed alive. It rippled and shifted as though woven from shadows, the edges dissolving into nothingness before reforming with each step.
I froze, my mind struggling to catch up. 'This… this is my summon?'
Where was the towering beast, the phoenix wreathed in flame, the dragon whose roar would shake the heavens? Instead, I had a little girl. She looked more like a figure from a painting than a creature of myth.
And yet…
The air around her was wrong.
It didn't swirl and dance like it had for Kael's dragon. It bent. The very mana in the room seemed to bow in deference, its movements subdued and reverent. The atmosphere thickened, and my legs trembled under a weight I couldn't explain.
Before I could form another thought, the Diamond grimoire in front of me responded. Its pages flipped open with a sharp, decisive snap, as though eager to reveal the truth. Words began to etch themselves onto the first page, glowing faintly with a light that seemed to devour all others.
I read them aloud, the syllables rolling off my tongue like the toll of a bell.
"Prime Eterna Divine and Miasma Beast: Heavenly Demon."
The hall erupted into chaos. Gasps and hurried whispers filled the air, but I barely heard them. My focus was locked on the figure standing before me.
She tilted her head slightly, her expression unreadable. She stepped forward, her movements fluid and deliberate, as though the world itself adjusted to accommodate her presence.
I couldn't move. My body screamed at me to kneel, to look away, to do anything but stand in the presence of this being.
"Headmaster…" a voice called out, distant and wavering.
I turned my head slightly, just enough to see Medea Solaryn, the headmaster of the academy. She stood frozen near the edge of the hall, her Gold grimoire glowing faintly. Her summon—the Amethyst Basilisk, a Prime Luminara—coiled protectively at her feet, its many eyes fixed on the girl with an intensity I had never seen before.
Medea's face was pale, her expression unreadable. But her hands trembled.
Fear.
The realization struck me like a hammer. The headmaster—one of the most powerful summoners in the kingdom, a woman who had faced horrors and risen above them—was afraid.
Of my summon.
I turned back to the girl—no, the Heavenly Demon—and everything clicked into place. She wasn't just powerful. She wasn't just Eterna.
She was beyond comprehension. A singularity of divine and miasmic energy, a being that defied the natural laws of the world. Her very existence was a contradiction, a paradox that shouldn't be possible.
And now, somehow, impossibly, she was bound to me.