The Cursed Prince

Chapter 919: Merfolk Realm

Raphael sighed and knew that gods did not have much patience. "You are free to leave, naturally—as long as you don't share a word. But do know, that when I ascend to be the next King or am rewarded... I won't think of you that much either."

"Did you hear me complain?" the god laughed. "I can burn letters from this princess' daddy dearest all day! Just give me the word and I can even burn the entire castle of this King Draco if you really want it to be done."

Raphael paused and looked at the god. As much as he was tempted to kill Rowena's evil father, if he did something like that, word would quickly spread around.

It wasn't obvious, but King Draco was not just any regular human. Twenty-odd years ago he was deemed worthy enough to attend the Tournament to Godhood. Had he won, he would have been one of them now, not just a mere mortal.

There were still some people in Cretea who kept tabs with him, and if Raphael had even heard of it correctly... King Draco might even reach out to his late wife's royal family in order to look for Rowena. He married an elven princess and still had a good relationship with a few elven princes in that realm.

That was why Raphael needed to be here in the human realm to stop all of the man's schemes and let Rowena live a good and happy life.

He thought she deserved that much.

Even if it meant that Raphael needed to stay away and work in the background to make her dreams of freedom come true, he didn't quite mind it... after all, she did save his life.

Rowena saved his life and that was why he was doing all of this.

"Huh..." The god of sea suddenly blinked and looked at a river nearby with a frown.

"What's the matter?" Raphael asked.

Nymia blinked and looked at the waters too and quickly shook her head. "He must just be having some troubles with some ships, right? Nasty seafaring captains are really focused on delivering those damn letters..."

The Goddess had once managed to make the sea god let her handle some of the waters, and when she had taken care of it—she secretly allowed some of the messengers to reach other continents.

Nymia thought that if the word finally reached other lands, Raphael would stop and consider his mission as a lost cause and return to Cretea, but in the end, it had given him more of a reason to stay.

And now, Nymia wanted to shut up the sea god and prevent him from speaking—but the water carried messages from everywhere and it had already reached both her and the sea god.

Unfortunately for Nymia, the sea god shook his head and slowly looked up to Raphael.

"Your friend... human friend?" The sea god looked carefully at Raphael's face and then plucked one of the lette

rs from the God of Avary's sparrows and showed the portrait of a younger Rowena. "This is her, right?"

"Well, I wouldn't quite call her my friend." Raphael rubbed the back of his neck. He knew that Rowena loved Lucent, but it didn't apply to him... so they were practically strangers. Except for the fact that he was focused on her.

"She has golden hair and eyes like amethyst?" the sea god asked.

Raphael immediately nodded. "Yes, yes, that's right. Did you—"

"Some of the Merfolks seemed to have captured a young woman that fit the description, Raphael." the sea god explained. "She was viciously destroying the coral reef in their lagoon."

"What? That's crazy!" a god laughed. "Is she really a human princess? That's really funny."

"Well, she has done something that warranted them to capture her." Nymia interrupted.

"Rowena wouldn't do something like that without a good reason," Raphael said.

"You haven't seen her for a long time, at least a long time in terms of human years," another god said. "So you can't really say that, Raphael."

The Seventh Prince frowned but shook his head. "Whatever the case, she's still the person I owe my life to—and that is more than enough reason for me to intercede on her behalf."

***

When the strong water whirled around Rowena and pulled her downwards, she couldn't help but start to drown and be engulfed thoroughly.

Even the hardest of resistance could do nothing in the water and yet this was the only way to save Julian.

She had risked her life, forced herself to swim, and stayed underwater for far longer than any ordinary person would have done—and her vision turned dark.

Rowena sunk deeper and deeper into the water, bubbles escaping from her mouth and nostril as the air she had slowly vanished as she traveled downwards.

Until at the last moment, the water around her started to shimmer, no, not the water itself but the magic contained in the water. If Rowena had been born in the elven realm, if her mother had stayed alive enough to tell her about her heritage... then she would have known.

Instead, Rowena's forehead glowed a beautiful shade of green which depicted a small magical rune—a mother's love placed once upon a time and made the magic help her.

Rowena's eyes widened as a light emanated from around her and gave her the ability to breathe underwater. Just in time for Rowena to recover her consciousness and experience the world that she knew turned upside down.

One moment, she had been falling downwards into the abyssal waves, drowning as she fell from the Wishing Mermaid Lagoon.

The next thing t

hat she knew was that she was rising, being pulled upwards into the waters, and being carried somewhere else until finally, she was thrown out of the water and into a cave.

Rowena coughed up some water out of her mouth, touched the land, and looked up in bewilderment.

The cave was not dark, on the contrary, it was decorated with something that resembled luminescent stars that decorated the cavern's roof. It depicted a beautiful galaxy above her.

And yet that was not what caught Rowena's attention. When she glanced back towards the waters, she ended up seeing a number of rocks around the lagoon and each one held a spectacular being. Half-fish. Half-human.