A few moments ago, while Daimon's group was dealing with the creature which appeared, and made them change the plan just a bit, not outside of Daimon's expectations, at the contrary direction to Warhammer city, there was the territory of the Delphini family.
Well, it could be said the original territory of the Delphini, because Annete as the queen had her own territory whose capital was Crystal Reef city, and it was right next to the territory of Vincent.
In other words, the Delphini Duke literally had to go through Vincent's territory if he wanted to cause troubles to Annete, which is why he didn't dare to go after her, even after she left the Delphini family with Mellie to never return... until today at least.
Carlos was having a bad day, after so many efforts, his son was recognized by the crowned prince and joined his team, meaning his Delphini family was on the right track.
When a new king rises, naturally new nobles are appointed, also those who have contributed for the campaign of the ryal successor, get rewarded, he was aiming to get an Archduke title for his family, which will put the Delphini on par with the Arcarius.
And so far, everything was working, even if his unfilial daughter rejected each and every of his letters asking to get more noble titles for the people of the Delphini family, he found a quicker route, through the crowned prince.
But everything crumbled earlier, the crowned prince who was severely injured finally woke up after half a day of the most expensive healing methods, and the first thing he did was expulse Corey out of his team.
Because he was related to the queen, who in his mind plotted everything that happened at the tournament, he lost, and it wasn't a close one, but a humiliating and crushing defeat, he was livid.
If it weren't for the fact that Corey was with him all the time, he would have accused him of giving information to his enemies, in any case Corey will never be allowed near the crowned prince, just because of association, as he now hated the queen and everyone related to her.
"Damn it if I knew such misfortune was going to fall in my Delphini family, I wouldn't have set my eyes on that bitch, even after death her daughters are causing me troubles", said Carlos as he gritted his teeth.
He then opened the door of his studio and then smacked the door behind him, he sat on his chair feeling a headache coming his way, he then sighed and pressed a secret button below his desk, which made the wall behind of him turn around to reveal his trophies, some weird discoveries he has had over the years, thanks to his Analyze Resonance.
Carlos suddenly frowned, he turned around to see the left corner of his studio, where a familiar figure was glaring at him from the shadow, those pretty turquoise toned eyes, how could Carlos not recognize them, after having been put through too much troubles, by their owner over the last one hundred or so years.
"What do you want, are you going to mock me now that my heir fell from the grace of the royal family... Annete".
The queen came out of the shadows with a calm expression, she ignored the Delphini Duke and instead approached the wall which was full with strange unknown discoveries, that were the pride of Carlos, the curiosity over the unknown is a common trait among the Crystal Dolphin race to which he belonged after all.
"Why would I involve in some child's play like that, no, I came here to get some answers", said the queen as she casually grabbed one of the so precious trophies of Carlos, and after inspecting it, she returned it to its shelf.
Carlos snorted in response; he waved his hand with disdain towards the door.
"You want to talk now after humiliating your own father, get lost, you are no longer a member of my Delphini family, never show yourself in my territory ever again", he said.
Annete smirked, she turned around and her mana pressure leaked out of her body, her lyre appeared floating in front of her too.
The Delphini Duke stood up from his chair, but as he was about to call the guards and summon his Stellar ranked weapon, thinking that Annete has gone mad, his legs gave in and he collapsed on the ground.
"Y-You, what the hell did you do... ahhh!", his muscles were retorting, stretching and breaking, every time he even thought of moving, imagine the pain of a serious cramp on your leg amplified around ten thousand times, that's what Carlos was experiencing right now.
Annete slowly approached him and then kicked his face directly with her heel, making a couple of teeth fly out of the Duke's mouth.
"Fuck, don't get carried away you low origin bit...ahhh!", this time Carlos tried to circulate his mana, blood exploded out of his skin as if some veins had broken all of a sudden.
The Duke's back was covered in cold sweat, he knows about Annete's capacity to disrupt other people's capacity to use mana, and while he admits is a terrifying ability, he has always believed that he can deal with it before it affects him, since he also has Analyze Resonance, so he has thought of a way to neutralize it.
But he was hit without realizing it what's more, this effect of feeling his body thorning apart wasn't in the report about Annete's spell, not only that she wasn't even her ability to boost her mage realm, so he was confused about what was happening here, how come a middle stage Stellar rank like him was being so easily suppressed by her.
Annete grabbed the Duke by his neck and raised him from the ground, her eyes had a cold light flashing on them as she said.
"One hundred years, I have held this grudge against you for one hundred years... do you think I haven't made all the preparations for the when the time to crush you came, your disgusting "rhythm" has been thoroughly analyzed by me, countless of times at this point, so that I can do something like this now".
Annete then used her pretty index finger to lightly pull one of the strings of her lyre, but there wasn't any sound produced by it, instead of that, two different sounds came from Carlos.
"Crack!".
"Aghhhhh!".
The sound of bones breaking as Carlos's right leg and left arm spun in an impossible direction, for any creature that has knees and elbows, followed by a miserable scream echoed through the room.
"What do you think of this "Body Shattering Resonance" which I created to deal with the experts of the Delphini family, you can use vibrations sure, but can you stop vibrations created by your own muscle fibers being pulled as strings~", playfully said the queen.
Carlos spat out blood, he who is the most skilled using vibrations in the Delphini family, found what Annete said outrageous.
"B-Bullshit, even if you can analyze living beings unlike the rest of the Delphini family members, there is no way you could memorize such a large amount of information and then turn it into a rhythm!", he shouted.
Annete softly snorted, her pretty fingers pulled the strings of her lyre and then all the fingers on Carlos's hands broke and twisted in different directions, making him scream in pain.
"Well, if you study someone for one hundred years, you'll get to know a lot of things", said the queen as she sat on Carlo's seat, in front of his desk.
The Duke gritted his teeth, when has he faced such humiliation before, he pushed the ring in his right hand against the ground, activating a silent alarm that called all the experts of his family to his studio, since he knew Annete could apply the same ability to those that were related as their rhythms resembled, he raised a couple of shadow protectors that weren't part of the Delphini.
'Just you wait, be complacent if you want, even if those two can't kill you, I just need a chance to let everyone know you are here, then even if you are the queen, you'll be executed for attacking an old noble house', he thought.
Annet who was leisurely sitting on Carlos's seat, smirked before saying.
"So, you finally called those two, what a shame no one will be coming, I even left a note with your handwrite explaining to your family how you were feeling overwhelmed and wanted to venture to find some new trophy for your collection, so you won't be returning for a long time".
Carlos's face paled, if she knew even about the secret protectors and deal with them, so easily to the point that no one else noticed then... she didn't come here alone, and the number of people who can silently kill Stellar ranked in the Clear Water kingdom can be counted with the fingers of a hand.
The door of the studio opened and Vincent who was dragging two miserably beaten-up figures entered the room.
"They were hidden exactly where you told me little Annete, these fellows are quite sneaky, but they are still early-stage Stellar ranks, so it wasn't that hard to knock them out without anyone noticing", said Vincent as he threw the two beaten up guys next to Carlos.
Annete stood up from her seat and then crouched down near Carlos, her eyes were cold and her usual playful attitude was nowhere to be seen.
"So, you really believe you were going to get away with it, sweeping the whole thing regarding my mother's death under the rug, making it look as an accident and then making any evidence disappear".
"You were dead the very moment she took her last breath back then; I have had the power to make you disappear without leaving a trace since a long time ago, the only reason as to why you are alive is because she told me not to kill you before I met a certain person, and now he is here, which means it's time to settle old scores", said the queen as the image of a silver haired youth flashed in her mind.
"It's quite easy to die when venturing in the Maelstrom Sea, don't worry I'll make whatever is left of you return to that bitch who was so happy my mother died".
Carlos trembled, he knew his end wasn't going to be a decent one, so he tried to detonate his magic core and take these bastards with him, just to feel despair when he noticed his mana wasn't obeying him, he followed the origin of the suppression to the tall old man who was glaring at him.
How could a mere recently ascended middle stage Stellar rank pull such a trick in front of Vincent, he thought of biting his tongue to die, but his body was now literally being controlled by Annete's lyre, there was nothing he could do but despair.
Vincent saw the cold expression on Annete's face and he sighed.
'One hundred years sounds like a short period of time, but enduring the urge to get revenge knowing you have 100% certainty of victory, even this old man can assure to do it... I hope that with this, you can finally leave this behind and return to be the little girl I met that day which changed my life as well', he thought.
"Uncle, clean the place while I take the "luggage" that the Delphini Duke will take for his one-way travel to hell", said Annete as she absorbed all the trophies in Carlo's secret wall, as well as the books on the shelves and any other document that was in his desk.
No one was allowed to come into this studio besides Carlos, and even if anyone entered just to satisfy its curiosity, it was normal for Carlos to take his important properties with him, in his storage ring.
Vincent nodded and used his water mana to erase any traces of them ever being in this place, Annete studied every aspect of the mansion of Carlos, to the point that she had memorized each and all the arrays deployed, she interrupted their functions with a weaker version of her Shattering Resonance, which is the same method Mellie used to disrupt other people's spells or martial arts, that's why no one noticed them entering the mansion.
Also no one besides Carlos knew about those secret protectors, they lived hidden in a secret base below the mansion, where they trained and did all the dirty work for the Duke, so no one will know about their disappearance.
Just as Annete stated, she studied everything and prepared to take action for one hundred years, if she wanted to, she could have killed Carlos a long time ago, but she respected the last message of her mother, and didn't do anything until they met the one who saved Mellie the very first time, she left the territory owned by her.
"Even after all these years, I don't know what were you thinking... mom", she mumbled, before she turned around, Vincent had created a water prison where Carlos and his subordinates were restrained.
"Let's go, we have a night meeting to attend", said Annete.
Vincent nodded, he opened a portal using space shift and they jumped into it, disappearing from this studio, to which Annete only had negative memories about, the last time she came here as a young girl, her mother died, this time the one who allowed it to happen will die.
