Chapter 266

Daphne

I must say, this world is certainly... different.

After graduating four years ago, I took it upon myself to do something novel: travel.And I took my bunny with me.

Watching the final pieces fall into place after Felix’s own graduation had been almost anticlimactic. The harem breakdown ticked above 87% when the snake girl, Velesia, finally leaned fully into her ancestral role: Protector, not paramour.

It made me wonder, not for the first time, why she’d ever been a concubine in the original timeline. Oh well who cares.

Whatever. I’m living the life.

And what a life it’s been. We’ve sailed to coastal kingdoms where elephant shifters move with a grace that belies their monumental size, their conversations rumbling like distant thunder. We’ve trekked across plains where rhino shifters hold court—massive, armor-plated, and terrifyingly serene. It’s been... humbling.

In my kingdom, I’m the apex. The panther. The biggest, baddest thing in the forest. Out here? I have to say, a pissed-off rhino beastman would kick my ass. Literally.

I could dart around them all day, but one solid charge? Pulp. I mean, I’m still the strongest predator in the traditional sense. But strength has many faces, and some of them are built like walking fortresses. Yeah. Some scary stuff out here.

We also, entirely by accident, came across a sunning rock occupied by a couple of... enthusiastic naked female hyena beastmen. Let’s not talk about that.

We met a tribe of whale shifters off the eastern archipelago. Actual whales. Beings who sang in frequencies that made the water vibrate and whose idea of a greeting was a wave that could capsize our ship.

Honestly, this world is pretty amazing.

But what makes it infinitely better is the bunny on my arm through all of it.

Now, though, the travel is over. We’ve arrived at the capital’s bustling port. I’d planned to go straight to my duchy, to the familiar, dark comfort of Nyxclaw, to finally rest.

Then I received a letter from Edith.

An SOS.

Apparently, the male lead’s uncle—the Tiger who’s been stewing in his own ambition for decades—is no longer willing to gracefully step aside for his nephew. And the old Lion King is unconscious after a severe heart attack. The kingdom is on a knife’s edge. On the verge of a civil war. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Yikes.

"System," I say, leaning against the ship’s railing as the capital’s spires pierce the smoggy sky.

The purple orb winks into existence beside me, indifferent to the salt spray.

"Will I still have successfully cleared this world if it descends into a civil war anyway?" I ask, already knowing the answer but needing to hear it.

[The primary mission to break the destined harem was to avoid the 50-year civil war specifically caused by the factional strife between the male lead’s nineteen children from five mothers. This is a different political conflict.]

I exhale a long, weary sigh that’s half growl. Fine. Of course. The job’s never just done, is it?

"Fine," I grumble. "I’ll help." The words taste of obligation. I’d really been enjoying not orchestrating kingdoms for a while.

A thought strikes me. "But Felix didn’t have any problems claiming the throne in the original timeline, though. The uncle was a non-issue."

The orb pulses slightly before responding, it’s metallic voice.

[In the original timeline, the Snowfrost Alliance ensured a smooth transition. Duke Snowfrost had his daughter married to the male lead, and his sister married to the male lead’s uncle. The power was consolidated within the allied family. The conflict was internalized, postponed, and later expressed through the harem’s children.]

Ah. So that’s how they’d played it.A neat, brutal piece of political engineering. Control both sides of the succession. No wonder Lumiya was considered the inevitable queen.

"Ah," I say, a slow, sharp smile cutting across my face. "So now they’re just being petty. Throwing their weight around because their preferred pawn isn’t on the board."

The wind picks up, tugging at my now-short hair. I’d loved the long, flowing look, that was very dramatic but after the third time it got caught in a tree branch while stalking game, or tangled in a ship’s rigging during a squall, practicality won out. It’s cropped close to my head now, efficient.

Besides it gives me a more handsome look these days

I lean against the rail and watch Nima. She’s down on the dock, directing a group of hulking stevedores,bear and ox shifters twice her size—as they unload our travel trunks and carefully handled crates of artifacts and art we’ve collected.

She’s so tiny beside them, her lopsy ears twitching with focus, her cute little button tail a white dot against her skirt. But her voice is firm, her gestures clear. She points, she nods, she checks a manifest on a clipboard. The large men listen without a hint of condescension.

As they should, the last person to disrespect my sweet little bunny...let’s not talk about them.

As if sensing the weight of my gaze, she turns. Her eyes find mine across the distance. I don’t bother hiding my grin, a flash of teeth, wholly predatory and teasing.

She narrows her eyes at me, a silent, playful accusation of ’I’m working, you’re lounging,’ before turning back to her task, her ears giving one firm, dismissive flick.

I stretch, muscles pulling tight after weeks at sea, and take a deep breath of the salt-and-fish air of the capital.

"Well," I purr again, to myself this time, the promise of violence humming in my veins like a second heartbeat. "The Snowfrosts aren’t the only dukedom capable of tossing its weight around."

Nima finishes her instructions and starts walking back toward the ship, weaving through the dock crowd with a calm assurance that makes my chest feel tight.

She’s not the same scared rabbit who flinched at shadows in the academy halls, as much as a certain part of me loved seeing her scared, and jumpy I like this version of her.

I like it a lot.