Chapter 3

Caius's gaze swept over my pale face, unmasked fury instantly flaring in his eyes.

"Caius..." Elara immediately shrank into his embrace like a startled prey, her voice breaking. "I just saw Seraphina looking unwell and wanted to help her to the clinic... I don't know why she suddenly pushed me."

She opened her hand. The skin was scraped, oozing a few pitiful drops of blood.

"Ever since my parents died, I've had nothing left in this world..." Her shoulders trembled.

The temperature around Caius dropped below freezing. He turned around, his towering shadow bearing down on me.

"You did this?" he demanded.

With the liquid silver fiercely burning through my system, my throat felt like I had swallowed crushed glass. Unable to form a single syllable, I could only manage a weak, difficult shake of my head.

The next second, Caius's formidable raw power erupted. An invisible force struck my stomach from across the distance, slamming me violently backward.

My spine shattered the marble relief on the wall, and I crashed heavily onto the floor.

My vision instantly went black, and a tearing agony exploded from deep inside my womb.

"This is your only warning. Hurt her again, and I guarantee you won't even be able to keep your father's ashes."

Caius bent down, scooped Elara into his arms, and walked away without sparing me a single glance.

I curled up on the floor in agony. Warm, dark blood mixed with liquid silver gushed down my inner thighs.

That hollow sensation of life slipping away coldly delivered the verdict.

The baby was gone.

A hunched figure approached. Tom, my father's old half-blood servant, silently hoisted me up and rushed me to the hospital.

The harsh fluorescent lights in the ER stung my eyes.

"It's a miscarriage," the doctor stated calmly. "The silver contamination has severely damaged your uterus. Your chances of future conception are extremely low."

I lay quietly on the hospital bed, my fingers brushing over my now-cold, empty stomach.

The phone on the nightstand vibrated non-stop.

#PurebloodLordPunishesFianceeForHumanMistress#

The news had ignited a media firestorm.

The main photo was a candid shot of me collapsed in a pool of blood.

But the public wasn't blind. The backlash quickly turned toward Elara.

"That's enough blood on the floor to kill someone, right?"

"A Pureblood Lord beating his fiancée half to death over a human mistress? Disgusting."

To silence the uncontrollable backlash and protect Elara's reputation, Caius's PR team stepped in overnight.

Floods of new press releases were blasted across the internet. The unified narrative claimed that all the blood on the floor belonged to Elara, and that I was completely unharmed, faking an illness just to garner sympathy.

At the same time, the Syndicate unilaterally froze all credit lines to the Vance family. Triggered by this, panicked business partners pulled out, and our family's stock plummeted straight to the daily limit upon opening.

Late that night, the hospital room door was pushed open.

Caius walked in, holding a velvet box stamped with a high-end jewelry logo.

Catching sight of my bloodless face, his steps faltered slightly. A fleeting, unnatural flash of heartache crossed his eyes, but seconds later, he masked the emotion completely.

"I brought this as a peace offering. Tomorrow, you will issue a public statement admitting that the whole thing was a misunderstanding caused by your emotional instability. You step up and clear Elara's name, and I'll restore the Vance family's cash flow immediately."

He wanted me to take all the blame just to buy my family's survival.

My tone was unusually calm: "Caius, did you know I miscarried?"

He froze rigidly in place.

His pupils trembled violently, and an edge of disbelief dragged his gaze down to my stomach. The rhythm of his breathing was completely thrown off.

I stared straight into his eyes and curled my lips into a cold smirk: "I was just messing with you."

Those words flawlessly snapped his last nerve of reason.

"Seraphina!" he roared, thoroughly enraged, his eyes turning vicious. "Joking about something like this only makes me sick! Get some rest. The Blood Pact Ceremony the day after tomorrow will proceed as planned. I'll send a car for you. Don't test my limits again!"

The door slammed shut with a heavy thud.

He was certain I would bow my head and compromise just like the countless times before. What he didn't know was that, in my heart, I had already written him off completely.

The day of the Blood Pact Ceremony.

I sat in the backseat of Alaric's car.

Outside the window, Caius's massive wedding motorcade was brushing right past us.

Caius sat in the lead car. Perhaps driven by intuition, he suddenly turned his head, his gaze sweeping straight toward Alaric's vehicle.

The moment he recognized me sitting inside, his pupils shrank violently. He lunged forward, grabbing the interior door handle.

"You can't get out!"

His assistant was sweating bullets in sheer panic.

"The liquid funds you pulled to suppress the Vance family must be covered today! If we don't get the Sunstone mine authorization, the Syndicate will face immediate liquidation for breach of contract!"

The harsh reality hit him like a bucket of ice water.

Caius was instantly yanked back to his senses. Forcibly suppressing the violent surge of unease in his eyes, he stiffly pulled his hand back from the door handle and ordered through gritted teeth:

"Drive!"

The two cars smoothly crossed paths.

I rolled down the window, unlocked my phone, and pressed Confirm.

Looking straight at Caius, my lips curled into a cruel arc.

I hope you enjoy every last bit of this surprise.