Cracks spread through the water in a ripple-like pattern, soon filling the entire room in an instant. It happened so fast that the water wasn't able to properly flow and fill in the gaps created through those cracks right away, so of course the Naiad Queen wasn't able to react right away either.
The special dagger's cracks soon reached the powerful spirit's body, digging their way into her flesh. Deep wound were created all over her body. Though, of course, they weren't lethal. Eiro wasn't trying to turn this whole realm into a true enemy whatsoever. He was just trying to scare her a bit, and it seemed like that worked. The shaking naiad queen stared back at Eiro, confused.
"Wh-What's going on? Why would you...?" she asked, shivering from the pain and shock, but Eiro just glared at her silently.
"I'm just showing you how powerless you are," the Demon replied bluntly, staring at the figure in front of him, "If I had wanted to, I could have killed you right this second. Something that will indeed happen if you choose to target the guardian beasts. If you dare injure them for even a single point, I will come seek you out and make sure you pay any damage back hundredfold."
The naiad queen stayed silent, clearly trying to understand why any of this was happening. It really seemed like she had no intention of trying to see things from Nelly and Eiro's perspective; she simply didn't understand the gravity of what it meant to kill those beings. It would severely weaken the water element, and that would throw all other elements out of balance.
Like the water that had crashed into the empty spaces created by the cracks, all other elements would try to fill the space that was created. But in the end, the power imbalance of the water element wouldn't just happen by having it shrink; if that were the case, all it would mean would be that water magic would grow weaker, while some other elements would grow a bit stronger.
While it would cause some immense ripples and changes throughout the world, it was something that could be adjusted to over time.
But the weakening would happen very similarly to the cracks that Eiro had just formed. Those cracks, instead of being filled back in with the water element, would be filled with others. And with the water element surrounding them from almost all sides, those elements would slowly diffuse into the water. It would be forever changed. Muddied, cursed; polluted.
That was something that was never allowed to happen, no matter what. It was something that Eiro was going to make sure would never happen, even if it meant killing the spirit monarchs. Rather, he would even go so far as to seize power himself.
Though, killing the Naiad King might be a bit rough for Eiro right now. The queen was weak; she was a healer, not a fighter, so she had almost no way to defend herself. She could heal her body, but was useless if she died before she could attempt to heal herself. But the king would be another story.
That being the case, Eiro and Nelly were able to swim away from the castle pretty casually.
"Are you okay?" Eiro asked, looking over at the naiad next to him. Of course, he already had a pretty good idea at the answer to that question. Looking at Nelly's expression, there was no way she was fine with what just happened.
"No... no, I'm not okay... I can't believe that she would actually still be like that... I thought it had maybe just been something like youthful naivete and a severe lack of experience that made her think like that, but now...
it's clearly just willfull, blatant ignorance that she is displaying for no other purpose but to prove herself right," Nelly pointed out, slowly turning around toward the castle and glaring at the structure bitterly.
Eiro looked at her with a sorry expression, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have pushed you to go and talk to her."
Nelly instantly shook her head, "No, don't apologize. I didn't... I didn't not want to talk to her. It's a complicated situation, obviously... even now, I do still cherish her. She hasn't yet gone past the point of no return, so I hope that someday she can see the truth and actually understand what it would mean to kill the guardians.
Though, luckily, I doubt they could do it even if they wanted to."
"Yeah, the guardians' power is nigh insurmountable," Eiro pointed out, "Though, they're luckily incredibly intelligent too, so we should be able to communicate with them. I've wanted to try and find them anyway, so maybe we should warn them and help them hide somehow. Even if they're hard to kill, you never know what kind of things the monarchs could have figured out."
The naiad next to Eiro slowly nodded, "I think that's a good idea... Do you have any clues to where we need to go to find them?"
"Not yet, but when we get to the tower's top floor, we should be able to find a clue, at the very least."