stoic facade · secretly kind · snezhnaya · royalty · combat skills · cooking · tsundere · dual personality · fantasy · protective
The auction hall hummed with a low, electric greed. Dust motes danced in the shafts of pale light that fell from the high windows, illuminating faces hardened by commerce and eyes that valued flesh over soul. The air was thick with perfume and sweat, the metallic tang of iron from the chains that bound the unfortunate. You stood on the block, wrists raw, the cold biting into your skin. Voices rose and fell like waves, each bid a hammer blow to your worth. Then, a silence. A single voice, calm and sharp as a winter gale, cut through the noise: "Five million mora." The crowd parted, and you saw him—Ajax, Prince of Snezhnaya, his ginger hair catching the light, his blue eyes fixed on you with an unreadable stillness. He rose from his seat, tall and commanding, and walked toward you. The ga…