Kaiserin
Kaiserin
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She was ten years old when she met Zane Ashford.
Hannah's father, Sergio Kessler, and the company sponsored the tournament.
Zane won the match.
After the publicity photo shoot, they went backstage to see the rest of the Kesslers — Hannah's mother Cassie and her younger brother Will, who was picking up Aetherium dueling alongside his real love, chess.
Zane crouched to Will's level, chatted with him, and jested that being Sergio Kessler's son, he'd surely be a champion — "you've got big shoes to fill!"
Then he turned to Hannah. "Do you duel as well?"
"I ride horses — that's where I'm strongest. I just competed in England."
That evening, Hannah overheard that Will might not want to inherit their father's dueling legacy at all — and recalled how, even when Will placed only third at a chess tournament, their father was quietly proud all the same. Perhaps Will's path was magic instead, carried through their mother's bloodline, watched over by the small guardian spirit Pell.
But what was in store for Hannah's own future? Was Zane part of it?
That night, alone by her window, she let herself imagine the Kessler empire as a kingdom — her parents its king and queen, she and Will its princess and prince. And if Zane was already a Vanguard... maybe, someday, she could be his Kaiserin.