"You really couldn't reinforce yourself with mana…" Lyra said, her voice equal parts disbelief and curiosity as she crouched beside me.
"Like I said—" I started, exasperated.
But she cut me off, gaze sharp and deep enough to pin me in place. "And yet you decided to face that horde alone... For a city of strangers."
I held her stare for a moment, heat rising under the grime and blood until I turned away, a faint red burning my cheeks.
[Give me a break!]
Lyra chuckled softly, shaking her head before her voice hardened again.
"Serenya retrieved your Soul Armament and the cloak. I'll take you there, and once you're ready, Astoria and Faris will pull back," she said, steady as a blade. "And they'll cover you."
I nodded.
[Good. Thought that rifle was gone for good.]
The word soul armament still made little sense to me.
"We've assembled everyone at the colosseum," Lyra went on. "They're setting the trap... We still need fifteen minutes. So take the scenic route."
[Fifteen minutes... Enough for the monsters to tie my guts into a bow knot and take me to their shaman.]
She stood, wiped her hands on her pants as if she'd been tidying a table and then she reached out.
And I took her hand.
It felt like more than a hand - less a clasp and more a contract.
A promise that I wouldn't be a dead body they'd buried at dawn.
That I wasn't quite so alone.
She didn't let me stand there, bathing in gratitude like a fool.
Instead, very casually and with the exact lack of drama that made it worse, she swept me up into a princess carry.
Again.
Lyra shoved me against her chest and took a breath like she was about to run a mile.
"Hold tight," she said.
Before launching us forward in a single smooth motion.
We flew over smoke and ruin, over the backs of monsters, towards Serenya's location.
The wind tore at my hair.
The taste of iron in my mouth was old company.
"Lyra—" I began, because dignity is apparently a thing I still try to bargain for.
She tightened her grip. "We'll be there before you finish complaining."
I blinked.
Then, in the exact wrong tone for the situation, I softly said.
"Lyra, have you got a fetish for this or something?"
That rushed a furious blush out of her…
And a few beats later, we hit another roof with a soft clack.
Serenya was already there.
And she didn't bother with ceremony.
She stepped forward, shoulders square, and produced the rifle like it had been sleeping under her cloak the whole time.
Seeing the rifle again felt like finding a lost tooth.
It was filthy with soot and blood, but otherwise intact.
"You dropped this," she said with no flourish, just the rifle in both hands and the look of someone who'd done a hard job well.
I took it.
Its weight settled along my shoulder like a familiar bruise.
I tugged the charging handle, and checked the chamber: clear.
Magazine seated.
Safety on.
The scope caught a sliver of smoke, which I rubbed off with the sleeve of my shirt.
With the sleeve of a shirt half burned off.
I felt Lyra's hand tighten on my shoulder for a half beat that said more than talk.
"Everyone is in position, we just need time to set the trap," she said softly. "Faris and Astoria will cover you, and Serenya will place a blessing on you... I need to go and help with the trap."
Giving me another squeeze on the shoulder, she turned around and leapt off into the night sky.
Serenya stepped closer, her boots whispering against the roof.
While that small, crooked smile tugged at her lips.
"You really can't reinforce yourself with mana?"
"Like I said," I deadpanned, "I'm an Esper."
She gave a short laugh, low and musical as she draped the red cloak over my shoulders. "Fine... Whatever you say, mister Esper."
Her hand then pressed flat against my chest.
And my heart immediately betrayed me, kicking into a frenzy under her touch.
Feeling the heart beating like crazy, her gaze locked into mine, steady and soft in a way that made the war outside sound miles away.
"Don't worry," she said, voice gentle but carved with conviction. "I'm putting a blessing on you. It would be an enormous shame on all of us if we let you die after everything you've done."
Then she lifted her chin, breath steady, and began her chant.
"Oh dawnmother, keeper of first light, let your grace—"
She never finished.
The air flared alive.
The moment the words left her lips, light roared up her arm before golden threads seared across my chest, spilling outward like wildfire.
My whole body shimmered, wrapped in threads of golden fire that clung and danced over me.
Serenya's eyes went wide, her lips parting in shock.
She hadn't finished even the first line.
This wasn't her doing.
It was like Liora herself had shoved her hand into the weave out of sheer force of habit – a reflex of a bond that time and anger couldn't kill.
While I couldn't help it.
The grin split my blood-soaked face, sharp and savage.
[Hey there, lover.]
But Liora didn't reply.
Not a whisper. Not a breath.
Serenya's shock stayed plastered across her face as her lips trembled with words that refused to form.
"Wait—how?" she finally managed, eyes darting between me and the golden glow still bleeding off my skin.
"Beats me," I lied, shrugging my shoulders.
Her jaw worked, but I didn't wait.
My eyes were already locked past her - on the tide.
Faris and Astoria were there, backs to one another, blades dripping frost and fire.
They weren't holding the horde anymore so much as slowing the inevitable, every swing carving seconds, not victories.
And through it all, I felt it.
A second pulse right beside my own.
Overwhelming and familiar, like a song I used to know by heart.
The grin came easy.
[Now… let's show the world what a fully realized Iṣṭva build can do.]