The ceiling hadn't changed in the last hour. Vel knew, because he'd been tracing along each line of the pattern until there were no new ones left.
The room was back in order. More or less. Books restacked. Drawers pushed in. Mattress flipped to hide the slash marks. It had taken him the better part of the evening, and the result wasn't so much "clean" as "functional enough to pretend nothing happened."
He turned toward the desk, still lying on his bed. Landre's letter sat where he'd left it, pinned beneath a paperweight he'd fished out from under the overturned wardrobe.
He'd already read it twice. The words hadn't changed.
--
Dear my lousy brother Vel,
I hope this finds you well before your tournament finals. First, thank you for the warning about Alukah. Your message arrived just in time — how you knew such specific details about such an ancient creature remains your own mystery. But everything you mentioned saved many lives.
We found it in an abandoned mine — villagers trapped in an awful state. We managed to separate Alukah from its core crystal, but Vel... something happened after.
The Void itself spoke through Alukah's broken body. The same darkness that once possessed me at the cliff's edge. I recognized its voice instantly. It called me "Vessel" and mocked our "gods" before saying something that chills me still: "This world is not what it seems to be."
Then it created a portal and vanished. No ritual, no preparation. Commander Varius was shocked — no creature should be able to do this.
Its final words haunt me: "WE will come back when TIME finds us." Not a threat, but a certainty.
I had to explain to the others how I recognized its voice. They were understanding, but I dread what happens when word spreads. The other sects would have a field day, and even within our own, there are those who wouldn't let something like this pass quietly.
There is good news — I managed to return the stolen life force to the villagers. Sister Imelda is keeping the now-empty crystal for when we meet next. I believe you might understand its nature better than any Church scholar.
Writing this reminds me of all those words I used to help you practice reading back in Oakhaven. Remember how you'd complain about my "fancy handwriting"? Yet you always wanted more lessons.
Try not to worry about me too much, Vel. This isn't the first time I've faced darkness, and we both know who helped me through the worst of it years ago.
With love, Lan
P.S. When all this tournament business is over, I promise we'll go fishing together like we used to. Though I can't make any guarantees with how much noisier you've gotten since becoming an Academy student!
ᶗ🎣
--
The first time he read it, nothing came. No thoughts. No analysis. He just sat there with the letter in his hands, staring at the last line until the words blurred.
It took the second read for the questions to start forming.
Every voidtainted creature he'd encountered or heard of up to now had been feral. Mindless. Not once had any of them spoken.
And that line, if that was exactly what it said. Could it know somehow? That this world was a creation? His creation?
But if it did, why didn't it say anything back on that cliff? It had possessed Landre, spoken through her, and still never addressed him directly.
Unless it didn't know back then. Unless it only became aware after he intervened, after he rewrote Landre's status through an admin item. The one act that shouldn't have been possible inside a living world.
He'd thought that was the end of it. That purging the Void's influence from Landre meant it was gone. But whatever the Void was, it persisted somewhere beyond his reach. A realm he hadn't even conceived when he first built Aeonalus.
What are they really after?
The timing was too convenient. Alukah. The Air Primordial's distress call. The cult markings around the Academy. All converging after he'd stood at the focal point in the arena.
He'd triggered something that day. He just didn't know what.
Thinking about it just made his eyes ache. Rubbing them didn't do much.
But despite the grim news, Landre was fine. Her words carried warmth between the lines, the way they always did.
He looked back at the desk. The corner of the letter peeked out from beneath the paperweight, and even from here he could see the crude fishing hook symbol she'd drawn there. Their private sign since childhood. It brought him back to that riverbank in Oakhaven, the two of them sitting in silence while the water carried their lines downstream. The day only he and Landre would ever truly understand.
Something in his shoulders loosened. Just a little.
One thing at a time.
He turned away from the desk and closed his eyes. But the quiet only made room for everything else.
"Should you place yourself in our path again... be ready to face the consequences."
Should he listen? Stay out of their way, keep safe, not just for himself but for those around him? Or dig into what they were planning before it was too late? And whoever ransacked his room today, were they connected?
Then there was Severin. Still unresolved.
And two days from now, he'd be standing across the arena from a childhood friend who'd grown apart.
He turned over. Flipped the pillow.
Sleep wouldn't come. He was stuck somewhere between trying and thinking, losing at both.
Vel kicked off the blanket.
Maybe some cool air would help. Despite the hour, this was actually when his mind worked best. At least when he was in his old world. Late nights at his apartment, just him and the glow of his monitor, a fresh brew from the coffee maker, building this very world, line by line.
He pulled on a light shirt and stepped into the corridor. The lodging was silent, the kind that made his own footsteps feel intrusive against the wooden floor. He passed the common room. Chairs pushed in neatly across every table, a single oil lamp burning low in the corner. The caretaker never missed a thing. Vel pushed through the back door.
The night sky opened above him.
Vel stopped mid-step, briefly caught off guard by how bright the night was.
Both moons hung full and bright, one pale white, the other faintly blue, positioned on opposing ends of the sky. Their light converged from two directions, casting twin shadows that split and stretched across the courtyard in overlapping geometry.
Right. The people in this world called it Mirror Zenith. An approaching phase where one moon mirrored the other in fullness, happening only every two years. Astrology students had been talking about it all week, something about amplified mana tides and celestial alignments.
Impressive, really. The twin moons were just a detail he'd put in to make the world feel ethereal. Nothing more than atmosphere. He never considered how an extra moon might shape every living thing beneath it, or how the world itself would learn to function around it.
Vel stood still in the middle of the pathway, both hands tucked inside his pockets, head tilted back. A cold draft swept across his skin, carrying the faint scent of damp stone and night-blooming something he couldn't name. The sky was vast and impossibly clear, the kind of sky that made everything below it feel small and temporary.
For a moment, he almost forgot about all of it.
Then his interface flickered.
A small notification, tucked in the corner of his vision. The party tracking system.
[Party member joined]
Celia? At this hour?
Vel followed the indicator past the practice dummies and into the training yard. The same place he saw every day, but under the twin moonlight, it felt almost unfamiliar.
He found her near the far fence, sitting on the ground with her legs stretched out, head tilted back against the wooden post. Her rapier lay across her lap. She wasn't practicing anymore. Just sitting there, staring up at the same sky he'd been admiring.
She'd been at it for a while, from the look of it.
Vel approached without hurrying, hands still inside his pockets.
Celia's eyes shifted toward him before the rest of her moved. No surprise. No flinch. Just recognition.
"Can't sleep?" she asked.
"No." Vel stopped a few paces away. "You?"
She didn't answer right away. Her fingers rested on the rapier's guard, tracing the edge idly.
"Something like that."
"What's keeping you up? The final?"
Celia's gaze followed him as he drew closer. She answered one beat late.
"At least something could be done about that."
"Hm?" Vel lowered himself onto the ground beside her. Up close, the signs of a long session were hard to miss. Sweat clung to her collar, loose strands of hair stuck to her neck, her knuckles faintly reddened.
Had she been training out here by herself?
"We've prepared as much as we can," he said. "Don't push yourself too hard, okay? Let's save our energy for when it actually matters."
Celia kept quiet. Her fingers stilled on the rapier's guard.
"When it matters..." she repeated, almost to herself. "If it was that simple."
Vel glanced at her. Something felt off, a tension in the way she held herself that didn't match the calm in her voice.
Then his own words caught up to him. Save our energy for when it actually matters. That could easily be mistaken as saying she could have done better in the fight against Severin.
"Wait, I didn't mean to—"
"I know." Celia turned to him. Her gaze was soft, carrying a gentle smile. "I know."
Did she really? He hoped she didn't misunderstand.
A silence passed between them. Not uncomfortable, just still. The kind where neither felt the need to fill it.
"Take Lona by storm, huh?" Celia said quietly.
Vel blinked. The promise. The one the three of them made together before Kein left Elnor.
"I didn't think we'd do it..." She paused, the corner of her mouth twitching. "With an actual storm."
A soft giggle escaped her.
Vel couldn't help the grin that followed. Of all the ways to honor that promise, conjuring a rainstorm inside an arena wasn't exactly what any of them had in mind.
"We could always do it again," he said, leaning back on his palms. "This time, Kein gets to be part of it. Whether he likes it or not."
Celia's smile broadened.
"Hey, Vel." Her voice shifted, quieter now. "Hileya told me about your room."
Vel didn't respond.
"Have you ever thought about how life would be if we didn't have to worry about what comes next?"
Vel froze.
"Not worry about the monsters lurking outside," she continued, eyes still on the sky. "The streets are safe. No one needing to carry a weapon just to protect themselves."
She said it like a daydream. Something distant and impossible.
But for Vel, it wasn't.
What she just described was his old world. A world he left behind. Crosswalks and train stations and convenience stores open past midnight. A world where the most dangerous thing on his walk home was a missed signal.
And this world, the one he'd built, was supposed to be the escape. The fantasy people logged into to feel alive, to feel powerful, to feel free. Millions of players chose this over the mundane safety of their everyday lives.
His closest friend was wishing for the opposite.
"Yeah... I can imagine," he said slowly. "Maybe we'd be learning something totally different at the Academy."
Neither of them spoke for a moment.
"But why are you asking?"
"I'm just... thinking out loud." Then she yawned, covering her mouth with the back of her hand. The kind that came from deep inside, the body finally catching up.
"Maybe you should get some rest."
"Okay." She blinked slowly. "How about you?"
"I'd go back to bed soon too."
Celia nodded. She planted one hand on the fence post and pushed herself up.
Her legs buckled before she was halfway standing.
Vel moved without thinking. His arm caught her around the waist, her weight falling against his shoulder. The rapier slipped from her lap and clattered onto the packed earth.
"Celia—"
"I'm fine." The words came automatic, reflexive. But her hand gripped his sleeve, and her legs weren't cooperating.
She wasn't fine. Up close, the signs were impossible to miss. The tremor in her arms. The way her breathing had shifted from measured to shallow. This wasn't someone who'd done a light round of practice before bed.
"How long were you out here?"
She didn't answer.
"Celia."
Her jaw tightened. She tried to pull away, to stand on her own, but her knees gave again. Vel tightened his hold and lowered them both back down to the ground, her back against the fence post, his arm still supporting her.
"...since sundown," she said finally, barely above a whisper.
Since sundown. Hours. In the dark, alone, swinging that rapier until her body gave out.
"Why?"
She didn't look at him.
"Because I keep thinking about the match." The words came out quiet, stripped of the confidence she usually wore. "I gave everything I had, and it still wasn't enough to finish it." Her fingers curled into the fabric of her training clothes, gripping the hem across her knee. "You had to end it alone. And look what that cost."
"That's not—"
"And then your room." She cut him off, not harsh, but firm. "Someone broke in, went through your things, and I didn't even know until Hileya told me. What if next time it's not just a room?"
Her grip tightened.
"If that match had been real, Vel. No charms. No officials stepping in." She let out a breath. "I don't have an answer for that."
"So you came out here."
"It's the only thing I know how to do. Train until my body gives out and hope that somewhere in there, I push past whatever's holding me back."
Vel said nothing for a moment. He understood the logic. Exhaust the body, silence the doubt. He'd done the same thing more times than he'd admit.
"I don't want to be someone you have to protect, Vel." She turned her head just enough to meet his eyes. "I want to stand next to you when it matters. Not behind you."
The moonlight caught the edges of her face. Both moons, white and blue, painting her in colors that didn't belong to the daytime. Her eyes were red at the rims but dry. She hadn't cried. She wouldn't let herself.
"You already do," Vel said.
She blinked.
"Stand next to me." He held her gaze. "You have. Every single time. The Behemoth. The tournament. Even when you threw yourself in front of that fire serpent. You think I would've had time to cast if you hadn't been there?"
His voice came out steadier than he expected.
"That's not someone standing behind me, Celia."
She stared at him. The grip on her knee loosened, finger by finger.
"You're not behind me. You never were."
Something shifted in her expression. The tension didn't leave all at once, but it cracked, just enough for the exhaustion underneath to show through. Her shoulders dropped. Her hand released her knee entirely and fell to her side.
"...you really mean that?"
"When have I ever said something I didn't mean?"
A pause. Then the faintest breath of a laugh left her lips.
"All the time, actually."
"Name one."
"The noodle shop. You said you'd only have one bowl."
Vel opened his mouth. Closed it. She had him there.
Celia's laugh came out properly this time. Tired, thin, but real. Her head tilted and came to rest against his shoulder. The weight of it was light, barely there, but neither of them moved to change it.
The yard was quiet. Somewhere beyond the fence, a night bird called once and went silent.
He thought about the tournament. About every fight they'd been through since Elnor. The Behemoth. The entrance exam. Every training session, every time one of them stumbled and the other was already there. Remove Celia from any of it, and the whole thing falls apart. Not some of it. All of it.
It wasn't a revelation. It was something he'd known for a long time without putting words to it.
"Believe it or not," Vel said, "I need you more than anything in this world. I couldn't be here without you."
Celia didn't respond right away. Her face turned into his chest, just slightly, and when she spoke, her voice came out muffled against the fabric.
"You idiot." A pause. "How can you say something like that so casually?"
Casually? He'd just said what was obvious.
"Because it's true."
She stayed there for a moment. Then she lifted her head.
Her face was close. Closer than he'd realized. The moonlight caught the faint shine along her lashes, the slight flush that hadn't come from training. Her eyes were open, unguarded in a way he'd rarely seen from her.
Her lips parted, just slightly.
He'd been this near Celia a hundred times. Training. Traveling. Proximity to her had never been something he needed to think about. She was just there, the way she'd always been.
But something was different at this moment. He couldn't tell what had shifted, or whether it came from her or himself. Maybe nothing had shifted at all. Maybe he'd simply never held her this close long enough to notice.
Every small thing he could feel. The warmth of her side pressed against his. The faint scent of whatever she used to wash her hair. Even the slightest shift of her weight registered against his arm.
Her skin was soft, but the muscles underneath, the ones he'd watched harden through every sparring session and morning drill, were completely slack. Relaxed in a way he'd never seen from her. Her whole frame felt a lot smaller than it should, fitting neatly inside his embrace.
Her eyes were dark, reflective, relaxed, as if looking forward to something in him. Her lips glossy, faintly wet.
Something in him simply wanted to know. Not a question, not a decision. Just a pull, as natural as breathing. What would those taste like.
And her eyes were saying she wouldn't object if he were to find out.
Nothing stood between them. Nothing there to stop it.
He leaned closer. Not entirely a decision. More like gravity. Something deeper had crept past the part of him that usually kept things measured, and for once, he let it through.
Her breath was warm against his face. Just inches now. He could count her lashes if he wanted to.
Celia closed her eyes.
Vel closed his. Braced for the inevitable that was about to come next.
Then something stopped him.
Not from outside. From inside.
A feeling so raw and sharp it flooded through him without cause. Confusion. Warmth. Something tangled and aching that didn't belong to him, not at this moment. It hit with enough force that his whole body went still.
What was that?
His breath caught. The feeling lingered, pulsing faintly beneath his ribs like an echo that wouldn't fade.
"Vel?" Celia's voice reached him. More concern than disappointment. "What's wrong?"
"I..." He swallowed. "Sorry. I just..."
His interface flickered.
[Party member joined]
Vel turned his head.
Hileya stood about ten steps away, just outside the flare of the lamp post. Her silver hair caught the bright shine of both moons. She wasn't approaching. Wasn't leaving. Just stood there in perfect maid posture, hands clasped in front of her.
How long had she been there?
He'd been so caught up in the world of two that he hadn't noticed the third.
What he felt just now. Was that from her? Did she somehow project all of that onto him?
Celia followed his gaze. She pulled back. The guard returned to her eyes.
"Hileya. You're up too?"
Hileya nodded, but it came a beat late.
"Young master. Miss Celia." Her voice was steady, practiced. "I apologize for the intrusion."
"You're not intruding," Vel said, though the timing told a different story. "What's wrong?"
"I couldn't sleep. And Miss Celia wasn't in the room." She paused. "I was afraid something happened, so I came looking for both of you."
Of course. Whatever had been weighing on them tonight had affected all three of them. Not just Vel and Celia alone.
"Can't blame you," Vel said quietly.
Celia looked between Vel and Hileya. Something seemed to cross her mind, and it pulled her attention away from whatever she'd been feeling a moment ago.
"Are you okay?" Vel asked her.
"Yeah. I'm fine now." She pushed herself up from the fence post, steadier this time.
Hileya turned slightly, pulling something tied behind her waist. A small flask.
"I prepared something when I found out Miss Celia was out here." She stepped closer, holding the flask out with both hands. "Sweetened Thunder Berry Tea. I heard it helps with restoring stamina. Best served while it's still hot."
Celia reached for it. Took a sip. Then stopped.
"Hileya... it's cold." She looked at the flask. "Not just cold. It's icy."
Hileya's composure cracked, just slightly.
"I... it was warm when I poured it. I swear."
Vel studied her face. Hileya wouldn't lie about something like this.
"I'm not sure why it keeps happening," she added, quieter now.
"What do you mean 'keeps happening'?" Vel's tone shifted. "This has happened before?"
Hileya hesitated, but she continued. "I thought it was coincidence. Or that I'd actually forgotten to heat the drink. But yesterday, the faucet started freezing on its own. Then the corridor lamp snuffed out as I walked past." Her gaze dropped. "One of them even cracked."
"How long has this been going on?"
"A few days now."
Something clicked.
Vel pulled up his interface. Hileya's Follower panel appeared at the edge of his vision.
--
Hileya Nightfae
Weapon Proficiency: Dagger
Affinity: Water (Active) | Entropy (Emerging)
Status: Mana channels open — unregulated output detected.
Contractual side effect: Suppressed.
--
Her elements were surfacing. Water had shifted to active. Entropy was emerging. And the contractual side effect, whatever it fully entailed, was listed as suppressed. Not gone. Suppressed.
That answered one question. What he'd felt back there, that raw, tangled spike that pulled him out of the moment with Celia. It came through the contract. From Hileya. Whether she intended it or not.
And she had no idea.
Vel closed the interface.
"It's the contract," he said. "Your elements are emerging. But you've never learned to channel them, so the mana is leaking out on its own."
"Mana leakage?" Celia raised an eyebrow. "That's a thing?"
"Think of it like a barrel full of water. Volatile. And since she never learned how to properly channel it, there's no pathway for it to come out."
"Is it dangerous?" Celia asked, glancing at Hileya.
"Not yet. But it could be if we don't address it soon." Vel turned the cold flask in his hand. "Who knows what happens when it's not just frozen water. Or when she's mentally unstable."
Hileya went quiet at that.
"So... what do I do, master?"
Vel looked up. The sky had shifted since he first stepped outside. Darker at the edges, paler where the moons still held.
"It's late. I'll prepare something tomorrow. Teaching you how to cast a spell should give the mana a proper outlet." He turned to Celia. "Can you help?"
"Of course."
The three of them fell into silence.
No one moved to go back inside. The air turned cold without warning, and a low wind swept through the training yard, as if to carry everything else away and leave only the three of them. Celia's loose hair lifted with it. Hileya's shawl rippled at her side.
And only then did the scene settle in.
Hileya stood to his left, bathed in the pale white of the first moon. Celia to his right, under the faint blue of the second. And Vel himself, right in the middle of both, where the two lights met and overlapped.
A Mirror Zenith.