The room fell quiet again.
Outside, a flare of arcane light burst into the sky—someone had triggered a glyph mine, and the crowd erupted with noise.
But the two girls inside the room didn't flinch. They were watching a different kind of match—one not shown on crystal feeds.
A match of belief.
A match of quiet verdicts.
The soft hum of the arcane projector orb filled the silence between them again. Outside, the trees swayed lightly, almost lazily, as if they too were eavesdropping.
Fuuka had remained by the window for some time—eyes distant, but voice ready.
She shifted slightly, leaning a shoulder against the frame. Her tone was quiet. Neutral, as always. But deliberate.
"What about the faction leaders?"
Yuki's pen paused mid-sentence.
"…Hm?"
"Two of them joined the bracket this year. That's… uncommon, isn't it?"
Yuki tapped her pen twice against the edge of the notebook. Not with irritation—more like syncing herself to a rhythm of thought.
"Yes. Rare. Unnecessary, even."
Fuuka kept her gaze on the fields below. Her voice barely moved the air.
"Still. It's interesting."
Yuki didn't answer right away.
Fuuka continued.
"Seryn Eloweth, for one."
Now that earned a pause. Yuki's fingers stilled entirely.
She stared at her notebook as if the lines on the page had changed. Then she closed it, quietly.
She didn't look at Fuuka when she answered.
"…She doesn't care about winning."
"No?"
"Seryn doesn't chase something as crude as 'victory.' She plays different games."
"And what would you call this?"
"An observation chamber," Yuki said, finally turning her eyes toward the glowing feed. "She's watching. Not fighting."
Fuuka hummed faintly, almost imperceptible.
"Still… even observation can disrupt the pattern."
Yuki offered a small shrug.
"True. But she's not the kind to disrupt unless the test subject misbehaves."
Fuuka tilted her head slightly.
"And if they do?"
"Then she recalibrates."
Another silence passed. The room felt colder somehow. Not from the air—but from the thoughts being passed like folded knives.
Then Fuuka turned her gaze upward—toward the sky, where streaks of magic from the tournament's illusions were dancing like inverted fireworks.
She spoke again, softer.
"And Kael?"
Yuki blinked once. Then reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a small, worn notebook—a different one. Brown leather cover. The kind with bent corners and no title.
She opened it without fanfare and scribbled something in shorthand. Her pen scraped against paper with intentional weight.
Then she said, almost like an afterthought:
"That idiot might be planning something suicidal."
"That sounds... accurate."
"He thinks strength is the answer to everything," Yuki muttered, still writing. "Like if he punches hard enough, the world might finally shut up."
Fuuka didn't reply, but her breath shifted—a single amused exhale. Not a laugh. Just a note of recognition.
Yuki flipped the page.
"But if we're talking raw potential—"
She looked up now, expression tightening ever so slightly.
"He could win."
Fuuka raised a brow.
"Even against Silas?"
Yuki didn't answer at first. Her pen hovered just above the paper, as if unsure whether the next word should be written or swallowed.
Then—quietly:
"Silas will have to move carefully."
Fuuka blinked.
"You're saying Kael's stronger?"
"I'm saying Kael's simpler."
She closed the notebook with a soft thud.
"And sometimes, simple things are the hardest to break."
The quiet hum of distant cheering was briefly overtaken by a more immediate sound.
Three soft knocks.
Then—
BANG!
The door burst open with the theatrical flair of someone who believed entrances were meant to be remembered, not respected.
In stepped a boy.
Tall. Loose-limbed. Wearing his uniform in a way that said "rules are a suggestion, not a lifestyle." His tie wasn't just loose—it looked like it had been repurposed as a makeshift scarf at some point. A box of snacks balanced lazily in one hand, the other lifting in a wave that was more gesture than greeting.
"Chief~!"
His voice sang through the room, dragging sunlight with it. Not in volume, but in intent.
Aria Cross had arrived.
Yuki didn't even flinch.
Fuuka turned slowly, one brow slightly raised—like a cat deciding whether the intruder was prey or just another house pet.
"You're late," Yuki said flatly.
Aria shrugged, stepping in as if he owned the floorboards.
"Time is a lie, and so are deadlines. But these—"
He held up the snack box like it was the Ark of the Covenant.
"—are very real. Imported sugarbread from East Market. I may or may not have flirted with a baker's apprentice to get them fresh."
Yuki didn't blink.
She reached out.
Took one.
Bit into it.
Expression unchanged.
"…acceptable."
Aria beamed like he'd just received a marriage proposal.
"You wound me, Chief. That was supposed to be the part where you say I'm irreplaceable."
"You're not."
"Cruel," Aria whispered, placing a hand over his chest in mock heartbreak. "But expected."
Fuuka, from her spot near the window, watched the exchange with something between mild interest and clinical detachment. She hadn't moved much, but her eyes tracked Aria with the same precision she used on wild animals.
Yuki, meanwhile, grabbed another piece from the box and held it out toward Fuuka without ceremony.
"Want one?"
Fuuka blinked. Then stepped forward, taking the offering with silent grace.
She examined it for a second—more curious than cautious—then nodded.
"Thank you."
She turned to Aria, head tilting ever so slightly.
"Are you… one of her club members?"
Aria's entire posture lit up.
He spun slightly on his heel, adjusted his stance, then dipped into something dangerously close to a bow—but with far too much flourish to be genuine.
"Aria Cross, at your poetic service," he said smoothly, offering a hand that absolutely no one asked for. "Third-string sound technician, part-time field runner, full-time charm distributor."
Fuuka stared at the outstretched hand.
Then stared at him.
"…I see."
Aria's grin didn't falter.
"I'm also the one who makes sure our darling Chief here doesn't starve herself mid-broadcast."
"I'm not your project," Yuki muttered.
"You are my routine, though," Aria said without missing a beat.
"Flirt less. Talk sense."
"I only have one setting."
"Unfortunate."
Fuuka looked between the two of them again. Then quietly took a bite of the sugarbread.
Chewed.
Swallowed.
"Sweet."
"Thank you," Aria said brightly, as if he had baked it.
Aria, now comfortably slouched across a spin-chair that he most definitely didn't ask permission to use, let the sugarbread box rest on his lap as he swiveled halfway toward the two girls—one sipping tea, the other pretending not to exist in the same reality as him.
"Sooo... what were we talking about before I, heroically, arrived?"
Yuki didn't even look up.
"None of your business."
And almost in the same breath—
"We were discussing tournament participants," Fuuka replied, voice as soft as ever, unbothered by the synchronized contradiction.
Aria raised a brow, eyes gleaming. The predator scenting gossip.
"Oho~ Spicy. And you didn't think to invite me into the commentary lounge?"
Yuki exhaled—just barely. That tiny, nearly imperceptible sigh that always meant "why are you still here".
"Fuuka, why would you tell him?"
Fuuka glanced sideways, utterly calm.
"What's the harm? More people makes the conversation livelier."
Yuki gave her a flat look. One of those "this is why I isolate myself" looks.
She didn't argue further.
Instead, she leaned forward, popped open the chilled tea bottle Aria had brought earlier, and took a deliberate sip—ignoring him with such intent that it circled back to acknowledging him.
Aria, of course, beamed like she just toasted him back.
"Well, since I've been graciously accepted into this inner circle of judges—"
Yuki snorted.
"No one said that."
"—I'd like to bring up a name that's been haunting my every waking thought since yesterday's field match."
That got their attention.
Even Fuuka, quiet as ever, glanced in his direction—brows ever so slightly raised.
"Let me guess," Yuki said dryly, "it's a girl."
Aria pointed dramatically, like she'd struck a nerve.
"Wrong! …But also yes. A girl. An elf, to be precise."
Yuki did not respond. She just drank more tea.
Fuuka blinked slowly.
"You mean… Lady Vilaphine Nhrfreya?"
Aria nodded like a priest confirming a prophecy.
"Exactly! Vila! That movement—those eyes—she walked like the wind was her cloak. I swear, if elegance had legs, it would sprint like her."
Fuuka tilted her head.
Yuki, somehow, looked even less interested.
Aria didn't care.
"Her aura. Her presence. Or should I say, the lack of it. An absolute mystery. It's like... she exists in the same plane as thought and myth."
He pressed both hands to his chest.
"I might—might—dedicate my entire romantic future to her from this day forward."
Yuki rolled her eyes.
"You said that about a 'Random' girl in the corridor last month."
"Different vibe," Aria replied instantly. "Vila's the kind of girl who'd stab you in the dark and make it feel poetic."
Fuuka blinked again. That might've been a smile. Might.
"She was with her team yesterday, Blanche, Ruka, and Yuxin," Aria continued. "Training. I think she's part of that team now. Makes sense—they've got discipline and aesthetic. Very... symmetrical."
"So now you judge people by team composition?" Yuki muttered.
"No. I judge people by their potential to make my heart implode."
"How romantic."
"It's a burden," Aria whispered.
"It's a disease," Yuki corrected.
Fuuka, still quiet, tilted the bottle of tea in her hands and looked at Aria.
"You really met her in person?"
"In person? Yes. In heart? Transcended."
"Did she talk to you?"
"...A little.she looked in my general direction once. Same thing."
Fuuka looked back out the window.
"Then your heart is easily led."
Aria placed a hand over his face like a tragic prince.
"My heart is an open book. Some people just don't know how to read cursive."
Yuki rubbed her temples.
"This is why I didn't want him to sit down."
The glass panes trembled slightly as a sudden wave of sound rolled in from outside.
Not thunder. Not an explosion.
But the roaring cheer of students—dozens, maybe hundreds—all shouting in layered excitement. Like a spark had been thrown into dry hay, and now the field was ablaze with adrenaline.
From up here, it felt distant. But not dull.
Fuuka's gaze drifted toward the window again. Her voice came soft, but with that slight, amused curve to it—like a quiet smile, made of syllables.
"Lively down there."
Aria stretched in his chair, spinning half a turn to face the window, sugarbread long forgotten.
"Can't blame them. Lotta prodigies in the mix this year."
He lifted a finger and started counting off without being asked:
"That beast of a first-year from Combat Unit Theta—what's his name? Grey-something. The one who broke the simulation glyph with his face. Then there's that girl from Lore Division, Elienne—she summoned a Wyvern in the mock exam, and no one knows how she even has an Invocation license. Oh, and don't forget the twins from the Mercantile Ward. Enchantments on everything, even their shoes. It's madness."
Yuki leaned her elbow onto the table, cheek resting against her gloved hand. Her eyes didn't move from the glowing orb, even as she replied:
"Pointless hype. As long as Silas is in the bracket, none of them matter."
Her tone wasn't cruel. Just... definitive.
Aria turned to look at her, one brow slowly rising in intrigue.
"Oho~ That sounds like someone's got a crush on the Council President."
Yuki didn't even flinch.
"So what if I do?"
Aria's smirk froze mid-smirk. He wasn't expecting that level of blunt honesty.
Fuuka, on the other hand, had just taken a sip of tea—and nearly choked.
She didn't. But her fingers stiffened slightly around the bottle. Her gaze flicked toward Yuki, then back to the window.
She said nothing.
But in her head, a thought echoed dryly.
"Yuki….that's my fiancé you're talking about."
No emotion. Just... the neutral mental version of raising an eyebrow into the void.
Yuki, oblivious to the telepathic awkwardness she'd just dropped into the air like a smoke grenade, sipped her drink with casual elegance. Her tone still level.
"Silas Caelumotris is competent. Precise. Strategic. And patient. There's no point denying what's obvious."
"Oh no," Aria chuckled, recovering with dramatic flair. "It's fine. You're allowed to admire gods in human form. We all cope differently."
"He's not a god," Yuki replied flatly.
"Sure, sure. Just a divine war tactician with bone structure that makes mirrors feel insecure."
Fuuka remained silent.
Still watching the field.
Still sipping her tea.
Still mentally repeating one very simple phrase with deadpan precision:
"He's literally engaged to me, you two buffoons."
She didn't say it, of course. That wasn't her style.
And besides—
Yuki didn't know.
Only a handful did.
And frankly?
Letting them ramble was a form of silent entertainment.
"…Honestly. What kind of romcom situation am I standing in?"