Ulfric's "lesson" had become the kind of test that rearranged method and meaning. The Bureau needed minutes to recover its nonchalant pace; Siheon could not wait for permission to be who he seemed to be becoming.
After Ulfric finally straightened and dusted marble from his cloak like one does after a storm, he said simply, "Again. But this time, with eyes closed."
Lucian snorted. "What's the point of that?"
"To force him to feel the fight rather than see it," Ulfric said. "Sight is a crutch. We remove it and see what remains."
Siheon swallowed. His systems hummed.
〈CELESTIAL SYSTEM: Recommend sensory shielding before blindfolding.〉
〈ABYSSAL SYSTEM: Sensory shield? Pfft. Nothing but truth. Blindfold him now.〉
Ulfric plucked a cloth of woven rune-silk and tied it over Siheon's eyes. Darkness flooded his vision, and the world narrowed to the pressure on his skin and the smell of dust and sweat.
He moved at Ulfric's cue.
The first strike came like a thunderclap from the left. He dove, the motion instinctive. He felt Ulfric's boot near his ear, the ghost of weight, a breeze that told of intent. He countered with a low sweep. Ulfric hopped; the balance changed.
A new sensation surfaced—sixty different shades between hot and cold—an internal mapping that let him "see" with memory and pressure, like sonar but older. He could feel Ulfric's bones, the cadence of muscle, the twitch before breath.
〈CELESTIAL SYSTEM: Host mapping improves. Possible integrated synesthesia.〉
〈ABYSSAL SYSTEM: Call it awakening. Cheering section at row G.〉
Ulfric punished him. Not viciously, but in a way a smith hammers a sword; sparks, pressure, and correction. Each blow Siheon absorbed made him more precise, more unflappable. The blindfold blurred his sense of humiliation and forged a new patience.
At some point in the middle of a complicated chain—Ulfric's elbow feint, the silent cross-kick, the palm strike—Siheon's hand brushed something cold and brittle. He didn't see it, but he tasted iron. A memory like rain slashed through him: a child in a collapsed corridor, hands reaching out, a voice…
"Baek… run."
Everything rearranged. The systems went frantic.
〈ABYSSAL SYSTEM: Memory unlocked—partial. Feed it more.〉
〈CELESTIAL SYSTEM: Halt. Secure cognitive integrity. Danger of cascade recall.〉
Siheon stumbled backward, the blindfold slipping. He collapsed to his knees, panting. The world tilted with childhood smells and broken light and a father's shout that might have been real or a betrayal of time.
Ulfric ceased his assault and helped him up without ceremony. "Good. You found a piece."
"What—what piece?" Siheon asked, his voice a thin wire.
Ulfric's look softened in a way Siheon hadn't seen before. "A trigger. Some locks need pounding. That one clanged."
Seraphina was at his side in an instant; she steadied him like a tether. "That was too much. We should stop."
Ulfric shook his head. "No. Not yet."
In the gallery, a whisper grew: Lilith. The name became a ripple until it was a current. Siheon felt it like a pulse, not from the crowd but deeper, as if something had woken and stretched.