The western sector began where the northern road ended and the terrain decided that the rules of normal roads no longer applied.

Stone instead of dirt.

Slope instead of flat.

And the kind of silence that belongs to places where people normally don’t go.

The three left Valdris at dawn.

Serah at the front, her markings in their steady morning glow.

Kai in the center with the quest sheet in his pocket.

Lira three steps behind with her sunglasses and leather jacket.

The eight-in-the-morning sun wasn’t the midday sun but it was enough.

Serah extended her ambient temperature field backward — not much, just enough to cover the radius where Lira was.

She did it without comment and without looking back.

Lira said nothing.

They walked for ten minutes.

"There," Serah said.

"There what?" Lira said.

"That was the one time." Serah kept walking. "I told you once."

Lira looked at the sun.

"It’s fine," she said, with the tone of someone who finds it perfectly comfortable. "It wasn’t that necessary."

---

[GarcíaFTW: SERAH KEPT HER WORD. EXACTLY ONCE.]

[NocheEterna99: "that was the one time" — no negotiation possible]

[Dr_Snow: Lira said it wasn’t that necessary. With the sun directly on her. WITH THE SUN DIRECTLY ON HER.]

[DragonicLegacy: the leather jacket is going to have to do all the work]

[Legitly_Lazy: Lira chose pride. Respect.]

[RagingMutant: this is going to last exactly as long as it takes Lira to admit she does need it ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

---

It lasted twenty minutes.

"I’m tired of walking."

Kai looked at her over his shoulder.

Serah too.

"You’ve been walking for twenty minutes," Serah said.

"I’m a high-class vampire. I don’t walk long distances."

"You can fly," Serah said. "Go ahead. We’ll catch up."

Lira looked at her.

Then at Kai.

Then back to Serah.

"Why do you want me to go ahead?"

"Because Kai and I have things to practice and we don’t need supervision."

"What kind of things?"

Kai stepped in.

"She doesn’t need to know."

Lira looked at the two of them alternately.

"You can go on without me if you want," she finally said, with a kindness Kai identified in the same second as the kind that preceded something different.

"I’m perfectly capable of flying ahead."

Pause.

"Although on second thought..." Lira looked at the road ahead with a reflective expression.

"I wouldn’t like to leave two pups alone in a mountain pass."

"We’re not pups," Serah said.

"The predators in this area aren’t going to verify rank classification before attacking." Lira kept walking, at the same pace as before. "And if Kai disappears..." a very brief pause, "my food source does too."

Kai looked ahead.

Serah looked at Lira.

Lira looked at the road with the expression of someone thinking about the scenery.

---

[GarcíaFTW: "TWO PUPS"]

[RagingMutant: "IF KAI DISAPPEARS MY FOOD SOURCE DOES TOO" — THAT WAS THE REAL REASON]

[StreamerHunter: Lira faked kindness for exactly two seconds]

[DragonicLegacy: Serah has a face like she wants to say something and is deciding it’s not worth the energy]

[Legitly_Lazy: the correct decision]

[Wolf1179: "pups" coming from a primordial wolf would’ve been worse. From a vampire it’s just annoying.]

[Dr_Snow: Lira isn’t going anywhere]

[Pedro_Sierra: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) "food source" ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

---

They kept walking.

Lira positioned herself beside Kai without anyone asking.

"Extend your right hand," she said.

Kai looked at her.

"Now?"

"Walking is better. The body is in motion, the flow is already active." She pointed at his hand with a gesture. "Extend it."

Kai extended his right hand.

Lira placed two fingers on his wrist — not the anatomical combat point from the catacombs, a different point, more internal.

"Do you feel something?"

Kai considered.

"Something."

"That’s the Qi pulse following circulation. When you walk, the movement amplifies it." Lira kept her fingers on the point. "Instead of searching for it with your mind, let it follow the rhythm of your step."

Kai tried it.

First step — nothing different.

Second — something.

Third — the same something but clearer.

"There," Lira said.

---

Serah, three steps ahead with her arms crossed, didn’t turn around.

Her silver markings pulsed.

Lira noticed it in the change of ambient temperature — not the temperature field Serah had used before, but the kind of change that happens when something that generates cold starts generating a little more cold without it being completely intentional.

Lira kept her two fingers on Kai’s wrist.

"The flow is interrupted when there’s external distraction," she said, loud enough for it to reach three steps away. "You need concentration."

She corrected the position of Kai’s arm — with both hands, one on the wrist and the other on the elbow.

The ambient temperature dropped another degree.

Lira smiled toward the road.

Kai noticed the smile.

He also noticed the temperature change.

"Lira."

"What?"

"Teach. Don’t bother Serah."

"I’m teaching."

"Both hands aren’t necessary for what you’re teaching."

Lira withdrew the one on the elbow.

The smile didn’t completely disappear.

---

[NocheEterna99: KAI CALLED HER OUT]

[GarcíaFTW: "teach. don’t do the other thing" — Kai knows exactly what Lira is doing]

[StreamerHunter: the temperature dropped two degrees. Serah didn’t say anything but the area said it for her.]

[DragonicLegacy: "both hands aren’t necessary" — Kai analyzed the situation in real time]

[RagingMutant: Lira withdrew one hand but the smile didn’t. PARTIALLY SUCCESSFUL.]

[Dr_Snow: Serah still hasn’t turned around. That’s more dangerous than if she did.]

[Legitly_Lazy: Lira when Serah reaches her limit ε=ε=ε=ε=┌(; ̄◇ ̄)┘]

[Wolf1179: ε=ε=ε=ε=( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ε=ε=ε=ε= Lira 1 / Serah 0 for now ε=ε=ε=ε=( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ε=ε=ε=ε=]

---

Half an hour later, Lira said she was hungry.

"Oh, I’m dying of hunger, if only there were a gentleman to lend me his neck for a moment."

"Perhaps it’s starvation," she specified.

"Possibly from the heat. Vampires process more energy at elevated temperatures."

Serah looked at her with annoyance.

"A few days ago you thought you’d die from the sun and now you’re an expert on the subject?"

Kai looked at her.

"How much do you need?"

"A little. It’s more a matter of stability than emergency."

Kai sighed.

"Fine."

He stopped on the road. He nodded toward his neck.

Serah stopped too. She turned around for the first time since they’d left.

Her silver markings were at maximum intensity.

Lira approached Kai.

She looked at his neck.

Looked at Serah.

And instead of the direct movement she would have made without an audience — fast, functional, without theater — she tilted her head, placed one hand on Kai’s shoulder with a delicacy completely unnecessary for what it was, and drank.

Slow. Deliberate.

When she finished, she pulled away.

She licked her lips and fangs with her tongue in an erotic gesture.

"Delicious," she said, looking directly at Serah. "It was delicious."

What followed wasn’t a roar.

It wasn’t a transformation.

It was that the area in a four-meter radius around Serah froze silently — the grass, the stones on the road, the air itself — with the specific stillness of something holding a great deal in very little space.

Kai looked at Serah.

Looked at Lira.

"Lira."

"What?" Lira said, her eyes still on Serah.

"Enough."

"I was just being descriptive."

"Enough."

Lira adjusted her glasses and kept walking.

Serah defrosted the area meter by meter over the next two minutes.

Kai followed the group without saying anything else.

---

[GarcíaFTW: "DELICIOUS. IT WAS DELICIOUS." LOOKING AT SERAH.]

[NocheEterna99: THE AREA FROZE. THE GRASS. THE STONES. THE AIR.]

[Dr_Snow: Lira turned drinking blood into a declaration of diplomatic war]

[DragonicLegacy: SERAH FROZE THE AREA SILENTLY. THAT’S WORSE THAN SCREAMING.]

[RagingMutant: @DragonicLegacy Serah’s silence is always more dangerous than anything else]

[Wolf1179: Kai said "enough" twice. The second time more tired than the first.]

[Legitly_Lazy: Lira 2 / Serah 0]

[Itsumi: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Kai in the middle of all this ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) surviving ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

---

The mountain pass appeared two hours later.

And with it, Grimvast.

It wasn’t a gradual appearance — the road curved and upon coming out of it, there it was.

Black stone of the kind that doesn’t exist in any quarry in the northern sector.

No windows.

No visible door from that distance.

No sign of construction to suggest anyone had built it rather than it simply having appeared.

Which was, according to Aldric’s quest, exactly what had happened.

The three stopped.

The pressure arrived before they finished processing the image — not a blow, a presence, the kind that doesn’t come from one direction but from all.

The air thirty meters from the fortress vibrated.

Not visibly.

In the way it’s perceived by something with sensors that aren’t completely human.

Serah frowned slightly.

Lira took off her glasses for a second, looked, put them back on.

Kai looked at the fortress.

"Interesting," he said.

---

[GarcíaFTW: "INTERESTING"]

[NocheEterna99: KAI SEES A FORTRESS FOUR S-RANK TEAMS COULDN’T ENTER AND SAYS "INTERESTING"]

[RagingMutant: Serah frowned. Lira took off her glasses. Kai said "interesting." Three perfect reactions.]

[DragonicLegacy: that aura pressure dissolved two A-rank teams. And Kai said interesting.]

[Dr_Snow: @DragonicLegacy at this point it’s predictable. And it’s still perfect.]

[Legitly_Lazy: ε=ε=ε=ε=┌(; ̄◇ ̄)┘ GRIMVAST ε=ε=ε=ε=┌(; ̄◇ ̄)┘]

[Wolf1179: ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ NEW ARC ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ]

---

[System — notification]

[Signal detected — origin: unknown]

[Classification: A_D_M]

[The system has never registered a signal of this classification from a physical location before]

[The system notes that the signal originates from inside the fortress]

[The system suggests caution]