The Valdris market opened once a month.

Serah had mentioned it the night before as information — that there were things she wanted to see. That she would go in the morning.

Kai told her alright.

Serah left after breakfast with her markings in the steady glow of familiar territory.

---

Lira came down twenty minutes later.

She looked at the room.

Looked at Kai.

"Training?" she said.

"If you want."

"The resonance Qi still isn’t where it should be."

"I know."

Lira took the coffee Aldric had left on the table and went to the yard.

Kai followed her.

---

Without Serah the yard was different.

Maybe because it was just the two of them.

Lira positioned herself in front of Kai.

"Close your eyes."

Kai closed his eyes.

"The origin," Lira said. "From the center. You already know where it is."

Kai searched for it.

He found it in four seconds — faster than the first day, faster than the tenth.

"I’ve got it."

"Good." Lira extended her hand toward his wrist.

"Now hold it there while I read."

---

Lira’s contact on his wrist was the same as it had been the two weeks before.

It wasn’t the same.

Kai noticed it the second Lira read the resonance Qi from the origin — the difference between feeling something in Serah’s presence and feeling it without her, with only Lira and the morning and the empty yard.

It wasn’t more intense.

It was different.

Lira noticed it too.

Her fingers stopped on Kai’s wrist.

"It changed," she said.

"What changed?"

"The resonance Qi." Lira read again, slower. "It reacts differently now."

"Different from what?"

"From when Serah is here."

Kai opened his eyes.

Lira was still looking at the point on his wrist with the expression of someone reading something they hadn’t expected to find.

"How is it different?" Kai said.

Lira didn’t answer right away.

Her fingers on his wrist. The resonance Qi still there, emanating from the center where Kai had found it, responding to something Lira was reading and taking time to describe.

"The resonance Qi responds to emotional state," she finally said. "With Serah it’s warm. Constant. Like something that’s been in the same place for a long time and knows it’s going to stay there."

"And now?"

Lira looked at him.

"Now it’s different."

"Yeah, how?"

---

Silence.

Lira looked at the point on his wrist again.

Kai looked at her.

"Interesting," Lira said.

She released his wrist.

"Seventy percent is holding well," she said. "Keep going from the origin when you can. In a week you should reach sixty-five."

She turned toward the inn.

"Lira."

She stopped. She didn’t turn around.

"Different how?"

One second.

Two.

"I already told you." She entered the inn. "Interesting."

---

[DraconicLegacy: "interesting" and changed the subject. LIRA.]

[Drakeking: released the wrist at the exact moment she had to answer.]

[Chris_Murray: the resonance Qi responds to emotional state. with Serah it’s warm. with Lira it’s different. KAI KNOWS NOW.]

[Warwolf: Kai asked twice. Lira didn’t answer either time. that’s the answer.]

[Per_Sudin: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) "interesting" ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]

---

Kai stayed in the yard.

He looked at his own wrist — the point where Lira’s fingers had been.

The resonance Qi at seventy percent, emanating from the center, responding to emotional state.

Kai considered what Lira had described.

Warm with Serah.

Different with Lira.

He didn’t ask what different meant because he already knew what different meant.

---

Serah arrived from the market two hours later.

She entered the inn with the kind of presence she had when coming from her territory — her markings in the glow of movement, her stride different from the inn’s.

She looked at the room.

Kai was in the armchair by the fire.

Lira was in her chair with a book she had taken from somewhere and was reading with the attention of someone using the book to not be doing something else.

Serah looked at both of them.

There was nothing different in the room — nothing to point to, nothing visible. The correct distance between the two. The low fire. The book.

Her markings rose in temperature.

Serah went to put away what she had brought from the market.

---

That night, with Lira in her room and the inn silent, Serah stared at the ceiling.

"Lira is thinking about you."

Kai wasn’t surprised.

"I know."

Serah looked at him.

"Since when have you known?"

"Since the north road."

Serah processed this.

"And what are you going to do?"

"For now, nothing." Kai stared at the ceiling too. "Lira needs to get there on her own. If she gets there."

"Why on her own?"

"Because Lira is an arrogant, conceited vampire."

Serah looked at him for a moment.

"That’s not a very nice thing to say about someone who’s in love with you."

Kai looked at her.

"But she’s also proud, and if she feels like I know and I’m pressuring her, she’ll break all the progress she’s making." And he smiled. "And you know how she is... She’ll throw a tantrum just because of that, so it’s better if it happens when it has to happen."

"And if she gets there?" she said. "To where she wanted to go."

Kai didn’t answer right away.

"We’ll see."

---

The markings pulsed.

Not the pulse of jealousy, but conflict over whether she’d be willing to share.

Serah stared at the ceiling.

Kai didn’t say anything else.

Not because there was nothing more to say — because Serah was processing and the silence kept her focused.

In the end Serah settled beside him with her head on his shoulder.

The markings returned to their steady pulse.

"Good," Serah said.

Kai looked at her.

"Good?"

"Good that you’re waiting for her to get there on her own." A short pause. "It’s the right thing."

Kai didn’t answer.

Serah closed her eyes.

The markings in the warm pulse of always.

---

On the other side of the hallway, Lira had the book open to the same page it had been on two hours ago.

Fingers on her fangs.

’Interesting.’

’That’s what I said.’

’Interesting.’

The fire made its sound.

---

The next morning Lira was in the corner of the guild when Aldric entered with the specific stride of someone bringing something they hadn’t asked to be brought but that had arrived anyway.

Not a quest.

A report.

He set it on the table.

"This came from the northern sector."

Kai looked at it.

Serah looked at it.

Lira looked up from her book.

"It’s from the Mount Heiguers hunters," Aldric said. "There’s something up there that escalated from A-rank to something the hunters can’t classify." He drank. "And they say the ground shakes when it moves."

Kai took the report.

He read it.

Looked at Serah.

Serah was already looking at him.

"Ogre," Serah said.

"Warlord?" Lira said, without taking her eyes off her book.

"Probably."

Kai set the report on the table.

He looked toward Mount Heiguers in the northern direction.

He smiled.

---

[Jack_Moore: ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ MOUNT HEIGUERS ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ]

[DraconicLegacy: Kai smiled. first full smile since Chapter 56.]

[Drakeking: SSS ogre warlord. the ground shakes when it moves. Kai smiled.]

[Chris_Murray: Lira said "warlord?" without lifting her eyes from her book. eight hundred years of context.]

[Warwolf: ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ Mara’s coming ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ ᕦ(ò_óˇ)ᕤ]

[Per_Sudin: the transition arc ended. the Mara arc begins.]

[System — notification]

[Current viewers: 1,800,000 → increasing]

[The system notes that Kai smiled]

[The system records the energy signature from Mount Heiguers]

[The system records that the ground shakes when it moves]

[The system classifies the entity as probable SSS]

[The system notes that Kai will soon meet his third SSS-rank entity]