Royal Reboot: Level up, Your Majesty!-Chapter 134: “You big softie.”

After the explosive trip to Aoraki, literally, it was already close to eleven in the morning by the time Eydis and Astra parked at the resort. Exhaustion pulled at Eydis, but she pushed it down and strode to Melissa’s suite, leaving Astra behind to cover their tracks and contact her partner.

The self-proclaimed Children had dramatically erased their facility. To the outside world, the High Peak had suffered only superficial damage. Avalanches of snow had slipped soon after the blast, dragging rock and debris down with them and leaving the mountain looking unchanged, its secrets sealed.

Yet, they still required assistance from Astra's partner to deal with the bodies of Taika and Huka. She hadn’t meant to kill Huka, but he’d chosen death over capture.

Perhaps chosen was not quite the right term for it.

“Right before the end, his eyes sparked with golden electricity,” Astra had shared regarding Huka.

“Like Taika, perhaps he was conditioned by Ares,” Eydis had replied.

Astra nodded. “Maybe Ares could do what Adrian did… or even Athena, among other things.”

“And all are possible within the EM umbrella?”

“Yes,” Astra whispered. “I think so…”

Mind reading, mind control. Probably the reason everything related to Ares remained so obscure in Taika’s mind, as if he had prepared his toys to be decommissioned the moment they were compromised.

A formidable enemy, indeed.

Huka was a corpse. Taika was technically alive, but about as animated as a soggy floret of broccoli.

Eydis had thought Astra would be disappointed in her, but the Saintess was surprisingly empathetic. Eydis felt like she’d evaded a direful divine scolding. She pushed down the thought, cringing at how it echoed some infernal whip-crack of a phrase she’d rather erase from her lexicon.

“Ah, Eydis. I thought you’d left.” Lionel’s voice rumbled as he opened the door for her, even though she hadn’t knocked. She realised she had been spacing out in front of Melissa’s suite.

Lionel looked exhausted, his broad shoulders drooped, crimson eyes rimmed with extra red. He remained composed, and the living room was immaculate, confirming there had been no attack, just as Envy had relayed to her through their flickering link.

“Left? Lionel, do enlighten me. What manner of… companion do you mistake me for?” She raised one brow, then found herself startled by how easily the word friend had almost slipped free. What magic had the Saintess wrought with her kisses?

He stopped with his hand on the door, and Eydis realised her speech moderniser was temporarily offline, felled by sleep-induced brain fog.

She cleared her throat with the slightest hint of self-consciousness. “How’s Natalia hanging, mnh, bro?”

Casual enough?

Lionel’s eyelids moved, very slowly.

Apparently not.

He finally said, “No news is good news, isn’t it?”

Ignoring his baffling stare, Eydis settled into an armchair near the crackling fireplace with one leg crossed over the other. Her gaze swept over the breakfast tray on the coffee table, taking in crumbs of pastries, smears of butter, a half-empty coffee pot.

How were they even filling?

She pulled out her phone and started looking up the menu of nearby restaurants, one knee peeking through the split of her black dress. “And Melissa?”

Lionel stood awkwardly, unblinking, in the centre of the living room. Then he jabbed a thumb towards one of the bedrooms. “I told Mel to rest, but she’d already gone straight into…”

He hesitated, as though Eydis hadn’t been there when the revelation about the extent of Natalia’s power was revealed.

“Stabilising Natalia’s Arcane energy? Yes, I was there,” she said.

“Ah, right.”

Eydis noticed a faint blue light seeping through the gap beneath the bedroom door. With a sigh, she tilted her head and silently communed with Cerberus.

Meanwhile, Lionel sat down on the sofa. A long, awkward silence descended until he cleared his throat.

“How’s… Natalia at the Academy? Is she…” He trailed off.

Happy?

He didn’t say it, but when Eydis looked up and met his bloodshot, hopeful crimson eyes, she knew. Sliding her phone into her blazer pocket, she leaned back, fingertips lightly touching her cheek.

Then she decided to feed his fear. It was the only way to make him listen.

“At the Academy?” She put on a thoughtful, serious look, her slender fingers worrying the gold button at her cuff. “Where do I even begin, Lionel? Natalia’s a fiery concoction of neuroses, self-doubt, and endless second-guessing.”

He flinched, eyes darting down.

She lightly extended each finger in turn and continued. “Not only that, she’s as impulsive as a kangaroo on a freeway, tactless enough to reveal plans before the occasion demands, and—”

“I get the vivid analogies, thank you.” Lionel raised a hand while the other covered half his face, shielding himself from the imagery, blind to the roguish sparkle dancing in Eydis’s eye.

She leaned forward, her voice dipped low. “And frankly, with that recklessness, it could be fatal if she were outmatched by some overpowered oaf.”

Like Taika.

Eydis watched Lionel and knew he understood, his hands dropped to his knees and he straightened on his seat.

Lionel let out a heavy breath. “I… see.”

She let the silence stretch, letting him sit with it, and letting the weight of his protective instincts press down on him just a little more.

When his fingers gripped his knees hard enough to crease his black suit trousers, she offered the lifeline.

“However, Natalia is also recklessly brave. She charges at snot-nosed high school bullies or beasts with equal disregard for her own safety. When it comes to her archetype games, she’s the quintessential… hmm.” Eydis’s smile softened. “Caregiver.”

“Caregiver?”

“Natalia once told me her power was a curse.” She watched Lionel’s expression solemnise, drinking it in. “That it was just fire and destruction. I suggested it mirrors her essence.”

He blinked slowly, defenses crumbling as he gazed up.

“Now, knowing what she truly is, or glimpsing it, I see the truth.” Her tone sharpened. “She could’ve chosen any form. Why fire?”

“How did you—“

“I connected the dots." She shrugged, casual dismissal masking her acuity.

Lionel pressed his lips tightly, refusing to say more. But she didn’t need his confirmation.

From his conversation with Melissa, Natalia’s Arcane heart had been transforming, evolving, perceiving Taika’s structure, and escalating to blue plasma flames. That was the kind of power the Van Nassaus hungered for. Natalia could match Taika’s power and instinctively improve upon it.

But of course, Eydis didn’t tell Lionel that. It wasn’t her place to interfere. She should have stayed out of it, yet…

“Why did she choose fire of all powers, Lionel?” she asked again. “You understand it better than anyone else.”

Lionel’s emotions were carefully masked, as expected from an operative trained to keep secrets from, perhaps, the most dangerous man in this realm. But when it came to his sister’s concerns, the mask slipped imperceptibly, letting her glimpse something else in that brooding, tempered expression.

Pride.

Just like the way Gidion looked at her when she surprised him with her theories, and when she effortlessly bound that particularly notorious Sin.

“But I think ultimately, fire fits her perfectly,” Eydis added, recalling Taika’s stunned awe when Natalia recharged him, unintentionally, instead of obliterating him. “Her flames have always leaned toward protection on instinct, haven't they?”

Lionel’s expression slowly settled into one of open affection. “Natalia has always stayed true to herself.” His voice softened unevenly. “And all I have done was make her feel… less.”

“You over-dramatised it all, Natalia’s brother,” Eydis said, amused. “Every teen grows up insecure about something."

His mouth fell open, then closed. A silent disagreement.

“Without the secret of her power…” Eydis gentled her voice. “Natalia would seem just like any child raised in love.”

“How… could you tell?” A tiny spark flickered in his eyes.

“Because I know what a child is like otherwise,” she murmured, rotating the ruby on her gold ring, her gaze far away.

Something flickered in Lionel’s eyes, but Eydis avoided lingering on it. “Natalia didn’t try to win your affection. She didn't push herself to excel because she never felt she had to compete for your love,” she continued. “She assumed it was there. That is a luxury, Lionel. One you gave her."

Lionel’s eyes widened.

“That said, she does possess a rather voracious appetite for brooding, emotionally unavailable love-interest novels. Masochist archetype, I might add.” Eydis let a sly smile curve at her mouth. “Perhaps, you should look more into deconstructing that instead.”

“I… really didn’t need to know that.” Lionel scoffed a laugh. Slowly, his gaze dropped to his knees once again, and he swallowed hard. His lips parted, as if to repeat the word love.

She could see the tension ease from his shoulders, the way he leaned back, as if some long-held burden had finally been set aside.

“So, yes, Lionel,” she answered his initial question, watching the faint spark of relief light up his face.

But she wasn’t here to play his therapist.

Eydis uncrossed her legs and leaned forward, allowing just enough ambiguity into her expression to unnerve him. “Natalia is happy.”

He held her gaze, understanding dawning quickly, then let out a restrained chuckle. “I knew a ‘but’ was coming.”

She said nothing at first, just arched an eyebrow and let a subtle smile curve her lips.

Lionel nodded slowly, more to himself than to her. “Natalia talked about you so often, Eydis. And now I see it,” he breathed. “I’m glad she has someone like you as a friend… because I…”

Eydis blinked in genuine surprise, her lips itching with the impulse to argue but she held back.

“I made her feel responsible, made her doubt her power, even though…” He added, lacing his hands together, “all she did when using it was out of pure kindness.”

Finally, Lionel lifted his head, locking eyes with her, his face schooled into careful neutrality, though his chest rose and fell with another deep breath. “Thank you for being such a good friend.”

She wondered whether the version of her that Natalia had described to him was the original Eydis from this world, but this wasn’t about her.

There was a message she had to deliver.

“My turn to ask questions.” Feigning nonchalance, she rested her chin on her palm.

“Alright.”

“Will you finally acknowledge the adult she has become?” Her black-polished fingers traced lightly on her cheek. “Will you teach her what she actually needs to survive, Lionel?”

She spoke in a lowered, velvety timbre. “Or will you persist in trimming her wings, all under that noble yet stifling pretense of protection?”

Lionel’s hands clenched so tightly it looked painful, yet he shut her out once more.

In the long silence that followed, Eydis could hear the soft whisper of snow outside, layered over the steady ticking of the wall clock. A familiar fragrance brushed her senses, faint enough to be almost nothing, yet unfailingly enough to make her smile.

Without a word, Eydis rose smoothly and opened the door, just as Astra’s knuckles hovered inches from the wood. On impulse, Eydis slipped her palm over, her fingers brushing Astra’s cold knuckles until they were completely enveloped, and watched as a shy smile thawed Astra’s previously icy features.

Astra stepped inside, her sharp eyes flicking between Lionel’s frozen expression and Eydis’s self-satisfied smirk, and let out an exaggerated sigh.

No words were exchanged yet when the bedroom door creaked open, and out stepped Melissa, fatigue shadowing her eyes, her blue hair hastily tied back into a loose ponytail.

“Natalia’s awake.” She glanced at Lionel. “Wow, you look like crap.”

Lionel’s face held both relief and dread. When he didn’t answer, still rooted in his armchair, Melissa flicked a look at Eydis, as though already naming the troublemaker.

With a long sigh, the doctor muttered, eyes returning to Lionel, “Do you want to come in? All of you?”

Lionel took another deep breath, and, much to Melissa’s visible surprise, he stood up and walked with steady, determined steps to the bedroom.

Eydis and Astra followed, noting the instant he stopped pretending to limp. They exchanged a knowing glance, and Astra reached out, lacing her fingers with Eydis’s in silent approval.

A soft smile tugged at Eydis’s lips.

Hopefully, she thought, after all this, Natalia will be free to see the truth of her own heart and grow into her full, remarkable potential.

Astra’s lips hovered near Eydis’s ear, whispering huskily so only she could hear, “You big softie.”

Eydis gave Astra a look of mock vexation, but she could not deny the warmth of Astra’s hand in hers, momentarily lifting the weight of the long night between them.