The infirmary had settled down again.
Someone coughed behind a curtain. Water dripped somewhere into a metal bowl. Boots crossed stone outside, then faded. Medicine and blood and hot cloth still hung in the air.
Rin was awake now.
Barely looked like he should be, but he was.
Bandages wrapped his ribs and side. His face was still pale. His hair was a mess. He sat propped up against the pillow with that same dead, annoyed look he always had when life kept happening to him.
Kai sat near the bed with one leg over the other, acting normal.
Rin noticed.
Of course he noticed.
Kai had told him what happened. The blackness. The stranger. The failed attempt. The fact that someone had come here, into the infirmary, to kill him.
And now Kai was pretending none of it happened.
Not because he was stupid.
Because Aria and Lila were on their way there.
The doors slammed open.
"KAI!"
Lila came in like a storm.
Still flushed from her match. Still bright. Still carrying that post-fight glow mixed with full-body attitude. Aria followed behind her slower, already smiling because she knew exactly what Lila was about to do.
Kai looked up.
Then immediately pointed at nothing. "Before you say anything—"
Too late.
Lila crossed the room and threw an arm around his neck from behind.
"You missed my match!"
"Khh—Lila—"
She squeezed harder.
"You fake monk! I was out there making history and you vanished!"
Kai clawed at her arm. "I can explain—"
"No, you can choke."
Aria laughed.
Rin stared.
Kai half-rose from the chair, stumbling. "I'm dying."
"Good."
Lila gave him one more shake, then let him go. Kai bent over coughing like he had just survived an assassination attempt.
Which, technically, he had.
"You're insane," he muttered.
"You missed my match," she shot back.
Then she saw Rin.
Actually saw him.
Her whole face changed.
"Rin!"
She rushed past Kai so fast he barely moved in time.
Rin's eyes widened. "Wait—"
Too late again.
Lila jumped on the bed and wrapped both arms around him.
Hard.
Real hard.
Her chest crushed into him. Her hug folded him halfway back into the pillow. Rin made a noise that was probably meant to be a warning but came out more like a dying cough.
"I missed you!" Lila said, squeezing him even tighter. "And I won my match!"
Rin, face half-buried and definitely not breathing right, managed, "I knew you could do it, queen."
Lila froze.
Then slowly pulled back just enough to look at him.
Her cheeks went pink.
Then red.
Then her eyes started watering.
Kai saw it first and lost it.
Aria went right after him.
Lila blinked fast. "Oh my God."
Kai pointed at her, laughing. "Nah, nah, look at you—"
"I'm not crying."
"You are absolutely crying."
"I'm emotional, stupid!"
Rin, still trapped in the wreckage of her hug, looked like he regretted waking up.
Kai was still laughing when he glanced over and caught Aria looking at him.
That stopped him for half a beat.
Not fully.
Just enough.
Aria tucked a piece of hair behind her ear, trying to look casual.
Failing a little.
"So," she said, "why'd you leave earlier?"
Kai didn't even blink.
"Bathroom."
Aria narrowed her eyes.
Kai spread his hands and laughed. "When a monk gotta go, he gotta go."
That got her.
She laughed and shook her head. "You're so stupid, monk."
In the bed, Rin slowly turned his head and gave Kai the nastiest side-eye he had ever produced in his life.
Kai saw it.
Ignored it.
Because yeah, minutes ago he'd told Rin about the failed assassination.
And yeah, Rin knew damn well Kai was lying right now so Aria and Lila wouldn't start spiraling.
Rin looked one second away from saying something.
Kai casually talked over the possibility.
"Anyway," he said, clapping once, "we're officially the strongest team in the tournament."
That one landed.
Lila smiled first.
Then Aria.
Then even Rin's mouth twitched a little before he ruined it by looking annoyed again.
Kai pointed around the room like some fake preacher.
"Look at us. Rin nearly killed a whole stadium. Aria's blowing people up. Lila just beat her match and came back glowing. I'm handsome. It's over for everybody."
Aria snorted. "Keep the good work up. It's only gonna get harder from here."
Her smile eased into something more focused.
"We're every opponent's goal now."
Kai pointed at her fast. "Girl, we can't lose with that raw power of yours. I bet your dad saw that and he's either impressed or shaking in his boots."
Aria looked away.
Smiled.
Blushed.
Just a little.
Kai caught it and grinned like he'd won something.
Then he turned to Rin.
"And you—bro, I've never seen anyone fight like that in my life. It was like watching that character all the kids in Janoah and Chun grew up with. What was his name? Karuto? Blond-haired Seeker, parents dead, tragic life, dark but hopeful, academy legend, all that—"
"Shut up," Rin said.
Kai kept going anyway. "No, seriously, you were doing that exact brooding genius—"
Rin looked at him.
"If you continue," he said flatly, "I will get up and kill you."
Kai went silent.
Instantly.
Aria cracked up.
Lila laughed too, one hand over her mouth.
Kai slowly nodded. "Fair."
Rin kept staring.
Kai pointed at him once. "Threatening a holy man in recovery is nasty work."
Then he turned toward Lila.
His tone shifted a little.
Not heavy.
Just real.
"For real," he said, "we never saw you as support. Ever. Always as an equal."
Lila blinked.
Kai leaned back in the chair. "You remember the Black Forest? You protected Minerva and Aria while me and Rin were running after that scroll."
"Facts," Aria said.
Kai nodded. "And I wish I could've seen you beat that team that day."
He pointed at her.
"But now look at you. You did it in front of the whole world."
Lila's smile got smaller.
Softer.
Kai kept going.
"Everybody knows the Lila Butters name."
Then he reached into his stuff, flipped open the Mason's Seeker Data Book, and turned it around to show his own stats to Rin like he was presenting sacred evidence.
"Mind you, I didn't even know how famous you and your mom were till I read this."
Rin looked at the page.
Then at Kai.
Then turned his face away and laughed under his breath.
Kai immediately pointed at him. "Don't laugh."
That only made Rin laugh harder, which for Rin meant one tiny breath through the nose.
Kai looked back at Lila.
"You're literally a prodigy raised by the best water user alive right now. You're probably stronger than me, and I get now why you didn't say all that when we first met. Especially before Trial by Mercy."
Lila looked away awkwardly.
"Yeah," she said. "I'm not really great at being straightforward about my family line."
She rubbed the back of her neck.
"It makes people think I'm stuck-up. So I just..." She shrugged. "Hide behind being goofy first."
Her voice softened.
"Then I met you guys."
She smiled.
"And I feel like I can be me."
Aria answered right away.
"You definitely can, bestie."
Lila made a tiny sound like she was about to cry again, then immediately hugged Rin harder.
Way harder.
Rin's eyes widened. "Lila."
She squeezed.
Rin tried pushing at her shoulder. "Lila."
She squeezed more.
Her chest smashed into his face again. His arms got trapped. His whole upper body disappeared in girl and violence.
Kai folded over laughing.
Aria grabbed the bedrail and lost it too.
Rin's muffled voice came out from somewhere inside the hug.
"I survived the tournament for this?"
Lila gasped. "Excuse me?"
Rin pushed uselessly at her again. "This is not a warrior's death."
Kai was crying now.
"I can't breathe."
"That means it's real."
Aria laughed so hard she had to turn away.
Lila only hugged him tighter out of spite.
Rin looked like he was actively reconsidering life.
And for a few minutes, with the lamps warm and the infirmary calm and the four of them together again, it felt almost normal.
Almost.
Far from the light, deep in a sealed section of the Grand Amphistad, the halls changed.
The walls were older here.
The air colder.
This wasn't the part the crowd saw. Not the grand stairs. Not the roaring chambers. Not the clean corridors under the arena.
This was deeper in the bones of it.
A forgotten stretch.
Restricted.
Half-abandoned.
A cloaked figure walked alone through the empty corridor.
No rush.
No wasted motion.
Just soft steps against old stone.
High above, sitting atop a narrow pillar built into the side of the hall, another figure lounged in the dark.
Tall.
Long-legged.
Wrong in the way some people were wrong before they even spoke.
Only his silhouette showed.
Six-four, maybe.
Relaxed like he owned the dark.
Then he laughed.
Soft at first.
Then wider.
"Why didn't you kill both of them?" he asked. "You had the chance."
The cloaked figure kept walking.
"If I killed the monk," he said, "the Seekers would notice."
His voice was young. Calm. Cold.
"They'd start digging. Asking questions. Chasing me through half of Janoah."
He kept moving.
"But if a Black Clan boy gets hurt? Goes missing?"
A small shrug under the cloak.
"Most people wouldn't care enough to make noise."
The figure above tilted his head.
"Oh?" he said, voice lilting and ugly and playful all at once. "So smart. So disciplined. I never took you for that type of boy."
His grin stretched in the dark.
"Tenji."
He laughed again.
High.
Creepy.
Like a toy that learned how to enjoy blood.
Tenji finally stopped walking.
"Shut up."
The figure above him only laughed harder.
Tenji's hand twitched under the cloak.
"He got lucky this time," he said. "Next time I won't show mercy."
Now the laughter slowed.
Interested.
Tenji stepped forward.
Out of the shadow.
The light touched his face.
Then his eyes.
Both of them black.
Tokoyami eyes.
When he spoke again, the hatred in it felt old.
Older than him.
Older than this hall.
"I'll kill that Black Clan scum and his monk friend."
The tall figure above smiled wider.
Tenji stood under the dead corridor light with both black eyes exposed and said,
"And I'll avenge the Nightshade Clan's honor."