The artificial moon of Solgrace hung low in the dark sky, casting a cool, silver pallor across the bedroom. The light filtered through the gossamer curtains, illuminating the quiet room with the soft glow of a false midnight.

Ayla opened her eyes, feeling entirely rejuvenated. The lingering irritation in her had vanished, replaced by a deep, settled satisfaction that made her heart hum with a rhythmic pulse. The air in the room was warm, carrying the distinct, grounding scent of flowers.

She turned her head to the right. Her cheek was resting against a broad expanse of warm muscle. Kenji was lying flat on his back, his left arm tucked securely beneath her head to serve as a pillow.

His right hand rested over her stomach, the palm heavy and reassuring through the thin silk of her sleeping gown. In the pale moonlight, his features looked softer than they did during the harsh light of the training yards, the scattered dark hair across his forehead lending him a slightly wild, untamed appearance.

An involuntary smile tugged at the corners of Ayla’s mouth. The intense irritation she had carried all morning, which was the frustration of a barren harvest and the sudden, sharp anger of seeing him smile at another woman, had completely dissipated the moment he gave her permission to eat Amanda.

He had not hesitated. He had not pleaded for that human’s life. He had simply looked into her eyes and handed her the prey.

As she watched him, Kenji’s eyelashes flickered. His breathing hitched, shifting from the deep, slow rhythm of sleep to the sharp alertness of a waking soldier. He opened his eyes, the hazel irises immediately catching the silver light of the room.

The very first thing he saw was Ayla’s close, dimpled smile. For a momentary breath, Kenji remained entirely stunned, his tongue heavy in his mouth as his mind struggled to bridge the gap between sleep and the sudden reality of her proximity.

The silence between them deepened, stretching thin like a taut wire. The ambient temperature within the small space of the bed seemed to rise by several degrees, the thick, unsaid tension warming the air until it felt heavy in their lungs.

Kenji watched in a silent trance as a single, tiny bead of sweat formed at the delicate line of Ayla’s jaw, rolled slowly down to her chin, and then slid down the pale column of her neck before disappearing into the shadow of her collarbone.

"Are you full now?" Kenji spoke, his voice low and raspy from sleep, breaking the silence before the inevitable happened.

In the quiet chambers of his mind, Kenji knew that their relationship had shifted into an entirely different department. The boundaries he had carefully maintained since leaving the lower tunnels had dissolved on the stone floor of the training yard.

It was an incredible challenge now to control his own movements, to keep himself from leaning into the dark, magnetic closeness that she offered without reservation.

A single push from his side, a single gesture of compliance, and they would cross a line from which there was no returning.

Yet, he held back from taking that final step. He knew that unlike him, Ayla was still in her exploration stage. The intense, possessive feelings she displayed toward him were solely due to his constant proximity and the unique nature of their shared survival.

She was a creature learning the world through a human lens. In the future, if she met more people, if she explored the higher tiers of the Crusade and experienced life further, those feelings might evolve or redirect themselves.

Furthermore, considering the age of her, his own rising desires felt distinctly predatory. He was a man who had died dozens of times, whose mind had been forged in the crucible of constant resurrection.

He could not allow his own internal weakness to trap her before she even understood the choices available to her. Kenji resolved to muffle his own feelings, at least until she had completely explored every possibility the world had to offer.

Ayla did not care about his inner turmoil. The complex, analytical boundaries of human morality were entirely foreign to her. For all that mattered to her was happiness, because Kenji had chosen her over Amanda.

He had proven that her appetite was more important than his past. She moved even closer, sliding her leg over his until the distance between their bodies became nonexistent.

"I am too full," Ayla purred, her voice thick with satisfaction as she rubbed her face against the bare skin of his chest, her silver hair tickling his chin. "I can’t even walk now."

Kenji helplessly rolled his eyes, though the expression was entirely devoid of any real annoyance. He watched her antics with a quiet, loving indulgence, his hand on her stomach twitching slightly before he settled it back down.

"In half an hour, the artificial morning will arrive," Kenji said, his tone carrying a pragmatic warning. "Do you want the entire staff and Grandpa’s remaining guards to know I spent the night in your room?"

"So what?" Ayla asked back, her gold eyes tilting upward to meet his.

"An unmarried man and woman can’t sleep in the same bed, dummy," he muttered, reaching up to flick her forehead very gently with his index finger.

"Ow." Ayla crunched up her brows, her fingers rubbing the spot where his finger had touched. She looked at him with an absolute, unblinking seriousness. "Then let’s marry."

The words cut through the room like a cold blade, choking Kenji of any reply. His mouth opened slightly, but no sound came out. The sheer simplicity of her logic left him entirely unmoored.

"A sister and a brother can’t marry," he managed to say, though the words lacked any real conviction. The argument felt hollow even to his own ears.

"Do you forget?" Ayla said, her tone perfectly matter-of-fact as she leaned her chin on his sternum. "We aren’t real siblings."

Kenji was completely at a loss for words. His mind scrambled for a logical counterargument, but the clinical reality of her statement left him entirely defenseless.

"I—I—" he stammered, his face flushing in the dark. "It’s better we continue our current act for the public."

By saying that, he gently placed Ayla’s head back onto the soft pillow, his palms sliding to the mattress as he attempted to rise from the bed to escape the suffocating heat of the sheets.

But Ayla moved faster. With a sudden, fluid grace that bypassed his Iron-rank reflexes, she pulled him back down onto the mattress.

In a single, seamless motion, she climbed onto his chest, her small knees pinning his thighs while her hands shot upward, catching his wrists and locking them firmly against the headboard above his head.

"Who gave you permission to leave?" she breathed.

Both of their faces were too close. The silver light caught the sharp, demanding line of her jaw. Their bodies were pressed tightly together, and with the thin, single layer of silk she wore, it literally felt as though they were completely naked against one another.

Kenji could feel the exact shape of her ribs, the warmth of her stomach, and the frantic, steady beat of her heart against his own skin.

"Ayla, you—"

"Shh," Ayla murmured, cutting him off as she lowered her head, burying her face into the crook of his neck. She inhaled sharply, drawing the scent of his skin deep into her lungs, archiving the fragrance within her catalogue alongside his core parameters.

The small, sharp intake of air sent a violent shiver down Kenji’s spine.

"I have a doubt," she whispered, her breath hot against his collarbone. She completely ignored the rigid, undeniable hardness that had appeared against her stomach where their lower bodies met.

"Ask it," Kenji said, his voice distinctly strained as he kept his wrists still within her grip. He could have broken her hold with his superior physical strength, but his body refused to cooperate with the command.

"Why does every soldier outside this room carry the Pyromancy trait?" she asked, her tone carrying a genuine, lingering annoyance. "Fifty men. Fifty copies of the same common trait."

Kenji fell silent for a moment, the tension in his shoulders loosening slightly as a grim, ironic amusement took hold.

"It was ordered by Grandpa," Kenji explained quietly. "He specifically staffed this compound with Pyromancers so you could observe their mana circuits and learn from them. They are veterans of the Eastern Front. He thought he was helping you develop your primary affinity."

He felt the utter absurdity of the situation pressing weightily against his chest. Roric Vale had gathered fifty of his most experienced fire-wielders to serve as an elite training tool for his precious granddaughter, entirely unaware that the "fragile girl" had treated them like a box of identical rations, consuming them one by one in the dark corridors out of sheer boredom.

None of those seasoned veterans had been any match for her.

"Oh," Ayla nodded, the explanation satisfying her clinical curiosity but doing nothing to improve her opinion of human tactical planning. "Another doubt." 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Before Kenji could ask what it was, her right hand loosened its grip on his wrist. It slid down his chest, past his ribs, and moved directly to his crotch, her fingers closing firmly around the thick hardness straining against the fabric of his trousers.

Kenji’s entire body went rigid.

"You said we can’t be married because we are siblings," Ayla whispered, her lips brushing the shell of his ear as her grip tightened slightly. "Then, why is this thing erected?"

"Ayla," he choked out, his hips twitching involuntarily at the contact.

"Shh," she breathed, her voice dropping into a rhythmic, mesmerizing cadence that she had pulled from the very depths of her [Emotion Weaver] trait.

"I saw some very fun scenes in Amanda’s memory just now. Something she did with a few guys in the lower districts before you returned. Wanna feel it?"

"What—"

"Do you know what she called you when she wrote to her father?" Ayla murmured, her hand slipping beneath the waistband of his pants, the cool skin of her palm contrasting sharply with the burning heat of his groin.

"A lapdog."

She paused, letting the word sink into the quiet space between them.

Kenji went absolutely still beneath her. His mind literally went blank, the silver light of the room fading into a cold, dark focus.

There was a brief, instinctive instinct to deny it, to believe that Amanda would never use such a dismissive, degrading term for someone she had known since childhood.

He had followed her through the academy, he had protected her from the lower-ring gangs, he had—

He stopped thinking. The realization arrived with the dull, heavy thud of truth. He had followed her every command.

He had spent three years holding onto her memory like a sacred text, while she had viewed his devotion as the simple, expected loyalty of a well-trained pet. He had been a lapdog.

Kenji gritted his teeth, a sharp, bitter anger flaring in his throat. But the resentment was entirely short-lived.

It vanished completely when Ayla’s warm, soft palm slid fully inside his undergarments and covered his erect member directly, her fingers wrapping around the heat of him with an instinctive precision.

"Mmbh," Kenji let out a low, muffled moan, his head snapping back against the pillow as his eyes closed tightly.

Ayla used her left hand to pin both of his wrists above his head, her single grip surprisingly ironclad as she shifted her weight forward, pressing her entire body down to anchor him to the mattress.

With her right hand, she slowly pulled his foreskin down, her touch clinical yet intensely reactive to the sharp tremor that ran through his thighs.

"Yours are bigger than Martin’s..." Ayla’s following words felt like a cold shower over Kenji.

"WHAT?"

"Don’t shout. Someone will hear you." Ayla retorted him with a sharp pinch on his penis.