It took a long time for Kenji to enlighten Ayla on what a kiss actually meant to humans. By the time she was finally educated on the matter, the silver pallor of the room had completely vanished, replaced by the bright, invasive rays of the artificial morning light.

Ayla cleared her throat.

"So it is not a kind of eating."

"It is not."

"But your mouth was on mine."

"Yes."

"And your tongue was inside my mouth."

"Yes."

"And none of that was eating."

"None of it."

She frowned at the ceiling.

"Oh."

The single syllable carried more than she had meant to put into it. The corner of Kenji’s mouth, against his better judgment, lifted by a fraction. Ayla caught the lift, and her shoulders sagged as she turned her face into the pillow.

Ayla cleared her throat again, a faint, uncharacteristic trace of embarrassment flickering across her features. She sat back on her heels, her grip on his wrists finally loosening as she realized the gravity of her misunderstanding.

She had to think carefully in the future before jumping to such violent assumptions. Her instinctive panic had completely destroyed the intense, fragile mood that had developed between them over the past hour.

Ayla’s shoulders sagged slightly, her silver hair falling forward to shield her face.

"I am sorry," she said finally.

The words were small, carrying a rare weight of genuine reluctance. Kenji lay on the mattress, blinking up at the ceiling as his consciousness fully reanchored itself after the brief trip through the void.

Hearing her apology, a strange, involuntary spark of satisfaction flared in his chest. This was the first time she had ever offered an apology to him after casually ending his life.

If anyone else heard the reason for his satisfaction, they would facepalm. Dude, she still killed you!

Yet, the realization of his own compliance quickly turned into a bitter thought. He didn’t actually care that she had killed him.

He felt no anger, no lingering fear, and no resentment toward the monster currently sitting on his stomach. Instead, his only real dissatisfaction stemmed from the fact that the kiss had been interrupted.

’Am I a masochist?’ Kenji thought bitterly, a silent groan echoing in his mind as he stared at the wooden headboard. He shook his head to clear the ridiculous thoughts, forcing his muscles to relax as he looked up at her downcast face.

"Just don’t do it again," Kenji said, his voice still somewhat rough. What he actually meant was ’don’t kill me when we are making out.’

Ayla nodded to his silent thought.

He gently pushed her knees aside, sliding out from beneath her weight to stand on the carpet. "And next time I try to show you something, try not to let your tentacles do the talking."

Ayla nodded, her golden eyes tracking his movements with a quiet, observant intensity.

"Are you angry with me?" she asked.

He set the question aside.

"It is fine," he said aloud, his voice carrying a softness he had not meant to give it. "I am hard to kill in any permanent sense. You know this."

"I should not have done it."

"You did not enjoy the sensation. The body reacted."

"That is not an excuse."

"It is not an excuse. It is a reason. Reasons are allowed to exist even when actions are not."

She thought about this.

"Mm."

The silence settled again. The morning light had brightened by another degree. Somewhere in the corridor outside, a tray clinked. Before the household staff could begin their morning rounds, Kenji crossed the room toward the window.

He paused at the frame, his hand resting on the latch as he glanced back at her. The intense physical proximity of the last few hours had left a distinct, undeniable scent on both of them, a mixture of her flowery fragrance and the sharp heat of their bodies.

"Wash yourself before you come down," Kenji said, gesturing toward the adjoining bathroom. "The last few hours have made a certain smell on us. Grandpa will notice the second we step into the hall."

Ayla sniffed her own sleeve, recognizing the validity of his observation, and nodded in agreement.

"Goodbye, brother," she murmured.

"Goodbye," Kenji replied, slipping through the window and disappearing into the morning shadows of the courtyard with the easy grace of a seasoned adulterer.

Once the latch clicked shut, Ayla rose from the bed. She shed the silk sleeping gown, stepping into the steaming water of the bath to rid her skin of the lingering traces of the night’s chaos.

She washed thoroughly, ensuring that every biological marker of her interaction with Kenji and her consumption of the fifty guards was completely erased from her form.

When she finished, she dressed in the clean, grey uniform of the Vale military line, her silver hair braided neatly down her back.

Her Apocalypse Bronze core sat perfectly settled within her chest, humming with a heavy, quiet power that made the air around her vibrate slightly.

She walked to the heavy oak door of her suite, turned the handle, and exited into the long corridor.

*

* *

Joseph stood near the balustrade, his hands clasped behind his back in a standard military stance. He was a Bronze-ranked Pyromancer whose record in the trenches of the Pale Reaches had earned him a temporary assignment to General Roric’s personal estate.

When the heavy oak door clicked, his posture instantly stiffened. He turned his head, expecting to see one of his fellow squadmates returning from the morning shift, but the figure stepping into the bright sunlight made his breath catch in his throat.

"Hey, Joseph," she called out.

The casual greeting hit him like a physical blow, stunning him into absolute silence. Joseph stood frozen on the stone tiles, his mind completely failing to process the fact that the young miss of the Vale house had just spoken directly to him.

The general had already announced Ayla as the young miss of the Vale house, so soldiers were ordered to call her so.

It was absolutely no secret among the units stationed within the Eastern Barracks that General Roric’s granddaughter was the most beautiful human alive.

Her breakthrough to the legendary Celestial Vessel had already turned her into a mythical figure within the city, but her physical appearance alone was enough to derail the focus of any soldier who crossed her path.

Together with her peerless, unprecedented talent, every single hot-blooded male in the elite squad had secretly become her admirer.

When the General had issued the sudden directive the night before, ordering fifty of his most experienced Pyromancers to serve as her exclusive dueling partners and rotating bodyguards, the lower barracks had practically burned with a mixture of intense jealousy and fierce competition.

Every man wanted the assignment. Among them all, Joseph had considered himself the most blessed, having drawn the short straw that allowed him to guard the primary corridor leading to her private suite.

To him, standing in the quiet hall for hours was a price well worth paying just for a single glimpse of her.

Now, looking at her under the unobstructed morning light, Joseph’s mind went entirely ablaze. Ayla was freshly bathed, the small water stains at the tips of her silver hair clinging faintly to the collar of her grey military uniform.

Even without wearing a single tinge of makeup, her pale cheeks caught the artificial sunbeams, glowing with a flawless, translucent quality that seemed entirely unnatural for a mortal creature.

Joseph’s gaze lingered on the delicate symmetry of her face.

In the privacy of his own thoughts, he secretly compared her with the so-called great beauties of the high human houses he had seen during previous victory parades in the inner districts.

He shook his head slightly, a silent, internal judgment locking into place.

’No one can match her,’ he thought with absolute certainty. ’The high houses don’t have anyone who can even stand in her shadow.’

Walking toward him with a patient stride, Ayla heard the precise trajectory of his inner thoughts echoing clearly through her perception.

A small, hidden amusement flickered deep within her eyes. She knew the soldier was entirely correct. Her defining trait, Perfect Assimilation, did not simply copy the structural parameters of a species, it refined them to their absolute biological limit.

Among all the humans currently crawling through the sectors of the Crusade or beyond, her current vessel was the literal epitome of genetic perfection.

She was designed to evoke this exact reaction from his biology.

Joseph suddenly returned from his reverie, the realization of how long he had been staring sending a violent jolt through his nervous system.

He coughed quickly, a rough, manufactured sound meant to hide the intense embarrassment of having looked at her so deeply.

As he adjusted his belt to regain his professional composure, a sudden, logical question appeared in his mind, replacing the haze of admiration. He looked at her, his dark brows furrowing slightly in genuine wonder.

"Miss," Joseph asked, his voice careful and respectful. "How did you learn my name?"

The question hung in the quiet morning air. He knew for a fact that he had not introduced himself to her since his rotation began, nor had any of the senior officers provided her with a roster of the lower-ranking guards assigned to the residential wings.

Then, how did she learn it?

Ayla stopped a few feet away from him, her golden eyes widening by a fraction as she instantly understood her slip of the tongue.

She could not exactly provide him with the clinical truth. She had not learned his name through a formal introduction. She had learned it an hour ago while devouring his brain in the dark corridor during her morning harvest.

The Joseph standing in front of her right now had regressed with her and Kenji.

To her, this man had already been known by devouring.

To him, the morning had only just begun.

Ayla’s gaze lowered to the stone floor, her human expressions searching the available data for a plausible lie that would satisfy a suspicious guard.

Before she could manufacture a story about overhearing the General’s morning briefings, Joseph’s hand moved upward.

He patted the heavy metal plating over the left side of his chest, a self-deprecating smile breaking through his serious expression as he answered his own question.

"Ah, it must be my nameplate," he murmured, feeling foolish for having questioned her. "I forgot the logistics department issued these new silver engravings yesterday before the transfer."

Only then did Ayla’s eyes trace the movement of his hand, her gaze landing on the small, polished metal rectangle pinned securely to his grey lapel.

The name Joseph was deeply etched into the surface, catching the bright sunlight.

"Oh..." she mouthed, her lips parting slightly.

She let the small sound linger, allowing the soldier’s own rationalization to seal the discrepancy for her.

She offered him a brief, dimpled nod before continuing past him toward the grand staircase, leaving Joseph standing by the balustrade, his heart hammering against his ribs as he watched her silver braid disappear around the corner of the stone hall.

"Holy heavens, she’s damn hot," he shouted inwardly like a little fan, not knowing she had already heard him and agreed with him.

’I am sure, damn hot.’