The communicator rang before Felix had even finished breakfast.
He glanced at the screen. *Mother.* He stared at it for a second, then sighed. This wasn’t going to be pleasant.
He accepted the call, and his mother’s face filled the screen immediately, his father standing just behind her. Both of them looked worried.
"Felix."
"Morning, Mom."
"What happened?"
He blinked. "Nothing happened. Breakfast’s good, weather’s nice, can’t complain."
"Don’t joke around with me. The Association told us you were injured."
His father leaned closer to the screen. "How badly?"
Felix scratched the back of his head. "I’m fine now."
"That’s not what I asked."
"I’m recovering."
His mother narrowed her eyes. "Recovering from what?"
"A mission."
"Felix."
He sighed. "Nothing serious."
His father gave him a flat look. "Nothing serious doesn’t put an A-rank healer in a medical facility for four days."
Felix’s jaw tightened. That number wasn’t something the Association handed out to family on request, not this fast.
His father had clearly gone over someone’s head to get it, probably before Felix had even fully woken up. He’d have to find out who, later, and have a word with them about what "confidential medical record" was supposed to mean.
"Four days?" His mother’s voice cracked with alarm.
"Mom, I’m fine."
"You were unconscious for four days!" Her voice rose.
He winced. "I woke up."
"That’s your defense?"
His father crossed his arms. "Who was leading the mission?"
"Aria."
"Where was the rest of your team?"
Felix hesitated. "Separated."
His father’s expression darkened. "Separated?"
"Spatial disturbance."
"And they allowed their healer to encounter a boss alone?"
"Technically—"
"Felix."
He stopped talking. His mother was fully furious now. "Give me the name of the person responsible for assigning that gate."
"Absolutely not."
"Why?"
"Because I know you."
His father frowned. "What does that mean?"
"It means if I tell you everything, the next thing I hear is that the Valerius family has declared war on the Association."
His mother looked genuinely offended. "We wouldn’t declare war."
His father glanced sideways at her. "We might have a discussion."
"With weapons?"
"A discussion can involve weapons."
Felix covered his face with one hand. "Exactly."
His mother leaned toward the screen. "How badly were you injured?"
He hesitated, this was the question he’d been trying to avoid the whole call. He could tell them. About the shattered organs, the damaged pathways, the Black Horn Panther, how much blood he’d lost on that valley floor.
But he knew his parents well enough to know exactly what would happen if he did, they’d be on the first transport to Valemont within the hour, and someone at the Association would have a genuinely unpleasant week ahead of them.
"I’m okay."
His mother studied him for a long moment, clearly aware he was leaving something out.
Eventually she sighed. "Fine. I won’t force you."
He smiled. "Thank you."
"But I’m still coming to visit."
The smile disappeared. "Mom."
"I haven’t seen you properly in months."
"I’m busy."
"You have two days off every week."
"I have rehabilitation work."
"You’re a healer."
"Exactly."
"Then heal your mother’s loneliness."
His father laughed, and Felix shook his head. "You two are impossible."
His mother smiled. "And you’re alive. That’s all that matters."
For a moment, his expression softened. "Yeah."
His father nodded. "Be careful."
"I will."
The call ended, and Felix stared at the blank screen for a moment before sighing. "That was close."
**Thursday**
The days after that passed quickly. Felix eased back into his normal routine, the doctors had cleared him for light duty, and his body was recovering well, though they’d warned him more than once not to overexert himself. He’d promised to listen. Naturally, nobody believed him.
By Thursday morning he was standing outside Acheron Deep with a book tucked under his arm, a fantasy adventure this time, something different from the mystery he’d given her before. She’d told him once that she liked reading in general, so he’d decided to branch out and see what she made of it.
He went through the usual security procedures: mana scanners, identity verification, weapon inspection, before Gideon escorted him through the reinforced corridors.
"How’s your body?" Gideon asked.
"Functional."
"That’s not reassuring."
Felix just smiled.
They stopped outside Seraphina’s cell, and Gideon unlocked the door. Felix stepped inside and noticed it immediately, something was different.
Seraphina was sitting on her bed, and her eyes went to him the moment he entered.
Neither of them said anything for a few seconds.
"Miss me?" Felix said, smiling.
Her expression stayed blank, but her eyes lingered on him a beat longer than usual. "You were late."
He checked the time. "By three minutes."
"Four."
He raised an eyebrow. "You’re counting?"
"Yes."
Something that might have been a smile threatened the corner of her mouth.
He held up the book. "I brought you something."
Her eyes went straight to it. "What is it?"
"Fantasy adventure."
She looked over the cover. "You chose it?"
"Obviously."
She took it from him carefully. "Thank you."
Felix sat down, but something still felt off.
She wasn’t as settled as usual, her eyes kept flicking toward him, quick glances she clearly didn’t want him to notice, almost like she was checking he was actually there.
"You’ve been distracted."
"I’m not."
"You are."
"I’m reading."
"You’ve been staring at the same page for five minutes."
She looked down. The book was still open to the same page it had been on since she’d picked it up. She closed it slowly.
Felix smiled. "So."
She looked at him.
"What’s bothering you?"
"Nothing."
"That’s the second lie."
Her eyes narrowed. "You said people lie most of the time."
"Exactly." He leaned back. "And you’re proving my point."
She didn’t answer that.
The session went differently from their usual ones after that, they talked, but her attention kept drifting somewhere else. Eventually Felix stopped pretending not to notice.
"You’ve been wanting to ask me something."
She looked over at him.
"You’re terrible at hiding things."
"I am?" She frowned.
"Yes."
She considered that for a second, then asked, without any warning, "How strong am I?"
Felix blinked. That wasn’t what he’d expected. "Your strength?"
"Yes."
"Your records say S-rank with Water: Mid II and Lightning: Low I affinities. "
"I know."
"Then why ask?"
"I don’t know what that actually means."
He straightened slightly. "What do you mean?"
"I know my rank." She looked down at her hands. A pause. "But..."
"You’ve never trained your elemental proficiency."
"No."
"You just... forced raw mana through?"
"Yes."
"How?"
"I attacked."
Felix stared at her, and she stared back without flinching.
He sighed. "That explains a lot."
"What?"
He leaned forward, holding her gaze.
"Seraphina, on paper, you’re an S-rank awakened."
She nodded.
"In practice, you’re pathetically weak."
Her eyes widened slightly, but Felix didn’t soften his tone.
"You have Tier 1 potential. You’re an extraordinary talent." He pointed a finger at her. "But you have almost no combat experience. You don’t understand proper mana control. You’ve never developed your elemental proficiency. You don’t understand positioning, timing, defensive technique, or how to fight as part of a coordinated unit."
Her expression frosted over with every word.
"Your actual combat ability is probably around D-rank. An ordinary C-rank hero with real training could beat you. A skilled B-rank could dismantle you without breaking a sweat."
Her knuckles turned white as her fingers tightened around the edge of the blanket, but she said nothing.
"Take Ryan, for example: one of the B-ranks on my team. Titan affinity, High III proficiency, our frontline tank." Felix shook his head. "You wouldn’t last three minutes against him. Even our lowest-ranked members have years of real battlefield instinct behind them. You have overwhelming mana and no idea how to aim it."
She lowered her eyes. "So I’m weak."
"Very." The answer was instantaneous.
She looked back up, a spark of defiance breaking through. "Even with an S-rank core?"
"Your mana is S-rank." He tapped his temple. "Your combat ability isn’t."
She was quiet for a long moment before asking, "How strong are you?"
Felix leaned back into the worn upholstery of his chair. "Me?"
"Yes."
He considered it for a beat. "After my last fight? I can hold my own against a peak S-rank hero or monster. Roughly even footing."
Her eyes sharpened. "Even alone?"
"Yes."
"Then why are you covered in bandages?"
His easy smile faltered. "Because even footing doesn’t mean you walk away clean."
He looked down at his scarred hand. "The Black Horn Panther was fast. Exceptionally fast. And I made a couple of miscalculations."
She studied him closely. "What if your opponent has Ultra proficiency?"
"Then the dynamic shifts entirely." His tone leveled out, dead serious. "If I’m up against a peak S-rank whose proficiency matches mine at the Ultra tier, I lose eventually."
She blinked, caught off balance. "You have Ultra proficiency."
"I do."
"With an A-rank core."
"Correct."
"How is that even possible?"
He offered a wry grin. "That’s the anomaly. My technical proficiency outpaced my core’s capacity. My spells are fundamentally more refined and demanding than my reserves can comfortably sustain."
She stared at him, struck silent. Slowly, her gaze drifted down to her own hands, the dormant flicker of water, the static hum of lightning, that vast, untamed ocean of mana sitting idle in her chest. All that destructive scale, completely unrefined.
For the first time, a bitter truth took root.
Her crimes hadn’t made her powerful. Her survival hadn’t proven her competence. Her S-rank classification hadn’t proven anything at all.
She had simply possessed an absurd volume of brute force and hurled it at people who had no means to deflect it. That wasn’t strength. It had never been strength.
Felix watched her in silence, seeing the realization click behind her guarded eyes.
Then she looked up. "Train me."
He raised an eyebrow. "What?"
"Train me."
There wasn’t a trace of hesitation in her voice, it was quiet, level, and absolute. "I want to be strong."
He didn’t answer immediately. Coming from a ward under high-security watch, it was a request that demanded caution. "Why?"
A flicker crossed her face, too fast to read before the mask snapped back into place.
"The Association wants me combat-ready eventually, don’t they? Isn’t that the premise of this entire arrangement?" She met his gaze directly. "If I’m as pathetically weak as you say, keeping me useless helps no one. How am I supposed to be an asset if I can’t even fight?"
Felix studied her. It was a flawless answer: pragmatic, defensible, and entirely calculated to give nothing away. He knew it wasn’t the real reason. There was a deeper motive buried beneath the logic, something raw she wasn’t willing to share.
But whatever was driving her didn’t change the utility of the outcome. If she wanted genuine strength, the underlying motive mattered far less than the discipline required to build it.
"Fair point," he conceded.
She didn’t blink, waiting for the verdict.
Felix settled deeper into his chair, a dry chuckle escaping him. The rehabilitation assignment was already proving to be far more complicated.
And looking at the cold resolve set into her jaw, she wasn’t going to take no for an answer anyway.
"Fine." His mouth curved into an amused grin. "Just don’t complain when the training hurts."
Her expression didn’t waver. "I won’t."
Felix laughed quietly. "We’ll see about that."