Chapter 224: Under Three Moons

Night enveloped the Guild like a vast, gentle blanket, not just darkening the world but softening it, muffling the echoes of pain, and wrapping everything in a fragile stillness that followed catastrophe.

Above, the sky stretched endlessly, deep and ink-dark, a canvas scattered with countless stars that shimmered faintly as if they were breathing. Three moons hung high in that expanse, each at a different height, their pale light spilling across the land in layers: one cold and silver, another faintly blue, and the third tinged with a dim amber glow.

Their combined illumination cast a strange, almost sacred radiance over the ruined Guild, transforming broken walls into silhouettes and unfinished structures into quiet monuments of resilience.

Outside the Adventurer Inn, the world felt suspended between exhaustion and rebirth. The sounds of reconstruction had finally faded for the night; tools lay set aside as workers rested. Even the most restless Adventurers retreated into their inns to gather strength for the days ahead.

Only the faint rustle of wind and occasional distant clatter of loose boards disturbed the silence. In that stillness sat Sage alone on a wooden bench near the entrance, his posture relaxed but his gaze fixed upward on the moons.

The air carried a slight chill, cool enough to sharpen his senses but not biting, and he breathed it in slowly. It filled his lungs and steadied thoughts that had refused to settle for days.

His body still throbbed beneath bandages; his soul bore the dull ache of overexertion. Yet for the first time since waking up, there was space, space to think, feel, and exist without immediate decisions pressing down on him.

Footsteps approached quietly, deliberate but unhurried and he didn’t need to turn to know who it was.

Valeria paused beside him before sitting down close, closer than she ever had before. Not across from him or standing at a distance but right beside him; their shoulders nearly aligned with only a narrow space between them that spoke volumes.

This alone was significant. Valeria wasn’t someone who tolerated proximity easily, especially not with men. The hatred she carried ran deep, etched into her being by years of experience reinforced by countless unspoken memories. Even standing near a man too long usually put her on edge; her instincts would sharpen as her hand drifted toward her weapon like muscle memory recalling things she preferred to bury.

For her to sit this close, to feel his warmth so intimately, meant something profound: trust or perhaps acceptance.

For a while they sat in silence beneath three moons watching over them, the quiet stretching comfortably between them heavy with unvoiced thoughts.

Finally, Sage exhaled softly, a faint smile tugging at his lips and without looking at her said casually, “So… how does it feel knowing your sister might end up with a man’s soul inside her?”

Valeria didn’t respond right away. She sat in silence long enough for Sage to turn his head, raising an eyebrow as he studied her expression. She stared ahead, her eyes calm yet distant, and her jaw was set in a way that suggested she was deep in thought rather than holding back anger.

When she finally spoke, her voice was low and steady. “Even now,” she said, “you’re still making jokes.”

Sage blinked, genuinely taken aback. Then he let out a quiet breath. “That’s… not the response I expected.”

Valeria turned her head slightly, her gaze shifting toward him, neither cold nor hostile, just observant. “How so?”

“Well,” Sage said, leaning back on the bench with a light but thoughtful tone, “for starters, you’re sitting this close to me, which you’ve never done before. And then I make a joke like that, and you don’t even look offended. If this were the old you… I’m pretty sure my head would’ve rolled across the ground by now.”

Valeria didn’t deny it. Her eyes returned to the sky before she quietly added, “I still hate men.”

Sage remained silent.

“There’s no confusion about that,” she continued, her voice calm but edged with something deeper than anger. “But hatred doesn’t mean I abandon judgment. I hate with purpose, not emotion. There’s a difference.”

Sage nodded slowly; that made sense, more sense than blind rage ever would. Hatred with purpose meant control and understanding; it meant she hadn’t allowed it to consume her or turn her into something reckless or irrational. The weight of her words settled between them as they fell into silence again.

After a while, Valeria spoke again, her tone quieter now and stripped of its usual sharpness. “Why are you doing this?”

Sage knew exactly what she meant without needing to ask for clarification. He took a slow breath and lifted his gaze back to the moons as if searching for answers within their pale light.

“Because she saved my life,” he replied simply. “And this… is what I can offer in return.”

Valeria furrowed her brow slightly. “You barely know her,” she pointed out. “You don’t have to go this far. You’re willing to throw away your future, your power, everything you’ve built, for someone who was just another member of the Guild until recently.”

Sage smiled faintly at that thought. “And she didn’t know me well either,” he countered gently. “But she still jumped in front of that attack without hesitation.”

Valeria had no answer for him because there wasn’t one, they both understood what such instinct revealed about a person.

Letting the silence linger for a moment longer, Sage finally spoke again in a softer tone that felt less guarded.

“I once had a sister,” he began.

Valeria’s gaze snapped to him, her attention fully captured. It was the first time he had spoken so openly about his past.

“She had an incurable disease,” he continued, his voice steady yet distant, as if he were recounting a dream rather than his own life. “The healers said it would eventually take her, no matter what we tried. But there was… a chance. A treatment. It was expensive, risky, and difficult but possible.”

His fingers curled slightly in his lap. “And I was the only one who could make it happen.”

Valeria listened in silence.

“We fought,” Sage went on. “About everything, responsibility, choices, the life I wanted versus the path she envisioned for me. At some point… I cut off contact. I convinced myself it was just temporary, that I’d reach out again once things settled down and I got my life together.”

He let out a quiet, bitter laugh. “But life doesn’t wait for you to get your act together.”

He exhaled slowly, his gaze drifting far beyond the horizon. “By the time I tried to reconnect… it was already too late.”

Valeria remained silent, absorbing every word.

“I wasn’t there when she needed me,” Sage said softly. “Not when she was scared or in pain or dying. And I keep thinking… if only I had swallowed my pride and reached out… maybe things would’ve turned out differently.”

“I wasn’t the one who killed her,” he murmured, “but it feels like I might as well have.”

The weight of his words lingered in the air, raw and unrefined.

“And that guilt…” he continued, his voice barely above a whisper now, “has followed me ever since. It doesn’t shout or tear at you; it just sits there, quiet and constant, reminding you of what you could’ve done but didn’t.”

Valeria tightened her grip on her knees. For the first time since sitting beside him, her expression shifted not into anger or grief but something closer to understanding.

“And Mina…” Sage said finally turning toward her, “she reminds me of her, not in looks or actions but in that stubbornness, the willingness to throw herself into danger for someone she cares about and that refusal to consider consequences when someone else is hurting.”

His smile was faint and fragile. “This time… I can do something.”

Valeria stared at him for a long moment before looking away; the three moons reflected faintly in her eyes.

“You’re a fool,” she said quietly.

Sage chuckled softly. “I’ve heard that before.”

“But…” she continued, almost inaudibly, “you’re not wrong.”

The realization surprised even her as they sat side by side beneath the vast sky, speaking little after that; their silence transformed from heavy to shared.

A quiet understanding settled between them, two people carrying different scars and burdens yet walking the same path for this moment.

Above them, the three moons hung in the sky, quietly observing a night devoid of clashing swords and roaring spells. Yet, something equally significant was taking place, two souls were slowly learning how to trust one another.

The amber moon’s glow caught Valeria’s profile, softening the hard lines of her jaw. The silver moon painted Sage’s face, illuminating the faint tracks of tears he hadn’t realized he’d shed.

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