Briar Rose gave Tyvan a quick report. Then, she ushered Yan Xue back into her SUV.

Bishop temporarily disabled the sealing formation to both allow her to leave and Dajik’s van to enter. Then, he verified the formation’s metrics before re-enabling the mana flow.

Tyvan casually confirmed its efficacy. It would last long enough for Dajik and his men to clean up the mess to the best of their mundane abilities.

❴The Kingdom❵ was not equipped to handle incidents of any scale much larger than the current.

Over two dozen bodies...

Dajik would make them disappear.

“Mirno more,” he’d say.

It was a common adage in his language, said to sailors going on a voyage.

--broken and cut bodies, tossed into the bay.

Dajik was as much of a poet as he was a gentleman.

Tyvan reached into his coat pocket, retrieving what had become of Yan Xue’s golden snake pin. Blackened. Twisted. It had lost its shape, what yet remained crumbling into dust. He closed his fist and scattered the ashes.

Yan Xue had nearly died.

She had been captured before their arrival. If not for the protective magics on her pin, they would have found her corpse.

He took a deep breath.

The fates seemed to favour the Arrow Group.

“Hey, Boss,” Rook approached his side. His walking gait had somewhat recovered. His expression implied discontent. Or perhaps, he felt a degree of regret or shame.

“You went kinda hard on that Chinese chick,” he said. “Didn’t y’say she helped you out at that hotel?”

“Callum,” Tyvan said, “you are my brother. If that bullet’s trajectory differed...”

“Was just a bit o’ bad luck.”

“If by bad luck you were struck, then by worse luck... I’d have been apologizing to your family.”

Rook grimaced, having nothing to say in return. Judging from his scent and posture, however, he remained unconvinced.

“If I was in your place,” Tyvan added, “you’d be just as furious, if not more so.”

Rook took a deep breath and shrugged, “Yeah. Y’got me there.”

Bishop walked over, his forearms resting behind his head.

Tyvan looked up, scoffing derisively, “You’ve something to say, as well?”

“She’s not useless,” Bishop replied. “We got the jump on the bad guys because of her.”

“The result might have turned out well enough,” Tyvan frowned, “but she was an unexpected and dangerous variable. That is not acceptable.”

“Oh, and she also fixed the dimensional rift in our laundry room!” Bishop said.

“She did what?” Tyvan asked in a flat voice.

A sudden gunshot, loud and heavy-- the trio turned toward the sound, as one.

Bishop adopted a fighting stance.

Rook had an axe in hand.

And Tyvan... had his body lowered, his palm outstretched.

It didn’t make any logical sense.

He had a pistol holstered to his chest-- but he didn’t reach for that.

Then, unlike Bishop, he had no long-range magics prepared.

As versed with fieldwork as he was in his current and previous lives, his adaptability to the inevitable shifts and twists of a mission remained painfully weak. Such was the reason he garnered assistance from allies objectively more versatile and skilled.

And, thankfully, neither of his current companions criticised his awkwardness.

Laughter came from the direction of the shot.

“Ha HA! One still alive!” Dajik yelled, “It oh’kay. I fix.”

Bishop and Rook settled down with uneasy chuckles.

“He’s a good’un, that Russian fella,” said one.

“His palačinke is P-erfect,” said the other. “But I’m not sure that’s actually Russian.”

Tyvan shook his head.

“Anyroad... leave it alone, you two. The best way to keep Yan Xue safe is to keep her as far as possible from matters exclusive to ❴The Kingdom❵.”

“Egh,” Rook sighed. “If ya say so, Boss.”

“Let’s get the cleaning supplies from the truck,” Bishop grinned, “I think Yeonha’s still asleep back there.”

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

----------------------------------------

Xue Yan cried silently on the way home, sitting in the passenger seat of Raia’s Gallivanter.

‘Useless child.’

She wiped her hands as clean as she could on leftover Dragon Burger napkins.

‘Inane.’

‘Reckless.’

She leaned her head against the window, staring at her pitiful reflection.

‘Only human.’

“Hey,” Raia said, “It’s... not so bad.”

Shay laughed pathetically, “Everything’s screwed up because of me.”

“No, it’s-- it’s not like that?”

Shay looked over to see Raia wearing the most forced smile she’d ever seen.

“It’s... it’s pretty bad,” she said.

Raia grimaced, sucking in air through her teeth. “Y...eah. It’s pretty bad. But it won’t always be.”

“I’m useless,” Shay sighed.

“Won’t always be,” Raia repeated.

“I can’t use magic,” Shay said.

“Mages are overrated,” Raia countered, “every single one of them that’s not Tyvan?”

Shay turned in her seat to glare at the woman just trying to make her feel better.

“I’m human.”

“Ooof,” Raia frowned. “Can’t fix that-- and that’s not something to fix. Not being human is, uh... it comes with its own problems, y’know?”

Shay rolled her eyes, “Raia, you can teleport with a cool turn-into-shadows ability. Bishop can wave his hands and things hundreds of cheeseburgers away just explode.”

“We... have our own circumstances,” Raia said quietly. “But I can at least say... if we had the choice to go back to being human, we would.”

Shay sniffed, wiping her tears with her shirt.

“I saw Rook get shot... and he just... walked it off.”

“Rookie’s fine~” Raia assured her. “He probably deserved it.”

“And Tyvan,” Shay said... “I thought... I think I heard him laugh.”

Raia’s expression stiffened... “Boss... he’s-- uh, a different person when he gets like that.”

She slowed to a stop at a red light and turned to face Shay.

“Listen, Shay... Tyvan gets really serious about this kind of stuff. But he’s like that because he cares. He’s got... a weird past? And he’s lost people before. That’s why he’s so hard on you-- on us, I mean.”

Shay’s gaze drifted from the lonely road in front, back to Raia’s soft brown eyes.

“He... took his snake pin back,” she said, hot tears blurring her vision.

A slow, pained grimace crossed Raia’s face... “Oh.”

The light turned green. Raia focused her attention on the road.

The rest of the drive finished as it started: in silence... save for the occasional hiccup of Shay’s misery.

----------------------------------------

Thursday morning came.

Shay did some mental calculations, trying to figure out how much sleep she actually got.

She remembered glancing at the red numbers on her alarm clock throughout the night. In hindsight, that didn’t help her sleep at all.

She got between 1 and 2 hours.

That was probably better than it could have been, considering someone in her friend-circle got shot and she’d literally heard the screams of people actually dying.

Shay went to class.

She kept it together.

It was... so easy to pretend that everything was okay.

It had... never been really okay. So even when everything was a lot worse than usual... she still managed.

Just a few hours ago, she had blood on her hands.

Just a few hours ago, she had her pillow wrapped around her head, trying not to hear the sounds that would plague her nightmares for the rest of her life.

Gunshots.

Shouts in Mandarin.

Laughter.

Things no one in her class would ever know about.

--and things she hoped they never would.

After school, Shay left the grounds, walking as quickly as her sore and injured muscles allowed.

A few people called out to her, but she just waved-- she didn’t stop to greet them or waste time with small talk.

She walked around the block.

She entered the plant nursery next to the Heights.

And as soon as she saw Heidi, she cried into her arms.

Time passed-- Shay didn’t know how long. Heidi ended up closing her shop early. Shay tried to argue, saying it was okay, she just-- something, something. But winning any argument against Heidi was basically impossible.

When Heidi put her hands on her hips and put on her fake-mad expression, Shay didn’t have the heart to fight back.

Heidi lived in the Eastern Dorms, at the very end and in her own private studio.

And her bedroom was...

Shay wasn’t sure what she expected.

Cute? Classic and austere, maybe?

It was bright --with white walls and indirect light on the ceiling from a standing lamp. There was one chair, wicker-woven, and with a poofy pink cushion.

And... there were a lot of plants.

Wooden box behind the door with succulents growing out of it. Three tiers of tiny flower pots hanging on a wall stud. Leafy vines spilling down from the top of her canopy bed.

It was supposed to be bad feng shui to have plants in the bedroom. But considering Heidi, her room wouldn’t have felt like hers if it didn’t almost have its own ecosystem.

Heidi finished changing, coming out of the bathroom wearing a gorgeous one-piece gown, forest green with flower patterns in gold-lace, and-- of course, giant white ribbons that ran down the front.

The color matched her golden curls perfectly, too.

“Heidi,” Shay said... “You look so pretty.”

“Oh, stop~” Heidi smiled. “This is just the quickest thing I could throw on. Oh, I’d be devastated if anyone aside from you saw me so unbecoming~”

Shay wanted to comment, but she just nodded, instead. Knowing Heidi, that might have actually been the most casual thing she owned that wasn’t a work outfit.

Heidi took hold of Shay’s hands, her bright blue eyes almost blinding to look at.

“Will you share your troubles with me, Shay? Whatever ails you, I just know you can overcome it.”