The last of the lifestones crumbled away as Dia got up from her bed, and the mix of blue and green light faded away. Mana surged through her veins, stronger and thicker than ever, and she stretched her fingers. Crossing over to the window, she placed a hand on the glass and looked out at the bustling roads.

Her attention drifted to the most depleted hourglass in her vision, the one that represented the amount of time left before the great Dark descended. It was a quarter full, while the hourglass that represented the time left before the Moons descended was three-quarters full. When the first hourglass finally depleted, huge changes would sweep the world, and bring with it a new beginning.

Shaking her head, Dia stifled a yawn. Burning a new set of mana circuits was harder than she had expected. It wasn’t so simple as the first one; she needed to layer the mana over the existing circuit without damaging it, and then get both parts to cooperate. It was an endeavour that required days of quiet concentration; she now knew why bi-folders and stronger folders spent entire days to draw a bit of their mana circuits.

Those stories about someone drawing a circuit in an hour?

Lies, all lies.

Metal clinked as she attached her sword to her belt. She didn’t really need to, since her favourite sword had been turned into her soul-bound weapon, but there were still movements one could make with the act of sword-drawing. Other than that, her overall physical ability had been improved. Even Dia herself found it hard to follow her own strikes when she went all out, but that usually also meant that some of their training swords would be disintegrated.

As a result, after a few stern talks by Schwarz regarding the excessive use of force and the equally excessive replacements of broken weighted wooden swords, Dia had to seal up her own ability, limiting herself to a quarter of her actual speed and strength. Although the others had also become a bi-folder, this handicap didn’t stop Dia from beating them up easily; mana circuits were a force multiplier. The greater one’s physical ability, the stronger the result.

Stretching her arms one last time, she headed out of her room and made her way to the living room, where Schwarz was sipping on a cup and reading a copy of today’s newspaper.

“Thought you’d spend a bit more time in your room.” Schwarz raised a cup at her. “I hope your short seclusion was fruitful.”

“0.3 in eight days,” Dia replied.

“That’s…probably one heck of a record.” A touch of frustration twisted Schwarz’s face. “How are you doing it?”

“With a light touch and lots of patience.” Dia yawned. “A glass, please.”

“You’re lucky I was the first to come out.” Schwarz rolled his eyes and poured out a cup of sparkling, bubbly apple juice for Dia. “But again, I stopped after six hours. Couldn’t concentrate, since everyone else was busy burning mana circuits. In the absence of Claud, I’ve grown to become the paranoid one.”

“I wonder where our little lovebirds flew off to,” Dia replied. “Haven’t heard a single word from them. How long has it been already?”

“Nearly three months,” Schwarz replied. “And how have you forgotten the time?”

“You do know I’ve been burning my mana circuits over multiple short seclusions, right?” Dia yawned. “It’s easy to lose track of time, especially since I haven’t ventured out of my room for the past few days.”

“If I ever become a god, the first thing I’m going to make is a calendar onto our statuses,” Schwarz replied. “At least you’ll be able to tell the date with that, right?”

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“Of the many improvements one could come up with, you started off with something not in the list.” Dia sipped from her glass and shivered as the fruity goodness slid down her throat, bubbling merrily the entire time. “Anyway, anything on the news?”

“Let’s see…well, news of the Moon Emissaries’ opposite number have appeared on the battlefield in Vacuos County,” Schwarz read out loud. “Apparently, they’re called Dark Heralds. They’re armoured fellows…and no prizes for guessing what colour their armour is.”

“Red with green dots?” Dia replied, a grin on her face.

“You’re screwing with me, aren’t you?” Schwarz shook the newspaper once. “The strongest one seen so far is a penta-folder, anyway. There’s nine of them too, compared to our seven Moon Emissaries.”

“Our?” Dia repeated. “What, do these guys belong to you?”

“They’re on our side.” Schwarz paused. “I think.”

“I don’t think they’re on anyone’s side but their own,” Dia replied.

“I dare you to say that in the city square.” Schwarz snickered. “Anyway, have you really not given thought to the issue of raising a little wee Moon baby? They’re really adorable!”

“Yeah, no. They grow up in a month, alright? Within a month, we’ll have an adult-sized soldier ready to kill us at a moment’s notice,” Dia replied. “Weren’t you supposed to fill up the missing tanks of paranoia after Claud left? How are you this supportive of babies destined to become soldiers?”

“Come on, they’re cute!”

“Then adopt a baby from the many orphanages in this city,” Dia shot back. “No one’s stopping you and Farah from doing that.”

“I just don’t get the same feeling from orphans…but we should do our part too, I guess.” Schwarz poured another cup for himself. “Maybe build another school?”

For some damn reason, Count Nightfall, Schwarz and Farah were totally in favour of stealing one of those little babies and raising them up here. More than once, Risti had asked Dia about this odd phenomenon, which certainly reeked of some subtle mental manipulation.

The question was how this manipulation worked. What exactly did Nightfall, Schwarz and Farah share in common? Birthplace definitely was ruled out, since Farah wasn’t from Licencia, so…

Dia had a feeling that she was close to the answer, but no matter how she tried to fish the remaining pieces of the puzzle up, all she got was a haze of fogginess.

Shaking her head, she said, “I think having one for the Moon Lords is good enough. And are we still going to keep that name?”

“What name?”

“You know, the Moon Lords?” Dia shook her head. “We never really did get around to having a proper meeting over the decision of a new name.”

“Well, one of us is always in seclusion, so it really can’t be helped. Free lifestones are very good incentives.”

“But you just pop into your room for a single day and give up on the next, so I don’t really think you have a leg to stand on for that particular argument.” Dia leaned back and took another sip of Schwarz’s new brew of fizzy drink and apple juice. For obvious reasons, however, the former was running out — the deliveries had stopped when the gigantic barriers that isolated the Istrel Sovereignty from the rest of Grandis popped up.

This was literally a commodity that would soon run out of stock, and Dia wasn’t going to let anyone else drink more than her.

“Oh!” Another voice entered the room. “You two are out! How rare.”

Dia turned to look at Countess Farah, who was rubbing her eyes. “Did you come out of seclusion or a good long nap?”

“Oh, I stopped burning my circuits last night, and then went to sleep for a while,” Farah replied. “Anyway, what were you guys talking about?”

“Uh, our new name,” Dia replied immediately, making a mental note to not bring up Moon babies in front of those two idiots. “I’m worried that the Lunar Lord and its Moon Emissaries would look at us the wrong way when they discover the name of our organisation.”

“Ah. Yeah, we’ll probably turn to moon dust or something,” Farah agreed. “But Risti is still burning her—”

“I’m done too,” said another voice, and everyone turned to her.

“Me too, me too!” Nero’s head popped out. “It’s been boring around here recently, since you fellows were all so hardworking, but—”

“It’s going to be like this for as long as possible, though,” Schwarz replied. “We’re all trying to grow stronger before the great Dark descends and begins a full-out assault on the Moons. The period after the great Dark descends and before the Moons follow suit are the most dangerous; if we don’t prepare ourselves, we might be swept away by the enemy.”

“You make it sound like that’s not going to happen,” Farah noted.

“I’m trying to keep morale up, alright? Telling everyone that this city has a lower chance of surviving than a fish in front of hungry cats isn’t a good idea.” Schwarz shook his head. “Anyway, anyone wants a drink? We do need to think of a new name, and we should do it now.”

“Alright, then.”

“Okay…”

Dia slid her empty glass over and smiled. “Seconds, please.”

“Really?” Schwarz took her glass. “Fine…”