Chapter 84 Episode 84: Mana…

Akira’s POV

I woke to the low hum of machines and the feeling of a hand wrapped around mine. The light in the room was soft. My body felt heavy and sore in places I had almost forgotten.

I turned my head and found Kael sitting in the chair beside the cot. He looked tired. Dark circles sat under his eyes and his jaw held a rough shadow of stubble.

"You’re awake," he said. His voice was quiet and rough from disuse.

"How long?" I asked. My throat felt dry and scraped.

He reached for a cup of water, helped me lift my head, and held it while I drank. The water tasted clean and cold. When I finished he set the cup aside and kept his hand on mine.

"A week and a little more," he said. "You went under hard after I found you. The physicians said the damage ran deeper than the visible injuries. They told me to prepare for the worst."

The words settled slowly. A week. More than a week of blank time while my body fought to stay alive. I looked at the room again. Private recovery suite. Clean walls. Quiet monitors. Kael’s chair pulled so close that his knee touched the frame of the cot.

"You stayed," I said.

"I stayed." He gave a small tired smile. "My mother sent for me more than once. I didn’t answer. I wasn’t going to leave and risk missing the moment you opened your eyes."

Something warm and tight moved through my chest. I squeezed his hand as much as my strength allowed. He squeezed back carefully, as if he was still afraid I might break.

I tried to sit up but pain flared along my side where the rib had been cracked. Kael moved at once, sliding an arm behind my shoulders and helping me shift against the raised support. He adjusted the pillows, checked the line of the bandages, and only sat back when I was steady.

"Easy," he said. "Everything is still healing. The rib is better than it was but it isn’t finished. Same with the rest."

I nodded and let my head rest against the support. My mind felt clearer than it had in the first moments of waking, but the gap of missing days still sat heavy. I remembered the service road. The fight. The limbo and the original version of myself. The quest. Then nothing until Kael’s face above me.

I did not tell him the full story. He only knew I had been attacked and badly hurt. The rest could wait.

We sat in silence for a while. Kael did not fill it with questions. He simply stayed close, one hand resting near mine on the blanket. Every so often he checked the monitors or adjusted the light.

The care was quiet and constant. It made the long stretch of unconsciousness feel less empty.

After some time I noticed a new sensation under my skin. Mana moved differently. In the past I had always drawn it from the pool inside me.

Now I could feel it in the air around the room, thin and present, like a current I had never been able to touch before. I focused on it without meaning to. A small thread of external mana answered and drifted toward my hand.

Kael noticed the shift in my expression. "What is it?"

"I can feel mana in the air," I said. "Not just my own. I can pull a little of it in."

He watched my hand. The faint pull of energy was visible only as a soft disturbance in the light. His eyes narrowed with interest and something like relief.

"That’s new," he said. "The physicians mentioned residual changes in your readings while you were under. They didn’t know what it meant. Looks like the recovery left you with more than scars."

I let the small thread of external mana settle into my own pool. It felt clean and steady. The capacity sat deeper than before. I did not push further. My body was still too worn for experiments.

Kael reached out and brushed a strand of hair from my forehead. The touch was careful. "We’ll test it properly when you’re stronger. No rushing. You just came back. The rest can wait."

"I want to try a little more," I said.

"Later." His tone left no room for argument but stayed gentle. "Right now you eat, you drink, and you rest. That’s the work. Training comes after the rib finishes knitting and the exhaustion clears."

I wanted to argue. The new sense of mana in the air made me restless to understand it. The look on his face stopped me. He had spent more than a week in this chair. The tiredness in him was real. Pushing now would only add to it.

"All right," I said.

He helped me drink more water and then fed me small amounts of soft food from a tray that had been kept warm nearby. I managed only a little before my stomach protested. He did not force the rest. He simply set the tray aside and wiped my mouth with a clean cloth like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"You don’t have to do all of this," I said quietly.

"I know." He settled back into the chair. "I’m doing it anyway."

The hours that followed moved slowly. Nurses came and went with minimal talk. Each time they checked the readings Kael watched every number. When they left he returned to the same place beside the cot.

I drifted in and out of light sleep. Every time I woke he was still there. Sometimes he was reading a report on a small screen. Sometimes he was simply watching me. The constant presence steadied something that had been shaking since I first opened my eyes.

In one of the clearer stretches I tested the new mana sense again. I reached for the air without moving my hands. A thin stream answered and flowed in. It was easier the second time. The pool inside me accepted it without resistance. I stopped before the effort could tire me.

Kael saw the small change in my breathing. "You’re doing it again."

"Just checking," I said. "It still works."

"Good. It will still work tomorrow and the day after. Rest."

I let the mana go and turned my head on the pillow to look at him properly. The stubble on his jaw was thicker than I had ever seen it. His eyes held a mix of relief and leftover fear. The fear had not fully left him even though I was awake and talking.

"You look worse than I do," I said.

A short tired sound left him. "I’ve been told. My mother used stronger words in the messages I ignored."

"Will you get in trouble?"

"Nothing that matters more than this." He reached over and took my hand again. "She can wait. The estate can wait. Everything else can wait until you’re on your feet."

The simple statement settled over me with more weight than a longer speech would have. I closed my fingers around his as firmly as I could. We stayed like that while the light in the room shifted toward evening.

Later a physician came for a fuller check. She examined the rib, the healing cuts, and the deeper readings. Her expression was more open than the ones Kael had described from the week I was under. She said the recovery had turned a corner.

Full strength would take more time but the danger of slipping back had dropped sharply. She left instructions for food, limited movement, and continued observation.

When the door closed Kael let out a long breath. Some of the tightness left his shoulders.

"You heard her," he said. "Slow and steady. No clever ideas about getting up and testing the new mana control in the corridor."

"I wasn’t planning that."

"You were thinking it." The corner of his mouth lifted a fraction. "I know that look."

I did not deny it. The new ability sat under my skin like an unused tool. I wanted to understand how far it reached and what it cost. Wanting it and being ready for it were still two different things. My body made the limit clear every time I shifted too quickly.

Night settled over the complex. Kael dimmed the lights further and pulled a thin blanket higher across my chest. He did not return to any other work.

He simply stayed in the chair with his hand resting near mine on the bed. The quiet felt different from the long blank stretch of unconsciousness. This quiet had a person in it.

"I kept talking to you while you were under," he said after a while. "I don’t know if any of it reached you. I talked about the yard. The defensive work we still need to finish. Ordinary things. It was better than sitting in silence."

"I don’t remember the words," I said. "But I knew I wasn’t alone when I came back. That part got through."

His hand found mine again and held on. We did not say more for a long time. The monitors kept their steady rhythm. Outside the suite the complex continued its normal night. Inside the room the only work was recovery and the simple fact of staying close.

I tested the air mana one more time before sleep pulled at me. The thread came easier. I let it go without drawing deep. Kael watched the small effort and said nothing. His presence alone made the experiment feel safe.

"When you’re stronger we start again," he said quietly. "Proper practice. Controlled. No rushing the rib or the rest of the healing. I’ll be there the whole time."

"I know," I answered.

The certainty in my own voice surprised me a little. A week ago I had been crawling on a service road. Now I was awake, able to pull mana from the air, and held in the careful attention of a man who had refused to leave the chair. The future practice sessions sat ahead of us like a promise instead of a demand.

I closed my eyes. Kael’s thumb moved once across my knuckles. The last clear thought I had before sleep took me was simple. I was back. He was still here. The rest would come when the body was ready.

Sleep this time was ordinary and deep. No grey limbo waited on the other side. Only rest, and the steady presence of the man who had kept watch until I returned.