Part Ninety-Five — Carrying Her Home

　The walk back took longer than it should have, my own legs still unsteady from whatever Assimilation had actually cost me, Sophia's weight settling awkward and unfamiliar against my arms the whole way.

Never carried an enemy home before. Feels strange. Feels like it shouldn't be this easy to just... do, without a second thought.

<"Your vitals suggest continued depletion,"> Anti-Subconsciousness noted, somewhere around the halfway point. <"I would recommend rest before continuing.">

Can't. Not with her like this. Not until she's somewhere actually safe.

　I pushed through anyway, the barrier's edge finally coming into view sometime past dusk, Horizoncrest's lights spread out below like a promise I still had to keep for a little while longer.

　Elaine found me first, at the gate, her expression shifting through several stages of alarm in quick succession — my own blood-soaked clothes, the unconscious Holy Knight commander in my arms, the sheer exhaustion written across every line of my posture.

"Kai—"

"I'm fine," I said, which was mostly true, and mostly beside the point. "She needs somewhere to rest. Somewhere safe. I'll explain everything once she's settled."

　Elaine didn't argue, already moving, already calling for space to be cleared in the same efficient, practical way she handled everything.

Good. Don't need questions right now. Just need her somewhere she can actually recover.

　We settled Sophia in the same room that had once, briefly, held Eris in her own worst hours — a small, strange symmetry I didn't have the energy to properly examine that night.

　Vance checked her over with the same careful, clinical precision she brought to everything, confirming what No.5's casual healing had already made obvious.

"Whatever healed her," Vance said, genuine professional awe underneath her assessment, "did so more thoroughly than anything I've personally witnessed. No trace of the wound remains. Not even scarring."

A primordial demon healed my enemy completely, for no reason I've been able to figure out yet. This world just keeps finding new ways to be strange.

　I sat with Sophia a while after Vance left, watching her breathe steady and even, turning over everything that had happened in a day that had somehow contained an entire war's worth of revelation.

Doran. Fenrik. I finally know who actually sent the order that killed you.

I finally know, and he's already gone, and it still doesn't feel like enough, somehow.

　Eris found me there eventually, exhaustion and relief tangled together on her own face — news of the Ashford army's collapse having clearly already reached her before mine had.

"You're alive," she said, quiet, settling beside me without hesitation. "I felt something enormous, from your direction, hours ago. Wasn't sure what to make of it."

"Long story," I said. "I'll tell it properly once I've actually processed it myself."

　She studied Sophia's sleeping form with careful, evaluating attention.

"Who is she?"

"The one who almost beat me," I said, honest. "And the reason I finally have a name for who actually ordered Doran and Fenrik's deaths."

　Eris went very still at that.

"You found him."

"Found him. Killed him," I said, quiet. "Turns out he wasn't even human. An archdemon, wearing a noble's face this whole time, manipulating half of Ashford's court into this war in the first place."

"That's—" Eris started, and stopped, clearly needing a moment to fully absorb the shape of what I'd just told her.

"That changes things considerably. If a demon orchestrated the war itself—"

"Then Ashford might not even fully understand what they've actually been fighting for," I finished. "Or who's actually been pulling strings behind their own court this whole time."

That's a genuinely unsettling thought. Worth exploring properly, once things settle enough to actually explore it.

"And her?" Eris asked, nodding toward Sophia again. "What happens once she wakes up?"

"I don't know yet," I admitted. "She fought honorably. Never lied to me, not once, even when lying might have served her better. I'd rather give her the chance to actually hear the full truth before deciding what she is to us — enemy, or something else entirely."

　Ace found us both not long after, exhausted in his own way, settling close with the particular quiet that meant he'd earned a rest as much as either of us had.

You did good today. Thank you, for having Eris's back while I handled mine.

We handled it together, Ace replied, warm despite his own visible fatigue. That is, I believe, rather the point of all of this.

Yeah. I think it is.

　I sat there a while longer, between an unconscious enemy who might not stay an enemy and a found family who'd fought a war alongside me and won, feeling the exhaustion of the day finally start to properly settle in.

Tomorrow, I'll have to explain all of this properly.

Tonight, I think I've earned the right to just sit here a while, glad everyone I actually love made it through.