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They climbed a long slope where the ward‑stones grew taller—pylons etched with symbols half chipped away by lichen and time. The air felt faintly charged near them, the kind of subtle shift in pressure one felt near summer lightning.
"Scarlette," he said suddenly, unable to help himself, "these ward‑stones—are they from the First Emperor's time?"
She didn't answer for a few heartbeats.
"Some," she said. "Older. Newer. Repaired. Replaced."
"That sounds like all of them."
"Mm."
He smiled despite himself.
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By midday, the road widened where caravans sometimes stopped to water their animals. A stone trough drew on a narrow rill that whispered over smooth river rock. There were once tally posts here; only their stumps remained.
Scarlette brought the horse to a steady halt. Ryan sat up carefully, testing his ribs, then swung his legs down. He filled the wooden ladle and offered it toward her wordlessly. She took it without comment and drank a measured sip.
He watched a moment, then risked a question that had less to do with mystery and more to do with method.
"Earlier—what you said about my form. You were right. I grip too tight. I think too late. But this thing about not relying only on my sword… how does someone even start with that? I mean—I don't have chantless anything. I don't—spew aura from a twig."
Scarlette tilted the ladle so the last drop fell back into the trough.
"Your sword is a medium," she said. "Not an identity."
"I… know that. Theoretically."
"You don't," she corrected without heat. "Not yet."
He made a face. "That hurts, you know."
"Good," she said. "Remember it."
He snorted under his breath, then sobered. "What should I do, then?"
"Hone your perception," she said. "Feel the rhythm of your own body first; the road second; the opponent last. If you cannot feel yourself, you cannot break yourself. If you cannot break yourself, you cannot rebuild."
It was the most she had spoken in a row all morning. Ryan tried to engrave the words into his skull.
"Also," she added, "learn to breathe."
He stared. "I do breathe."
"Like a drowning man," she said. "Slow. Then sharp. Then desperate."
"…Point taken."
She handed the ladle back and stepped up into the driver's seat again. The horse obeyed her lightest motion as they resumed their journey.
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Hours passed.
The forest thinned here and there; hills rolled into long plains like old backs turned to the sun. On the horizon, the faint shadow of a watchtower lifted its lone spine. In the dips between ridges, Ryan thought he saw, far away, the blurry rims of farmlands—a patchwork of greens and golds.
He didn't know how many times he glanced up at Scarlette and then away again. The tilt of her head beneath the hood. The fall of her hair. The way she answered with a single syllable and somehow still said more than most people. The way her silence did not ask to be filled.
"Scarlette," he said before he could stop himself, "if the First Emperor really existed… do you think he regretted it?"
A long stretch of silence followed.
"Regret," she said finally, "is a luxury for people who can stop."
Ryan blinked. "And if they can't?"
"They continue."
He expected nothing else from her. It was somehow both cold and honest—like being told a truth you already knew but didn't want to hold.
They crossed a small stone bridge. Beneath, a creek wove through rocks and grasses, glinting like threads of bright steel. He felt the tug of fatigue again; his bruises complained.
Scarlette's hands were steady on the reins.
There were a thousand things Ryan wanted to ask. Ten thousand he knew he shouldn't. He settled for the smallest one.
"Thank you," he said.
"For what," she asked.
"For taking the watch. For not leaving me in the forest. For…" He gestured vaguely. "…not killing me during our practice match."
Scarlette's eyes flicked toward him once.
"I held back," she said.
He coughed. "I know."
A breath passed.
"…You kept standing," she said, almost as if speaking to herself. "Even when you should have fallen. That… is something."
Ryan looked at her, startled.
For Scarlette, that was practically a speech dressed as praise.
He smiled and dropped his gaze, letting the wheels speak again.
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They traveled until the sun began to bend westward. Shadows lengthened; warmth receded. Somewhere far off, a bell—distant, dreamy—rang once and then fell silent.
Ryan shifted against the wagon boards and realized his shoulder had stiffened more than he'd expected. Scarlette must have seen it in the corner of her eye; she adjusted the reins with a minute motion that made the ride even smoother.
He thought again of the First Founding Emperor—a man out of place and time, pulled through a ritual to save a world that wasn't his. A man whose name had become so layered with myth and allegory that it was impossible to distinguish the person from the parable.
He wondered if the Emperor had felt caged in by the miracle people needed him to be. He wondered if the Emperor had looked at the horizon as Scarlette did now—like it wasn't a thing to reach, but a line that must be carried.
He wondered—
And cut the thought there.
Scarlette's presence seemed to push idle fantasies away like fog before a stern wind. She made it clear: she had no interest in being anyone's legend, or anyone's ghost.
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"Scarlette," he tried one last time, "about last night…"
"No," she said simply.
He shut his mouth.
He didn't insist.
They fell into quiet again.
The wheels turned. The road held. The ward‑stones watched like old sentinels.
Ryan looked at the crimson‑haired woman's back—the elegant line of her posture, the guarded economy of her movements, the humanity she kept buried beneath steel—and felt the urge to say something clumsy and kind that would only make them both uncomfortable.
He didn't.
Instead, he folded the blanket tighter across his lap and stared at the line where sky met earth, and promised himself he would become someone worthy of her advice.
Someone who didn't rely only on a blade to be a person.
Even if he had no idea what that meant yet.
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He didn't notice when his eyes closed.
He didn't know how long he slept.
But when he woke, the light had softened to amber, the sky rimmed with the faintest hint of violet, and Scarlette still held the reins like the road had always meant to be under her hands.
For a quiet moment, he simply watched her.
Everyone admires her, praises her, fears her, he thought. But in the end, she is still—
He stopped himself.
He didn't want to reduce her to anything. Not strength, not gender, not myth, not rumor.
He wanted to respect all of it.
Even the parts that hurt to look at.
Even the parts that made him feel helpless in the face of someone else's grief.
'Everyone admired and praised her because of her reputation but at the end, she is still a woman. A woman who needs to be comforted when all the pain she felt are now boiling up inside her but still, she didn't show any weakness and that makes me respect her even more.'
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