Chapter 16: Reflected

Perfect. No one will be there to see me arrive. Melia scrolled back across the map on the Chozo interface before donning her masked headdress and clambering into the vent.

She was headed towards the same convention centre she had visited a year ago: the one that was hosting the annual Melia Appreciation Club meeting. Knowing that they would be meeting again on the last Saturday in February, she was planning to surprise them with her appearance.

It was a plan that had been fermenting in her mind for pretty much the entire year. She had spent so much of her life alone, with little if any support from the general public, that she felt compelled to reward the few who did indeed seem to care about her. There was no shortage of risk - she wasn't supposed to be outside the palace without a guard present if she wasn't on an anonymous excursion - but she was feeling pretty good about her odds of convincing Kallian that she was doing the right thing, which would almost certainly sway her father's opinion on the matter if they were to find out.

Of course, travelling through the ductwork was more of a hassle with her mask on, making her tunnel vision even more pronounced. There was no chance of it being damaged, at least - she'd abused it pretty hard as a frustrated child and it never came out with a scratch.

As usual, it took no time at all to arrive at her destination: the women's washroom at the convention centre. Peeking out through the vent to confirm that no one was present, she dropped down from the ceiling and smacked the dust off herself.

I can't show even these few people my face. She looked at herself in the mirror, seeing nothing but her displeased mask stare back. All it takes is one loose mouth and and it's all done for. I cannot trust this amount of people to keep a secret. After all, the fewer half-bloods that helped with Colony 7 managed to leak the mission.

Well, here goes nothing I suppose.

Still a bit apprehensive but determined, Melia strode out of the washroom and into room 4, where the meeting was about to begin.

She blinked a few times, unsure of what she was seeing.

Apparently, this year's theme was "dress-up contest". About half of the people present were wearing the same style of clothes she was seen wearing on a regular basis, with prop masks and ether staffs to complete the costume. Most of the accessories looked a bit hastily done, but a few were of quite high quality, and could easily be mistaken for the real thing at a distance.

...well then. This has taken an unusual turn. Melia carefully sat down, ensuring it was not in the same seat as the previous year. This is eerie, seeing all these doppelgangers about. But it should provide for a much more amusing reveal.

She watched the last few stragglers arrive; there seemed to be slightly more people than the previous year, at about sixty-five. Most of the costumed attendees weren't currently wearing their masks, but a few were, so she didn't stand out very much.

"Welcome, fellow members and interested guests, to the 17th annual meeting of the Melia Appreciation Club!"

Melia joined in the applause, trying to blend in as much as possible.

"As you can probably tell, this year's theme is impression. The main event is a dress-up contest, but we've got a few other things in store, so if you didn't bring a costume don't worry. Right, first things first, everyone in costume please take a number so we can tell you apart. And everyone else come get a name tag, because you'll need them for the first event."

The tags were handed out. At the far end of the room, Melia was given number 36, and was therefore the highest-numbered participant. Maybe I should have placed myself more in the middle somewhere.

"The first event is a party game called Assassins in the Palace." The leader began shuffling a deck of cards. "Everyone gets a card. If you get the Ace of Flames, you are the emperor. If you get any other Ace, you're one of the assassins. Everyone else is a guard. Once everyone has their role, I secretly tell all the guards who the emperor is, while I tell the assassins who their co-conspirators are. From there, you'll all start trying to find out who the assassins are in order to execute them and remove them from the game. If all the assassins are executed, the emperor and guards win. But each assassin can reveal themselves at any time, including just before their death, and select another player to kill. If they kill the emperor, all the assassins win. So the assassins need to figure out who the emperor is while looking like a guard, while the emperor and guards need to find the assassins without revealing who the emperor is - or who the emperor cannot be."

The cards were dealt. Melia looked at hers: the Five of Winds, making her just another guard. Good, the role of no commitment. I can sit back and observe unless I am questioned, and being eliminated is no great loss to either team. Eventually, the leader reached her and told her that Rubeus was the emperor, a middle-aged man sitting about halfway across the room.

Once everyone was correctly informed, the game began. It was clear that some people had played the game before, as they were quick to cast suspicion on random players in order to get discussion started. Players naturally formed groups from each table to reduce conversational interference. Trying to remain in the background, Melia did little to participate, simply nodding in agreement with specific notions of the emerging debate.

After an initial five minutes of deliberation, the first player was voted out and revealed as a guard. From there, a chain reaction began where several players were eliminated in quick succession under the assumption that two players who disagree must be on opposite teams. By the time things had died down a bit, only thirty players remained.

From there, the first assassin made their move. He picked Melia out of the crowd and declared that she was the emperor, under the logic that she wasn't doing anything, nor being called out for not doing anything. Melia simply shrugged and revealed her card, denoting her opponent's failure to choose correctly.

I have succeeded in diverting the kill away from the person of importance. How appropriate.

With one assassin gone, the remaining players got in a groove, analysing motives and reactions to fish out the remaining baddies with minimal loss of teammates. Once the final assassin was outed, twenty guards remained, with the emperor safe among them. After all the cards were recollected, the leader allowed a few minutes of discussion before taking control again.

"Our second event should be pretty exciting. Everyone come outside, it'll take place in the backyard."

The leader directed the meeting out the rear door and into the back yard of the building, which was about twice the size of the room inside. An umbrella stand in the centre of the yard contained five Popular Staves.

"Pretty simple really: We'll each be having a try at summoning elementals!"

The crowd oohed and aahed. Melia was intrigued. People tend to greatly overestimate how difficult it is to summon the simpler elementals, so there should be a large amount of unexpected and therefore satisfying success here.

"Isn't that dangerous?" someone asked. "Can't elementals really hurt someone?"

"Rest assured we have taken every precaution." The leader pointed to a wire on the ground and a bucket of water. "Any electric elementals can be safely discharged into this ground wire, and any fire elementals can be eliminated by submerging them. My research shows it's extremely rare for a beginner to be able to summon anything else, but those are the ones that aren't as dangerous anyway."

"But don't elementals fly around a lot?" a second concerned member said.

"Only if you want them to," a third person stated. "If you don't do anything, they'll just sit in the staff."

"Anyone who doesn't feel safe can head back inside," the leader declared. "Otherwise, let's have the first five people line up."

No one returned indoors. The leader passed out the five staves to the closest participants.

"Whenever you're ready, make your best effort to summon something. We don't have all day, so I'll have to set a time limit of one minute."

The fun began. The first five participants scrunched up their faces, trying their hardest to envision the desired element, with a few words of encouragement from the crowd. The air grew quite staticky. After thirty-five seconds, the first bolt appeared in someone's staff, and in the next ten seconds the other four had also all succeeded. Everyone cheered.

The process repeated for each group of five. The average summoning time was about forty seconds, with about one flare for every seven bolts, and every now and then someone simply failed to attain success within a minute.

Melia ended up being part of the second-last group. It had been so long since she had taken hold of a staff that wasn't her own that she'd forgotten how heavy they could be; she almost ended up dropping the one she was given. When the time began, she simply did nothing until she could sense the people next to her were close, followed by summoning a flare in no time. She had to catch herself to avoid subconsciously moving it out of the staff's head.

With everyone having had their turn, the meeting moved back inside for the third and final event.

"It's time for the costume contest!" the leader announced. "Everyone gets three poker chips. To vote for someone, place one of your chips in the box of the same number. Once everyone's done voting we'll count 'em up and get our winner!"

The participants started donning their masks and headdresses. Melia began considering how exactly she should conduct herself; she wanted to let the contest run its course without her interrupting. Ideally, people treat me as just another participant. I have heard stories of famous actors losing these sorts of lookalike contests because of the public's skewed perception of them, so I cannot be surprised if I follow suit. Once the results are in, that is probably the best time for me to reveal myself.

The contest began. People started to wander around and interact with the participants, trying to determine who to cast their votes for. The non-participants acted as if they were meeting the real thing in jest, such as asking the taller participants "Why do you look so short on TV?". Having the correct size and shape, Melia was asked the slightly more serious questions, which she gave less-than-straight answers for.

"Do you have a middle name?" "Not as far as I'm aware." A simple "no" might have been sufficient I suppose.

"Have you named your staff?" "I have never seen the need to." Though it's an interesting idea...a little bit cheesy, however.

"Are you really that short?" "Am I supposed to be shorter?" Really now, is this my main attribute or something?

"Do you really have gold hair?" "Why would it matter?" The rumour I invented last year still has weight, it seems.

"On a scale of 1 to 10, how awesome is Kallian?" "That cannot be measured by a number." Take that how you will.

"Do you have to wear that mask while in the palace?" "Gratefully, no." That would be deplorable.

"Who's the lucky guy?" Are you serious? "Obviously not you."

In between questions, Melia conducted her own assessment of the other participants from a distance. Near the end of the time limit, she added her votes to those she thought had her movements and mannerisms pinned most accurately, with costume accuracy a secondary factor. She then started planning her reveal.

With all the votes cast, the leader opened the boxes to find that there were five main contenders, and spent time counting only them as everyone else mingled.

"Okay everybody, sit down. It's time to announce the winners!"

He paused to wait for everyone to comply.

"Honourable mentions go to Melias number 18 and 29, at fourth and fifth respectively."

Everyone clapped politely.

"In third place, for an artbook of the hovering reefs, Melia number 15!"

Number 15 was one of the adolescents, slightly taller than the real Melia and with a headdress that was clearly labouriously hand-painted. She jumped up in glee and skipped up to the front to collect her prize.

"In second place, for a book on the history of the imperial line, Melia number 36!"

I guess that's me. Melia walked up to take the book, which she already had her own copy of. I'll have to ensure the prizes get shuffled down to fourth place, so my presence doesn't mean people get cheated out of rewards.

"And in first place, for a one-of-a-kind painting of the imperial palace, our winner, Melia number 8!"

Number 8 was an older woman, probably one-fifty or so, that had clearly put a lot of effort into hand-sewing the complex patterns onto her dress. She got the loudest applause as she took her prize.

Now is the time.

"Well that's pretty interesting. Really now."

Everyone threw Melia sour looks at her unexpected outburst.

"Hey, don't be a spoilsport there," the leader said. "If you-"

Now standing up, Melia raised her staff into the air as an earth elemental appeared in its head, followed quickly by an aqua. She twirled the two elementals around the handle like a screw before bringing them in line above her shoulders.

It took the crowd several seconds to parse what was going on. Once they finally did, everyone started to emit squeals of glee or gasps of admiration, and began to form a mob that was undecided exactly how close they could approach their idol without getting in any trouble.

From there, things turned into a bit of a blur. The crowd was somehow coerced into a handshake line, as Melia walked around the room and accepted stammered greetings from everyone. It took quite a while to work through the entire group; by the time she had reached everyone, the meeting was running five minutes over time.

The leader managed to get everyone to calm down enough to speak. "Princess, may I ask what prompted you to grace us with your presence?"

Melia wasn't really comfortable with revealing the true reason, but had a backup reason prepared. "The amount of goodwill displayed by this organisation simply could not continue to operate without my acknowledgement."

"But...but how did you get here alone?" The question by one of the club's younger members gathered several nods from others that at least suspected she was acting outside the royal rules.

"I don't think it would do to reveal my secrets."

"No, of course not." The leader looked at the time. "We're running late, but if you could stay for just a moment longer-"

Melia guessed what he was about to ask and cut it off. "It would inconvenience me to take your package at this time. I can wait until tomorrow to accept it."

"V-very well. Thank you, Princess."

"You are quite welcome." She turned to leave as applause broke out.

Once out of sight, Melia quickly dashed into the washroom and up through the vents, returning to her room as fast as possible. Back in the safety of home, she replaced her headdress on the shelf and flopped onto the bed.

She hadn't realised how stressful the whole ordeal was until now; she could feel her heart trying to slow down after willingly putting herself in a high-risk low-reward situation. Trying to fit in with the costumed citizens, trying to act not as herself but as the perception of herself, and then revealing her presence to her most devoted fanatics - it seemed even crazier an idea now. Even without the unexpected dress-up contest segment, it wasn't something she looked forward to doing again.

But it was the right thing to do, in the end. I can't imagine the feeling of putting in so much work for someone only for them to continue to be oblivious.

Melia woke with a start to find that her head had rolled off her pillows and left the bed, taking the rest of her body with it. She was momentarily confused as to what could have caused it, until she remembered what her recent dream had entailed: being thrown into the sea with her head locked in an iron box, definitely one of the more frightening nightmares of the past little while.

Collecting herself together, she looked up at her dreamcatcher, spinning lazily in the warm June night as if nothing had happened.

It is clear that my dreamcatcher is in need of another upgrade. Yet it already houses a rank VI focal gem, which is supposed to function well though its owner's natural lifetime. Perhaps it simply does not function correctly on half-bloods past a certain age. After all, it is usually not until age eighty that its owner requires a rank VI gem to maintain pace, yet I reached that point fifteen years ago.

Maybe...could a rank VII gem do the trick? That would be so difficult to get ahold of though. Every rank VII gem in the city has its whereabouts under constant supervision, and there is no chance whatsoever that Father would allow one to be used for this comparative pittance of a task.

There must be a rank VII earth gem in existence that is not currently being used and would not be missed if it vanishes. Something with a less-important attribute, or that has mostly been forgotten about. Or both.

Tomorrow is Saturday. I'm going to see if I can have a look at the gem manifest, to try and find one labelled as lost or missing. If so, I can go on an excursion to try and find it myself, and hope that something else hasn't found it first.

The gem manifest revealed the best-case scenario: just the previous day, a rank VII Muscle Up gem was lost during a fierce training exercise on Hovering Reef 3. It was strongly suspected to have fallen into the sea and be lost forever, but there was a small chance that it remained aground, potentially claimed by one of the creatures wandering about. A team was being assembled to search for it in the afternoon. As a result, Melia started to make haste so she could arrive there first.

It was the first time she had gone outside of Alcamoth anonymously, taking the transporters across the hovering reefs to reach her destination. She was somewhat surprised that there wasn't some sort of "don't let Melia outside the city" system in place, although she supposed the transporters could simply be tracking her movements instead.

Once arriving at Hovering Reef 3, she glanced around to find a good place to start looking. She hadn't really considered how much area she might need to cover to find the lost gem; it took her about an hour to reach the reef, and didn't want to come across the official search crew later, meaning she probably had no more than two hours to search.

Well, I might as well start here. Melia started walking concentric circles around the transporter, scanning the grass for the gem. She figured it would be pretty easy to spot; rank VII gems were quite sparkly, and the burnt orange colour of earth gems would contrast decently well with the green grass.

She was quite wrong. In no time at all an hour was gone, and she had only covered about a third of the reef. She was starting to go cross-eyed from staring at the ground for so long.

This isn't going well. She sat on a rock and closed her eyes, trying to reset her mind. Perhaps I am not going about this the right way. Shouldn't I be able to simply feel the presence of such a powerful earth gem? Maybe I need to be doing a less directed, more widespread search. Sweep with a broom, not a toothbrush.

Getting up, Melia began moving towards an as-of-yet unexplored area of the reef, trying to look with her mind more than her eyes. After ten minutes of wandering around with her eyes half-closed, she could sense a strong nexus of earthly ether.

Aha, that has to be it, there aren't any crystal deposits around- She looked up to find a Bono Nebula, hovering in a circle in front of her. ...Why is a wind nebula giving off...does it have the gem?

Melia tried to peer into the floating cloud of wind ether. It was difficult to see if anything was inside it; it was moving too fast, and the gas in the centre was the thickest. She wanted to get its attention but knew this was foolish, not knowing how strong it could be in battle.

I need a way to distract it somehow, without it targeting me. She tried to think of ideas. She could simply swipe her staff through the creature, knocking out the gem if it was present, but that would certainly attract its attention without dealing any damage to speak of. She could try distracting it with a wind elemental and slowly remove the gem herself, knowing that it could not feel very slow movements, but it was very risky indeed to get that close to a nebula and its instinct to self-destruct.

A second Bono Nebula became visible not too far away, also lazily sauntering around in the sky.

Perhaps I can provoke this second nebula into fighting the first. If the first has the gem, the second may very well wish to steal it once it realises it's there.

Melia positioned herself between the two gaseous beings and sent a wind elemental into the air. The first nebula seemed content to ignore it, but the second swooped in quickly. Melia swung her elemental towards the first, dragging the second along until they almost collided. At this point, she dispelled the elemental and stepped away.

The two nebulae hung still in the air for a moment before they began unloading ether energy into each other, creating a spectacular display of green light. Melia backed off even further as the fight started to cover more space, the combatants getting more and more energetic. After three or four minutes, they both detonated simultaneously, raining green wisps of ether down across the reef.

There it is! Melia saw a flash of light drop straight down from one of the two nebulae. She dashed forward to see an earth gem lying in the grass. Hah, a flawlessly executed-

A green mist was beginning to surround the gem. The ether wisps that remained from the fight were beginning to condense, forming at least four distinct clusters.

...er, perhaps not flawless. It had escaped from her mind that getting two nebulae of the same element to explode near each other was how the species reproduced, and now she was probably about to have four of them trying to fight over the gem. Time to get out of here.

Melia quickly snatched the gem off the ground and started running towards the transporter. The newly-born nebulae would take a minute or two to become aware of their surroundings, but she wasn't taking any chances. She wound up reaching the transporter without any trouble, and from there she slowed to walking pace as she returned to Alcamoth and finally her room - taking her time to avoid anyone who she suspected had the same gem-detecting sense that she did.

All things considered, that was probably the easy part. Melia looked up at the canopy of her bed, far out of her reach, where her dreamcatcher was hanging. Now I have to somehow replace the current gem with this one, without enlisting anyone's help, nor leaving any evidence that a switch has been made.

The first solution that presented itself was to simply throw the new gem, knocking the old one out of its weightless perch in the centre of the web and remaining there itself. But she had no confidence in her ability to throw objects accurately, and couldn't have anything damaged in the slightest. She could stack her two suitcases on the bed and clamber up, but it looked to still be out of reach even without considering that the mattress would deform under the weight.

And trying to climb up there is beyond foolish, there's nothing to grab ahold of that can support my weight. If there was some way to control objects at a distance, then...hang on. I can summon a water or wind elemental and move it around easily. Could I stick the gem into the elemental and use it to carry the gem up there? If so, that would actually be a very useful thing to learn, manipulation of small objects via elementals.

Deciding that she didn't want to get anything wet, she summoned a wind and carefully moved it down close to her desk, where the gem was resting. She had to move it pretty close to the gem, but eventually the vortex picked it up. Trying to move it was difficult, as going too fast caused it to slip away and clatter back down.

Wait, I should remove the old gem first. She tossed a second wind upwards and sent it through the dreamcatcher web, blowing the existing focal gem out of the centre and down onto the covers.

From there, it was simple trial and error. It was a satisfying challenge, to move the elemental slowly but surely, trying to catch the gem when it tumbled away to not lose too much ground, with the difficulty rising as things moved further and further up. After about twenty minutes, she finally nudged the gem into its perch and dispelled the elemental.

That should do it. She waited for the dreamcatcher to stop swaying. She felt quite the sense of accomplishment for something so minor - though in the end it was a lot more than a minor effort, leaving Alcamoth in secret for the first time, and learning to do something new with elementals. In fact, she was newly determined to hone the latter skill, so she could move things around with wind elementals as easily as with her hands. She wondered whether it was something that anyone else bothered to do; it would certainly be useful should both her hands be occupied.

Now what am I going to do with this rank VI gem? Melia picked up the old gem and gave it a go-over. It was a Poison Plus gem if she recalled correctly; it didn't shine nearly as brightly as the new rank VII one. It's a bit too good for me to just get rid of, but I can't be seen with it, or people will wonder where I got it from. For now I'll just hide it. She stuffed it into her sock drawer alongside the Chozo interface, the only place where she was confident that no one ever snooped during cleaning and maintenance. My body and mind are fully grown now, and rank VII is the highest gem rank that exists. I expect to have no more nightmares ever again.

The first Wednesday of the new year was several degrees below normal, resulting in a messy slush falling from the sky instead of rain. Melia spent her free time just watching the odd weather splat against her window before going to her training.

Reflection was progressing well. Melia could produce a single protective panel of the correct size almost instantly, and had quickly mastered the part that was normally the trickiest: the ability to control its existence but not its movements with her mind, allowing it to independently swing around her to defend from all sides without being dependent on her reaction time or limited field of vision. Reddel determined it was time to move on.

"A single panel of Reflection is enough to deflect minor blows from weak or uncommitted attackers, but in order to defend against anything stronger, you will need a unified structure of several simultaneous panels. There is no trick to this - you simply put your mind to producing multiple panels at once."

Melia nodded. "How many panels do you recommend?"

"Well, naturally you would start with two and add one at a time once you become comfortable. As for the maximum number, it is different for each practitioner, which does end up affecting the art's ultimate power. Some can only support as few as three, while others can generate as many as ten. Given your general history, I expect you will easily reach the higher parts of the range."

Wasting no time, Melia started spinning her staff. She produced the first panel instantly and a second one a few seconds after that, and from there began a pattern of making a new one every time the older of the two vanished. After a few minutes of the continuous cycle, she tried adding a third into the mix but faltered, breaking the pattern and dropping back down to one at a time.

Start from the beginning again. She waited a bit for everything to reset and tried again, keeping up two panels with little effort but not able to produce a third before the first expired. It's all about speed. The faster I can create the first and second one, the faster every one after that can come, and the more I can fit in within the time limit.

Melia spent the next ten minutes producing a constant stream of reflective panels, coming very close to three at once but never quite making it in time. Taking a break, she realised she had a question.

"Mr. Reddel, why do you produce all of the panels at once when you cast this art, instead of a constant stream that can defend for a longer span of time?"

"Quite simple, really: if you're always making panels, that means you're still focusing on them, meaning they can't react to attacks. Only once you take your mind off them can they perform their job correctly."

She nodded. That makes sense I suppose. It's like a swarm of insects, operating as a whole instead of a group of individuals to defend most effectively.

She started practising again. As with the past several months of training the art, Reddel would occasionally summon an elemental and weakly toss it in her direction, forcing her to temporarily stop so the panels could deflect it. It was an effective way of confirming that it functioned both visually and physically.

Once the session was nearly over, Reddel had a request.

"Melia, in the interest of further research on your elementals' unusual properties, could we do some further testing for a moment?"

A month previously, the pair attempted to reverse their roles as an experiment, and discovered that Reddel's Reflection was completely ineffective against Melia's elementals, shattering the panels as if they were made of hair-thin glass. Reddel was baffled at the development and said he would consult his colleagues on the phenomenon.

Melia nodded. "All right. What do you wish to test?"

"One of my partners has suggested a potential explanation for the curious results. To test it, I would need to attempt reflecting your elementals and your Burst End, and note the results."

"Very well." Melia waited for Reddel to be ready and fired a bolt just past him, which crashed through all eight of his panels without effort. She then started tossing enough elementals across the room to activate her burst aura and detonate Burst End. This time, Reddel's panels easily rebounded the wave of energy upon her, which felt unpleasant but did not actually hurt.

"I see, I see." Reddel nodded slowly, stroking his mustache. "Well, you continue to amaze both me and the entire ethermaster community." He paused for a moment to take in the conclusion he had reached. "Tell me, what do you think your talent art is?"

Having read about talent arts not long ago, Melia answered instantly. "Burst End, of course. It cannot be used on a whim and has by far the largest area of effect."

"Indeed. Burst End is the talent art of all known ether staff practitioners; it is intrinsic to the physics of casting elementals and its effects vary slightly for each user. However, there can be no doubt that, somehow, you are an exception. The evidence is crystal clear that your talent art is instead your Elemental Discharge."

"...because it is unhindered by your Reflection?"

"Exactly. Reflection is quite weak against talent arts, and in fact is completely ineffective in the majority of cases. If your arts behaved normally, your elementals would bounce off just as mine do against your shield, while your Burst End would ripple through with hardly an issue. As the reverse is instead true, the only conclusion is that you have an unprecedented affinity for discharging."

"So..." Melia tried to make sense of the new development. "So is there a practical application for this information, or is it just a curiosity?"

"I would say it is very practical," Reddel said. "For example, you may encounter a foe that possesses an art similar to Reflection, rendering normal arts useless. If one is not prepared to use their talent art, they must wait until the situation changes before they can do anything else. But with Elemental Discharge being your talent art, you can use it at effectively any time to break through such limitations, making it impossible to defend against your primary means of attacking. You are therefore uniquely suited to defeating enemies that can block or seal normal arts."

Melia considered the opposite side of the revelation. "Does that not mean that I am also uniquely vulnerable to abilities that are capable of blocking talent arts?"

"Hmm..." Reddel thought for a moment. "You're almost certainly right. If something possesses the ability to deflect talent arts, it would indeed be much more of a problem for you than for others. But as far as I'm aware, no creature has such an ability, and no known art has such an effect. I wouldn't completely ignore the possibility, but I think it's safe enough to discount for the time being." He nodded to himself, probably considering how he would present his findings to his colleagues. "I've kept you long enough for today. See you next week."

"...Yes." Melia left the room a bit slower than usual, deep in thought.

She was always aware that her ether affinity was exceptional. She could sort a pile of gems into element and rank groups with her eyes closed, she could sometimes sense when someone was sick hours before any symptoms presented themselves, and every ether art she learned was met with praise on how much of a natural she was at it. Yet of all the unusual things that surrounded her, it was quite disconcerting to learn that she had a different talent art than every other ethermaster in history. It didn't seem like the sort of thing that should be possible, like she was breaking some sort of law of the universe.

It had been an unusually warm November, with the summer plants and animals taking their time to go into hiding. Melia was walking through the Lumian District, letting her legs and her mind wander at random.

If light ether and dark ether can be manipulated for arts such as Reflection and Shadow Stich, why can elementals not be formed of them? Are they too unstable, too weak, too dangerous, or simply unattempted seriously? I would think that if it were any but the last of those, I would have seen information about it somewhere in my readings, but it's equally difficult to believe that no one has ever tried. Perhaps in a few decades, after learning and mastering all my slated arts, I can attempt it.

What would such elementals do? I'm not sure what kind of beneficial effect that a dark elemental could have on the user or allies, nor what kind of damaging properties a light elemental could inflict on enemies. Perhaps this is why they are unused - their functions are comparatively limited and so not worth the effort. Actually, maybe a dark elemental would emit an aura that is detrimental to enemies, perhaps in abilities or morale, instead of a friendly boost.

What type of ether is Burst End, anyway? It's a golden yellow in colour, which would imply electric, but electric elementals are purple. And I recall reading that the colour of Burst End varies between users based on its effects: yellow for debuffs to foes, cyan for buffs to allies, and magenta for direct damage. I wonder if it's possible to change which one-

Melia's thoughts were interrupted by noticing that two people walking towards her had suddenly taken several panicked steps back, pointing at something behind her.

Acting on instinct, she quickly bent down and extended her staff while keeping it latched to her belt. There was a loud "clank" as a knife hit the head of the staff, covering where the back of her head just was, and clattered onto the ground.

Melia stood up and turned around to see someone familiar in the street: Hillary Glenbrook, the madwoman who had carried out the first assassination attempt on her eight years ago. She was quite thinner and paler, but there was no mistaking her.

Well now. Look who's escaped prison and gone straight to trying to complete their original objective, disregarding common sense.

"YOU." It was the same contemptuous snarl that kept creeping back into Melia's dreams every now and then.

Melia was surprised to realise she wasn't all that scared - in fact, she felt like she had the definite upper hand, with her opponent unlikely to be in top physical or mental condition. With little fear of any fight that was about to ensue, she felt compelled to reflect her enemy's taunting from their last meeting back upon her.

"I believe you dropped this knife here. Would you like it back?"

"You're dead."

"Really? I would have thought that would stop me from walking around."

Roaring in blind rage, Hillary dashed in with her second knife in hand. With several more years of experience compared to their last encounter, Melia had no trouble extrapolating her vector of attack and calmly stepped aside. Anger and frustration beget predictability. She easily read and avoided the next slash. It should be simple to keep her enraged enough to render her a non-threat.

"This is an interesting dance. Where did you learn it?"

"Not a chance!"

"I suppose failure is an acquired taste."

"If you're just here for a reminder, yes my blood is still red."

"Nice try, I suppose?"

"I see you spent the past few years very constructively."

"Weren't you supposed to be good at violence?"

"So this is just for spectacle and not actually an attempt to kill me, correct?"

It was blissfully therapeutic, to have a real-life rematch with one of her personal demons and come out on top so convincingly. She didn't even need to launch an attack of her own; the enemy would tire herself out before long, and by then surely one of the bystanders would have called the police. But if she had to be honest with herself, she quite enjoyed dumping out all this pent-up vitriol that she didn't realise she had, and didn't wish to see it end any time soon.

"Almost. Perhaps. No, actually not that close at all, really."

"I believe there are more effective ways to encourage blood donation."

"What is your strategy, to build my confidence?"

"I can taste the rust on your breath."

"How many times have you missed now? I'm actually a bit impressed."

"Pathetic!"

"I award you a grand total of zero points for that display."

"Another miss by you. Not a big surprise."

Hillary shrieked and mindlessly tried to stab Melia in the foot, which did nothing but shatter the blade on the road. She then backed off and fished another pair of daggers out of her belt, longer than the ones she was previously using, and resumed the attack.

"Oh me oh my, whatever shall I do?" Melia was getting a bit exhausted from all the dodging and sarcasm, and decided that being more aggressive on the defensive would be a safer idea. She wielded her staff and parried the first blow, knocking one dagger out of the assailant's hands. From there, she simply used her staff to block the offensive and keep the attacker at arm's length, which was much less taxing than moving out of the way. Hearing a police siren in the distance, she continued with her own verbal assault.

"Do you ever win at rock-paper-scissors?"

"If you wish to try again next week, my schedule is open."

"Outplayed."

"You won't even be front-page news at this rate."

"Remind me again how I'm inferior."

"Once you decide to hurt me please let me know."

"You're a disgrace to your profession."

"If I was given a chance to redeem myself, I would put some effort into it."

A police vehicle arrived, with a total of four officers disembarking.

"What's all this then?" the head of the cops spouted.

Typical officers, talking before acting. Melia responded with an unnatural calm. "Oh hello sirs. Just defending myself from this unprovoked attack." She blocked a slash at just the right angle to deflect it back into her adversary's midsection, cutting a small slice into her torso.

"ERNNNNNNNNNGHF!" Hillary made to throw the bloodied knife at Melia, but she sidestepped, caught it by the handle in midair, and inspected it.

"Ooh, this smells a bit strong. It could do with a little diluting, don't you think?" Okay, that was actually rather insensitive to pure-bloods. I'll try not to use it or similar again.

Out of knives, Hillary tried to throw a punch at Melia's head. She ducked it and kicked her opponent in the abdomen, sending her toppling across the ground. The police finally stepped in and made their arrest.

The head officer went over to Melia. "Are you okay, miss?"

"Not a scratch." She watched the escapee get loaded onto the police vehicle. Bit of a pity, really, to fail so utterly in one's grand return.

"Good, good. Would you mind telling us what exactly this was all about?"

Melia shrugged. "Some years ago, I was near the palace and this loon attacked me. I have no idea why. The guards caught her quickly and probably threw her into their prison. She must have escaped recently, and just happened to meet me today."

"We'll ask the imperial guard about her then." The officer nodded. "Have a good day, miss."

"Thank you."

The cops left, with their quarry spewing wordless nonsense.

She's a persistent one, she is. But I don't think I'll ever have to worry about her again. Even if we do meet again, I can only have improved, while she will continue to stagnate.

I think this calls for a treat. Melia targeted the nearest bakery. To mark how far I've come in the past...eight years since her first attempt on me, sixteen years since I began training. It's kind of impressive actually; after eight years I couldn't land a blow, but another eight years and I came out completely unscathed. And with effectively zero fear to boot.

This could turn out well for us overall. If I can feign weakness and continue to defy kills aimed at me, by the time the assassins decide I'm too much trouble to target, Brother will probably be emperor already, and mission accomplished.