While Pengpeng was away, Varie and her strike team drifted back like dust after a storm, dropping off what they’d salvaged from Lama City.

She carried a playful itch, wanting to peek at Mira—the quiet gourd on the windowsill—to see if she’d grown mold and mushrooms while they were gone.

But the scene that greeted her rose like a banner in a headwind, completely unexpected.

Before she even reached the orphanage wall, her lion ears twitched, catching neat, young voices chanting in rhythm like beating drums.

For a heartbeat, she couldn’t link those voices with that den of little foxes; doubt hung over her like shade until the iron gate slid into sight.

Through the bars like bamboo stalks, she saw kids in square formations on the sun-baked plaza, sinking into horse stances under a white-hot sun.

These thick-skinned rascals had faces flushed like persimmons, yet none whined or plopped down; the strange stillness made Varie’s eyes widen like lanterns.

What was this, some new kind of group protest, a banner raised against boredom?

She slowed, the dust of doubt settling, then spotted Mira aside, calm as a moonlit pond, sipping tea that breathed steam like mist.

“Wow, what are you doing! Bullying kids?” Varie’s voice burst out like a startled bird.

Mira lifted her face, steady as a stone, but before she spoke, the king of brats, Tigalin, boomed like a little drum.

“Hero! Please don’t disturb our training!”

“Huh? Training?” Varie’s brows arched like bows.

“Yes. We’re… getting stronger!” His last words leapt like sparks.

Varie shot Mira a look full of question marks, like fish eyes in a bucket; Mira took a final sip of red tea and set the cup down.

Her voice moved slow as wind over grass, explaining how the road had meandered to this moment, while Varie’s confusion only multiplied like droplets in rain.

“Why so shocked? Aren’t all children of the Nacha Tribe meant to pass warrior training? I’m just schooling the ones you forgot in the fog.”

“Uh.” The word “forgot” pricked like a thorn; Varie scratched her mane, guilt flickering like a moth.

“Yeah, our generation still had regimented drills. But since the migration and lockdown, everything tangled like vines. Budgets for early education got cut like cloth.”

“Don’t look at me like that. Once things return to normal, we’ll relaunch the programs, like fires rekindled after rain.”

Her grin tilted, curious as a cat. “Anyway… I won’t ask how you made those imps obey like geese in a row. But how come you’re teaching?”

“Don’t make me believe you always wanted to be a teacher.”

“Nothing special. I was bored.” Mira’s tone fell like a pebble into a well.

Varie squinted, a sly glint like sun on steel. “Ha. The goddess of dead air, who can stare at a door for hours, finally found boredom?”

She clicked her tongue, playful as wind chimes, and met Mira’s wordless silence like dusk meeting night.

Jokes aside, her chest eased like knots loosening; Mira leaving her little courtyard felt like a window opened.

The gourd breathed better; Pengpeng, who carried weight alone, found a hand at his back; the kids burned with zeal like lanterns.

A win for all, smiles like rising suns—Varie saw a perfect ending laid out like a festival table.

But not everyone wore that sunlight without a shadow.

The gloomy cloud was Anta, the senior roped in as an assistant, shoulders small under a big sky.

“Mira sis… are you in?” Her voice tapped the dawn like a soft knock.

On the fourth morning of Mira’s substitute teaching, news of Pengpeng’s return didn’t arrive; Anta’s knuckles did, like raindrops at the door.

“Can I… skip sparring them today?” She stood there, hands behind her back, her face wrinkled like a bitter plum.

Since Mira set that “challenge me” rule, Anta hadn’t had a breath; from Tigalin down to five-year-old sisters, waves kept breaking on her shore.

Meals, naps, free time—every tide was a duel; even Copato squeezed into her bath stall like a cat into a box.

Nacha Tribe kids buzzed around her like bees, begging to spar; as the “senior,” she couldn’t swat them away.

Days piled like stones; she was drained, mind allergic to the door like a startled deer.

Mira saw it all like moonlight on water, yet asked anyway, voice smooth as silk. “What’s wrong? Isn’t no one beating you?”

“It’s not about winning.” Anta’s gaze sank to her toes like pebbles in a stream. “There are just too many.”

“I know you want to find partners for me. Copato and that big lug are fine, but the little ones… I’m scared to hurt them.”

“Even single-word spells feel like blades. It barely counts as practice.”

Mira watched her, approval withheld like rain at the edge of clouds; no denial either, only a nod that felt like shade.

She stepped aside, revealing a wastebasket stuffed with dead letters, paper like dry leaves, and pointed gently, finger a reed.

“Anta, my trash bin’s full. Will you take care of it?”

“Ah, toss it in the outside barrel? Got it.” Anta moved, as brisk as a sparrow.

A slender arm barred her path, light as a bamboo pole but firm as a gate.

“Not tossing,” Mira lifted Anta’s hand, aiming it at the basket like sighting along an arrow. “Dissolve it with your acid magic.”

“Eh?” Anta froze, like a rabbit in frost. “B-but the furniture might—”

“Just try to control your range.” Mira’s tone tightened like a drawn string. “You don’t want to spar, right? Then this is your morning practice.”

Mira sis is serious—Anta’s eyes widened like stars; once she felt it wasn’t a joke, she hesitated like leaves in wind, then raised a finger.

A deep violet trail sketched in the air, a stroke like ink on rice paper.

“Hapta…” The simplest chant, yet it sounded odd, mood clinging like dew.

Magic gathered at her fingertip, a glyph blooming like a flower; Anta even closed her eyes, violet hair trembling like grass.

Mira’s hand settled on her shoulder, weight gentle as snow. “It’s okay. Trust yourself.”

Her voice, usually flat as a winter lake, carried a steady warmth, like coals under ash; Anta’s shiver eased.

She drew a breath, lungs filling like bellows, and—puff—a soft snap sounded, purple magic shot straight like a dart.

It struck the top wad of paper, true as an arrow to a target, and spread with a hiss, violet eating outward like frost.

Black bloomed, then blanched to white; wind through the window lifted brittle confetti, crumbling like old leaves.

Falling fragments touched neighbors; each turned gray-white, then drifted into air like ash after a fire.

Self-spread and seep—acid’s nature as a variant element—the blessing in battle, the worry indoors, a blade with two edges.

Anta swallowed, eyes locked like a hunter’s; page after page melted, until only a thin skin hugged the basket’s sides.

If it kept chewing past the paper, the basket would be the next bone; the orphanage didn’t have furniture to spare—her heart thumped like a drum.

The worry proved smoke; the magic burned out at the exact edge, like a candle at the last inch.

One small corner of paper hung lonely on the rim, a pale flag in quiet air.

The basket stood empty, clean as a winter sky, just as Mira asked.

“I did it!” Anta’s joy jumped like a fish from a pond.

Mira’s clap was light as rain on tiles. “So, satisfied with your three-day special training?”

“Eh?” Anta’s amethyst head tilted like a bird; her eyes blinked, dew-bright.

Mira’s tone stayed calm, even as a river. “You think sparring little ones meant nothing, that it held you back.”

“But that is training, isn’t it?”

Anta looked at the unharmed basket, then at her hands, and understanding opened like dawn.

A few days ago, this precision was a mountain; now, from careful play with kids, she’d carved rivers into the stone.

“Mira sis, I know you’re in a rush,” Mira continued, voice low like thunder on the horizon. “You want legion-grade battle spells.”

“And you want to meet the man in red on a field and duel him, blade against blade.”

She held Anta’s silence like a cup, then set it down with weight. “But chasing speed alone is empty wind.”

“For where you stand now, foundation matters more than shiny spells, roots before blossoms.”

“You’re gifted. Don’t pour that gift into the wrong soil.” Her words sank like rain into earth.

She bent and patted Anta’s shoulder, light as a willow leaf, and felt how slight she was.

Yes, the child was truly small, a sapling under wide sky; “small as a handful” fit like a proverb.

Even after Adelaide and Mira fed care into her like broth into bones, Anta hadn’t filled out much.

She wasn’t older than many of those “little ones,” truth be told; she was still a child under the lantern light.

And this child carried a heavy bundle on her back, stones that weren’t hers by age or season.

Anta never poured out her homeland’s tragedy like water; she kept it locked, yet every move told stories Mira could read like lines.

Whenever the next lesson came, she clutched Adelaide’s sleeve, a plea bright as a firefly—teach me the dangerous, the high-tier, the storm spells.

That’s not how a child should stand under the moon.

…Complicated—that was the word that rippled through Mira, like wind over reeds.

She had felt a prickle of jealousy at first, seeing “a new little sister” at her sister’s side, bitter as tea steeped too long.

But after time like slow rain, the flame in those amethyst eyes—crimson tucked inside—stirred more than pity.

Something unnamed pressed at her chest, a feeling like a bird beating against a covered cage.

An impulse buried deep, a voice in dusk whispering—help her.

“Mira sis, I get it! I’ll keep taking their challenges!” The young voice cut through like a bell.

Mira blinked and returned to shore; Anta already stood straighter, spine like a sapling set in good soil.

She strode past the door, firm as a step onto a bridge. “I’ll work hard in real practice and won’t fail you or Adelaide!”

Mira watched that small back, a little boat heading downriver, until the gate framed her like a picture.

A blue-haired, cat-eared girl sprang from the corner like a playful squirrel, grabbed Anta’s wrist, and shouted to the sky.

“Copato and Anta’s Grand Adventure—set off!” Then they dashed away like kites tugged by wind.

After that, for reasons known only to quiet waters, Mira’s mouth drew a soft arc, relief like sunlight warming frost.