June 26. After a brief sweetness, Medith steadied herself and rose from the bed. She dressed and buckled her gear, steel returning like dawn on a blade, then stood by the mattress.

The room breathed a strange fragrance, like incense clinging to silk. On the bed, the lazy beauty murmured drowsily, sleep pooling like a warm tide. Medith looked helplessly at Sais, her small form hidden under a single quilt like a shelled pearl. She tapped her, left no trace, then slipped out.

The door clicked shut like a lid on a lantern. Under the quilt, Sais bit back tears; reluctance bloomed like a bruise, and burst. She clutched the pillow and sobbed, like rain finally let loose.

Outside, Medith leaned on the door, heart knotted like reeds in wind. She stared up at the ceiling as if it were a mute sky, sighed, shook her head, and walked away.

...

“Medith, be careful in everything,” Milia said, voice soft like gauze. “We’ll build the guild in Sass City just like you asked, so you...” The rest caught in her throat like a fishbone. She swallowed the words come back alive.

Medith wore light gear, only food, water, and her accessory, Sip. And no attendants trailed her shadow. She nodded, looked at their tangled faces, and her resolve hardened like iron in quenching. She gritted her teeth, turned her mount, and rode off in a ribbon of dust.

“Commander... has she always been like this? Carrying everything herself...” Nora watched that single rider, tall and alone, and felt awe rise like a flag.

“That’s how she is,” Sais sighed, breath a cool thread. “That’s what the name Medith means...”

“I once heard Medith kills without blinking,” Nameless said suddenly, voice flat as a drawn blade. “A true demoness, the Green Devil. Her hands are soaked in blood. That blood-red greatsword fights like a hell-forged blade, chilling and dire.”

“And after what you’ve seen lately, what do you think?” Milia asked with a smile, sunlight through thin cloud.

A cool wind brushed by, and Nameless’s shoulder-length ponytail swayed like grass. His face set, solemn: “She may be a demon who kills without blinking. Her hands are bloodied, and that’s true. But sometimes people truly can’t choose. She chose the road most of us want to walk but fear. The road we dare to walk, yet can’t. No matter what, she’s the one I respect for life, above all.”

Milia nodded and smiled, but her expression hardened like cooling clay. “Can’t choose... huh? Then what about Paris? What’s he chasing? Did he have a choice...”

...

July 4. Medith stood again before Sia City. The familiar walls loomed within reach, like an old mountain. Elyu’s farewell felt like yesterday, yet everything had shifted like sand.

On the walls, patrols had multiplied like crows. A dozen improved Blackblood War Chariots crouched above, iron beasts on the rampart. Bonecrusher Arrows etched with Wind Magic gleamed cold, each shaft a frost-edged warning to intruders.

Within a kilometer of the gate, a rough palisade ran like a wooden river. Nearly a thousand soldiers patrolled and camped, stern as a war season. Yet the flow of merchants and sightseers kept coming, like caravans after rain.

After the battle of Sia City, the crowds swelled like a tide. People came to witness a legend writ in earth. The four high towers speared the sky, their shocking scars speaking of war’s misery, each wound a mute howl.

“Huh? You are... oh, damn! It’s Medith!” A commander with shoulder-length pheasant plumes rushed down from the wall and greeted her in person.