Kenji stayed silent for the rest of the evening.

Not that Ayla cared. She did wonder why he was acting like this. She had shown no animosity toward his mother.

The woman smelled good, certainly, but Ayla had not once considered eating her brain.

The restraint was not virtue.

The woman was simply too strong for Ayla’s current rank. Sarah’s presence carried a weight that Ayla’s instincts read as Silver or possibly Gold.

A Crusader at that tier would not be brought down by a quiet bite to the back of the head, no matter how good Ayla’s tendrils had become.

She summoned her status screen with a thought.

Name: Ayla

Race: Mimic Slime

Rank: Iron

Level: 29 (3000 / 3000)

Core: Apocalypse-grade Bronze, awaiting conversion

Traits: Perfect Assimilation, Emotion Weaver, Death Looper (S), Eight-Wing Transformation (A), Bloodnet (B), Pyromancy (C), Iron Will (C), Wind Walker (C), Life Link (C), Shadow Stride (C), Earth Bind (D), Bone Density (D), Acid Synthesis (D), Body Enhancement (E)

Bone Fragment: Twin Lens of the Weaver

Available Forms:

Form 001: Human (equipped)

Form 002: Bloodnet Spider

Form 003: Goblin

Form 004: Hobgoblin

Form 005: Eight-Winged Bat

Form 006: Eyes of the Weaver

The apocalypse monster was called the Emotion Weaver. It had the capability to control the emotions of living beings. It almost controlled her but failed since she did not have any emotions of her own yet.

She dismissed the screen.

The breakthrough sat at the edge of her core. If she wanted to break through to Bronze, she had to enter the Crusade. Earth did not have the environment to support the breakthrough.

After the evening concluded, an old man arrived to pick the two of them up. He was Alex, Damien’s manager.

His shoulders had the practiced stoop of a man who carried a powerful family’s secrets for a living.

He bowed at the hospital door and called Kenji "young master" and Ayla "young miss" respectively. His mind was also empty while greeting them.

That surprised her so much. Was it because he had a trait capable of emptying his mind? Ayla licked her lips, prompting the old man to glance up at her. S

he smiled at his gaze.

A car waited outside.

Ayla stopped at the threshold of the hospital entrance and looked at it.

"Wow."

The vehicle was longer than any room she had walked through in the tunnel. The body gleamed dark blue in the late sun. The glass had the faint mirror quality of armor. Two attendants stood at the rear doors with white gloves.

"Country pumpkin," Kenji muttered behind her.

She ignored him. Alex held the door open. The inside of the car was leather and pale wood. Cool air moved through unseen vents.

A small tray of fresh fruit sat between the seats. The whole space smelled of something Ayla could not name.

She climbed in. Kenji climbed in beside her.

The car moved.

The city unfolded through the window in a way Ayla had not been able to see the day before. The black transport that had taken her to the hospital had been sealed and quick.

This ride was slow and deliberate, designed to be seen. The vehicle moved through main streets at a pace that allowed pedestrians to look at it.

She watched everything. The buildings were taller than she had pictured from Jaxon’s memories. The glass on their faces caught the orange of the setting sun and threw it back in long sheets.

The trees lining the avenue were trimmed in shapes that did not occur in nature. Birds moved between them in flocks that broke and reformed as the car passed.

The sky. She kept returning to the sky.

It was wider than any chamber she had walked through. It was wider than she had thought any space could be. The orange near the horizon faded into a deep blue overhead, and the deep blue was already beginning to darken at its highest point. A single star had appeared.

She watched the star without speaking. Kenji kept his eyes on the floor of the car. She tried twice to draw him into a question, once about the buildings and once about the trees.

Both times he answered with a half syllable and a turn of his head. She bit her lower lip and stopped trying.

The drive ended at a gate. The Hayashi estate sat at the center of the city. Walls of pale stone rose three stories.

The gate itself was a wrought iron piece tall enough to admit a small house. Two guards in dark suits stood at either pillar.

Both wore earpieces. Both pretended not to look at the car as it passed through.

Ayla felt the first set of presences as the gate closed behind them. There were Iron-rank guards along the inner wall, a dozen of them evenly spaced.

Two Bronze-rank presences flanked the main door. The car rolled along a long drive lined with flowering trees and stopped at the foot of a stairway.

The house at the top of the stairs did not look like a house. It looked like a fortress inside a city. It featured white stone, tall windows, and a roof line that suggested rooms she could not see from the ground.

A line of staff in white and black livery stood at the base of the stairs. They bowed in unison as the car door opened.

Alex stepped out first. Ayla followed. Kenji stepped out behind her without meeting her eyes. At the top of the stairway, two figures waited.

Sarah was there in a different dress now, dark green silk with her hair freshly arranged.

And a man was there too.

Ayla had not seen him in person before. Damien Hayashi stood half a head taller than Sarah. He was broad through the shoulders in a way that suggested he had never let his rank softening overcome his old habit of training.

His face was square and unreadable. His suit was dark and his tie was the same color as Sarah’s dress.

His eyes met Ayla’s at the bottom of the stairs. The eyes were cold. The mind behind them was not.

’Should I go down to meet her? No. She might be frightened of me. Damn it, Kenji. Why did you not tell me about her first? Is this why you have been spending all your time in the Outer Walls? Have you been protecting her this whole time? Why did you not trust me?’

The voice in Ayla’s head was loud in contrast to the appearance of the man. His mind voice was more easygoing than his expression suggested.

Interesting.

The Twin Lens read him without effort. The mind beneath the cold eyes was scrambling at each passing moment she waited without climbing the stairs. Ayla glanced sideways at Kenji.

Damien’s gaze daggered at him.

’This idiot. What is he waiting for? Take the girl inside already.’ Damien was fuming inside.

She nudged Kenji with her elbow, lightly, to share the small relief. He did not look at her. Ayla bit her lower lip. It tensed her that he was not speaking, and she did not know why he was overreacting.

It was not as if she had eaten his mother and father.

Yet.

Then she decided not to wait for him as she began the long walk up the stairs to meet her new father.

Damien watched her climb. His mind, beneath the cold eyes, had begun to soften.