As Caroline, Clarissa and Nero huddled together and talked about things that would probably make the heads of everyone else in the room explode, Dia looked at her sword. It was a sword that wasn’t quite a sword; instead, it was a hilt that could fitted above a standard imperial blade.

The weapon was designed in this manner for a reason — it allowed Dia to make use of her Sword Roar over and over again without needing her to adjust. As for the power…she didn’t know that much about it, however. She hadn’t had the chance to test out its power.

Everyone looked at the sword as she moved it around, their eyes deep in thought.

“So, a soul-bound weapon…if we soul-bind your sword, would it bind the hilt? Or the whole thing?” Schwarz eyed the blade. “And if you were to call it over, would the hilt appear, or will the whole weapon appear?”

“That’s a very good question,” said Farah, who was now examining the weapon up close. “We can’t exactly try it either. Everyone can only have one soul-bound weapon. Even if it’s destroyed beyond recognition, you’ll never be able to create a second soul-bound weapon.”

“If I happen to bind only the hilt and not the sword inside…” Dia looked around for something to drink, and Schwarz slid a small cup over. Catching it with her left hand, she took a sip from it, and then pondered over her next move. “I think more testing is required.”

“Yeah. What constitutes a weapon?” Risti muttered. “What’s the exact definition?”

“Still, do we need to go that far?” Farah asked. “Soul-bound weapons are, by nature, somewhat indestructible. Even if you completely shatter your blade or whatever, calling it over will cause them to reassemble. Just run your mana through it later to hold the pieces together, and it’ll be fine.”

“Really?” Schwarz. “That’s really convenient.”

“Yeah. It’s a reason why many soul-bound weapons tend to be cherished ones. You can actually repair them, given a skilled blacksmith and a forge. My Delphinus has been cracked more than once. A few pieces broke off too. But instead of searching for it, I simply summoned it back, and all the pieces returned.”

“That’s really convenient,” said Schwarz.

“You know what's really convenient? Archers usually have a particular arrow that they like a lot. Maybe it’s made out of a rare metal or something, and they make it their soul-bound weapon, so that arrow can be retrieved after firing,” said Farah. “You know those legends about inexhaustible quivers? Actually, the guy is firing the same arrow over and over.”

“Still, we should look into the definition of a weapon,” said Schwarz. “What if I have a small folding fan that fires out twenty throwing knives? If I turn it into a soul-bound weapon, does that make these throwing knives soul-bound too?”

“I’m sure quite a few people have thought about it, but things like these are kept within organisations and noble families. For fairly obvious reasons, I don’t know the answer to that.”

“But you…” Schwarz glanced at Caroline, before shutting up.

“Even if you’re saying that,” Farah replied, stressing the last word, “I really don’t know. My…parents were horribly irresponsible, and they definitely never bothered to think too hard about inheritance and knowledge. We’ve lost many things in this one generation.”

Schwarz eyed her. “Dia was quite silent about this issue, but I did hear a few things from Lloyd. I didn’t expect it to be this…terrible.”

As the two of them continued to talk, Dia wondered about Farah’s identity. From what she could tell so far, Caroline hadn’t quite noticed Farah’s actual identity, or she couldn’t be bothered to think about it too hard. Lloyd, Farah’s butler, had also stayed out of the way while Caroline was around, but sooner or later, someone would probably find out.

What would Count and Countess Nightfall think about the whole thing when they found out? That would be an interesting question. Risti didn’t make it a point to advertise the identity of her father too, and few people knew that Lily was once the heiress to a now-destroyed barony.

Save for Schwarz and Claud, everyone else had their own, special identity.

“Dia?” Farah waved her hands in front of Dia’s face. “You alright?”

“Sorry, did you say something?” Dia shook her head slightly. “Just thinking of something. Anyway, I think I should actually check on the definition of a weapon before doing anything else. It’ll be nice if it was actually the whole thing, but…”

“Yeah. Put that way, a bow loaded with as many arrows as humanly possible would also be a weapon. The arrows would return with a single calling,” Farah replied. “Fortunately, we have three people who certainly have an answer.”

She paused. “Probably, I hope.”

“You don’t sound all that confident,” Dia muttered, before placing aside her weapon. “Let’s not talk about this for the moment, then. What are we going to do next? Nightfall’s coming back, which means no more troublesome things.”

Schwarz laughed dryly. “I haven’t forgotten what happened back then, when the Moon Lords were first formed.”

Dia twitched. “Please, no.”

“Heh.” The bartender produced a few more bottles. “So, assuming that we have free time, I think we should focus on procuring more lifestones. We have enough money to buy a whole bunch of high-ranked lifestones. With them, we should all be able to become bi-folders eventually.”

“Is there enough for everyone?” Dia asked.

“With the war averted and everyone trapped inside the Istrel Sovereignty, trade between the three dukedoms has resumed once more. We should be able to get enough lifestones to make us all bi-folders. The only issue is time,” said Schwarz.

“Time…” Risti nodded. “Yes. Other than lifestones, our ability to control mana is very important. We can actually set back our progress, if we do things haphazardly.”

“If only there’s a way to automatically draw our mana circuits,” Farah mumbled. “I don’t really fancy my chances of getting it right on the first time.”

“More training is required, everyone.” Dia let out a nasty chuckle, and everyone flinched.

“Well, I must admit that your training is effective,” Schwarz conceded. “But…”

“No buts.” Dia let the smile slip off the face. “Everyone here can feel it, right? We are witnesses to an era of great change. If we aren’t strong enough, we will die with the tide.”

“Even we tetra-folders won’t be exempt from that axiom,” said Clarissa, and everyone jumped. At some point in time, the three of them had finished their discussion. Nero had a glass in his hand, while Caroline was looking at a folder and reading it.

“Even you?” Farah asked.

“Even me,” Clarissa replied. “You’re right about one thing. The winds of great change are blowing. The White Church is recalling nearly everyone back to the Istrel capital — the one that used to be Umbra. I’ll be leaving shortly after Nightfall arrives too.”

“You’re leaving?” Schwarz looked at her. “But…”

“The issue of Tot or whoever it was is not something I should have been dabbling in. The Chromatic Lords will do it in my stead, in their own way,” said Clarissa. Most of them have awakened too, and will act as buffers against the Moon Emissaries.”

“Octo-folders as buffers?”

“We’ve received some good estimates about the Moon Emissaries’ strength. Of the six present, four of them are tetra-folders, and two of them are penta-folders,” said Clarissa. “The Chromatic Lords can put them down easily, really easily. However, we have reason to believe that killing anymore would incite a nasty reaction.”

“Like?”

“The forceful summoning of a far greater Moon Emissary. My people have dug out some old records. Legends, if you will. The bulk of Moon Emissaries have strength comparable to the weaker Chromatic Lords, septa-folders.” The Holy Daughter of the White Church shook her head. “Stronger than Emperor Grandis…or what he lets on, anyway. We have reason to believe that Emperor Grandis isn’t as weak as he seems.”

“And you’re telling us that?”

“Oh, come on. It’s a conjecture.” Clarissa smiled, her stern, business-like demeanour crumbling away. “But stay safe. We’ll try to protect you people and vanillas as much as possible, given all the help, but…”

“How about Nero?” Schwarz asked.

“Until someone figures out how to breach the walls of energy around the sovereignty, he’s staying here.”

“No biggie,” Nero added. “The booze here is better than the ones in the Black Church, anyway. No one makes them as strong as Schwarz.”

He raised a fist, which Schwarz bumped.

“Alcoholics,” Farah muttered. “Well, you could help us out by giving us a cart or so of high-ranked lifestones when you finally leave. You have no use for them, right?”

Nero nodded. “Sure.”

“Let me chip in some too,” Clarissa added. “I don’t use them anymore. Pure-ranked lifestones are hard to come by nowadays, though. So…I apologise in advance.”

“That’s more than plenty, really,” said Schwarz. “Time to practice, then…wait, we have questions regarding soul-bound weapons!”

“Go ahead,” Clarissa replied. “Fire away!”