The car ride to Emberfell was nothing more than a blur to Aiden. He and Aldegar sat in the back while Khiara zipped through the winding roads. A strong rainfall had since begun, and the road became slippery, taking lots of focus to drive at high speeds like Khiara did right now. Despite his current state, Aiden couldn't help but be impressed. He was resting against Aldegar's shoulder, trying his best to not fall asleep, worrying if he did, he wouldn't wake up for at least 12 hours.
When the familiar skyline of the busy Emberfell began to slowly appear on the horizon, dawn was just breaking. They soon parked into the Manor's driveway, as it was on the very entrance to the city. Aiden went to step out of the door, but Aldegar wouldn't let him. Instead, he went over to the other side of the car and carried Aiden into the house.
Khiara slowly unlocked and swung open the Manor doors, trying to be as quiet as possible. "Welcome back home, Aiden." said Aldegar, as he began carrying Aiden up the stairs. "However much I'd want to talk through everything with you right now, you need rest."
He carried him to the door of his old room, surprising Aiden. "I told Emilia to sleep in Valarie's room tonight, so, you can rest for as long as you want." The room was almost identical to when Aiden still lived in it, but it was clear it was re-decorated by a young girl. A young girl who clearly liked overdecorating.
The walls were much more densely packed than when the room was Aiden's. Granted, he only had a wall clock and a few family photos, but still. Across the walls were all sorts of Oracle memorabilia, posters, souvenirs, some even signed. The person who showed up the most was surprisingly, Khiara. After Aldegar put Aiden back onto the ground, he walked up to one of the photos. On it, a sticky note was attached, which read:
"Khiara is so beautiful and strong! I want to be like her when I get older."
Aiden chuckled slightly, finding this amusing. Surely, this girl must be pretty young, then. Suddenly, Khiara popped up in the doorway. "I gotta say, I'm honored." She said as she walked into the room. "I'm only number four, so I don't have a lot of fans. I'm glad mine are at least passionate." She went up to the same photo Aiden was looking at, taking a pen from the table, and signed it.
"I'd love to meet Emilia, but I need to head back to Dawnvale. Since Aldegar is gonna help you get back in shape a bit, I'll go report our findings instead of him." Khiara now pushed Aiden towards the bed. "Go to sleep, Aiden. You look horrible. No offense."
"None taken. I feel horrible too." Aiden waved Khiara off, wishing her a safe trip, and laid down in bed. He felt as if he fell asleep the very second his head touched the pillow, the comfortable bed hugging him tightly. His back ached horribly, considering he slept the last three days on the wooden planks of Cassius' basement floor.
He woke up to a light knock on the door, shattering his sleep almost instantly. "Come in!" said Aiden as confidently as he could, his voice still shaky from waking. The door gently swung outward, and the silhouette of a young woman with red hair tied in a high ponytail appeared. Before the girl even had a chance to say anything, Aiden jumped out of bed and rushed to hug her.
"Jeez, Aiden! Don't do that, you're still recovering!" the familiar voice lightly echoed through the room. It was none other than Valarie, and Aiden was overjoyed seeing her. "You really don't know how to stay out of trouble, don't you?"
"Oh come on!" Aiden joyfully laughed. "You're acting as if you would've been smart enough to escape."
"Not smart enough to escape…" Valarie gently let Aiden go, before pushing him back into the room "But smart enough to never join, dumbass!"
"Don't give me a hard time…" Aiden placed his hand on his forehead and began spinning in a circle. "I'm but a wounded young man." Valarie began laughing so hard she hit her head on the door frame, which only made Aiden begin laughing too. Soon enough, Aldegar appeared behind Valarie.
"What's all this ruckus about?" asked Aldegar. "You're going to end up waking Timo up with your noise, and you know how much he hates that. Either way, come on, breakfast is served."
At the mention of breakfast, Aiden's stomach immediately rumbled, reminding him he hadn't eaten in over four days. He bolted as fast as he could downstairs, being the first at the table. Slowly, his siblings appeared one by one, none of them seemingly knowing that Aiden came home, or what even happened. They all asked Aiden as they arrived, but he brushed them all off by saying he'll explain when everyone gets here. Everyone talked with Aiden and made their way to the desk, until Runa came. Without even a word from her mouth, she ran up to hug Aiden as soon as she saw him.
"Brother! I missed you!" She was jumping up and down with her hands in the air. "How's Sylvanwood? Dad told me it's very beautiful there." Aiden gently laughed at his overjoyed sister, before patting her on the head.
"Sure is, Runa. Maybe you should visit one day, all of you should." Aiden looked around the room, but, someone was still missing, other than Emilia. "Oh, yea, where's mother? I'm surprised she didn't come to provoke me, if nothing else."
"She isn't home, she's in Dawnvale. Otherwise, that would've been her at your door this morning, not me" said Valarie, and she shoved an overly large pancake piece in her mouth.
"Yes, she's in Dawnvale. She's giving a hand preparing some new Defense Corps trainees." Aldegar began speaking as he arrived, but, Aiden noticed something. Behind him stood someone. "Oh, yes, I forgot. Come on, Emilia."
From behind Aldegar's back appeared a short young girl with pitch black hair and green eyes. She seemed pretty young, and it was clear that only Runa was younger. "Hey… I'm Emilia. Uh, I don't know what else to say…"
Aiden just nodded in approval. "It's okay, we'll get to know eachother soon enough either way."
"Make sure to never listen to this guy's advice." chimed in Theo from the far corner of the table. "He'd only get you into trouble."
"Says the guy who fell through a sewer hole because he didn't see the warning sign that it's broken?" Aiden took a big sip of his drink, not breaking eye contact with Theo for even a second. He noticed Timo laughing too, and he wouldn't let that slide. "I know you're definitely not laughing Mr. 'I Left My Deodorant Under The Sun And It Blew Up'. I know you're twins and all that, but come on?"
This friendly banter is something that Aiden missed, and it was a much needed change of pace compared to what had happened recently. After breakfast, Aiden was going to head to the bathroom, but he was stopped by Aldegar.
"Son, I'm sure you're enjoying the family bonding time right now, but…" Aldegar stopped and deeply sighed. "What happened with you and Feyr deeply worries me. So, we'll be heading to Dawnvale by train today, so you can get checked up."
Aldegar pulled out from his pocket a piece of paper neatly folded, and handed it to Aiden. "We'll be leaving by bullet train at 15:00. Also, you should read this. It's addressed to me, but I think you're the target recipient.
Aiden thanked Aldegar and took the note, before heading into his room. He unfolded it, and the clean, flowing cursive handwriting was immediately recognizable. It was from Midori.
"Dear Mr. Silvius
Hello, my name is Midori. I work for Sylvanwood Commerce, and I'm Aiden's coworker. I'm not sure if Aiden has told you about his friends over here in Sylvanwood, but he and I are really close. For the past five days, I haven't seen Aiden anywhere, nor has he shown up for work, and I'm beginning to worry. I tried reaching out to him, but he never did respond. I figured he was just busy, but after this long, it's clear something is wrong. Although Olek is trying to convince me everything is okay, I wanted to check in with you, figuring that if anyone knew - you would. Please, write back as soon as possible, whether the news are good or bad. I'd rather I know than be left wondering what happened. And if you see him - tell him I said hi.
- Sincerely, Midori Hilten."
"Always so formal." said Aiden as he hit himself over the head with the paper. "No wonder Olek avoids you like the plague."
He ran over to Valarie's room and grabbed a pen and paper, and began to write. Last thing he would've wanted is to have people thinking he vanished into thin air. He told Midori how everything is okay now, and that he'll be back in Sylvanwood in a few days, and then he'll tell her the whole story. He didn't want to reveal too much in the letter, since this was just to ease her worries. He put it in his jacket pocket, and figured he'll drop it off at the post office when they head to the train station. As he was finishing jotting down the letter, trying to make his crude handwriting seem somewhat tangible, a light knock was heard.
"Yeah?" said Aiden, turning his head, only to see Emilia at the door. "Oh, hey Emilia, what's up?"
"I- I wanted to get to know you a bit better. Aldegar told me you're leaving for Dawnvale later to see a doctor… is everything okay?" Emilia made her way into the room, sitting down on the bed, before looking over to the right and noticing the photo Khiara had signed not too long ago. Her eyes filled with joy as she began questioning Aiden if he knows anything about this.
"Yeah, Khiara and dad were the ones who brought me here. She wanted to meet you, but needed to go to Dawnvale urgently, and left you that as a gift." Emilia immediately began running around the room, moving around her posters and photos, placing the signed one in the very middle, before smiling with an air of accomplishment. "You really love her, don't you?"
"Yeah! I want to fight alongside her one day! My power would be a great help!" Aiden remembered Aldegar's words from before he left. Right, she had a power.
"Yeah, Aldegar mentioned you had a really strong power. I'd love to hear what it is."
"Well, I haven't named it yet, but look." Emilia seemingly turned into a purple mist in front of Aiden, before pushing her hand straight through his chest. Not only did it pass through, but Aiden didn't even feel it. "Also, I can do this."
Emilia got up from the bed, and went back into the hallway, and she immediately disappeared.
"Wow, that's so cool! How does it work?" Aiden was genuinely interested, because he never saw such a power before. Almost all power wielders he met until now had a combat power. Cassius, Clara, Khiara, Aldegar… none like this one.
"It's Shadow." Emilia returned back to normal. "I can turn myself, friends, things, into shadows. They become invisible when you're far enough away. You can make yourself pass through objects, too, but it's hard."
Aiden and Emilia spent some time bonding, and the time to head to Dawnvale began approaching. Aiden got ready to go, before Emilia stopped him. "Are you going to be okay?" she asked, clearly worried about Aiden's predicament.
"Don't worry, I'd never let any of you guys worry about me. Not to mention, Valarie would beat my ass if I got myself injured badly." Aiden laughed, before slightly crouching down and hugging Emilia, and saying goodbye.
He'd soon head to the train station near the northeast corner of the city. "Getting to Dawnvale would be really hard without this train" Aiden thought. "Though, I'm surprised no one ever did anything with the Arridune Desert other than make the railroad."
He made it, and Aldegar was already waiting on the station. They boarded the train, speedily making their way to Dawnvale and the Oracle building. The Oracle building, or should I say, buildings, were really weirdly structured. Each Corps had their own base, a rectangular skyscraper like tower, placed one next to each other. But, around the halfway height, they were connected with eachother. I guess this was done to promote unity and cooperation, but it made the buildings look ugly.
Aiden and Aldegar made it into the Medical Corps building, the furthest one to the right. Each building had a colored strip stretching all the way from the top to the bottom, on the corner right of the entrance. Offense is red, Defense is yellow and Medical is purple.
After being identified, they made their way to one of the top floors, and they were greeted by three doors, marked "Sterile Room" one through three. "Sit down over here, Aiden. The Medical boys aren't fast, we're definitely going to be waiting for quite a bit."
After around 5 minutes of waiting, the elevator door opened, but it wasn't any of the doctors. Instead, it was Khiara. Aiden seemed kind of shocked that she showed up, and he was staring at her without a word.
"What? You really thought I would miss this?" Khiara placed her hand on Aiden's head, before shaking his hair around and making it messy. "Of course I wouldn't!"