"Father."
The person who taught him how to ride a horse. How to fight. How to move through a world that didn't forgive weakness. Erwin remained silent for a long time. He looked at his son.
Finally, Erwin placed his hand on Rush's forehead.
"How do you feel? Does it hurt anywhere? You had me worried."
He withdrew it.
"I feel alright, Father," Rush replied, though he instinctively reached up to touch his left shoulder. "Just a little pain here."
Erwin followed his eyes.
"You've been unconscious for a week."
Rush looked at the ceiling.
A week. I thought it was only a few hours, Rush thought.
Beelzebub surfaced.
You were there only five seconds before you woke up. The concept of time is different in the Neuroverse.
Five seconds. It felt like hours.
"Yes," Beelzebub said. "It always will."
"The professors treated you," Erwin continued. "Your core is stable. The Khaos Blocker held. Master Elyse oversaw it personally."
Rush looked away from the ceiling. Toward his father.
"Grandma was here."
"She was here within hours of the incident."
Erwin sat back in the chair — the chair that was visibly too small for him, its proportions designed for a student rather than the Lord of Zephoria. He didn't appear to notice or mind.
"She contacted me immediately after."
Rush looked at him.
His father had come from Castle Hart. From the eastern domain of Zephoria. The journey by manaship was two days at minimum — which meant Erwin had left within hours of Elyse's contact and had been here, in this dormitory chair, for most of the week.
He looked at the coat folded over the chair's back.
The dark, practical coat his father always wore. Folded with the precision of someone who had been living out of it rather than a wardrobe.
"Mother doesn't know."
It wasn't a question.
Erwin looked at him steadily.
"No."
Rush looked at the window. At the pale morning light coming through it.
He didn't ask why. He already knew — Elsa Ryanheart, knowing her son had been attacked by an Infernal Greater Demon while unconscious for a week, would not have stayed at Castle Hart.
Liz, knowing the same, would have found a way to follow her.
"Don't tell her, Father. She would worry."
Erwin looked at his son. He walked toward the bed and patted his head a little.
Rush looked up.
His eyes were bright. Not quite dry.
"I'm here. No need to put a tough act. Be yourself."
Rush didn't let the tear fall. But his voice broke.
"Father..."
He didn't say anything further.
The silence stretched. Neither spoke for a while.
"The domain—"
"Is being managed — your mother is the best duchess, you know." His steel-blue eyes held Rush's without shifting.
Rush looked at him.
He had seen his mother manage Castle Hart on her own.
He didn't say anything. There wasn't anything sufficient to say. He looked at his father's face and let the silence carry what words couldn't, and Erwin — who had spent a lifetime reading silence — received it without requiring it to be translated.
A knock at the door.
Erwin turned his gaze toward it.
"Come."
The door opened.
Nia entered the room.
Rush recognized her immediately — but differently from every time before. The glasses perched on the bridge of her nose, her usual awkward appearance still intact.
But the way she moved through the doorway was different. The careful smallness gone. Her posture disciplined. She walked like what she actually was.
The way she carried herself was different now—her gaze was sharp, her posture was disciplined, and she radiated confidence.
"Greetings, Lord Ryanheart. Greetings, Young Master," she said, bowing deeply to Erwin before acknowledging Rush.
Master.
He had heard that word — just before the dark.
"Nia... do you work for my father?"
Before he could press further, Erwin answered for her.
"She is Albert's daughter."
"Uncle Albert's!"
Rush looked at her again.
Nia nodded.
"You're Luvinia?"
"Yes, Young Master," Nia said. "It is good to see you awake."
Everything was falling into place now. Her tripping on day one. Her staying close to him most of the time. The gaze he had felt since his arrival in Prasta. Everything he thought was normal.
"Are you alright? The Phantom Sleeper nearly killed you."
"I'm fine, Young Master. Thank you. "
Erwin stood from the chair.
He looked at Nia.
She met his gaze directly. Composed. Formal. The confidence of someone who had been waiting for this specific moment for long enough that they had decided how they intended to occupy it.
"Nia is your retainer, like Albert is to me," Erwin said, looking at his son. "She is one of my best students."
Rush looked at Nia.
"My retainer?"
He looked at her the way he looked at things he was recalibrating his understanding of — comprehensively, without rush, letting each piece settle into its correct position.
The dining hall. Every meal they had shared. Every quiet moment. The spectacles fogging in the alchemy lab. The deliberate stumble on the training ground. The word Master arriving through the dissolving edges of his consciousness before everything went dark.
"You knew everything about me," Rush said. "Before you arrived."
"Yes," Nia said. Her voice was the same — the same quality, the same register. But without the careful smallness underneath it. "Lord Erwin trained me personally."
"You knew about Darius? What he was?"
"I suspected something was wrong. I didn't know what it was until Hunter's Willow."
Rush looked at her.
Then looked at his father.
Erwin was watching the exchange with the expression of someone observing something proceeding correctly.
"She was always meant to serve at your side," Erwin said. "As your retainer. Not hidden — that was specific to the Academy, specific to this period. When you leave here, she will stand beside you openly. She was born for this, Rush. And she chose it."
Rush looked at Nia again.
"You chose it," he said. Not doubting. Just confirming.
"Yes," Nia said. "Lord Erwin gave me the choice when I was old enough to understand what it meant. I chose." Her eyes held his — steady, direct, the eyes of someone who had made a decision a long time ago and had spent years living inside it. "I would choose it again."
Rush was quiet for a moment.
"Call me Rush," he said. "You're my friend, and master sounds awkward. "
"Yes master — I mean — Rush," she said.
Rush looked at her, a small smile.
Then he looked at his father.
Erwin looked back at him with the expression of a man who had built something over many years and was watching it stand.
Rush looked at the window.
"How long was I unconscious?" he said.
"Seven days," Erwin confirmed.
Seven days, Rush thought. He already knew that. He was thinking about something else.
He looked at his hands on the blanket.
"Jennifer," he said. "And Slavic."
He looked at his father.
"How are they?"
"They are safe."
Rush looked at the window.
Safe. I need to see them.
He let that word settle where it needed to settle and closed his eyes.
"Rest well. Tomorrow we meet with Master Elyse," Erwin said.
He looked at Nia. She fell into step behind him without being asked. They left the room. The door closed.
Rush kept his eyes closed, thinking for a long moment before sleep finally took him.