Chương 587: Chapter 579: Prosper

Balance. A simple word with a straightforward definition, to ensure all sides are equally represented in distribution, but after spending most of her life in pursuit of it, Mila was only now beginning to understand the complexities behind the supposedly simple concept. The most essential application of Balance was as a defence against the Father's foul servants, the ethereal Spectres Rain both feared and devoured.

Their purpose was obvious, to whisper foul lies and lead Martial Warriors astray by tempting them into indulging their deepest, darkest desires. Pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth, these were the Father's favoured tools used to divide humanity against itself and tip the scales of power in His favour. Not to say these seven sentiments were evil in and of themselves, for they were but part and parcel of human nature.

Too much of any one sentiment could lead one down the wrong Path, and people had been known to turn against the Mother for any number of reasons, even love or compassion. Mao Jianghong, the traitorous Guard Captain of Sanshu was one such example, and one could even argue Butcher Bay's infamous leader Yo Ling was another. Both began their lives as decent men and went on to become Martial Warriors, and both turned to the Father because the loss of their families made them vulnerable to Wrath.

Jianghong's downfall came about when he learned his family had been murdered on the orders of merchants, while Yo Ling blamed the Sanshu Magistrate for evicting his parents from the city and leaving them to die in the wilds. In fact, though it might be blasphemous to say this aloud, it was possible that more humans had turned to the Father in the name of love than any other emotion, and worst of all, Mila understood why.

Mother knows what she would do if she lost Mama, Papa, Song, or Rain to Imperial machinations... Regardless of their initial reasoning, Mila suspected anyone tainted by the Father's touch would eventually succumb to their base desires and become no different from any other Defiled, for that was how He preferred His minions: impulsive and unthinking.

The so-called Chosen of Heaven might retain some of their faculties for now, but in her eyes, it was only a matter of time before they were indistinguishable from the irrational Defiled who hailed from beyond the Empire. To better withstand the Father's foul minions, most Martial Warriors placed their emotions on a scale as a measure of Balance, pitting joy against sorrow, love against hatred, and so on and so forth, but True Balance was not so easily measured.

Paired and opposing emotions were a human construct, one put together to help human minds understand them, but sorrow could also be countered by anger, love, or any number of other emotions besides joy, and the same could be said for any other pairing. Some people threw themselves into work, others devoted themselves to hedonistic pursuits, while still others sought emptiness for comfort when faced with adversity, and who could say if any one of these options was better than the others?

Balance was easy enough when there were only two sides to consider, but add in a third, fourth, or fifth side, and matters grew exponentially more convoluted and all but impossible to manage in this same manner. True emotional Balance was not about ensuring you had equal representation in all emotions at all times, but about keeping any one emotion from overwhelming you to the point of unbalance.

Rather than a scale, a better representation would be a spinning plate on top of a stick; while the plate might reel and wobble, constant adjustments and continuous motion could keep the porcelain in place indefinitely, but it only took one misstep to bring everything crashing to the ground. An interesting Insight Mila stumbled upon, and it opened her eyes to a multitude of new avenues of thought.

A weighted scale was the most fundamental representation of Balance, but it was an inadequate one, for true antitheses were rare in nature, a lesson the Mother revealed to Mila inside the bamboo grove. A simple dirt path encircled by bamboo stalks, yet it made use of so many different facets of interacting natural forces that it was almost impossible to list them all.

The damp earth nourished the plants, and in turn, the plants nourished her body and mind, with scents and sounds intermingling into a refreshing balm for the soul. The stalks filtered out sunlight and cast shadows in such a way as to ensure it was neither dark nor light during the day, and at night, the stars and moons seemed to illuminate the world around them, without revealing any of its secrets.

Mila couldn't even begin to understand how it all came together in Balance, because there were so many forces at play and the explanations ventured into the mystical, supernatural, and metaphysical, so instead of chasing after answers she knew she would never find, she set her mind to identifying these mundane mysteries of Balance.

One such example was weather patterns, with the sun drying up water to be raised up to the skies, where clouds would form until they grew too heavy with moisture and burst with rain or snow. This too was Balance of a sort, but again, only scratching the surface of a system which was riddled with complexities. Where did drought and forest fires factor into this Balance? What about lightning or ice storms? Heat waves and cold snaps? Floods and earthquakes?

Were these examples of Nature becoming unbalanced, or were they merely brief bouts of intense conditions, comparable to a burst of joy or anger? These natural disasters could simply be the world correcting course to obtain Balance over a cycle measured in decades rather than seasons, or even centuries, though there was no way for Mila to be certain of the truth. So many questions with no answers to be found, and the more Mila looked, the more questions arose.

Plant growth was intricately tied to the weather, so how did this play into the overall scope of Balance? Plants blossom in spring and wither in winter, but where did evergreens fit in? Saplings sprout into trees until they grew tall enough for the wind to whisk away their seeds to grow into saplings, yet every so often, wildfires would consume whole swathes of forests to start anew again. How did the wind move, and what determined if it was hot or cold?

Why did smoke rise in almost uniform manner, leaving a layer of clean air close to the ground? Why was lightning drawn to the tallest trees on the tallest mountains? What kept water flowing from streams to the ocean and how did it keep from drying out, or conversely, flooding over into the Azure Empire? As broad and all-encompassing as her questions might be, Mila knew the answers had something to do with her Martial Path, else the Mother would never have steered her mind towards these issues.

To find answers, she went back to the beginning, in this case, literally. It was common knowledge that the Mother crafted this world with help from Her four children, the Primal Elements. Mama always said the world was a blank canvas that had been painted in the colours of the four Primal Elements, while Papa often likened it to the forging of a sword, combining heat, metal, force, and so much more to create something new and different.

All this was neither here nor there, but the key was in how the four Elements had integrated so well into the world that it was exceedingly rare to find any one Primal Elements in complete isolation. Earth, Water, Air, and yes, even Fire could be found everywhere, but always in coexistence with one or more of the other Primal Elements.

The sea and oceans looked like pure Water, but was filled with plants, soil, and even Air, while towering Earthen mountains often hid cores of Fire within, and whose interiors were scattered with metals, minerals, gases, aquifers and more. The skies held clouds filled with Water, ice, and lightning, and Fire was unable to exist without something to burn, whether it be wood, oil, or air, meaning there were precious few examples of Pure Primal Elements to be found, and none which Mila could name.

From this, she determined that even though the Primal Elements made up the basic building blocks of life, Auxiliary Blessings were the most commonly used components, and Esoteric Blessings were the plethora of intricate interactions which made life as they knew it possible. A revelation which had Mila in high spirits, because for years, she'd been plagued by the problems of her own Esoteric Blessing.

Though she knew how to make use of her Awakening, she was never entirely sure what her Blessing was called, because nature had little use for names or labels, and the Mother cared not to explain how Her gifts worked, only how to make use of them. Unlike most, Mila Awakened early in life, just after her tenth birthday, and although she knew it to be an Esoteric Blessing because that's what Mama and Papa called it, for years she treated it as a less flexible Auxiliary Blessing of Metal.

It wasn't the worst comparison, as her Blessing offered her the benefit of stronger skin, bones, and muscles, as well as an innate resistance to flames, but she would never be able to shake the earth or conjure flames to strike down her enemies from afar, like a true wielder of Fire or Earth. Still, for many years, she felt it was a close enough approximation and never cared to dig deeper, because she had yet to comprehend what she'd already been given.

There was no sense being greedy, Mama would say, and she was right, but after stumbling into the bamboo grove, Mila finally understood that those gifts were merely the byproduct of her Esoteric Blessing, rather than the main focus she once took them for. The difference lay not only in what she couldn't do, but also in how her gifts arose. Wu Gam bore the Blessing of Earth, but his enhanced strength and durability was the result of an Earth-based Chi skill.

How it differed from Reinforcement and Domain-derived durability, Mila could not say, only that she knew them to be different just like she knew water and oil were different. Where Wu Gam required Chi and focus to power his ability, Mila's Blessing required no effort at all, for it had reshaped her physical body to grant her the benefits it entailed.

It came at a cost of course, meaning she weighed more, ate more, slept more, and had little to no control over her strength at times, but it also allowed her to match Papa in contests of raw muscle and work at the forge with little to no protective gear. In fact, she only wore a leather apron because it kept her clothes from catching fire, since even molten metal would do little more than leave a reddish mark that was quick to fade.

It only happened once, but Papa would never let her forget the time she ran home swaddled in aprons to hide her shame... Imagine her dismay when she learned her hardy natural resistance to flames did not apply to those of the Chi-fuelled variety, all those years ago in Sanshu. It made sense now, knowing what she didn't know then, that Gen's External use of Chi imbued his flames with a rudimentary form of Domain.

Without one of her own to counteract it, Gen's Domain pierced through her natural resistances and left her as vulnerable as anyone else, though for some reason her shield could still turn aside his flames, and her resistance to heat applied to the super-heated metal, if not the air itself. She didn't understand why it didn't apply to both, since the air was not imbued with Gen's Domain, but the laws of nature held firm even if human minds did not recognize them.

Still, selective protection was better than none, because she would have died if she had not been able to keep hold of her Spiritual Weapons, and instead only suffered a painful and ugly burn along one side of her face... Annoying, all these hidden, unknown forces at work, but such was the way of the world. And just like that, the answers came to her, but not in a structured, coherent form like Rain demanded, but more in an abstract sense of understanding without being able to put words to her comprehension.

The Primal Blessings were not truly about physical Earth, Air, Water, and Fire, because those things didn't naturally exist. No, the Primal Blessings were about the myriad of unique forces of the universe broken down into their four most fundamental units. Or maybe not exactly four fundamental units, but four broad categories represented by the Elements themselves, and the combinations of the elements produced even more new and different forces which made up the fabric of reality itself.

Some of these forces she had names for, such as push and pull, friction and momentum, heat and chill, gravity, tension, resistance, magnetism, and more, but others... others simply were. There was the force which made Mila's hair frizzy in the humidity or the one which gathered raindrops together as they flowed down a flat roof.

There was the force which drew moisture out of the air on chill spring mornings or wicked it away on dry winter nights, and the force which turned eaten grass into growing muscle or rotting meat into field fertilizer.

Ocean tides, lunar cycles, seasonal changes, and more, the world was made up of thousands upon thousands of interacting forces, all which could be broken down and categorized using combinations of the four Primal Blessings, in the same way the Common language broke down into two-hundred or so radicals and how all numbers could be broken down using only zero to nine. Small wonder scholars still couldn't come to a consensus on Auxiliary Blessings, because examples of two interacting Primal Elements were everywhere.

Did Earth and Water form Wood, Plant, Mud, Stone or something else entirely? What about Air and Water? It could be Cloud, as the general school of thought proclaimed, but it could also be Fog, Mist, or even Rain. Fire and Water created Ice, but a more common application was Steam, so why was Ice the preferred nomenclature?

What's more, the presence of Esoteric Blessings made things even more complicated, because it could be argued there were only a handful true interactions between only two Elements, and most interactions were a steady balance of all four. Like she said earlier, names were for humans to keep track of things. Nature needed no names, only interactions. Rain and Taduk helped Mila come to this conclusion, while sitting for lunch in the Medical Saint's garden.

Taduk said that some believed there was no need to differentiate and that a classification system would only over-complicate the matter, and this rang true to Mila's ears. What did it matter what it was called, so long as it still worked? So long as she understood the rules, or even how to work with the rules without understanding them, then what need did she have for the reasoning behind the rules themselves? Thus, she cut her meal short to meditate upon this new discovery, as well as the words of Guan Suo.

Although she hadn't been there to hear her progenitor's declaration on the fields of Sinuji, Rain, Tenjin, Tursinai, and Song all repeated more or less the same thing. Guan Suo said 'Fire and Air wasn't all (he) was', or something to that extent, and Mila heard a ring of truth in those words. At first, she assumed his Blessing of Smoke was Fire, Air, and Earth, but then she remembered her earlier musings and decided it was more likely to be a combination of all four Elements, rather than only three.

Fire, Air, and Earth were evident enough, but it was Water which held it all together as visible smoke instead of a diffuse puff of wind. In the same vein, humans were creatures of all four Elements, so how could her nameless Esoteric Blessing have enhanced her physical body without using all four Elements? The name didn't matter, nor did the ratio as Rain suggested, not exactly, because it all came down to how the forces interacted.

With this in mind, Mila decided studying the various forces of the world would be immensely beneficial, but time was not on her side. It felt like she'd only just begun putting the pieces together before Taduk shook her awake while old fogey Du fussed about how they were already running late. What followed next was a jarring, disconcerting journey taken between snippets of Insight, with too many distractions interspersed along the way.

Song was almost always there, either handing her something to eat, helping her into bed, or reminding her to go use the latrines, things Mila wholeheartedly appreciated but never remembered to thank her sister for. Lin was there too, always wearing a silly smile, which oftentimes was a bad sign if said smile was directed at you, but Mila couldn't be bothered to care about the mischievous half-hare's antics.

Luo-Luo's music also sometimes wormed its way into Mila's consciousness, and the cheery tunes would wash away her frustration and fatigue, but even then she rarely noticed its presence until after the fact, when the sudden silence left a jarring emptiness in her subconscious mind. Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Rain also showed up every now and then, but even though she couldn't quite keep track of how often he appeared, they felt few and far between. She remembered one particular instance, where she came to as he stroked her cheek.

The gentle touch was filled with love and longing, his amber eyes warm and worried, but as much as she enjoyed his affections, he'd interrupted her during a particularly informative brain-storming session after a frustrating period filled with some clucking woman who kept nattering on about frills, skin-care, morals, and curls, so Mila scowled and snapped in wordless frustration. She didn't mean to, because she loved Rain so very much, but he barely even flinched at her aggressive and somewhat feral response.

Instead, he simply smiled, kissed her hands, and whispered that he loved her, and she loved him all the more for it. It still didn't make up for how he failed to notice his banquet was scheduled for the same day as their wedding though... This loving interaction proved to be the turning point however, because it was the last unwelcome interruption she could remember.

At some point afterwards, she found herself back in the bamboo grove, and nestled within that mystical world of shadow and light, she continued to meditate and explore the mysteries of nature in blissful peace and serenity. There was so much to learn, but Mila trusted the Mother to guide her as unerringly as always, so she settled in and studied how the myriad of forces behaved and how they all fit together.

To do this, she recreated the bamboo grove piece by piece inside her mind's eye, and watched how each new variable interacted with the rest. First came the ground, the earth beneath her feet, dark, rich, soil full of whatever it was that plants needed to thrive. And Pong-Pong's excrement of course, liberally sprinkled about by Taduk, but rather than try and recreate this, she simply imagined it as it was in the real world.

There were details she obviously could never truly know or understand, such as what exactly plants took from the soil or how night soil, rotting carcasses, and decomposing plants contributed to replenishing those resources, but for her purposes, the details didn't matter. So as it was in the world, so it would be in her mind, and she painstakingly committed every detail she noticed to mind.

She left out bugs and other animals burrowing beneath the surface, but why, she couldn't say, and instead mimicked their passing with an effort of will which she eventually released to continue autonomously for as long as she would need it. There was still so much more to take into account, but she worked at it until it felt right, and only then did she move on from the dirt ground.

The bamboo stalks came next, along with their fragrant, flowering scents, followed by the whimsical manner in which light and shadow drifted down into the grove. Next, she added the wind whistling through the tips of the stalks, and the drifting blanket of air which sat about the base, and she marvelled at how everything fell into place. The moving winds set to circulating the stagnant air she'd only just introduced, mixing the scent of dirt, flower, wood, and nature altogether in a heady bouquet.

Everything had its place, even if she couldn't quite understand how it all worked, but she could see the myriad forces going through this cascading series of interactions. It was, in a word, Divine. Despite having done all she could, Mila felt things still weren't quite right, but aside from the animals and bird songs which she'd chosen to ignore, she couldn't think of anything she'd forgotten to add. For the first time in... days? Weeks?

Hard to say, but for the first time, Mila's progress stalled as she compared her mental construct to reality. The inner grove kept changing as Taduk tended his flourishing garden, so she did away with this part entirely, but then she was left with an empty hole in the centre of her grove. Thus, she set to seeding the empty space with more bamboo stalks, but now she had to gauge how each new stalk would interact with what was already there and make adjustments accordingly.

Light and shadow were the hardest, while wind and airflow was not much better, not to mention having to estimate how the smell would change. More flowers should mean more floral scents, but she found that this might not necessarily be the case since the new stalks also interfered with air flow and could easily block the scents from mingling. Even after adding a plethora of new stalks in a way which didn't affect the overall Balance, Mila still wasn't pleased with her work. It felt too...

small for her purposes, and too cluttered as well, so of course she needed to make it bigger. This was simple enough once she realized she could just duplicate the area she already had and plop them down next to one another, because so long as she added them in pairs, the overall Balance remained unchanged.

Eight copies of the original grove were all she could manage, and she even rotated them about so they weren't all in the same orientation and left a grassy plain in the middle for future expansion, along with a comfortable dirt mound in the exact centre to sit and meditate upon when needed. Overall, it took many meals and bathroom breaks to achieve in full, but she still felt it wasn't quite right, so she added a river flowing around it on all sides, like a moat to a castle.

This effort almost took as much time as the entire grove thus far, and then she doubled the time spent during what she could only call a fit of divine inspiration, when she raised a mountainside underneath the whole project and set an image of Northern Forests and landscapes all around to hide the void. Only the image, mind you, for she'd reached her limits with the mountain, which meant she could no more visit those lowland forests than she could catch the moon's reflection in the water.

Pleased with what her efforts had wrought, she spent a bit more time putting in the final touches by adding rocks, flowers, minerals, clouds, and other embellishments to make it feel more like a mountain in the North rather than a grove in Central. Every detail had to be painstakingly placed, every bump, divot, incline, and strand of grass meticulously arranged, and when she was done, Mila felt at peace here inside this mental fortress.

Lonely though, since it'd been some time since she'd actually spoken to anyone, but Mila was loathe to leave her work since it would be gone the next time she returned. She didn't have a Natal Palace yet, which meant... Wait... Mila distinctly remembered eating meals and tending to her bodily needs in reality, but the grove – no, it was more of a mountainside forest now – was always there waiting when she returned. Which meant...

this was her Natal Palace, and Mila, at only twenty years young, was now a full-fledged Expert of the Empire, just in time to show off at Rain's stupid banquet. Opening her eyes to reality, Mila blinked the harsh light out of her eyes before seeking Balance once more, just to make sure the mountain forest was still there, which it was. Overcome with giddy delight, she was thrust back into reality with a wide grin upon her face and an aching crick in her neck.

Gingerly pushing herself to her feet, she patted the dirt off her hands and bottom before wandering into Taduk's Spiritual Garden, and for a moment, she was stunned by what she saw. Gone was the vast swathe of empty, turtle-poop strewn dirt, all tilled and waiting to be planted, and in its place was a beautiful garden filled with herbs, flowers, and vines aplenty, all of which was in full bloom and being tended to by a humming Taduk.

A carpet of grass covered the ground, but it was kept neat and trimmed by the army of rabbits hopping about with an eye on the fenced vegetation. Inside those fences, planters had been laid out in neat little rows, with plenty of room to walk and sit between them, a safeguard against not only the voracious rabbits, but likely also to keep any wild rodents burrowing up from underneath.

Even as she thought about it, one such animal popped out of the grass, a brown-furred weasel head that was much too large for an actual weasel. A yellow ribbon bow tied neatly around its neck marked it as a new pet, which meant it was probably still a wild beast since there was no way Rain could have tamed a new animal so quickly... without...

"Wait," Mila said, her startled voice breaking the tranquility of the herbal garden and startling Taduk out of his concentration.

"How are these plants already mature?" Spiritual Plants grew quicker than normal ones, but even then it shouldn't be this fast...

"Oh hello Mila dear," Taduk exclaimed, brushing the dirt off his hands before skipping over and lifting her into a warm hug.

"Good to see you back again, we were all starting to worry. Sweet Lin-Lin missed you oh so much, especially with Rain always gallivanting about, but lucky for you he returned home a few days past."

"Gallivanting?" Heart skipping a beat in her chest, Mila clutched the grinning Medical Saint's hands and asked, "Did Rain recover? Is he back in fighting form?"

"Oh no, Mila dear, I'm so sorry, but he's still the same as before." Gently turning her about, he switched to Sending while leading her out of the bamboo grove.

"Still crippled, but healthier than you remember, with some meat on his bones for once. To answer your first question, you've been ruminating on your Insights for over three months now, so we're well into summer which is why my plants are so mature. Aren't they wonderful? I'd always dreamed of having my own Spiritual Plant garden, and now I do, but I made the grove much too small. I've only fifteen different varieties, and not enough room to even keep duplicates, but I can't expand yet.

Everyone else wants to sit on the path and meditate for days on end, which I don't mind in the least, but I'm not sure if meddling with the grove would interfere with whatever it is going on out there, and I'd rather not have to start a second grove. Honestly, I don't know how you all stand meditating for so long, I get fidgety from sitting still for a few minutes, and..." On and on Taduk went, but Mila only paid him half a mind. Three months?

The banquet was long done by now, but at least it sounded like Rain emerged unscathed, no thanks to her. Unfortunately, the chatty Medical Saint had a habit of going on tangents and useful information was decidedly scarce, though she learned the names of all of his new Spiritual Plants. Not their plant names, but names he gave them, much like Rain named all his pets. On the way out, they tiptoed past Mama, Yan, Alsantset, Sarnai, and several others, all of of whom were crammed into the grove's pathway to meditate.

Apparently, Mila was the last to emerge from her extreme bout of Insight, with Yan and Alsantset regaining their faculties some weeks ago, though neither one had reached another milestone on the Martial Path like she had. Before she could ask why he brought her out, Taduk Sent, "Alright Mila dear, I can't leave the rabbits alone for long, else they'll find the courage to try for my precious leafy babies, so we'll catch up at dinner yes?

I've Sent for Song and she'll be on her way shortly with the quins, so you just wait here with Princess. Bye for now." And with that, he was gone, scampering back into his garden and leaving Mila alone with the strange weasel creature who'd followed them out from the grove. Princess proved to be a burly, bearish creature with a stout, stocky body, a narrow weasel head, and ferocious looking fangs and talons, a bold and adorable beast whom Mila instantly adored.

Without so much as a greeting sniff, Princess shuffled over and hurled herself bodily against Mila's leg before settling in to wait, and she couldn't help but lean over to stroke the beast's fur. Startled by the unexpected touch, Princess grunted and studied Mila with curious surprise before stretching her stubby arms out to indicate she wanted to be carried.

Happy to oblige, Mila held her new friend like a quin held their pups, with one hand under both the weasel-bear's arms and her legs and furry tail hanging straight down. When Song arrived with Erdene, Mafu, and Atir in tow, she greeted Mila with a warm, hearty hug, which came as a welcome surprise.

"Hello Sister," Song said, beaming so prettily beneath the mid-day sun.

"It is good to see you. Are you well?" A warm hug, pretty smile, cheery greeting, and now small talk from Song? It'd only been three months, not three years, right? Lifting her affectionate sister off the ground in a one armed embrace, Mila resisted the urge to squeal in delight and settled for a muted squeak instead.

"Hello Sister. It's good to see you too. Thank you for looking after me all these weeks. I don't remember everything, but I know you were there." Mother Above, was Song blushing? This was just too wonderful. Perhaps Mila's absence allowed her beloved sister to finally get all the love and affection she deserved.

"I'm doing well, but I'm a little confused, having lost three months in... well not the blink of an eye, but it didn't feel like three months, you know?" Nodding sagely at the statement, Song launched into a recounting of everything Mila had missed, and without prompting at that. Oh this would take some getting used to, so she listened with an open ear while greeting Atir after this long absence.

The quin was thrilled by the attention, and looked like she could use more since she was getting a little too round for Mila's liking, likely because rotund Mafu was still courting her with treats. Together, they set off for the Citadel at a reasonable pace so they could continue their conversation as they rode, but it all seemed so surreal. Mila could hardly believe it.

Not only did they attend the banquet and return home without starting a civil war, the People emerged from what should have been a death-trap as the undisputed victors. Song was an Expert of the Empire now, Zian and BoShui had been raised to First Grade Warrant Officers, Huu, a Second Grade, and Rain was appointed to Imperial Office as the Minister of Finance... What in the Heavens was the Legate thinking? Had he gone stark raving mad?

Mila loved her beloved dearly, but what did Rain know of managing financial affairs? True, he had a way with earning coin, but he also went through coin like drinking water and didn't know when to give up on chasing after his strange, silly ideas. Unless the Legate meant to bankrupt the Empire, he could not have picked a worse man for his Minister of Finance.

The hour-long ride back to the Citadel was informative, but as usual, Song was light on details of anything she considered irrelevant, which was almost everything unrelated to the Martial Path. Armed with the knowledge of how Song's sparring partners were faring and heart palpitating in nervous excitement, Mila burst through the familiar warehouse doors and stomped up the stairs to Rain's boardroom.

There, she found the bears and wildcats lazing about while Rain, Luo-Luo, and an unfamiliar Imperial stood over a fancy looking official document.

"I don't know," Mila could hear Rain saying, as she barrelled past the Death Corps who should have known better than to stand in her way.

"Are you sure the ink and dye won't run? We can't have –" Then the armoured guards hit the floor and he came alert like a warrior born, standing between Mila and his guests while reaching for his sword. Luckily for him, he stopped before even touching it, as beautiful eyes widened in surprise and confusion.

"Mila? Song, why did you bring her back so –" Mila's reaction caught them both off guard, as she had not been prepared for the surge of emotions which burst up at the sight of him, looking so handsome with his full cheeks and a healthy pallor, not to mention a suitably filled-out frame and shiny, medium-length hair stylishly slicked back. Without meaning to do so, she grabbed him by the back of the neck and pulled him in for a kiss, her lips starved of the taste and feel of him for far too long.

His hand circled around her waist, then down to her butt, then returned to her waist for the sake of propriety even though she wasn't complaining, and for long seconds, no one and nothing else mattered. Breaking away with a breathless gasp, Mila held him close and gazed deeply into his eyes, basking in his honey and sandalwood scent.

"I'm sorry," she said, tears forming in her eyes.

"I should've been at the banquet to help you, I wanted to be there, but you had to go through all that without me and be incredible all on your own. I'm so proud and so sorry, I just –""Shut up and kiss me." He didn't give her a chance to refuse, not that she would have, and she almost melted in his embrace. Only belated did she remember Princess was still in her arms and was now growling in palpable warning, but Rain didn't seem afraid and Mila didn't want this kiss to end.

It had to eventually of course, and to her mild delight, Rain looked as brainless and breathless as she felt when he pulled away, all moon-eyed and glazed over with focused distraction.

"I've missed you, beloved," he whispered, brushing his nose against hers.

"I could see you and hold you, but it just wasn't the same without your beautiful smile." Crinkling his nose, he added, "As for the apologies, stow 'em. You've nothing to apologize for, beloved. Man proposes and Heaven disposes." Eyes widening in alarm, he broke away from Mila to rummage through his pockets instead.

"Oh, and speaking of proposes..." Dropping to one knee, Rain held up a small, velvet lined box and opened it to reveal a stunning, diamond-and-ruby studded platinum ring which must have cost him a large fortune. More proof of his spendthrift ways, wasting good coin on silly jewellery, but Mila loved the gesture all the same, so long as he hadn't misappropriated funds from his Office to buy it.

"Sumila, I messed up," he began, his pained gaze melting her heart, "I forgot about our wedding date, and I am so sorry. I know this ring won't make up for it, and nothing ever will, but I love you and want to spend the rest of my life trying. Will you marry me? Our wedding can take place any day, and at any time, even tonight if you so wish it, so long as you say yes and make me the happiest man alive."

"Of course, you idiot. Why would you even need to ask?" It was about time her beloved fool took the initiative for once, because Mila was beginning to worry he didn't want to marry her at all.

"Ah. Not tonight," she stammered, her cheeks growing hot as she fought to hold back tears, but luckily Rain was busy trying to get the ring onto her finger. Three months, she sat around, and he didn't check if the ring fit? And the Legate wanted this man as the Empire's Master of Finance? Oh, never mind, Rain meant to put it on her fourth finger for some reason, where it fit perfectly.

"We can't be wed tonight. I need time to prepare." Not for a showy ceremony or lavish banquet, both things she could do without, but she needed to fire up her forge before the wedding could take place, and pray she could forge something strong enough to hold. After all, even though Rain looked hale and healthy as can be, there was still a good chance Mila might accidentally snap his spine if left unrestrained during their long awaited wedding night... Chapter Meme