The next morning arrived quietly, without fanfare.
Kael was on the rooftop, shirtless and sweating, doing push-ups with a grim sort of determination—not for strength, not for discipline, but for distraction.
He hadn't slept.
After explaining everything to Selene the night before, she'd finally understood.
Well… "understood" was generous.
She was still angry—just marginally less inclined to stab him in his sleep.
Progress.
But when Kael had laid down, sleep never came.
Only the battle.
Again and again, it played behind his eyes—the clash with Eiden.
The cold precision of it.
The moment he realized he wasn't the predator in that fight—just background noise in someone else's ascent.
He paused, muscles trembling, and looked toward the rising sun.
Its warmth didn't reach him.
"I got cocky," he muttered.
After defeating monsters. Then an undead. Then a general.
The pattern had tricked him.
