"Yeah, too bad that I can't take tomorrow as a day off. We're in the middle of a case. Damn if I hate being a responsible adult." Kamila went into the bathroom, replacing the lingerie with a baggy pajamas.
"That makes the two of us, babe." Lith said before taking a lonely cold shower.
The following morning, Lith left the Ernas household. Quylla's Scanner confirmed that his life force was now no different from how it had been before. There were no new cracks and the old ones hadn't grown any bigger.
Once he was back into his tower, Lith took all the loot he had gained from Kulah out of his pocket dimension, letting Solus prepare their Forge while he called Protector.
"Scourge, what happened to you? I tried to call you multiple times to remind you of your promise. At first, Selia bugged me because she thought you were avoiding us but over time she got so worried about you that she almost forced me to visit your parents and ask them about your whereabouts." Protector was relieved from hearing Lith's voice.
As long as the owner of a communication rune was alive, their rune would remain, but not seeing Lith's amulet active for a month had brought Protector to the point of thinking that he was held captive and unconscious.
Lith told all about the events in Kulah to Protector, explaining that going deep underground had blocked all communications. Life in the wilderness was quite boring, so Selia's hologram appeared as well, sitting on Ryman's lap along with their children, listening to Lith's story as if it was a fairy tale.
Lith was amazed by how quickly Protector Hushed the kids' ears during the most gruesome parts. Then, Lith asked for their help.
"I would like to introduce Kamila to the four of you."
"Well, any kind of company is most welcome, but can I ask you why? I thought you wanted to keep your life as an Awakened a secret." Selia asked.
"And I mean to keep things that way. Learning about Awakening might put her in danger. My issue is about leaving her in the dark about my other half as Protector did to you. In a while, we'll have our one year anniversary.
"I don't think it's fair to drag things this long without giving her the opportunity to decide if she wants to stick with me or find someone more normal." Lith sighed. "You are the only mixed couple that I know, and seeing how she reacts to your situation would greatly help me to understand how open-minded she is."
"So, you're asking us to reveal our secret before gambling on yours?" Selia asked. Lith hadn't shared his hybrid nature with her, but the huntress had actually guessed a lot from the subtext.
"Yes." Lith nodded.
"Fine by me. What about you dear?" Selia asked Protector.
"Wait, what?" Both men said in unison. Ryman trusted Lith so much that any friend of his was also Protector's friend, otherwise he wouldn't have revealed himself so easily to Friya.
"Why so surprised? It's obvious that I'm interested in checking if all humans are scumbags. You are now in the same situation my children will be in a few years. I'm not doing it just for you, but also for my family.
"By the way, if she breaks up with you just because of what one of your ancestors did, she doesn't deserve you." Selia said, believing that Lith carried the blood of an ancestral Emperor Beast.
"It's kind of more complicated than that." Lith replied.
"Are you going to tell me?"
"Not now. Otherwise she would be the fifth one to know, which would make things even harder for her. Especially considering that my ex already knows…"
"Slow down. Are you saying that you already found a girl who accepted you in the past?" Selia cut him short.
"Yes."
'Actually two.' Lith thought since he considered Solus a girl too.
"And you let her go? I'm not going to lie, kid. That was a dick move on your part. When do you think you'll bring her here?"
"As soon as I can. She has a full-time job and so do I. Finding the right time might be tricky. I plan to do that first and then visit Faluel. As you can see, I haven't forgotten about my promise."
After another bit of chit-chat and receiving from Selia the magical equivalent of a grocery list of enchanted items she wanted as a "spontaneous gift" for her troubles, Lith joined Solus in their Forge.
She had already placed several cheap swords and all the lower grade mana crystals in their possession above the obsidian table that they employed for their experiments. She was in her humanoid form, wearing a simple blue dress with a knee-length skirt.
"I hoped that after our bodies fully regenerated, I would look even a tiny bit more human, but I'm still glowing like a frigging bedside lamp." She sighed. "My physical appearance must be linked to my mana core."
"Well, you still look gorgeous." Lith said. "Are you sure you don't want a body? With my current knowledge about constructs, undead, and even body-swapping, we could easily fetch you something."
"Damn sure. Now let's get to work. I've already organized a few things for you to look at. First, the Odi's runes on the blade are more advanced of those we found in Huryole, since they don't glow, but I think they are also less powerful.
"I've drawn you a comparison between all the rune engraved weapons we managed to examine with Invigoration, including Phloria's."
"What? When did you do that?" Lith was flabbergasted. That was the kind of dirty trick he would usually employ, something that he wouldn't expect from the kind-hearted Solus.
"The moment we got stuck in Kulah's lower floor and the life of everyone depended on you. I studied all the artifacts left around while the others rested. I did it only because I thought that learning about runes might boost our chances of survival." She replied as the lights in the tower turned red in embarrassment.
"As I was saying, even though the Odi blade has a pseudo core as strong as Phloria's, the entirety of its surface is covered in runes, whereas Orion used barely thirty runes in total."
"Are you telling me that Orion is already able to do much better than the Odi?" Lith's shock almost made his mouth fall on the floor.
"Well, it's no surprise if you consider that he is likely to use state of the art magic whereas the Odi stopped making any advancement centuries ago. Phloria's blade is just made of Orichalcum yet it would have been able to take the Odi on equal footing even if the other one used an Adamant sword.
"The main difference between the two weapons is that the Odi's was designed akin to a mana blade. By pumping the mana they received from the Reactor into it, the sword can be turned into the rough equivalent of a laser blade." Solus explained.
"I wish I could imprint it and discover its powers! It would be a huge step in understanding how runes work with different enchantments. I can't even fuse it to retrieve the damn Adamant!" Lith cursed the Odi and their self-destruct mechanism.
"Maybe, and maybe not." Solus said with a triumphant smile. "Rather than give it away to the Griffon Kingdom in exchange for pocket money and a handshake, we might as well try to purify it with Origin Flames."