She raised her eyes. This was the only voice she was able to recognize, the voice of her father.

“Get up. We’re going.” Her father appeared in front of the door, “These go on your feet.”

Yumeka took the objects her father handed to her and slid her feet into them. She stepped out of the room and onto the wet soil, but unlike the times she tried it before, her feet now remained dry. She didn’t look back on the room but instead closed the gap between her and her father, until she was only two steps behind him.

“The car is ready for you, Mr. Mizushima.” One of the attendants spoke to her father, leading them towards something Yumeka couldn’t even begin to describe. The attendant opened a door and her father entered the ‘car’. The door closed behind him and she could no longer see him, since the entirety of the car was black. The attendant opened a different door and held it open.

“Yumeka, what are you doing? Sit down.” Her father commanded and she joined him in the car. He didn’t sit next to her, but instead on her opposite side. Two attendants joined them, one sat next to her and the other one next to her father. Suddenly, they started moving, and Yumeka tried to grab at something to maintain her balance.

“How long until we’re in the air?” Her father asked.

“Two hours sire.” The attendant next to her father spoke, “A private jet has been reserved for our use. Along with the necessary precautions, of course.”

“We can never be too careful.” Her father nodded, “Those bastard loving councilmen might as well use this opportunity to kill me. I don’t trust any of them as far as I can throw them.” 

“Quite right, sire.”

Yumeka had no idea what the men were talking about, and she didn’t ask. Her father never replied to any of her questions – no matter the subject, so instead Yumeka used the opportunity to look around. She noticed all three men had a black strap along their chest, and that it connected to the seat underneath them. Yumeka’s eyes quickly located a strap next to her, she pulled it, tying it similarly to her father.

Seifen was sitting in the garden adjacent to the council’s building. In his hand the two envelopes Tarek handed to him and Zaizen an hour prior. Zaizen was of course nowhere to be seen after he mumbled something about making it in time for a wedding and ran off, leaving Seifen to handle both assignments. This wasn’t surprising behavior on the part of his mentor, nor was it particularly surprising Seifen had stepped in in Zaizen’s place. If anything, Seifen smiled, if Zaizen had somehow managed to complete his part of the mission without a hitch, it would have shocked him to his core.

Not far from him, he saw the gate open, and a long black limousine made its way through the driveway. The car stopped as close as possible to the Aegis’ building, and four people came out of it. Three men and a young woman, all wearing wrapped-front garments, with long square sleeves and a sash tied around their waist. All the men had blue and purple robes, the colors of the Water Genus, but the woman’s robes were more colorful. In fact, Seifen narrowed his eyes, there wasn’t a speck of neither blue nor purple on her, a decision no doubt was intentional.

The castle was bigger than anything Yumeka could envision, even in her dreams. Her room was not only small in comparison, but also very much different. She couldn’t explain why and how, but she felt transported into another world, a world she knew nothing of. Her feet led her towards a garden which was filled with various flowers and plants. Yumeka crouched next to one of them, her eyes closed, and took a deep breath in. The pleasant scent enveloped her, and when she opened her eyes, she finally noticed the man who had long taken note of her.

Her eyes widened; he looked nothing like any person she had ever met. His hair was the color of the sun, and his eyes were the color of the sky, Yumeka thought, unable to take her eyes off him. Seifen smiled and closed the distance between them, and Yumeka noticed she had to raise her chin quite a bit to meet his gaze. 

“Hello.” Seifen said, but Yumeka just kept staring at the man with the strange clothes. To her, he was just like the flower she had smelled earlier, something out of a world she did not feel a part of. She had no knowledge of etiquette or manner, so naturally she had no idea her behavior was considered extremely rude, but if Seifen had thought it as such, he didn’t show any of it on his face.

Seifen however, was immensely puzzled by the girl before him. Everything about her was utterly defenseless. She didn’t notice his presence until they were mere feet apart, nor did her expression convey any sort of emotion. Seifen wondered of her eyes most of all – violet, blue, green and even somewhat yellow – the girl’s eyes resembled a glowing crystal, but as beautiful as her eyes were, there seemed to be nothing reflecting in them. Her gaze was almost mindless, Seifen thought, he couldn’t even begin to guess as to what was going through her mind.

“They sure are taking a while in there, aren’t they?” Seifen added after a while, but the girl still did not answer.

“I’m Seifen, by the way.” Seifen extended his hand, “I’ll be accompanying you to retrieve the water relic.”

Yumeka had no idea what most of the words he said meant, but realized that ‘Seifen’ must be the man’s name.

“Yumeka.” She pointed to herself, realizing that this was the first time she has said her own name out loud, since she had never introduced herself to another person before. She then took notice of his hand in the air and mirrored the gesture. Both hands hovering in the air in front of them. Seifen leaned forward, his hand enclasping hers. For a second Yumeka was taken aback by the sudden gesture, but she did not remove her hand from his grasp. There was something nice about this exchange, even if she didn’t know what it was. His hand was warm, Yumeka thought, even when Seifen released his grip she could still feel the warmth on her palm.

Seifen has long realized something was wrong. Yumeka, the Water Pure of Heart, was nothing like any mage he had met before. Seifen’s eyes widened as an inconceivable thought took root in his mind.

“Yumeka,” Seifen spoke, the words escaping his lips before his mind could properly register their meaning, “Can you use magic?”

Yumeka who was now hunched in front of a different flower, raised her colorful eyes to Seifen.

“This is preposterous!” Vlasis yelled out, “How could something like this happen?!”

“And that fiend Daiyuki.” Avatz gritted his teeth, “The gall of that scoundrel! To call me, out of all people, ‘bastard lover’?!”

“It wasn’t just you.” the representative currently manning the Sound Genus chair, Yuri, smiled, “Delano almost killed him, didn’t you, brother?” Yuri turned towards one of the two sound mages behind him, the beefy and muscular one grunted in response.

“Can’t we do anything about that?” Eogen asked, looking at Alleria.

“Technically he’s right. He just needs to provide the Pure of Heart, no one ever said he needed to teach her magic.” Alleria shrugged her shoulders.

“And choosing a woman for that…” Tarek’s eyes narrowed to thin slits, “Despicable.”

“Yumeka did not leave with them. Does it mean that we continue with our original plan to retrieve the relic?” Seifen asked. As soon as the Water Genus party left, he was summoned back into the chamber.

“We couldn’t have gone and told him we summoned her here just to see if he’s loyal!” Vlasis yelled, “We can’t just say ‘take her back we don’t want her’!”