Later that night, Rune pulled her usual midnight training session in the courtyard. As she moved through her forms, she noticed a soft, dim light emanating from the lower workshop window. Moving completely without sound, her quartz armor catching the faint moonlight, she peered through the glass.

Inside, Eliot was hunched over a workbench, meticulously repairing the heavy, hand-carved plates of Vane's obsidian armor and Alden’s vanguard gear.

"What are you doing awake at this hour, Sir Eliot?" she asked quietly, hopping through the window frame.

Eliot practically jumped out of his skin, dropping his wrench. "Oh! Princess—"

"Knight Rune Vesper, please," she interrupted gently. "I am no princess anymore."

"Oh. What happened? If you don't mind me asking?" Eliot asked softly, adjusting his glasses.

"Let's just say I was born a princess but bloomed into a knight... and my father strongly despised the final result," she said simply, closing the subject. "What are you doing up so late?"

Eliot let out a frustrated sigh, looking down at the heavy metal plating. "I'm just trying to upgrade Vane and Alden's armor matrices before the next shadow wave hits. His Majesty also expects me to invent a filtration system for the dark chemical smoke choking our factories... but the schematics keep failing." He buried his face in his hands, oversharing out of pure exhaustion. "Oh, structural seals! I'm sorry, I shouldn't be dumping this much protocol data on a guest. I'm completely useless."

"Hey. Look at me. It's okay," Rune said firmly, stepping into his line of sight. "I don't mind, and I have zero intention of exploiting your data. But you need to stop talking to yourself like that. Your subconscious automatically accepts whatever labels you repeatedly assign to your identity over time."

The advice made Eliot smile, his expression instantly reminding Rune of her younger brother, Prince Marshall. Within minutes, the two scholars were deep in conversation, their minds pulling data from each other seamlessly.

By the time the first threads of dawn broke through the sky, Vane walked down into the workshop, fully geared for his morning shift. He stopped dead in his tracks.

The entire workshop was an absolute disaster zone. Blueprints were pinned to every available surface, metal scraps littered the floor, and Eliot and Rune were aggressively arguing over a massive mechanical prototype. Rune had completely stripped off her quartz plating, standing only in her thin inner uniform, with her armor pieces scattered across the floor.

"Have you two literally been up all night?" Vane asked in utter disbelief.

"Vane! Look at this!" Eliot yelled excitedly, despite the massive dark circles under his eyes. "Knight Vesper figured it out! The King is going to be ecstatic! We just need to construct the physical apparatus and run a live test! She suggested adding a molecular regeneration valve to the exhaust lines, which means the factory smoke will automatically neutralize its own toxins before leaving the stacks!"

"That's incredible, Eliot," Vane said gently, walking over. "But... we're stopping right now."

"What?! Why?!" both Rune and Eliot demanded simultaneously.

"Because neither of you can build a continental filtration system while surviving entirely on disgusting, dirt-flavored energy potions and zero sleep," Vane said firmly.

Before Rune could protest, Vane stepped forward and casually scooped both her and Eliot up into his arms, carrying them toward the residential wing like a couple of stubborn children. "You have a mandatory briefing with the Duke later today, and you aren't attending looking like ghosts."

Eliot immediately started whining, demanding to be let down, but Rune’s reaction caught Vane completely off guard.

Her entire frame went completely rigid with pure horror and absolute panic.

"H-Hey! Let go! I can walk on my own! Let go of me!" she demanded, her voice shaking violently.

Vane immediately set her down, startled by the genuine terror in her eyes. The moment her feet hit the floor, Rune scrambled backward, her hands trembling as she tightly gripped her wrists. She was still wearing her specialized tech-magic gloves—the ones she absolutely refused to take off.

With a frantic sequence of commands, her scattered quartz armor pieces flew across the workshop, snapping and locking violently back onto her frame. The moment the visor slid down, hiding her face, her shaky posture instantly stabilized into an icy, unyielding composure.

"You know... you could have simply told me to go to bed," Rune said, her voice tight as she stabilized her breathing. "There was absolutely no requirement for physical contact."

Vane stood frozen, realizing that she absolutely despised being touched without warning.

Five hours later, Rune was standing in the corner of the grand Estoran training grounds. Vane's second younger brother, Torin Steel, was currently attempting to train the youngest siblings—a group of toddlers aged five to seven who were completely ignoring his instructions and running amok.

Torin ran his fingers through his dark-orange hair, which was streaked with the distinct white lines unique to their bloodline, looking entirely defeated.

Vane walked over, noticing Rune standing perfectly straight in her corner. "Princess? What are you doing out here? You and Eliot were up the entire night."

Rune glared at him through her visor. "I secured exactly five hours of sleep, Vanguard. That is more than enough to maintain a flawless performance standard all day. Drop the subject."

"But this isn't healthy—" Vane started.

"I survived far worse conditions in the Silaxen court," Rune cut him off sharply, her voice dropping into a hiss. "You think I can't handle a basic schedule shift in a foreign territory? Do not project your limitations onto me."

She immediately turned away, executing a flawless, aggressive sequence of sword forms in her isolated corner.

"Yeesh," Percy murmured from the sidelines, watching her move. "How is she an actual princess? She's sharp, hyper-focused, incredibly protective, and has absolutely zero softness to her."

Rune paused her form, noticing Eliot watching the training from the benches, looking down at his own hands. She walked over, a small, genuine smile tugging at her lips. "What are you doing sitting on the sidelines, Scholar?"

Eliot scratched the back of his neck, looking down at the dirt. "Oh... well, I was never the fighting type. No matter how hard I try—physically, emotionally, or tactically—I just can't do it. It makes me feel entirely helpless in a family full of legendary generals. I'm just a geek."

"Believe me, I am highly familiar with that dynamic," Rune said softly, leaning against the railing. "I have two geeks for brothers back home, and one of them happens to be the Crown Prince of Silax. But the point is that you are actively trying, Eliot. You remind me a lot of my little brother, Prince Marshall, though you have a much bolder analytical mind. Come on. You at least need to know the basic parry forms."

From the center of the field, Alden scoffed loudly, shearing his broadsword. "What would a pocket-sized outsider know about the basics of Estoran combat? We don't even believe half of your theories, girl."

Rune’s focus instantly shifted, her eyes locking onto the General. "I don't particularly care what you believe, General Ferro. But I am more than willing to take whatever advantages I can get. Let's put our respective combat data to a live test... if your ego can handle the parameters."

Alden smiled wickedly, his eyes flashing with dangerous amusement. Torin Steel’s face went entirely pale; he knew Alden was considered the most lethal frontline commander in the entire country. The idea of a petite, mid-20s Silaxen princess challenging the General of the border defenses to a live duel was madness.

"Umm, Brother Alden! I'm entirely certain Rune didn't mean to—" Torin tried to intervene.

"No, I definitively meant every syllable," Rune interrupted smoothly, stepping onto the center sands. "Besides, I've been meaning to analyze the Estoran defensive style. When I fought Vane for the first time, he was entirely stuck in a defensive feedback loop and didn't dare strike back. Let's see what a real Estoran commander can execute."

She effectively fed the flames of Alden's massive pride.

"You better understand exactly what type of conflict you are initiating, Princess," Alden warned, his smirk widening as he dropped into a heavy stance.

"Show me your data," Rune challenged.

She stood with the absolute, terrifying confidence of someone who had already lost everything she ever owned. She had no status, no kingdom left to defend, and no family backing her play. She was her own protector, her own supporter, and her own anchor.

The duel began with an explosion of sand. Alden was instantly taken aback by her sheer flexibility; her movements were a flawless, unpredictable hybrid of multiple different continental fighting styles fused into one fluid motion. Yet, using his massive size and heavy leverage, Alden executed a crushing shield-bash, sending Rune's sword flying across the courtyard, embedding it deep into the reinforced stone flooring where her tech-magic gauntlets couldn't recall it.

Alden smirked, expecting her to yield. But instead of backing down, Rune simply clenched her bare fists, dropping into a lethal, low-profile martial arts stance.

Alden didn't feel sorry for her. He didn't lower his weapon like Vane would have; he aggressively swung his heavy broadsword straight at her. Rune moved like a feather caught in a slipstream, completely avoiding his cutting edge with millimetric precision. Slipping entirely past his guard, she delivered a brutal, stone-hard punch straight to his chest plate.

She struck the exact same structural weld three times in rapid succession, her non-magical, raw physical strength causing Alden’s heavy vanguard armor to visibly crack.

As Alden’s movements slowed from the shock of the impacts, Rune took her window. Sprinting across the sand, she grabbed the hilt of her embedded sword, ripping it out of the stone flooring with all her might. With a sweeping arc, she closed the distance to finish the match.

But just as the edge of her blade was about to cleave his skull, Hart—the emotional, deeply empathetic side of Rune's inner psyche—took complete control of her mind.

Rune violently halted her momentum, pinning the glowing edge of her blade a mere millimeter away from Alden's throat.

"Damn it," Rune muttered under her breath, her voice laced with pure annoyance as she stared down at the stunned general. She absolutely hated that deeply hidden, kind heart of hers—the piece that continuously restricted her from letting Avery take their combat to the absolute, lethal extreme. Avery wanted nothing more than to completely dismantle his defense, erase his smug expression, and execute the threat.

Rune calmly pulled her sword back from his throat, the sharp ringing of the steel fading into the stunned, dead silence of the courtyard.

Alden remained flat on his back in the dirt, staring up at her through his shattered chest plate, his breathing frantic. His identical bright eyes—usually so full of unyielding pride—were wide with absolute disbelief. A pocket-sized knight from Silax had just systematically dismantled his entire military fighting style using nothing but raw human agility and her bare fists.

"You left your guard open, General," Rune said coldly, her voice entirely steady under her helmet as she sheared her blades back onto her back.

Torin Steel and the younger siblings stood like literal statues, completely speechless. Vane stepped forward, offering a silent, deeply respectful nod to Rune, before looking down at his stunned older brother. "I told you not to underestimate her, Alden."