Viola leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms.
“So,” she said, “should we expect trouble?”
Torvares answered without much hesitation.
“We shouldn’t.”
His tone was calm, certain in the way it usually became when speaking about things he had already weighed from several angles.
“No one in their right mind would try something during an event like this,” he said. “Not when the entire empire will have its eyes on it.”
That was true enough.
The emperor’s birthday was not some private gathering tucked behind noble walls where quiet knives could disappear into political darkness. It was a stage. A public one. Too many eyes. Too many witnesses. Too many factions watching each other to let something reckless pass without consequence.
Viola nodded. “Then we shouldn’t be worried.”
She paused.
Then added with obvious satisfaction, “Unless Ludger picks a fight with someone.”
Ludger did not even bother reacting at first. Viola, of course, continued.
“We’ve all heard about it,” she said. “You’ve apparently taken quite a liking to fighting the northerners on equal grounds and terms.”
Ludger shrugged again, the motion faintly irritating in its simplicity.
“I’m just keeping them on their toes.”
Luna turned her head slightly toward him.
“That sounds more like you’re being overconfident because you can heal yourself.”
Ludger glanced at her. Luna, as usual, was not done.
“You still have signs of damage,” she said. “Your ears, for example.”
Viola leaned forward immediately, interested.
Luna pointed lightly. “And the scratches.”
Ludger clicked his tongue once.
They were right. The marks had mostly faded, but not completely. There were still a few thin signs left behind, small scratches near the ears, the last remnants of several weeks of willingly letting oversized northerners treat his head like a target.
Ludger, however, remained entirely unbothered.
“They’re my medals,” he said.
Viola blinked. “What?”
“For all my victories.”
There was not even a trace of irony in his voice. That somehow made it worse. Viola stared at him for a second, then leaned back again with the long-suffering look of someone who had just confirmed an old suspicion beyond all doubt.
“Arguing with you is a waste of time,” she said.
Ludger looked ahead at the road. “Then don’t.”
Viola snorted. “Walls are better at listening.”
Luna gave the faintest nod. “That’s true.”
Ludger’s expression stayed flat. “That seems unfair to walls.”
Viola groaned softly and rubbed at her temple. “See? This is exactly what I mean.”
From behind them, Torvares let out a quiet sound that was dangerously close to amusement.
The carriage kept moving, the road stretching forward beneath the muted hum of runes, while the brief calm inside it settled into the familiar shape of their group: Viola complaining, Luna observing too much, Torvares enjoying more than he admitted, and Ludger remaining just difficult enough to make all of it inevitable.
Thanks to the runic carriage, they barely needed to stop.
The enchantments built into the frame kept the ride smooth, steady, and far faster than a normal carriage had any right to be. As long as the runes were supplied properly and nothing went wrong, they could keep moving for long stretches without forcing the horses, or the people inside, to suffer for it. That meant the only real reason to stop was to eat, stretch a little, and make sure no one started becoming stupid from sitting too long.
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It made the trip efficient. It also left Ludger with more time than usual to notice things. For example, he had expected Viola to challenge him at some point. Not seriously.
Not in the middle of the road with luggage bouncing behind them and Torvares pretending not to be involved. But at least a comment. A provocation. Some demand to spar during one of their breaks so she could show off the results of her training.
That was the sort of thing she normally did.
Especially after making progress. Especially if he was there to witness it. But she never did. Not once.
Instead, she stayed inside the carriage most of the time, apparently content to relax. Which, coming from Viola, was unusual enough on its own to feel mildly suspicious. She did not exactly have the temperament of someone who let opportunities for attention pass quietly.
Torvares, meanwhile, had solved the problem of travel boredom in the most old-man way possible.
He was reading a book. Not sleeping. Not drinking. Not staring out the window in thought. Just calmly reading as if they were in a quiet study instead of on the road toward the capital for an imperial event full of hidden agendas and potential irritation.
Ludger respected it more than he wanted to admit.
That left only Luna sharing the outside watch with him. Even that felt slightly excessive. At least for now. It was too soon for trouble.
The roads nearest Torvares territory were secure enough, and no one should have been foolish enough to try anything this early into the trip. Still, Luna remained as alert as always, her posture composed, her attention spread across the road and the surrounding land with the sort of readiness most people could not maintain for long without exhausting themselves.
But Luna was not most people.
She kept scanning the surroundings in a steady rhythm, her eyes moving from one side of the road to the other, catching details without seeming hurried. Forest edge. Hill line. Track marks. Open stretches. Shadows between trees. The whole landscape passed beneath her quiet scrutiny like she was peeling it apart layer by layer without ever needing to make a show of it.
Ludger said nothing. He simply kept driving and let the silence sit between them. Now and then, though, he had the odd feeling that she was looking at him. Not directly. Not obviously. Just… enough to notice.
A faint sense of attention landing on him for half a second before disappearing. The first time, he ignored it.
The second time, he thought maybe it was accidental.
The third time, he turned his head slightly to catch it… And found Luna already looking somewhere else.
The road. The trees. The distant rise to the left. Anywhere but him.
Ludger stared at her profile for a brief second. Then looked ahead again.
A little while later, the same thing happened. That strange flicker of attention. That small, nearly imperceptible weight of being watched.
Again he turned just enough to check.
Again Luna’s gaze was somewhere else entirely, calm and focused like she had never once been interested in him to begin with.
Ludger frowned very slightly. There were only two explanations. Either Luna had somehow learned to twist her neck at the speed of light… Or he was imagining things. Given his recent weeks of getting punched in the head by northerners for stress relief, neither option felt especially comforting. So he stayed quiet.
The carriage rolled onward beneath the steady hum of runes, the road stretching ahead in long cold lines, while Luna continued her watch with maddening consistency.
And every so often, Ludger still had the feeling that someone beside him was looking his way just before he turned and found nothing at all.
After a while, Ludger finally glanced sideways at Luna and said, “You can go inside and relax too.”
She did not move.
Ludger kept his eyes on the road as he continued, “I have security covered with Seismic Sense and Mana Sense.”
That should have been enough. For most people, it would have been. Luna, however, was not most people.
She stayed where she was, calm as ever, and said, “You’ve gotten overconfident recently.”
Ludger’s expression did not change.
“So you might miss some details.”
That made him look at her.
“It isn’t overconfidence,” he said. “It’s just confidence that I can smash most people to a pulp with ease.”
Luna took that in without the slightest visible reaction.
Then she said, “Being overconfident is part of you.”
Ludger stared at her. She went on in the same calm, almost annoyingly reasonable tone.
“You’ve always been like that. Since we first met.”
That made him click his tongue softly. Luna, of course, did not stop there.
“The only good thing about it,” she added, “is that you’re not arrogant.”
Ludger raised a brow faintly.
Luna explained, “You’re too focused on improving for that. You always keep trying to get stronger, sharper, better. That’s what stops your overconfidence from turning straight into a death trap.”
For a moment, only the hum of the runic carriage filled the space between them. Then Ludger looked forward again.
“That almost sounded like praise.”
“It wasn’t.”
“I think it was.”
Luna shook her head lightly. “It was an observation.”
“That sounds like praise disguised as caution.”
“That sounds like you are hearing what you want.”
Ludger let out a faint breath through his nose that was almost a laugh, but not quite. Annoyingly enough, she was not wrong. His confidence had grown.
It would have been strange if it hadn’t. He had become stronger, survived more, seen more, killed more dangerous things, and carried burdens most people never even brushed against. Pretending otherwise would have been stupidity disguised as humility.
Still, Luna’s point landed cleanly enough. Confidence became rot very quickly if left unchecked. And while Ludger had no intention of apologizing for knowing what he could do, he also understood the difference between trusting his strength and blindly assuming it solved everything.
That difference was exactly why he was still alive.
So after a short silence, he said, “Fine. Stay, then.”
Luna nodded once, like that had always been the obvious outcome.
And the two of them continued watching the road ahead, one with senses spread beneath the earth and through the flow of mana, the other with eyes sharp enough to catch what confidence might decide to ignore.
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