The apartment was quiet when Sirius returned from training.
Outside, Insomnia pulsed with life: magitek trams hummed along glass rails, neon glyphs flashed advertisements in the night, and the crystalline dome above shimmered with faint light from the Crystal. But inside the Blake home, silence ruled. The wards embedded in the walls softened the city's noise until it was little more than a murmur, like a dream slipping away.
Sirius' body throbbed with exhaustion. His arms trembled from drills, his knees ached from stances repeated until his legs felt carved from stone. Yet the pain was nothing compared to the weight pressing in his chest—the memory of Cor's blade finding him in silence, of shadows swallowing him whole, of how much further he had to go.
From down the hall, a cough drifted faintly. His mother.
He padded softly to her door, pressing a hand against the frame. Through the small gap, he glimpsed Lyla curled beneath her blankets. The lamplight caught faintly in her hair—white as snow, though her face was still young. Her breath came shallow, a fragile rhythm that made his chest tighten with each pause.
He lingered longer than he should have, guilt tugging at him, then eased the door closed. His father's words echoed faintly in his memory: Don't make her worry more than she already does.
Sirius swallowed the lump in his throat and turned toward the study.
---
The study smelled of old ink, dust, and the faint tang of oiled steel. Reports were stacked neatly against one wall, soldier's manuals lined in perfect order. Maps pinned the walls, crisscrossed with Dominic's careful handwriting.
Sirius set down his practice sword, intending only to distract himself with reading—something, anything to quiet the ache gnawing at him. His fingers brushed across the desk, straightening parchment, before pausing on a small wooden chest tucked half-buried beneath military orders.
Curiosity pricked.
He lifted the lid.
Inside lay folded documents, some maps, and beneath them, a leather-bound journal worn at the corners. The handwriting across the first page was sharp, disciplined—familiar.
Dominic Blake.
Sirius' pulse quickened. His father's words were always measured, never more than necessary. To see them here, captured on paper, felt like trespass and revelation all at once.
He sat, lanternlight spilling across the desk, and began to read.
---
The early entries were terse. Notes of patrols. Weather reports. Lists of monsters sighted along Leide's borders. Records written not for himself, but for duty.
But the tone shifted as he turned the pages.
Month 7.
"Lyla collapsed. She says it was exhaustion. I know it is more."
Sirius' throat tightened.
Another entry, the script pressed heavier into the page:
"The healer called it Nyxshade Syndrome. Rare. The body fails to carry light through its veins. Fatigue, weakness, hair paling too soon. They say it cannot be cured."
His hands trembled on the journal. Nyxshade. A name at last. A truth hidden from him.
He read on.
"Potions ease her pain for a day. Hi-Potions, three. Elixirs, a week. A Hi-Elixir, two. But the Superior Restorative… a month. The Megalixir… two. They are not sold in markets. They exist only in dungeons. Treasures locked where no healer dares tread."
Sirius gripped the page so tightly it nearly tore. His father had known. His mother had borne the weight in silence. And he—he had been blind, caught between childish ignorance and the burden of two lives.
Another entry followed, the ink darker, as though pressed through the page itself:
"If only I could find them for her. But I am sworn to the King. My oath binds me."
The words struck like a blade. Sirius slammed the journal shut, his chest burning.
---
He sat in the lantern's glow, breathing hard. Then his eyes fell on the corner of the desk where a rolled map lay, half-buried beneath parchment. He pulled it free, brushing dust from the edges, and spread it open.
A world map of Lucis.
The capital gleamed at its center, with roads winding outward like veins of light. Beyond them stretched wilderness—plains, forests, caverns. Marked in ink were locations labeled only as dungeons.
Sirius' pulse quickened.
He knew these places. Not from Dominic's journal. From somewhere else. From the life that still whispered in fragments at the back of his mind.
He reached for a pencil, circling them one by one with careful precision:
Keycatrich Trench
Costlemark Dungeon
Malmalam Thicket
Balouve Mines
Myrlwood
Names etched into both his memory and the parchment before him. To Dominic, they were mysteries. To Sirius, they were clear, carved into him as deeply as scars.
He opened his own notebook and copied the names, his handwriting sharp, almost frantic. At the bottom of the page, he pressed hard enough to score the paper:
"The dungeons must have at least these: Superior Restorative. Megalixir."
He underlined it once. Twice. A third time.
The words stared back at him like law.
---
He leaned back, the lantern flickering shadows across his face. His chest heaved with uneven breaths, the promise of answers and the weight of impossibility crushing in equal measure.
He didn't yet know these places were sacred tombs of kings, resting places of Royal Arms. To him, they were lifelines—vaults of salvation hidden in the wilds.
He pressed his notebook to his chest, closing his eyes. The vow slipped from his lips in a whisper.
"I know where to go, Mom. One day, I'll bring them back."
---
The lantern hummed softly. From down the hall, Lyla's cough broke the silence. Sirius clenched his fists until his nails dug into his palms.
This was why he trained. Why he endured Cor's merciless trials, why he bled in drills and forced his battered body to rise again. Not for titles. Not for glory. Not even for himself.
But for her.
The creed whispered sharper than ever, not as words from Cor's lips but as truth written in his bones: Protect unseen. Bleed without witness.
If he had to bleed unseen in the dark, let it be for her.
That night, Sirius Blake swore silently: he would find the dungeons. He would claim their treasures. He would change the fate written for his family.