32.1. Acknowledged - Part 1

We lock ourselves in the conference room. To be honest, I'd have preferred to do it in our apartment but that might be too suspicious. Here, we can pretend that we're communicating with the security department and planning things. Miruel and Vermiel stand guard in front of the door, making sure no one interrupts us.

"Don't overdo it, Ryuu," Erik warns me. "You're still recuperating."

"I'll do whatever is necessary to get them," I say resolutely. "But just in case I faint, don't call Julia and just let me rest. I should be fine."

My boyfriend sighs and looks at the gang. Only Liana is missing, sleeping in her bedroom. It's for the best, she deserves rest more than anybody and I should finally prove to her that she can count on me. If I have to become the Celestial Emperor, I should start acting like one. And being reliable is part of the job.

"Will you be able to tell us right away when you find something?" Fefnir asks and is clutching his phone.

"It's long-distance telepathy, not astral projection, Fefnir," I roll my eyes. "I'll be perfectly aware of everything around me so don't distract me."

"Like that, Aefener?" Ingri puts several pillows and a blanket she took from the lounge on the floor.

"Perfect, thanks," I nod. "Much better than a chair," I eye the seats in the conference room. Definitely not made for Celestials.

"You look like you're about to meditate," Erik chuckles to relieve the tension and helps me sit down on the cushions while putting the blanket under my knees.

"That's actually exactly what I'm going to do," I say. "We've been training it with Julia, remember?"

I envelop myself into my wings, cross my legs and naturally straighten my back. Perfect, most comfortable. I take a deep breath and close my eyes. I used my ability like this before in Liana's mansion, of course, but I didn't control it that well. But now I feel that I am in control. Is it thanks to my training? Or because I don't struggle with my Celestial nature?

"Erik, stop it, please," I say without opening my eyes. "I love it but I feel you too strongly when you're touching me."

"Sorry," he lets go of my wings he started caressing. He's been doing it almost automatically lately. Whenever there's an opportunity, his hands find my feathers. A lovely new quirk. But not now.

I breathe in deeply once again and try to calm down my frantic thinking. I count ten breaths until it works and I become a bit more detached from my own thoughts. The emotions I perceive all around me sharpen and I can sense perfectly well what my friends are feeling right now. Anxiety. Fear. Distress. Uncertainly about our future.

But I don't go for their feelings, I need to find people who aren't supposed to be here— the intruders who stole my feather. I filter all Draconians but I'm still left with a few dozen humans. I'm searching for emotions like hatred that are always strongest and easiest to spot but all I get is just slight disgust coming from several sources which is probably normal.

"I... I didn't get anything," I open my eyes and chew my lip.

"You couldn't do it?" Erik clutches my hand in comfort. "That's okay, Ryuu, you're still training it after all."

"No, I could do it," I shake my head because I feel my friends are really confused by the outcome. "I perceived everyone in the skyscraper but there's no one who would want to hurt us."

"So they either fled already," Fefnir narrows his eyes, "or they don't want to sabotage us."

"Do you mean to tell me they were satisfied with just taking Aefener's feather?" Emi stays sceptical and impatiently thumbs her right foot (o rather a paw?) against the floor.

"Can't it be connected to the intrusion in Liana's mansion?" Ingri is thinking aloud. "We never found out who hired them but we do know that they wanted to abduct our Aefener."

"Could be," Emi agrees. "It's evident someone is seriously after him. If they really went only after the feather and fled immediately when they got it, knowing they can't get Aefener himself, they might want it for DNA testing as Julia suggested."

"But who? For what purpose?" I'm lost. "I was no one before. Just a student. A gamer."

"You call being a telepath no one?" Emi nudges me and exemplary rolls her eyes. "Is there someone who might suspect you have this ability?"

"Only my Mom knew and she's dead," I claim.

"But you were just four at that time," Erik says. "She might have told someone without you knowing. Or you don't remember it."

"What about your father? You never mentioned him. Is he dead too?" Fefnir asks. A rather too directly to my liking so I frown and purse my lips.

"Some subtlety, Fefnir?" Ingri pokes him hard but I doubt he felt that through his scaly skin.

"I won't apologise, it's high time Aefener starts to ask right questions about his origins," Fefnir stands his ground. "To be honest, I'm shocked he's so uninterested in it."

"Because it's dangerous!" I exclaim and get extremely flustered for some reason.

"Ryuu, what's wrong?" Erik hugs me right away. "You're shaking."

"I.... I'm not sure," my lips tremble. For a moment, a sense of dread overcame me when I started thinking about my father. "I never knew him, my Mom left him before I was born."

"Are you sure? Because it seems you're afraid of him," Ingri suggests carefully. "Maybe you forgot? I mean... come on, who actually remembers things that happened when they were four?"

"I remember some things, Mom made sure of that because she wanted to protect me," I insist. "Don't touch people carelessly. Don't react to things that aren't said aloud. Don't you ever tell anyone about your ability. Don't..."

I freeze for a second. Don't... what was the fourth rule again?

"Ryuu?" Erik stops the petting. "Don't...?"

"There was something...," I mumble, dumbfounded.

"Something about your father perhaps?" Fefnir helps me.

I feel that dread again. Why? Why is even thinking about a person I've never met so unpleasant? Did he hurt me? But I'm sure my Mom wasn't lying. It's very hard to lie to me after all. Mom, what's the fourth rule? What had you been telling me? Don't...

"Don't you ever look for your father," I say dreamily. The words just slip out of my lips.

My friends look at each other with raised eyebrows, confused at first, then worried. Erik, doting as he is, doesn't say anything and works on calming me down because I'm still shaken. I couldn't love him more for that.

"Is it possible you've been conditioned by your mother not to look into your family background?" Emi voices what others are probably thinking. "If you feel scared just thinking about your father... I mean..."

"Conditioned? Well, my Mom supposedly studied both IT and behavioural psychology," I say faintly. "Or at least that's what my Gran told me. I believe she had no reason to lie about that."

"No shit!" Fefnir clicks his tongue in a dragon-like manners with a hiss.

Only it doesn't end with a simple hiss. He suddenly looks like he's about to puke, panics and starts coughing furiously.

"UGHAAAAA!" he wheezes and... a flame comes out of his mouth!

We're staring at him for ten long seconds when he struggles to take a breath. He coughs again and sparks come out, burning the carpet under him. Emi reacts immediately and uses the water in her glass to put it out.

"D-damn," Fefnir finally manages to take control.

"Fire breath confirmed!" Ingri exclaims excitedly, more thrilled than scared.

"He really is a dragon," Erik gasps as if this is the first time he's acknowledging it.

"Duh!" Emi shrugs. "I can't wait when I get my full were-transformation."

"You what?" Erik widens his eyes, astonished again. He did try to study Draconia's lore and gameplay but we were too busy so he couldn't go deep. There're a lot of things he doesn't know about and will probably come true.

"Don't worry, Celestials have nothing like that," I assure him because I feel he's starting to panic in his mind. "Our bodies are eternally frozen at a certain ideal age and we're not able to do any physical transformation of any kind."

"WHAT?!" now he shouts, horrified.

Only now I realise the gravity of what I've said. Celestials aren't immortal, of course, but according to our lore, when we reach certain age which slightly differs for everybody, our bodies get frozen and we don't age anymore. At least not externally... and definitely not as fast as humans.

"B-but...," he looks at me desperately and clutches my hand. Too tight but I don't flinch. I know exactly what he's afraid of—that we won't grow old together.

"It doesn't have to come true here," I say quickly to calm him down.

But when I focus on my mana circuit, I can feel the mana repairing my cells, giving them miraculous longevity. And I know that part of lore got transferred as well. Do other Celestials feel it as well? I guess not, they're still quite behind me in their development and mana sensitivity.

Erik, still touching me, knows what I'm thinking about because I hardly ever close my mind to him. He looks into my golden eyes, scared by what it'll eventually mean to us in the future. Surprisingly, I'm not as shocked by this revelation.

Am I gradually stopping to treat anything Draconian as unusual? Just like the rest of my people? I know it should be astonishing. I should be shocked. I want to be shocked. But I don't feel anything particularly wrong with that prospect. On the contrary, it feels just right. My only worry right now is how it'll effect our relationship.

"Erik?" I carefully address my boyfriend because I feel something snapping inside of him.

He's usually so sensible and collected that it takes me aback. It was always him comforting me, telling me everything's going to be okay. But now, for the first time, he's starting to think that things might now work out according to his wishes—the vision he has in mind for us.

Before I can reach deeper into him, he jerks away and his hand slips from mine. He can't close his mind to me so the only way how to interrupt our direct connection is to stop touching me. He stands up, his expression unreadable.

"I need some time to think," he whispers. "Sorry, Ryuu... I have to think it through."

"E-Erik?" I stutter.

The emotions I'm catching coming from him aren't dark but they aren't positive either. So far he was accepting everything about me but could this be the one thing he won't be able to digest?

"Sorry," he apologises again because he doesn't know what else to say and hurries to the door.