The air beyond the hidden corridor was different—calmer, untouched. The stone walls gave way to crystalline rock, faintly glowing with low-level Ather.
A narrow alcove opened into a cavern blanketed with luminous moss and trickling water. The sound of running droplets echoed gently, offering rare peace amid chaos.
"This'll do," Mia muttered, tossing her bloodied coat to the floor. "We patch up here."
Ellen silently crouched near the small stream, dipping a cloth into it and pressing it against her side where the Writheborn's fist had cracked into her ribs.
Noct leaned against a wall, breathing steadily. His mind was a storm of math and memory—formulas, angles, variables, and the rising hum of something else building deep in his chest.
"You alright?" Ellen asked him after a few minutes of silence.
He nodded… but hesitated. "When I use Numbers, it's like I can feel the rules of the world. But they don't always make sense. The more I reach for, the more it pulls back."
Ellen studied him. "You're overthinking it."
Mia snorted. "That's his whole thing. You overcalculate. We react."
He managed a small smile. "Guess we make a good team then."
Mia stretched out, lying flat against the moss with a deep sigh. "Don't get used to it. I still don't like you."
"But you saved me back there," he said.
She rolled her eyes. "I saved myself. You were just in the way."
Ellen laughed under her breath. "That's her being nice."
Noct finally sat, arms resting on his knees. The silence that followed wasn't awkward—it was the silence of survivors. Of people who had stared death in the face and walked away breathing.
After a while, Ellen pulled something from her pouch—a small, battered pendant. Its chain was tarnished, the emblem cracked.
Noct glanced at it. "What's that?"
Ellen stared at it a moment. "Belonged to someone I lost. He used to say: 'When the world falls apart, make sure your heart doesn't go with it.'" She looked at him, eyes cold but not unkind. "You've been through hell, Noct. But you're still here. That counts for something."
Mia closed her eyes. "Don't get soft on him."
"I'm not." Ellen tucked the pendant away. "But I'm not blind either. You've grown."
Noct didn't respond. His hand went instinctively to the ring he'd taken earlier. Even now, he could feel the flow of Ather rebalancing within him. Like the labyrinth had given him something in exchange for his pain.
They stayed there for hours—resting, recovering, sharpening blades.
Noct sat last, his gaze drifting upward toward the jagged ceiling. Somewhere above, the world believed he was dead.
But down here, beneath the stone and silence… he was beginning to understand who he really was.
And the Numbers were starting to speak.