Over the course of the next few days, the An and Lee families settled in together in their large estate. True to Chunhei’s words, the place really was easily large enough for three families. Even with six people occupying three bedrooms—Narae had opted to stay with her mother rather than get a room to herself—the place felt a bit empty. In order to rectify that, Jia filled one of the largest rooms and the courtyard adjacent to it with training equipment and made a point of inviting her friends for sparring and training as often as possible.

Eui’s parents quickly took to Jia’s sisters—particularly little Narae, who they were shocked to learn was already a cultivator. There was a little bit of early friction when Chunhei learned about Jung’s former profession, but those differences swiftly crumbled under the force of mutual momness.

“Oh, she’s so precious! And so smart for her age! You must be so proud.”

Jung demurred under Chunhei’s praise of her daughter.

“She means the world to me. If your daughter hadn’t saved my life, I don’t know what might have happened to her. She grew up fast, but...”

“Oh, it’s so terrible the way they treat the outer cities. To be a mother at such a young age—it’s not right! But I’m glad to have you here with us.”

And so it went, the Lee and An families swiftly merging into one over the course of just a few days. Ja Yun and Rika frequently visited for training and to relay messages, their own grumbling escorts in tow. It was clear that the guards didn’t appreciate being dragged around to babysit, but even Han Shin’s incessant grumbling couldn’t withstand Chunhei’s hospitality—though Jia couldn’t help but notice the way Eui or Minjun would always step in whenever she offered to cook.

Four days after moving into their new home, Hayakawa Kaede herself arrived for a visit, escorted by Captain Sagong. She arrived with a housewarming gift, or rather gifts—apparently a Yamato tradition. Jia wasn’t sure where she’d gotten them, but Hayakawa had brought a beautiful arrangement of flowers in red, pink, and white, a matching pair of kimonos for the An couple, a wood-element infused ginseng plant, and a perfect quality third-stage gravity core.

“Ha—Lady Hayakawa, this is too much, really—”

Hayakawa cut off Jia’s protests.

“Not at all. In fact, I hope you can forgive me for such a paltry housewarming gift. It was the best I could do on short notice.”

Jia strained to keep from rolling her eyes—rich people! Eui’s parents, at least, were absolutely over the moon to have such august company. Chunhei immediately lost herself in the dresses.

“This is amazing work! Is this Bai silk? How in the world did you acquire it?”

Hayakawa shook her head.

“The silk is sourced in Yamato—I can’t tell you more than that.”

“Tsk, that’s a shame—I’d love to work with some.”

Minjun stepped in neatly with a merchant’s smile.

“My wife is a seamstress and dress designer herself, you know. Perhaps we could work out a custom commission at cost—for a friend of the family. Please, come have a seat.”

Jia saw Hayakawa visibly twitch at the word ‘friend.’ Apparently she wasn’t entirely over her personal hangups, but nevertheless, she politely entertained the Ans’ sales pitch. She’d even placed an order by the time she was freed from their grasp hours later to join Jia in the training room. Jia smiled wryly at the taciturn woman as she entered, looking more than a little haggard.

“Got a bit distracted?”

Hayakawa sighed, clearly trying to keep herself from frowning without quite succeeding.

“I’ve never been one for social engagements, Miss Lee—I find them exhausting. They were quite persistent, too—I can see where Miss An gets her intensity. Speaking of which, will she not be joining us?”

Jia shrugged.

“She’s cooking dinner right now, but she’s here.”

She tapped her temple for emphasis, and Hayakawa furrowed her brows.

“Ah, yes—I must admit that I am still struggling to grasp that aspect of your cultivation.”

“You get used to it. Anyway, I assume you actually had something you needed to talk to us about—chat about it over a spar?”

Jia nodded her head towards the empty courtyard as she asked. The tension drained from Hayakawa’s shoulders, and she gave Jia a rare smile as she answered.

“I would love to. It pains me to say it, but you seem to know me much better than I do you.”

As they moved into the courtyard and took up their stances, Jia chewed that thought over, giving Hayakawa a helpless shrug.

“I’ve thought a lot about what you said before. Maybe we haven’t given you a fair chance. If I could make amends with Yue after everything she did—well, let’s just say I’m trying to be nicer.”

Hayakawa nodded once in acknowledgement, then their spar began. There was no signal—neither of them really needed it anymore. They simply sprang into action, both of them holding little back—though they stuck to basic martial arts in the interest of keeping the garden intact. Hayakawa expertly parried a series of strikes from Jia, redirecting her attacks and stepping to the side in a way that forced Jia off balance—even after all this time, Hayakawa still had the upper hand in martial skill. Hayakawa began to speak as Jia twisted herself out of the way of a reprisal.

“Our arrival has been acknowledged by the palace, and I’ve received word that we can expect to receive the schedule for our first audience in one month at the earliest.”

Jia nearly lost her footing in surprise, and had to scramble back to create some distance to make up for the error before she could respond.

“A month before they’ll see us? Isn’t it a bit weird to keep you waiting for so long?”

Hayakawa kept up the pressure, and Jia envied the way she could effortlessly continue the conversation while fighting.

“No, it’ll be at least a month before they even tell us when we’ll be seen. If my father were here in person, then perhaps we could expect an accelerated schedule, but I’m not him.”

Jia frowned, suppressing the urge to use her lightning ki as she attempted to slip past Hayakawa’s almost impenetrable guard—that would just escalate their spar beyond the scope of a simple exercise.

“Still, it’s a bit insulting, isn’t it? I wonder if I should try contacting Eunae after all.”

Hayakawa caught one of Jia’s strikes and pinned her arm. Before she could follow up, Jia used a technique from her less-used Soft Fist style to leverage her own pinned limb for a throw. Rather than be slammed to the ground, Hayakawa released the arm and flipped neatly over Jia to land back on her feet.

“I wouldn’t. Your association to her probably isn’t unknown, but if it was discovered that you have a direct line of communication with her, things might get a bit more difficult for us.”

“How so?”

“While I have no doubt that the central palace of a metropolis like Songdo is extremely busy, I think that the real reason we are being kept waiting is to give time for high nobles to send representatives and learn as much as they can about us and our motives. The less they know about our connections, the more advantages we’ll have during negotiations.”

Jia grumbled a bit at that, parrying a few of Hayakawa’s attacks with more force than necessary and earning herself a clean strike to the gut for her carelessness.

“Oof! Ugh, I don’t like that. I just want to see my friend again—we’re so close!”

“That’s understandable, but I’m sure you’ll have an opportunity to see her when we visit the castle for our preliminary audience.”

“Yeah, about that—there’s going to be more than one?”

Hayakawa sighed, then quickly ducked a claw-swipe trying to take advantage of the motion before she responded.

“Yes, Miss Lee. Negotiations like this are bound to take dozens of meetings, not just with the queen, but with prominent nobles, who we’ll want to get onto our side. This is going to take a long time.”

Finally, their spar came to a tipping point, when Hayakawa slipped inside of Jia’s reach—an impressive feat considering she was so much taller—and managed to disrupt her footing. Caught so far off balance within arms reach of Hayakawa left Jia helpless to defend herself as Hayakawa pinned an arm behind her back and dropped Jia to the ground with a knee against her throat.

“Ack! Yield!”

“Good fight, Miss Lee.”

Jia groaned as she stood up, panting for breath.

“Ancestors, even after all this time I can’t take you in a straight fight.”

Hayakawa shook her head, smiling ruefully.

“Between the two—or, three of us. With or without Miss An, I don’t think that I would win in a life-or-death battle against you. Your martial arts prowess alone is nearly a match for mine now, and despite my best efforts, I’ve made very little progress in the other disciplines.”

Jia considered that for a moment as she grabbed a towel to wipe away her sweat.

“Mm, well if you’re going to be training Narae, maybe we can use that time to help you cover your weaknesses as well. We just discovered a way to reconfigure your foundation into unified cultivation.”

“The one Miss Ja tested? With due respect, I’m not sure I’m ready to try something like that just yet. Still, I’ll happily accept the offer to train my arcane and spiritual arts with you.”

Jia nodded, thoughts of politics set aside for now. A love of cultivation was at least one thing that she shared with Hayakawa Kaede, and it seemed to be one of the keys to cracking her hard exterior. For once, it felt like neither of them was trying to gain something from the other—maybe there was hope for Hayakawa yet.

“It’s too heavy!”

Narae’s complaints fell on deaf ears as she swung a wooden practice sword for what must have been the thousandth time. Her new coach heard no complaints.

“Then make it lighter! Your swings are still too slow! For each bad swing I will make you do two more properly. Faster!”

An Chunhei frowned at the display as she set a tray of snacks down between Jia and Rika, who were taking a short break to watch Hayakawa train Narae.

“Isn’t that a little too harsh? She’s only—what, seven? Eight?”

Rika chuckled and shook her head.

“It’s mostly just bark. Hayakawa’s not actually going to force her to do more than she’s capable of, but she’s not going to let her get away with doing less, either. Truth be told, with how everyone fawns over her—myself included—Narae could probably use someone uncompromising like Hayakawa to keep her grounded before she gets too big a head.”

“If you say so...”

With that, Eui’s mother left the pair alone, returning to her work designing a new dress for Hayakawa’s commission. As she did, Eui returned from helping her father in the kitchen, and Jia couldn’t help but grin at how happy she seemed. For the last few weeks, Eui had practically been a completely different person. Her bright, cheery demeanor left almost no trace of her usual grumpy attitude. She flopped down into a seat next to Jia, wrapping an arm around her waist and drawing her in for a quick kiss.

“Hey guys! How goes the training?”

Rika propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin on her palm, watching the entire exchange with a smirk.

“Not bad—I think poor Narae is starting to question her life choices though.”

Eui snickered.

“As if any of us would go easier on her. She’s lucky she got Hayakawa instead of me. Are you not with Yun today?”

Rika shook her head.

“She’s tied up back at the embassy. Just me and grump-face this time.”

‘Grump-face’ in this context referred to Han Shin, the irritable bald guard who always seemed to have something to complain about. Thankfully, since his captain was also present escorting Hayakawa, he was on his best behavior. Eui snorted in amusement.

“Not literally, I assume.”

Jia laughed incredulously when Rika just smiled silently in response to Eui’s question.

“Okay, I don’t want to know. I guess that leaves the three of us free, then?”

Rika nodded.

“I guess so. Are we actually going to do this?”

Jia sighed. They’d been putting off a proper joint-meditation session ever since the experiment with Melody of the Dreaming Moon—mostly due to the fact that they’d all been busy with one thing or another since then. Now, without any excuses or distractions, Jia found herself hesitating a little bit. Still, she had promised, and after their trial run, she was convinced that there wouldn’t be any danger to Rika.

“Alright—let’s try it.”