The pair sat back-to-back, either seemingly aware that loss of support would render the other powerless to stop from falling over. Kyoya's exhaustion didn't take its time setting in, either: a result of having totally burned away what little was left over from their duel in the arena.

Stagnant air was finally washed out by the afternoon's wind, cleansing the beachfront of the wounds incurred just moments before. While calming, he was alarmed by how frigid the breeze felt, whereas it had only been a bit crisp earlier.

"You're cold." Lyric murmured.

She offered more to lean on as his end dwindled, even to the point that his ability to sit up was sheerly due to her support. So little as talking took more effort than he could ever imagine, but before he managed, Lyric spoke again. "Easy. It feels like you're all burned out."

The girl struck her fingers along the ground next to him, sparks breaking away from each run. Soon, a small ember formed in the grass, which she stoked by letting tender gusts send cinders into surrounding blades. "This should help a little."

While he silently questioned this at first, the return of a tinge of heat offered reassurance. It came in inches, but just as she'd said, the fire's presence slowly brought vitality back, and with it, he'd finally found enough strength to speak again.

"...And you wonder why I want to stick around."

"Not as much, anymore." She kept him up again as the fire slowly died out, gentle breaths suggesting that she'd already recovered enough to handle the both of them. "We're partners, after all."

Further silence ensued as the scene around them embraced normality, ambience returning to the wilderness and restoring morale en masse. The lack of strength to so much as move irked him, even if he had nothing to do in that moment, but being in such a position didn't disturb the boy nearly as much as he'd thought it would.

One part of this eluded him more effectively than the rest, though.

Why was it that even in being reduced to a muted and powerless state, he felt... comfort?

Truthfully, he'd never known the feeling of being so pitifully weak until just a few minutes ago.

The moments he watched Lyric continue to fight with virtually zero mobility, while it took the sight of her being overpowered just for him to break free of a control spell served as a revelation that even if he could rival the Seraph's power, he couldn't possibly match her resolve.

That, compounded by her display of unyielding courage in the face of such a threat, left him wondering if he really could even hope for a chance in the world she planned to confront.

Yet, despite all of these figures tearing apart his pride, the fact remained that something about it was comforting; wearing this overwhelming weakness, the faults so wistfully highlighted in the wake of this struggle, had revealed something completely different to him.

Kyoya recognized this as his expression of vulnerability.

Up until this point, it was gritted teeth and clenched fists, through and through; yet, here he sat, sapped of energy, only allowed to sit upright by the support and approval of the one he'd come to call his partner. Even after taking as brutal of an onslaught as she had, Lyric remained, as if an unshakable force that absolutely would not allow either of them to fall any further.

There was a humbling shame that accompanied his soul in this moment.

The Seraph cut through their silence after a while of mutual thought. "You know we're gonna have a lot to talk about when we get back, right?"

He opened his mouth to speak, but a rasped, empty husk of a word was all that found its way out. The Miscreant persevered, though, eventually breaking through his fatigue.

"Yeah."

Inch-by-inch, Lyric shifted to her side, taking careful measure to prevent him from falling over until they sat shoulder-to-shoulder. She used her free hand to bring forth the Advent Glaive, driving it into the ground at his back, and then let him lean back onto it. They faced the beach from where they sat, at last able to fulfill the conditions of their agreement outside the Galleon.

"I come out here when I've got a lot on my mind... Suffice to say, there's a little more than a lot, now. I was hoping to show you this without nearly getting assassinated, and everything."

"You and I both... I'm a little surprised you aren't more worried about making me tell you what that was about, though."

Lyric's eyes closing was followed by a light sigh, after which she addressed the comment.

"Believe me, I'm hiding a lot of it; I'd just rather we had a chance to appreciate what we came for. You deserve it, whether or not you think so."

His better judgement disagreed entirely.

"You had some kind of toxin running through you, and all I had going against me was a flimsy control spell... but you kept getting up, while I just stood there. Don't tell me I deserve something when-"

"Shut up."

"...What?"

"I said shut up, you dunce."

She pulled her knees in and stared onward. "Don't forget that you snapped out of it. When I was on the ground, watching you go ballistic just because she put me on the ropes..." Lyric lowered her stare to just in front of them. "I couldn't even land a hit, but there you were, doing what you do. I just-... I felt so fragile..." She shrunk back towards the glaive with the end of that admission, a tender gale swirling around them and kicking up fallen leaves.

It was bittersweet, the revelation that he wasn't the only one ridden with guilt over their encounter.

However, a familiar amber shine soon found her eyes. "...but, the more I watched you fight, it felt so redeeming, seeing that I had somebody there who would have my back... After all, that's the ideology of Hope.

Kyoya rested with that.

What he'd been guided to view as weakness, as inability, she was able to reform into a might that could only be achieved in the company of another. One which he'd only just found, and initially thought to be shameful, degrading, and now learned was actually the hidden potential for an even greater strength, found only amidst the aftermath of the acceptance of faults.

Now, he was warmed by it, even furtherly soothed by the fact that Lyric found so much validity, so much purpose in his previously denounced vulnerability.

Although it was only the first time he'd acknowledged such a thing, the fact remained that he'd rather it were few else to have seen him like this.