Chapter 35: The Way Home

Chapter 35: Chapter 35: The Way Home

The camp was quiet, the ruined demon settlement still smoking faintly in the dark around them.

They’d done what they came to do, the S-rank boss behind all the abnormal activity was dead, the rift had already started to destabilize.

Aria stood at the edge of camp, looking up. "The portal will close soon." Everyone followed her gaze above the distant treeline, the faint distortion marking their way home had grown visibly unstable.

"Then we’re done," Darius said.

Seraphina sat beside Felix, still cradling the small flowers the elf child had given her, careful not to crush them.

"You really like those," he said.

She nodded. "First flowers anyone’s ever given me."

His expression softened. "Then take good care of them."

"I will."

---

The elves returned not long after, the same little girl among them, who spotted Seraphina instantly and ran over grinning.

Seraphina crouched down to meet her, and the child looked at the flowers still carefully cupped in her hands. Seraphina smiled anyway and touched the top of her head; the meaning came through fine without translation.

Aria approached the elves separately.

"We’re leaving." They didn’t understand the words, but they understood her gesture toward the distant portal well enough.

One of the older elves pressed a hand to his chest and bowed deeply, the rest following, and the team returned the gesture the best they could.

They’d arrived as strangers. They were leaving as something closer to allies.

---

The team broke camp: weapons secured, mana cores collected, supplies checked over one last time. Seraphina tucked the flowers into a protected pocket of her gear.

"I’ll find somewhere to properly preserve them once we’re back."Felix said.

She looked at him. "Really?"

"Of course."

Her expression eased into something warm. "Thank you."

"No problem."

---

A deep tremor rolled through the ground, and everyone looked up at said, the portal’s edges had started folding inward.

"Everyone, move," Aria said, already serious, and the team fell in, heading for the gate one after another.

Seraphina paused halfway there, looking back: the forest, the village, the elves, the wreckage of the settlement they’d left behind.

She still didn’t want to leave it.

This had been the closest thing to a normal life she’d ever had: sunlight on her skin, fighting alongside people instead of against them, sleeping under open sky, flowers pressed into her hands by a child who had no reason to fear her, and hours spent beside Felix with no reinforced glass or steel between them.

"Seraphina." She turned. "It’s time," Felix said.

She nodded, took one last look back, and followed him through.

---

The moment the last of them crossed, the gateway collapsed behind them, the distortion gone, the forest gone, the rift sealed shut.

For a few seconds nobody said anything.

Then Kael dropped straight onto the ground. "We’re home."

"You’re acting like you’ve been gone for months," Lena said, laughing.

"It felt like months."

Darius just shook his head. Aria turned to the Association staff waiting by the gate. "Mission complete," she said, and they immediately started logging the closure: mana readings, boss confirmation, casualty count, monster totals, the whole record building itself in real time.

Felix looked around at his team. Exhausted, every one of them, Ryan freshly broken into A-rank, Seraphina’s proficiency advanced, and the team’s first real mission with her closed out clean.

"Not bad," he said.

"*Not bad?*" Kael pointed toward the medical staff setting up nearby. "We just leveled an entire demon settlement."

"And we’re all still standing."

"That’s your bar for success?"

"Pretty much."

Kael stared at him.

---

Seraphina hung back slightly, looking toward the Association building. Most of her life, Acheron had meant the same gray walls, nothing waiting on the other side of them.

This time felt different. She wasn’t walking back alone.

Felix passed her, glancing back. "Coming?"

"Yes." A small smile crossed her face.

Heading back to prison didn’t feel like returning to the place her life had effectively ended. It felt more like somewhere she’d simply be waiting, until the next time she got to leave again.

She fell into step beside him, fingers finding the flowers she’d kept safe through the whole trip home, and smiled again.

The mission was over. For Seraphina, something else was only just getting started.