I Am the Strongest Femboy, So Stop Protecting Me!-Chapter 26: Ridiculousness.

POV: Virginia Halcyon.

There were only a very few things in Virginia’s life that had shaken her as much as the death of her childhood friend did.

She had spent years grieving her dear friend, the last moments she had shared with him replaying over and over in her mind as time passed. She had dreamed about him, she had cried for him, she had spent sleepless nights wondering what she could’ve done differently to make sure that he lived.

Eventually, she had to move on. Being the heir of Halcyon, a family with such a deep influence on the workings of the world, she had to close her heart. Let go of past grievances as she studied, trained and grew to fill the role of a leader.

So when she saw Aris walk into that room today, she had barely managed to hold herself back from breaking down into pieces. To not revert back into that child who all those years ago, had lost her one and only friend.

It had been such a hard task.

She had almost, almost, not recognized him.

True, he still looked prettier than any man, or woman for that matter had any right to be. And he was still laughably short, even considering how gigantic the Ashbornes used to be in general.

It was that hollow gaze, the look of someone who had let go of themselves, that threw her off.

The Aris from her memories was a sweet boy. A shy, outspoken, nerdy kid who liked quietly spending time on things and people that he liked. Virginia, could have never, ever in her life had imagined the innocent gaze of that child could grow into such a vast hollowness that just felt so... wrong.

She was still in autopilot, monotonously filling out paperwork for a project she was overlooking, when Lyra called.

"He what."

She had to do a double take, and wonder if she was starting to hallucinate from all the stress she was going through.

Lyra repeated what she had just told Virginia, voice as business like as ever as she delivered the news.

"You’re telling me, that he solo cleared a dungeon, and walked out of it with the Regulus Au Nyx on his back."

"Yes."

The silence was deafening.

"What in Ra’s name."

"I understand the confusion, Lady Virginia, but we need your help. Now."

Virginia let out a sigh.

"I’ll be there in half an hour. Tell him to not speak to anyone until i arrive."

"Thank you."

The phone quietly beeped as she hung up.

Virginia looked at the clock in her office room for a long moment, it said it was almost midnight.

She let out a long exhale, a thousand different concerns racing through her mind.

Then shaking her head, dialed up her new manager, arranging for the car to be ready in five minutes, to go the the Awakened Association HQ.

***

The headquarters was as quiet as ever, silence encompassing the premises as if this was the most peaceful day in forever.

She waited until the association clerk came to open the door for her, nodding politely as she stepped out. A sign of courtesy, to let them know that she is willing to follow the rules, that she was willing to be civil if the same was true with them.

The clerk looked rather nervous, a mundane man in his thirties, poor thing.

Contrary to what one would believe, Virginia Halcyon had never particularly enjoyed throwing her weight around.

It was effective, certainly. The Halcyon name opened doors that had no business being opened at midnight, and the particular quality of stillness that fell over a room when she walked into it had its uses. But effectiveness and enjoyment were different things, and she had long since stopped confusing them.

She followed the clerk through the quiet corridors of the HQ with the composed unhurriedness of someone who was not in a hurry because she had already decided that the situation would wait for her. The building at this hour was stripped down to its essential staff—security, overnight processing, the skeleton crew that kept the administrative machinery running while the rest of the institution slept. Several of them looked up as she passed.

She did not look back.

Lyra was waiting outside the private medical wing with the expression of a woman who had been managing an impossible situation for the last two hours, and had run out of the kind of patience that showed on the face, leaving only the functional kind.

"Lady Virginia."

"Lyra." She nodded, then looked at the closed door. "Who’s inside."

"Young Master. The Stormborne girl, we’re still trying to finding out how she got involved. Regulus Au Nyx, still unconscious, medical staff have been briefed on a need-to-know basis only." A pause. "There was some resistance to the need-to-know part."

"I imagine."

"I told them it was a Halcyon matter." She added.

"Good." She looked at Lyra properly, the way she looked at people when she wanted the version underneath the professional summary. "How is he."

Lyra was quiet for a moment in the way she was quiet when she was deciding how honest to be.

"Physically fine," she said. "He hasn’t really talked about what happened inside the dungeon."

She opened the door for her, leading her in through the ward.

"The lady of Stormborne confirmed that it was a solo clear, and there are four children that are witnesses. The Aureate seems to have lost a limb prior to the gate opening, the young master mentioned that might have been the reason for the unusually fast manifestation."

They turned a corner towards the intensive care unit, Lyra still briefing her on the details.

"The higher ups of the association are still in a meeting, trying to figure out the details of the situation. There’s already concerns that the return of the Aureate might get leaked somehow. And lastly, lady Amari Stormborne mentioned that there was a chance that the dungeon was aberrant. If that is the case, this will be the second clear of an aberrant dungeon in the span of three days. Both having involved the young master."

The last sentence landed with the particular weight of something that had been held back until the right moment, delivered in Lyra’s characteristic tone of a woman stating facts and allowing the facts to do their own work.

Virginia stopped walking.

Lyra stopped with her, patient, waiting.

"Both," Virginia said.

"Both."

"In three days."

"Yes."

Virginia looked at the door at the end of the corridor, the one that had light under it, letting out a long exhale as she quietly cursed the world for making things so complicated.