Chapter 74: Rebuilding the Squad
Morning light poured over the academy training grounds.
Holden walked across the grass with Lyra beside him. She’d changed out of the banquet gown and back into her academy uniform. Her hair was down, loose around her shoulders. She looked more like herself again.
The outdoor training fields were mostly empty this early. A few dedicated students ran drills in the distance. The archery range at the far end had only one occupant.
Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!
Renna was firing arrows at a target with aggressive intensity. Each shot hit dead center, splitting the previous arrow down the shaft. Her jaw was clenched. Her shoulders were tight. She was shooting like she wanted to kill the target.
Twenty feet away, Emric sat on a bench with a thick textbook open on his lap. He wasn’t reading it. He was just staring at the pages, turning them occasionally without absorbing a single word.
Holden slowed as they approached.
Renna noticed them first. Her next arrow went wide, missing the target entirely, when she saw who was walking toward her. Her bow lowered. Her eyes went wide.
"Lyra?"
Emric’s head snapped up. The book slid off his lap and hit the ground.
"Lyra!" He stood up so fast he nearly tripped over the bench. "Are you alright? We heard about the banquet. The rumors are insane. They’re saying Holden crashed it and paralyzed Lord Oscar Thorne in front of a hundred nobles."
"That’s exactly what happened," Lyra said calmly.
Renna’s shocked eyes shifted to Holden. "You... what?"
Holden didn’t answer her. He stepped forward, putting himself directly in front of both of them.
"I messed up," he said.
Renna blinked. "What?"
"I was wrong to push you away when Lyra left. I was wrong to stand there like a statue while you were hurting. And I was wrong to let the Twins insult you without consequence."
Emric picked up his book, his movements slow and careful. "Holden..."
"I’m not done." Holden met both of their eyes. "The elite uniform doesn’t change who I am. The missions with Vespera don’t change who I care about. Team Soup is my real squad. You two are my real friends. And I should have told you that instead of letting my stupid survival logic get in the way."
Silence.
Renna stared at him. Her bow hung loose at her side. Her lower lip trembled.
Then her face crumpled.
"You absolute jerk!" she yelled, but she was already running toward him. She hit him with a hug that nearly knocked him over. She held him as tight as she could and pressed her face into his shirt.
"I was so mad at you!" she said, her voice muffled against his uniform. "Like actually furious! I couldn’t sleep! I kept replaying it in my head and getting madder and madder and then you go and paralyze a royal prince and I don’t know what to feel anymore!"
Holden patted her back awkwardly. "Fair."
Emric adjusted his glasses and stepped forward. His expression was carefully composed, but his eyes were bright.
"For the record, your apology was overdue by approximately forty-eight hours." He extended his hand. "I accept."
Holden shook it firmly.
Lyra smiled and stepped forward to join the group hug. Renna immediately reached out and pulled her in, squishing all four of them together.
"Group hug! Official Team Soup group hug! Nobody can escape!"
"This is highly inefficient," Emric muttered, but he didn’t pull away.
For a moment, things felt normal again.
Then, a voice suddenly ruined the happy moment.
"Why are you talking to trash?"
Cora and Sera walked onto the training field from the north path. Their black-and-silver uniform was pristine. Their expressions were identical masks of disdain.
"Freshman deadweight," Sera continued.
"Should be beneath your notice," Cora finished.
Renna pulled back from the hug. Her happy expression vanished, replaced by a flicker of the anger from before. But this time she didn’t reach for her bow. She just stiffened and looked at Holden.
Emric’s jaw tightened. He stepped back slightly, positioning himself beside Renna.
Holden turned around slowly.
That happy moment disappeared. In its place was something cold. Something he’d shown in the warehouse when he’d blocked a broadsword with his forearm. Something he’d shown in the banquet hall when he’d shattered Oscar’s meridians.
His eyes went dead.
He released his aura.
Crash!
The pressure hit with a banging force. Rank 2 energy rolled across the training field, completely overwhelming. The grass under Holden’s feet flattened in a circle. The air itself seemed to vibrate, humming with barely contained violence.
Cora and Sera both flinched and stepped backward.
Holden walked toward them. The aura moved with him, pressing down harder with every foot of distance he closed.
"Let me explain something," he said in a low voice. "Vespera’s missions are Vespera’s missions. When we’re in the field, we work together. I’ll cover your backs and you’ll cover mine."
He stopped three feet from the twins. The pressure was intense enough that Cora’s hand had moved to her sword purely on instinct.
"But this is my academy life. These are my friends." He didn’t look back at Team Soup. He didn’t need to. "If you ever approach them again. If you ever speak to them again. If you even look in their direction..."
He let the sentence hang.
The air crackled.
"...we are going to have a real problem."
The twins stared at him. Their synchronized masks had completely shattered. Beneath them was something they rarely showed anyone.
Fear.
They’d seen him block a sword bare-handed. They’d felt his counter-aura in the courtyard yesterday. But this was different. This wasn’t a warning. This was a promise.
Cora’s hand dropped from her sword.
Sera swallowed hard.
Neither of them spoke.
Without another word, they turned and walked away. They didn’t look back.
Holden let his aura fade.
The pressure lifted. The grass slowly rose back up. The humming in the air dissipated.
He turned around.
Renna, Emric, and Lyra stood frozen in place. Their eyes were wide. They looked like they’d just watched something they couldn’t quite process.
Emric was the first to find his voice.
"That was... that was a Rank 2 aura." He spoke softly, trying to understand something that made no sense. "Holden, you’re registered as Rank 1."
"Yeah," Holden said. "I know."
Renna blinked. Then she shook her head hard, like she was resetting her brain.
"You know what? I’m not even going to ask. I don’t care. You apologized, Lyra’s back, and you just scared the creepy twins so bad they practically ran. That’s good enough for me."
She grabbed her bow and slung it over her shoulder.
"So what’s the plan, captain? What are we doing today?"
Holden looked at his team. At Renna’s bouncing energy. At Emric’s quiet relief. At Lyra’s warm smile.
Team Soup.
Back together.