Finding himself alone within his inter-dimension of twisting shadows and nightmarish creations, Kampfer closed his eyes and sunk into a sitting position. I underestimated that Killing Doll, although luckily the damages are minimal. And I still need to take care of the Count of Zagrev. How troublesome… He silently thought to himself, allowing his handless arms drop to his side, before feeling familiar company standing over him.

Tilting his head back slightly, he opened his eyes to acknowledge the girl's presence. Blue-grey eyes returned acknowledgement. Isaak also saw the loving mockery, but he said nothing; he probably deserved it. Thin red lips curled into a mischievous grin and formed the equally mocking words spoken by a young soprano. Entranced by her venomously undertoned voice and dripping sarcasm, he nearly flinched at the sharpness of each syllable.

"You should listen to your own lectures on carelessness. Maybe then you'd stay in one piece."

The Wizard remained silent. It wasn't that he couldn't think of anything to say, as he had a fine scolding for her. He simply figured he would save it for later, after his hands had been regenerated. After all, what fun would it be to chide his disrespectful daughter if he didn't have a hand with which to pull her ear?

The girl knelt next to Isaak, brushing back a few strands of her long black hair. She spoke again as she gently cradled his bloody wrists in her small hands.

"You seem rather gloomy. You're not usually one to take every mistake so seriously." A red glow emanated from the pentagrams on the girl's gloves and a fluid blackness was beginning to form around the elder Kampfer's wrists. A fiendish smile stretched across the younger's face as she continued, "Although, truthfully, it was a very pathetic mistake."

Isaak's previously dull expression now sharpened somewhat at this direct insult. His right eyebrow twitched slightly and he unintentionally jerked his arms as he resentfully responded,

"What a wicked thing for you to think! Even more wicked for you to say it, Isabella Fae. What a vile child you are, to say ill of your own father!"

"Ah-ah, careful, father dearest," Isabella kept a grip on her father's wrists, which were now completely covered with the gradually expanding darkness, "I'm not finished yet." Her eyes were twinkling with pure mischief; she was completely aware that she wouldn't have gotten away with such disrespect in any normal circumstances without losing at least an arm, probably both. Impish delight played upon the highlights of her alabaster face as she continued the reconstruction of Isaak's hands.

After a few moments, the blackness that Isabella had summoned faded away along with the glowing pentagrams. Kampfer flexed his new, bare hands and smiled in approval. "Ah, well done my dear," he complimented his daughter as he stood up, "a very well performed regeneration."

Isabella smirked as she handed her father a pair of gloves embroidered in the same manner as hers. "You know what people say, that some things just run in the family."

Wizard chuckled in mild amusement as he fastened his gloves. "Indeed my dear. Like father, like daughter." Pushing back a strand of hair, he glanced back at his daughter and added, "Although you seem to have failed to inherit much in the matter of respect."

Isabella rolled her eyes and started walking away, bored with the thought of another lecture. "Cry more, old man. At least I didn't inherit your faulty logic, since you don't seem to realize respect is learned."

Before she could close her mouth, Isabella found that she had reflexively launched herself into the air. Dodging back into the air every instant she barely touched the ground – whether it was with her foot or her hand didn't matter – she saw, occasionally, the sharp glint of what to an average human would have been an invisible thread, and realized why her reflexes had activated. The painfully keen edge of that thread whipped closer, threatening to dismember a limb or possibly the life of the Wizard's daughter.

...Not that it seemed to bother her. In fact, a wicked smile was stretched across Isabella's face. What fun, the mono-carbon again… She was predicting every move Isaak made – everything down to the most minute finger twitch – and reacting accordingly so that she would remain just out of his reach. Probability from previous experience stated which moves were most likely to be made, and within minutes a pattern had been assumed. It was so simple it was—

—Wait, this undesirable feeling is… A piercing, almost burning sensation bit into Isabella's side, bringing her string of calculations to a reeling halt. While she prevented herself from flinching, her eyes still darted to the source of what she finally gathered to be pain; he had managed to hit her. Blood ran freely from the two-inch-deep gash down the still-embedded filament. How…? While it wasn't impossible, probability stated that there was a less than 2% chance of a different move. Somehow, he had managed to hit that less than 2%.

While Isabella struggled to ignore the intense pulse of pain as she twisted away from the thread and pushed off of the ground again, she tried to restart her calculations while keeping in mind how much time she'd have left before fainting if her bleeding didn't stop. Each move she made now brought her closer to her father; her priority now shifted to disabling him in order to buy time to heal herself. The pain, now radiating up to her chest and down to her hip, reminded her of this priority every time she touched the ground.

Abruptly, just as Isabella reached for the vital disabling point, she lost all feeling in her limbs. As she fell limp to the ground, she was able to feel the tangled fibers tightening around her neck. The pain in her side diminished to a dull sensation of pressure despite her still moderate bleeding. As long as she didn't struggle, the mono-carbon wouldn't cut, but the increasing tightness pressed on her nerves and rendered her helpless in moving. Ah, that fatal mistake, I made it again…

"I see you've still failed to adjust your attention pattern." Isaak looked down at his daughter with little of any emotion in his black eyes. "If you continue to drop your guard within that crucial time frame of reaching a target…" He trailed off, narrowing his eyes slightly as if expecting a response. When he received none, he tugged gently on the mono-carbon fibers wrapped around his fingers and watched Isabella jerk in a short spasm. "Aren't you going to say anything, daughter dearest? Your vocal chords aren't paralyzed like everything else, and I know how you enjoy my lectures."

Isabella's eyes were dull with obvious boredom. For a short time she just stared at her father before finally answering, "While your lectures are incredibly dry, they're well deserved in this scenario. I obviously failed to learn the lesson; therefore the lesson should be repeated, nein?"

Isaak simply shrugged. "Ja, but that hasn't stopped you previously from saying anything."

"Perhaps I'm bored with this and would prefer to stay in one piece for once. I'm not really in the mood for any more unnecessary regenerations." The girl glanced at the wound in her side, which had finally stopped bleeding.

"I was beginning to wonder if you would ever grow tired of this foolishness." Satisfied that his daughter was done with her "games", Isaak released the tension on the mono-carbon.

Isabella winced as the full, throbbing pain of the gash returned. Carefully she slipped two fingers between the still dangerously sharp mono-carbon and her throat. Meticulously unweaving the tangled fibers, she loosened the loop enough to safely pull her head out of it. The soft hiss of the mono-carbon slicing through her gloves prompted her not to be overly hasty.

Isaak watched Isabella free herself, and halfheartedly advised her when he saw a small trickle of blood follow one of the interlaced fibers, "When you have ample time to accomplish a task, there's no need to rush. If you need to, utilize every available second rather than risk sacrificing an appendage or worse."

The girl merely shrugged as she tossed the mono-carbon aside. She tightly clutched her side as she struggled against the pain to sit up. Through clenched teeth she responded, "Better a finger or two, which can be regenerated, than my head, which can't."

Isaak sighed, seeming disappointed. "While that's true, it shows that you're still depending too much on being able to regenerate almost anything you lose from your carelessness. Everybody has limits, even you; I know you can't completely heal that gash in your side." He watched as his daughter stubbornly tried to keep healing herself despite the mentioned gash ceasing to respond after healing only halfway. "You need to be able to act in a more reserved fashion. You can't just keep charging in headfirst and expect to always be able to temporarily weasel your way out to patch yourself up. You'll only tire yourself out like you're doing now, only possibly with more lethal results. For the moment, though, the worst you're going to face is the inability to stand or walk, or unconsciousness."

"I love you too," Isabella sourly muttered, finally giving up on the partially-healed wound. Shakily, she managed to stand up, but with her first step her vision blurred and she found herself reacquainted with the ground. Clumsily she tried to stand again, but with the same result.

Isaak shook his head slightly at his daughter's stubborn attempts. However, the slightest curve of a smile overtook the corners of his thin lips. His never-shining black eyes lost focus for a moment as he watched her repeat the cycle of standing and falling after one step. She always has to do things for herself. She's so determined… just like her—

"Wake up, old man. Daydreaming about the days past isn't going to help either one of us. Besides, it's not like you anyways."

The sour outburst, combined with the sudden weight of his daughter on his shoulder, instantly broke the Wizard from his thought. Wrapping his arm around her waist to support her, he quietly answered, "No, it's not." There was a short moment of silence as they started walking, then Isaak spoke again, "Oh, one more thing." He reached his other hand across and tugged on Isabella's ear.

"What the hell was that for?!" The girl shouted in pain and twisted her head away.

"You know very well what that was for. You know better than to be listening to my private thoughts, or anyone else's for that matter!"

Grumpily, the girl replied, "I can't help when you're thinking loud enough for me to hear it without trying," yelping when Isaak pulled her ear again. "I'm serious! Do you really think I would purposefully go through your thoughts again? They're so boring… Ah-ah-aaah, let go, let go already! You're going to rip it off!" Screaming, she reflexively tried shoving her father away to get her ear released.

Isaak didn't flinch, although he did let go of Isabella's ear. "Why can't you ever let anything go? That big mouth of yours is going to get you killed from friendly fire one of these days."

Lightly rubbing her now very red and painful ear, Isabella turned her face away from Isaak and breathlessly muttered, "I'll at least lose an ear… AUGH, alright I'll be quiet!" Swatting Isaak's hand away yet again, Isabella's shouts trickled down to a mass of non-understandable—although very obviously grumpy—mutterings.

Isaak, now seeming cheerful, which was very odd, replied, "I love you too."