"Hey big brother," Ruby calls out to Aqua from laying down on the couch. "Papa seems to be kinda a big shot, no?"

"No kidding," Aqua groans as he sinks back into the seat next to her. He lulls his head back, staring at the ceiling. "I thought we were weird enough, but this is beyond what I could imagine. A magician who saved the world several times? Seriously?"

Even with his adult-like mind, he still can't quite comprehend what he was told. He was always a man of science — wait a moment. Should he now say he's a child of magic instead?

Aqua clutches his head in frustration. He would say the gods had some twisted irony, but now he would have to consider whether or not that would actually piss them off.

Ruby giggles at Aqua, bending her head back to stare at him in amusement. "Well, anyone who dates Mama has to be just as amazing, otherwise Mama is too good for them. But I get your point. It's almost a dream come true for me, really."

Aqua raises his eyebrow. Ruby had always declined to talk about her previous life, but he had always felt like she lived a rather sheltered life, even more so than they did now. "Why do you say that?"

"Because I had always wondered what it'd be like to be a child of a celebrity and finding out that I'm a child to practically two of them is quite a shocker!"

Aqua's jaw drops slightly — why did she sound so much like — the door opens, and unexpectedly, it is Mashu Kyrielight who enters the room.

He and Ruby scramble to prop themselves up and straighten their backs to greet the visitor. "Hello, Miss Kyrielight."

"Ah, sorry to intrude," Mashu apologizes, bowing her head to Aqua and Ruby. "But I just couldn't help myself. I wanted to talk to the two of you for a moment."

"Talk to us? Not with Ai — Mama?"

Aqua cringes at his faux paus. While it was indeed hard to change a habit of referring to his mother as Ai — considering they had to go with the cover story that Miyako was their actual mother all this time — the day's revelations shake his usual composure.

"Yes," Mashu confirms as she squats down to their eye level. "We've talked with your mother about coming back to Chaldea with us. Mister Velvet is working on the finer details with President Saitou and his wife. It's most likely you two will also be coming with us for protection. I will be the one to safeguard the three of you."

"Protection?" Aqua's memories flash to when he was Gorou Amamiya — to the time he got confronted by presumably Ai's stalker and mistakenly ran off in pursuit of him. He still has no idea how Ai's location got exposed like that. Was it just a coincidence? Does that mean even more incidents like that might happen?

Mashu's eyes furrow in sadness. "Yes. Even with how personable your father is, he still made some powerful enemies. There are those who would use any advantage to target him."

"But don't worry," Mashu reassures them, "it's just a precaution. There are a great many of those who allied themselves with your father."

Aqua nods to himself, still taking it all in. Maybe it would be best for him to learn something about magic — he definitely has the time to do so now.

"Hey, Miss Kyrielight," Ruby peaks up and asks, "how well did you know Papa? Can you tell us a bit more about him?"

"Sure, there is much I can tell you!" Mashu exclaims before blushing at her slight levity. She clears her throat and continues, "He is someone who is perhaps the most human of us all: someone who is not the best, but the one who still tries their best. Someone who can see the good and bad in a person and still respects them no matter what."

"Sounds like you got a crush on him. He is Mama's, you know?" Ruby blurts out, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Ruby!" Aqua exclaims, a scandalized expression on his face.

"Maybe I did," Mashu confesses, shocking Aqua at how earnest she replies. "I always regarded him as my Senpai since he's the one who taught me how to live as a human. He's someone I've looked up to and care a lot for. My feelings for him were strong, but I never understood what they truly were."

"Man, even a lady as pretty as Miss Kyrielight is heads over heels over him," Ruby pouts, clutching the hems of her sleeves. "Is this Papa a two-timer? A playboy?"

"No, not at all," Mashu denies, shaking her head. "I'm not pretty like Miss Ai. I can definitely see she's a one of a kind idol."

Mashu pauses; a nervous finger scratching her cheek. "Now that I think about it, he does seem to have a lot of admirers. However, he was always steadfast in his devotion to Miss Ai. We didn't know much about her, but when he did mention her, we could tell he missed her a lot."

She pauses and places a hand on their shoulders. "And I'm hoping that you can help him as well."

"Didn't your report say he's in a coma?" Aqua presses on, wincing slightly at his callous question. "I mean, we're just children. What makes you think that we can help him?"

"In a sense, yes, but don't worry about that," Mashu answers, "I can tell that the two of you are a lot more special than normal children."

Aqua's insides twist into a panic, but he manages to suppress it from showing on his face. On the other hand, Ruby is trembling as she clutches his arm.

Mashu raises her hands up in peace. "It's why I wanted to talk with the two of you a bit more, to confirm my instincts. Even Mister Velvet has his suspicions. I'm sorry if I scared the two of you. That is your secret, and so we won't press any further."

Mashu kneels before them as she had done with Ai.

"It's my hope and wish that you and Miss Ai are able to connect with him at a far deeper level than we at Chaldea can. As much as we can support him, it might have the opposite effect so far."

"Humanity once again correctly walks towards the stars — always wanting to embrace the light that shines their path forward. An era that has such exemplars of humanity yet their journey to the stars could never be so different from each other. The line between hero and villain may blur, but it is inevitable for humans to struggle, sacrifice, and grow for their desires. That at its core is humanity's greatest virtue."

Closing one of her eyes, she now peers at the fated meeting of the two who had once walked by their side.

"In that vein, they are the greatest hero and villain that humanity has ever created — yet at what cost?"

A faint hint of a smirk dances on her lips as she observes the stars and stargazers moving forward..

"Now at the culmination, what about sayest thou? Not all hope is gone — it can never be gone so long as the light is still kindling. No matter how many heliacal risings may occur, they should no longer hide behind the glory of the sun. Go forth, children of the star — guide home the watcher. Their duty is done. Their burden is no longer theirs to bear."

She turns away, walks off into the shadows. Nothing is left where she had stood but a single black feather.

"Remind them once more that the past is just as valuable as the future. A path has a beginning to its end after all."