"And this is your library card, enjoy!" The clerk at the front desk stated happily to Pyra, taking the card and examining it closely. The clerk looked on in concern until Miko suddenly popped in and vouched for her.

"She used to live an Amish lifestyle and she's still trying to adjust." She said. Frankie nodded in affirmation. The clerk was satisfied and bowed politely before helping the other customers.

Miko was already gone at this point, back with Kaito, looking for suitable reading material.

"Alright, let's see, what kind of ooey gooey mushy stuff should I read with Miko today…?" Kaito asked himself as he paced the manga section, drawing his attention towards a thick Ambush on Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms volume and looked away with a cringe. Definitely not that.

"Kaito… pssst! Kaito…!" Miko whispered from the other side of the library.

"Miko? What's up?" Kaito asked as he came to her.

"I know this isn't exactly what we came here to do, but we're all in this together, so, check this out!"

She directed him over to a selection of books on old Greek myths and history. "Some of this stuff sounds like what you were talking about regarding Pyra's whole blady-ness, right?"

Kaito scanned the titles of the books, "Greece: An In-Depth History, The Wars of Greece, The Greek Armies, Greek Myths and Legends, The Blades of Elysium, Th- hang on!"

He pulled out the last two books and held them over his shoulders.

"Yeah, these are the ones."

"Elysium…that's where Pyra said she was from, no?" Miko asked as she looked at the books Kaito held up.

"Yep, this could be useful in learning more about it. Plus, while it could mean anything, the word 'Blade' could be an in-the-face clue." He turned his attention to the other book, "This too, from what I remember, Elysium shows up in a lot of Greek mythology, so we might get something on it from this."

He took another gander at the books on the shelf, placed the two he was holding under his arm, and reached for the one titled "The Greek Armies."

Miko looked puzzled as Kaito pulled it out of its placement, "Do you think that one can help too? It seems more like a basic history textbook."

"Right, but books like these often have descriptions of the weapons used in wars. It might be a long shot, but if we want any more info on Blades, this might be our ticket."

Miko nodded in understanding as she peered at the shelf for anything else that could help, while Kaito shifted around for a comfortable way to hold all the books.

"Hmm…what about that book you told me and Frankie about? The one you read back in school about those chains and the awakenings and all that?" Miko asked, looking back over at her struggling boyfriend before taking one of the books for him and smirking.

"Heh…thanks. And uh…about that…"

They were later standing back in the manga section of the store, looking at a series that lined an entire portion of the bookshelf, with Miko looking suspiciously between the volumes and her nervous boyfriend.

"Hey, you were the one who asked!" He retorted.

Miko simply squinted before reaching for Volume 1 of what she later read out as:

"Heart Snacker…huh."

The cover contained what seemed to be the heroine wielding a massive scythe, the blade of which had a punk-ish looking boy climbing out of it. Behind the two of them was a rather…voluptuous witch lady sitting on a massive pumpkin.

Miko's squint harshed as she looked back over at Kaito, who was now stammering for an explanation.

"I PROMISE you the plot and fights were why I was reading it! Don't get any funny ideas!"

"A likely story…"

Miko looked at the cover a bit more intently, only for her attention to be drawn to the fact the main heroine looked rather…familiar.

She checked the back cover for her name before sneakily smiling, "So it's 'Maka', huh? …oh you silly dorkus…"

"Say something?" Kaito asked.

Miko shook her head before pinching her boyfriend's cheek.

"So…are you sure these can help?"

"Well, a lot of the names and concepts are word for word what Frankie told us, in this story, there are Drivers who are equipped with Blades, living beings that can transform, which act as both their weapons and their partners."

"Huh, maybe these are what we're looking for."

"Told ya, if anything I'd wager the author took inspiration from the stuff written in these-" He gestured to the books in his hand and the other one in Miko's, "making them another source of info. Plus I'm doubting these old history books have many visual representations of the concepts we're looking for. It might be way stylized, but this series could act as that visual accompaniment."

"Well, alright then." Miko handed Kaito the books she was holding before reaching for more volumes.

"Go for 16 and 22, those have a lot of different characters in them, would be good for reference."

"If you say so, geek." She snickered at him.

"Hey, you read just as much of this kind of stuff as I do, nerd!" He chuckled back.

The short couple waddled their way back, books in hand.

Frankie had searched for Pyra after he had picked up a collection of animal encyclopedias, only to find her attention completely invested in a large college level history textbook. He looked back down at his relatively childish material and cringed in embarrassment, slinking back to put them where he got them from and reconcile with her to hopefully try and explain things to her.

Pyra glanced up and down on every word of every page, staring deeply into the visual that accompanied them, it was almost like she was hypnotized, but… she did look rather upset, before she could get much further, Frankie finally showed up.

"Catching up on everything you missed?" He asked as he pulled up a seat next to her.

"Well, it's probably the most digestible thing I can do at this point in time…" she admitted. "You know, I'm no stranger to historical fiction and how things get twisted up in translation, but, reading all these solid accounts of the not too distant past and learning about what happened to people whose sole crime was just… being a different shade than the majority, and all they had to suffer because of it, it almost feels like… like…" Pyra shook the awful thought from her head, wincing in emotional pain. Frankie looked on sadly at her and proceeded to at last sit down.

"Nothing on Elysium?" He asked, in an effort to make her less uncomfortable.

"That was one of the first things I tried looking for before I decided to take a closer look at all this… it's like they don't even remember we exist…"

Frankie sucked his teeth as he turned away, going here was his idea, a fun time in fantasy land suddenly turned into a mire of despair from cold hard reality, and Pyra hardly looked pleased. He had to think quickly. He knew just the thing. In an instant he had gotten up and returned with the same animal books he picked up before coming Pyra's way. She stopped reading her own book and focused her attention on those, as they looked very intriguing, a lot nicer too.

"Do you… like nature, Pyra?" Frankie asked nervously. Pyra smiled sweetly as she gently closed her book and let Frankie take a seat once again.

"One of the perks of being a blade was always getting to stop and smell the roses every once in a while… it was always such a shame those moments never got to last." She lamented.

"Well, did you get to see any creatures in your travels?"

"All different sorts of them, but, well… we did have to eat and… get better at fighting and all…" Pyra sighed, turning away in a bout of disgust.

"Hey, Pyra, it's okay, you don't have to think about that anymore, lookie here, ever wonder what the largest animal on earth is?" Frankie pried open a book on marine wild life and immediately showed Pyra a dual page showcase of large piscine creature, exhausting air through the blowhole on its head, dwarfing all other creatures that swam in or around its area.

"Oh my goodness… I've seen creatures that rise up nearly as tall as the treetops, but I've never seen anything quite like this…" She said in awe as she lowered herself down to get a closer look.

"It's a blue whale, the world's largest mammal and animal, period. It's humongous, but it only eats tiny little krill by opening up wide and letting the baleen in its mouth get rid of the water while the tongue does the rest of the work." Frankie explained, pointing to the whisker-like bristles that lined up in the creature's mouth. Pyra's childlike wonder did get a chuckle out of him, and he was more than ready to keep going on as much as she wanted. "Now if you think that's crazy… wait until you see where they all started…"

Much like how they did during Pyra's first visit to Frankie's house, the two of them began chatting and discussing a fair bit more than either would've liked to admit, Frankie just randomly going off on specific animal trivia where he saw fit, describing evolutionary paths in great detail, while Pyra just looked on in wonder, both at him and the creatures. The two of them simply engaged in what the other had to say, to a point neither of them had quite experienced before. Pyra, who had been rather anxious and nervous all day, was now so relaxed and happy, with every goofy statement Frankie made creating a smile on her face that practically brightened the whole room. And for Frankie's part, the normally reserved and similarly anxious young man was spilling his heart with so much passion, comfortable in seeing Pyra so fixated on every word he spoke. He could only get to this level of chatty around his brother and sometimes Miko, and even then neither were quite as full-throttle invested as Pyra was.

It was like they were in their own special bubble, where everything was so happy for them in every way imaginable.

This was the sight Kaito and Miko came back to with their haul, and the both of them could do nothing but smile cheekily at a love clearly blooming.

"Heh…look at those dorks. Did we look like this when we were starting out?" Miko asked a wide-smiled Kaito.

"Well you do get pretty mushy sometimes…"

"That's my line, ya doof!" She teased.

"Hah! Ah, but…it's really good to see big brobro being so happy with his girl, even if he doesn't quite understand exactly what he's feeling yet, and for said girl to be just as happy with him." He started to get a little misty-eyed, which he wasn't expecting. But it had just now hit him how long it had been since he'd seen Frankie so overjoyed, he couldn't help but feel emotional and just…thankful.

Miko lightly bumped him in the arm and gave a sweet and reassuring smile, which Kaito returned.

"Even if Pyra isn't exactly what we were expecting, this is…nice. And you're right, they seem really happy together." She commented.

Kaito cheekily sighed. "Mhm…but I think it's around the time we should probably pull their heads out of the clouds for a sec."

"Unfortunately." Miko did the same.

Miko and Kaito plopped their books down on the table Frankie and Pyra were sitting at. Not aggressively by any means, but certainly with the intent of catching their attention, which it did.

"O-oh my, I'm sorry Frankie, I completely lost track of time there…"

"N-no Pyra, that's on me. I just uh…"

The two of them looked sheepishly away from each other, checking around to see if anyone else had noticed.

"Aw, don't you worry about that! Pyra, sweetie? We need to discuss something about Kaito's cavitational situation real quick."

"Oh my, that sounds quite sensitive! I'll leave you to it then." She stood up, holding Frankie's hand briefly and giving him a warm smile before wandering off, leaning towards the kid's book section. Frankie watched her walk off in bewilderment, mouth agape in utter confusion at how swiftly Miko got her to leave before turning back around to the table, hands resting on his temples.

"It was that easy…" He said to himself in disbelief. Might as well have picked up a copy of The Rainbow Fish while he was there.

"You know that kind of excuse isn't gonna work on her in like, a week right?" Kaito chastised Miko lightly as they sat down.

"It's only a one-time thing!" She snapped back.

Frankie had known Miko for quite a while now so he was well aware of her ability to debate, drawn partially from her aiming at a law degree, which she was so deft at pursuing that she was already being allowed to handle certain smaller cases by herself. And pairing her up with his journalist brother who was just as, if not more of a convincing debater when he wanted to be, just made her quick reasoning skills even more frightening with him as a support.

Quite the power couple we crafted here, eh? He thought to himself.

"Anyways, this is pretty important and it's…probably better Pyra isn't around to hear it, at least for now."

Frankie's expression tightened as she said that.

"So, we've been looking into some of the things Pyra said to try and get a better idea of where's from and what these 'Blades' are…" Kaito explained, laying out the books they had been searching through. "And it's been rough, to put it mildly. That isn't to say we didn't find anything at all, but… you'll- you'll see…"

"And those things are all detailed within the confines of these pages, right here!" Miko announced dramatically, holding out a book she randomly took from their assortment to present to both the boys. Kaito held in a stifled chuckle while Frankie tilted his head in confusion.

"That's uh… huh… I didn't know you were into those kinds of things, Miko." He pondered. Miko's closed eyes snapped back open quizzically as she examined the book she pulled out closer. Volume 16 of Heart Snackers, voluptuous pumpkin lady right in middle of it all. She blushed furiously and stuttered in embarrassment as she scrambled to hide it behind her back.

"You can thank HIM for that, thank you very much…" Miko pointed directly at Kaito, while Frankie raised a suspicious eyebrow at him. The younger man sank sheepishly into his chair and flashed an impossibly toothy grin.

"Getting back on track!" Miko stated as she pulled out a more suitable scribe for the discussion, the one on Greek armies Kaito had pointed out.

"There wasn't a lick of a mention about 'Blades' in this whole book, which I thought was weird since, if they existed, a book on armies would at least mention them in some capacity. But…"

He then shifted some of the other books around in an order, likely to present them to support his upcoming theory.

"Blades and Drivers do in fact come up in a ton of Greek mythology and legends, they're just not always stated as 'Blades' and 'Drivers'." He flipped through the book to one of the folktales, "For example, in this one, they're referred to as a phenomenon called 'Ouroborus'. While it's not exactly the same as what Pyra told us, there are a lot of key similarities."

Frankie was already starting to get a little lost in all of these technical terms, but watching his brother at work, for him and Pyra no less, kept him engaged.

Miko then handed the book she was holding, the one on Greek armies, to Kaito as he continued.

"-So I figured, maybe this book does contain mention of what Pyra was referring to, just under a different name?"

"So…did it?" Frankie asked.

What he received was a collective, exasperated sigh from both Kaito and Miko.

"That's…not reassuring…"

Miko picked up where Kaito left off.

"It's not like we didn't find anything, but it's all wrapped under layers and layers of unclear metaphors and vague descriptions. Everytime we think we're getting somewhere, the section ends with no follow-up."

"Honestly it's starting to feel like direct mention of this stuff was actively taken out of the books." Kaito added.

"And here I thought the museum of creationism was out of date…" Frankie sighed.

"Ah don't worry big bro, something will turn up eventually, it always does." Kaito patted his older brother on the shoulder.

"I guess…what about Elysium? Did you find anything on that?"

Miko shrugged in response. "Well…kinda?"

"I mean…we found a lot of stuff on Elysium, it's just that, like Blades, most of it is entirely within folklore. It's at least primarily called Elysium in all the stories it's mentioned in, which was a start, but there's nothing on its actual existence in reality."

Frankie sighed yet again. "Pyra did say it seemed like Elysium was erased from the textbooks she read. Well, thank you two for going so far out of your way to help…"

"Don't mention it, Frankie. We wanted to, and we know you would have done just as much for either of us." Miko patted him on the shoulder this time.

"Yeah big bro, and uh…before we cap this off, there's one more thing about Elysium you should probably know…"

"Hm?" Frankie looked at his brother intently.

"Well uh…how to put this…there's one big commonality with every mention of Elysium. It's always presented as this place of higher being associated with Gods, either being created by their hand, being where they rest, etc. Its…most well known counterpart in other cultures is…"

"What is it, baby bro?"

"...Heaven."

"O-oh…"

Frankie, a bit taken aback, slowly turned over to Pyra. It appeared as though she was helping a group of small children read a picture book, but her enthusiasm gave the impression she was just as invested in it as they were.

Frankie watched her…somewhat in awe.

"...Heaven, huh?"