She sat motionless, eyes wide.

  "This... is for me?"

  Carlos just nodded, his eyes fixed on her. With fingers that trembled slightly, Tassi began to undo the bow, with almost reverential care. The ribbon gave way, but the knot in the paper was stubborn.

  "Here, let me," said Carlos, his practical impatience winning over the moment. He took the box and, with a quick movement, tore the paper.

  "Carlos!" she exclaimed, scandalized. "Paper is extremely expensive!"

  "For now," he retorted, unapologetic. "Soon, our paper factory will be running. Now open it!"

  With a mix of exasperation and excitement, Tassi lifted the lid of the simple wooden box. Inside, resting on a soft cloth, was a revolver. It wasn't a crude weapon, but an object of careful craftsmanship. The wooden grip was polished and painted white, and on it, in elegant black letters, was a phrase:

  “Dà nú wéma, jí ?ò hànjiji.”

  At first, Tassi was completely unfamiliar with this writing, but as she read, the sound of the words brought meaning. Tassi brought her hand to her mouth. It was Fon. Her mother tongue, the language of her mother's songs, whose written form she had never even seen.

  "This is... Fon," she whispered, her fingers hovering over the letters without touching them. "I've never... never seen it written. 'Even buried, the seed germinates.'"

  The translation came out in an emotion-laden breath. The meaning crashed down on her with the weight of an ancestral truth. She, the slave buried in the darkness of the sugar mill. She, the seed that, even in the deepest oppression, held life. And that had germinated here, in this free soil, ceasing to be just a warrior, a slave, and becoming Tassi, a joyful woman who likes to eat, play ball, and has an important role in the Republic. The phrase could also refer to her earth and grass powers; Tassi couldn't think of a more perfect phrase for her. Her eyes filled with tears she fought to hold back.

  "How... how did you get this?" her voice came out hoarse.

  "I asked Nyran for help," Carlos admitted, his expression becoming cautious upon seeing her reaction. "She helped me think of the phrase and translate it correctly."

  "Nyran?" The name came out like a crack. "The one who tried to kill you?"

  "The same Nyran who has known you since before the quilombo," he corrected softly. "I wasn't alone, Tassi. There were guards. And she... she's been cooperating. She seems genuine."

  Tassi shook her head, the tears threatening to finally overflow.

  "The person who knows me best in this place... is you, Carlos. Not Pedro, not Aunt Vera, not even Nyran. It's you. Who I am now was forged by your side."

  "But she knows the seed," insisted Carlos, gently. "She knows the soil you sprouted from."

  "The soil I sprouted from is dead. It was plowed by suffering. The seed that germinated here... that one is mine. And you were the one who watered it. Thank you."

  Carlos smiled, moved, but there was a glint of enthusiasm in his eyes.

  "I haven't shown you the best part yet."

  "Best part?" she asked, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

  "Much better!" He picked up two small leather pouches that were inside the box, one black and one white. "Remember when you defended me during the attack, shooting from within the earth? That gave me an idea. I spent weeks exchanging letters with the Popess, sketching with Nia, driving the magical artisan in the Holy City crazy... until we succeeded."

  He placed the black pouch on the table.

  "These are special bullets, made from earth gems. When fired with your active power, upon hitting the ground or a hard surface..." he made an explosive gesture with his hands "...they fragment into a rain of stone and earth shrapnel. Ideal for area attacks."

  He then picked up the white pouch.

  "These here are the opposite. During its flight, if you channel your magic in the bullet, when it fires, in the air, it accumulates earth and rock from the environment. The farther it goes, the bigger it gets. It can reach the size of a watermelon at two hundred meters, without losing its initial speed. And if fired from underground..." he made a piercing gesture "...it gets even bigger. Pierces almost anything."

  Tassi was absolutely paralyzed. Not by the tactical function of the weapon, but by what it represented. Someone not only saw her as a warrior but thought, planned, innovated for her. Someone had dedicated time, resources, and genius to create something that fused the power of his world with hers. Never in her entire life—neither in her stolen childhood, nor in brutal slavery, nor in the harsh camaraderie of the army—had anyone been so intentionally, profoundly good to her.

  The mask of the warrior disintegrated. Her chin trembled. Her breathing became ragged. And then, the tears she had held back so much rolled silently, soon accompanied by muffled sobs that shook her whole body.

  Carlos was petrified, not knowing what to do. But before panic could fully set in, instinct spoke louder. He stood up, walked around the table, and without ceremony, pulled her chair back and wrapped her in a hug.

  Tassi didn't pull away. She buried her face in his shoulder, her fingers still gripping the wooden box on the table, and cried. She cried for the lost girl, for the wounded woman, for the tired warrior. She cried from gratitude, from relief, from a colossal emotion that had no name. The hug didn't make her stop; on the contrary, it gave permission for the flood to come. And, strangely, she felt stronger than ever.

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  "I need to test it," she declared, her voice firm, as she separated from the hug and wiped her tears.

  "I agree," said Carlos, surprising her. "But not here. The sound of a gunshot, even silenced, travels. And the secondary effects... better not risk a pierced roof or a vaporized flower bed. I know a place."

  Twenty minutes later, they left the last lampposts of the settlement behind, plunging into a narrow trail in the dense forest. Carlos carried a strong light-gem lantern, whose beam cut through the darkness like a dagger, revealing twisted roots and the shining eyes of nocturnal animals that fled. Tassi followed with silent steps, the revolver already loaded and secured in her new holster, the box with the special ammunition under her arm.

  The air was different here—heavier, humid, laden with the smell of rotting leaves, wet earth, and the wild vitality of the forest that surrounded and protected the quilombo. Strange sounds echoed: the grunt of an opossum, the rustling of something heavy in the treetops, the distant cry of a night hawk.

  "Is it safe for us to walk alone at night?" asked Tassi, more out of ritual than fear.

  "Safer than testing a weapon that can uproot a tree in the middle of the main square," Carlos replied, pushing aside a branch for her to pass. "Besides, I'm sure Shadow is somewhere spying on me."

  Tassi had gotten so used to Shadow's presence that she now barely remembered he was always nearby Carlos, but upon remembering him, she managed to sense him. Poor guy, pulling overtime because of me... or not, after all he has to guarantee Carlos's safety even when he sleeps.

  After nearly half an hour of walking, the trail opened into a natural clearing. It was an old riverbed, dry for most of the year, surrounded by stone cliffs covered in ferns. The ground was fine gravel and sand, and the full moon, now visible between the open treetops, bathed everything in a silvery, ghostly light.

  "Here," Carlos announced, extinguishing the lantern—or rather, covering its light. It was a contraption he'd made for the army; when you wanted to turn off the light, you simply closed the wooden flap at the lantern's tip. He shut off the light because the moonlight was sufficient. "The stone cliffs muffle the sound and contain any... excessive enthusiasm."

  Tassi stepped onto the soft sand, feeling her connection to the earth immediately amplify in this open, virgin place. She took a deep breath, filling her lungs with the night air.

  "It's perfect," she said, and for the first time that night, her smile was one of pure warrior anticipation.

  She assumed her stance, feet firm in the sand, feeling the energy currents from the soil rise through her legs. The revolver, when drawn, seemed to capture the moonlight.

  The first shot, a regular bullet, was a dull puff that barely disturbed the clearing's silence. The recoil was smooth, the impact on the target rock thirty paces away, satisfying.

  "Precise. Reliable," she assessed, her voice professional.

  Next, the brown bullet from the black pouch. She channeled her power, and a subtle aura of earthy energy enveloped her hand. The shot was a bit louder, a muffled CRACK. The projectile hit the base of the cliff. Instead of a simple impact, there was a contained explosion—a crater the size of a gourd opened in the rock, launching a rain of pebbles and dust with enough force to whiz through the air meters away.

  Now, the brown bullet from the white pouch. The target was a solitary rock in the center of the clearing, almost fifty meters away. Tassi closed her eyes for a second, tuning in not only to the earth under her feet but to the very matter of the place. As she fired, she maintained the magical flow, a continuous thread of intention.

  The projectile began to fly. In its wake, particles of sand from the riverbed rose like iron in a magnetic field, sticking to the projectile. Pebbles followed, then larger stones. In less than a second, what had left the barrel as a small lead ball had transformed into an irregular, rough stone ball, the size of an orange.

  The impact was monumental. A deep, guttural WHUMP!, like subterranean thunder, echoed against the cliffs. The target rock didn't crack—it disintegrated into a cloud of dust and shards that rained down across the entire clearing. The ground trembled under their feet.

  The silence that followed was absolute. Even the insects stopped chirping.

  Tassi slowly lowered the weapon, panting. The extreme concentration and power discharge left her slightly dizzy. Her wide eyes met Carlos's in the gloom. In him, she saw the same reverent awe and the same wonder at the force they had unleashed.

  "It works," she said, her voice a bit hoarse from contained emotion.

  And then, the reaction came. The adrenaline began to subside, and in its place rose something deeper. It was no longer emotion for the symbol, but for the power. A power that was hers, but that he had shaped, channeled, and delivered into her hands. The vertigo was so great that her legs weakened. She leaned against a large rock, her breathing ragged.

  Carlos approached without speaking. He saw tears he knew, they weren't tears of sadness, but of a colossal overload—of identity, of strength, of future. He pulled her into a hug, firm and secure, anchoring her as the wave passed through her.

  This time, she didn't cry for the past. She cried for the future she could now shape, and for the man who, instead of fearing her power, had forged it in metal and wood for her.

  After staying a little longer in the woods, they both said their goodbyes and headed for their homes.

  When Tassi parted from Carlos, eyes still red but with a shy smile and the precious box hugged to her chest, Carlos paused for a moment and watched her silhouette being swallowed by the night.

  That's when the realization hit him like a brick.

  Wait a minute. Dinner alone, at night, by gem-light. Special food from 'another world.' Wine. A personal and deeply meaningful gift… Damn. That wasn't a dinner between friends. In my century, that would be a date. A super romantic date!

  He rubbed his face with his hands, a heat rising up his neck.

  But she probably didn't interpret it that way. Surely not. She comes from a completely different context. She probably just saw it as a... grand demonstration of friendship and gratitude. Yes. That's it. I'm projecting. Overthinking, as usual.

  He returned home, trying to ignore the confusing whirlwind in his chest, and began washing the dishes, the sound of running water drowning out the noise of his thoughts.

  On the way back to her apartment, Tassi felt her legs weak, but not from weakness. A strange and pleasant warmth radiated from her chest, as if a small sun gem had been planted inside it. As she passed by a flower bed, the night scent of the flowers enveloped her in a way she had never noticed before. Her mind replayed every moment: the taste of the lasagna, the glint in the goblets, the weight of the revolver in her hands, the strength of the hug.

  There was a sweet flutter in her stomach, a kind of butterfly flight she had never experienced. It was confusing, it was scary, it was... wonderful. The phrase on the grip seemed to pulse against her arm, through the wooden box.

  "Even buried, the seed germinates."

  And, at that moment, Tassi felt that something new, tender, and full of life had indeed sprouted within her. And she had no idea what it was, only knowing it was connected to the man who, with a dinner and a gift, showed her that her own story could be written—and not just remembered.