In the days after the family gathering, Kaelen spent the first 240-hour reserve across all four tracks to stabilize the battered harbor defenses. Each one-time 723× draw ran concurrently for one minute, yielding 723 baseline hours per track; he then closed the windows and forfeited their unused time. Sixty real hours of renewed rest under compression built each track back to 120.
The leather recipe book hit Kaelen Vance directly in the ribs.
It did not hurt. His Saint Vessel flesh had the density of refined continental iron. It did knock his straw hat askew, letting the afternoon sunlight poke his left eye.
“Kaelen,” Claire Vance said, her voice dry as aged bark. “Explain this.”
Kaelen did not sit up. He adjusted his hat by two inches, shielding his face beneath the braided straw. The ocean breeze off the Void Lotus lagoon carried the scent of brine and spirit-kelp.
“That is a sacred Vance family heirloom,” Kaelen murmured from the hemp hammock. “A profound text on ancestral nutrition.”
Claire picked the volume up by two fingers. She shook it once. A loose sheaf of cheap pulp paper fluttered out and landed on Kaelen’s stomach.
The crude woodblock print showed a masked outlaw carrying a maiden through a swamp. The smudged title read: The Bandit King’s Secret Bride, Book Thirteen.
