I think so. After... after the city fell, all the newspapers reported that you and Noct died, too. Obviously, we were with Noct so we knew that wasn't right, and we got a message from you not too long after that, but at the time, it was--it was hard to hear.

[He laces his fingers together and rests his elbows on his knees, breathing out slow.]

Lucis is as much under the "protection" of the Empire as everywhere else, now.