Glug glug.
Lian hid half of her face in the hot water, blowing bubbles outward.
“Xiao Lian, you’ll faint from the heat if you keep that up, okay?”
“……Mind your own business! Don’t turn around!”
Vera had just turned her head when Lian panicked and ducked her head even deeper.
Feiyin had finally managed to strip the bath towel from her body before leaving, and she was now soaking in the pool water back-to-back with Vera.
This was Lian’s firm request.
Because she truly couldn’t look directly at Vera’s body—when she had to respond to her anger earlier, Lian noticed that her figure was already different from her girlhood, having developed into something very… mature.
Once she lost the cover of that oversized military coat and tight-fitting uniform, Lian realized that Vera was the type who was even more impressive once undressed.
Even though the steam and mist were doing their best to obscure everything, she still didn’t dare use her Eyes to look directly at the other’s slender figure and the muscle lines that had become more graceful and smooth through years of training.
In fact, even while sitting back-to-back like this, she could constantly feel a heart-pounding softness from Vera’s spine.
Just by feeling this softness, Lian felt as if her heart was about to explode.
Meliya Meliya Meliya… if Meliya were here too… What would her body look like now? It must be very different from before, right? Compared to Vera…
She tried to chant her wife’s name in her heart to slow her heart rate, only to unexpectedly create even more alluring images in her mind.
“It reminds me of the past… back then, I sat back-to-back with that person just like this. That was when we had just entered the Border Mountains. That day, he and I had just fought our way out of a cave of Trolls, and we were covered in that foul-smelling blood. After walking through the mountains for a while, exhausted, we actually had the great luck to stumble upon a hot spring…”
“Glug glug glug glug glug.”
“Xiao Lian?”
Hearing the sound of bubbles being blown from behind her, Vera, who was immersed in her memories, turned around in confusion—she saw that Lian had completely sunk into the water.
“Whoa?!”
She hurriedly helped her up from the pool water and brought her to the edge of the pool.
…
……
………
“Don’t turn around.”
“Who would turn around? Please, give it a rest… I’m tired even if you aren’t after slaying all those Trolls.”
Faced with Vera’s repeated warnings from behind him, Lian En simply tilted his head back to look at the sky.
Small snowflakes falling from the sky brushed against his cheeks from time to time, then fell into the hot spring below and melted away.
This snow-capped Border Mountains, just as its name suggested, had borne the important responsibility of being the dividing line between the Human Realm and the Demon Realm since ancient times.
It divided the skies of the Human Realm and the Demon Realm into two colors: black and white.
In this hot spring near the mountain peak, the endless dark clouds shrouding the Demon Realm in the distance were close at hand, seemingly within reach.
Lian En gazed even further into the distance… The cloud curtain there was even tinged with a faint red shadow.
He knew that was caused by the light emitted from the lava rivers that ran through the land of the Demon Realm like blood vessels and veins, reflecting onto the clouds.
“…Just looking at it makes me numb. Can the Demon Race really survive in a world like that, devoid of sun and filled with ash and lava?”
“That is the reason for their strength. It is a world where even the air is overflowing with Magic Power… that is why our Soldiers cannot enter.”
Vera’s voice was heavy—because she remembered those several failed expeditions of the Human Allied Forces in history.
Magic Power that is too powerful is a lethal poison for ordinary people; just by stepping into the Demon Realm, ordinary Human Soldiers would collapse with blood flowing from their seven orifices.
“So you’re saying the enemies we’ll face after entering will be even more troublesome than these damned Trolls?”
“Of course. From now on, we will probably face many High Demonkind. Are you afraid?”
“You’re the one who’s afraid. Focus on healing the wound…”
Ignoring Vera’s provocation, Lian En closed his Eyes wearily.
His chest had a terrifying sword wound—it almost covered his entire chest.
Most of the wound had already healed, with a fluorescent green light surging over it.
“…”
Vera lowered her head, noticing the water around her was stained with a slight pale red.
Then she scooped up a handful of spring water and found a thread of blood drifting in it.
“Lian En.”
She hesitated slightly, but she still spoke up and asked.
“Hmm…?”
“How is your wound?”
“It’s just like that… anyway, it’ll be fine after a bit of rest.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“It’s bound to bleed a little… after all, Healing Magic isn’t omnipotent. It would be great if Linxi were by our side at a time like this.”
He had already made his voice sound as relaxed as possible.
But Vera could tell that he was suppressing his pain.
“Since you knew Linxi wasn’t here… why did you block it for me? That strike couldn’t even kill you, so it should have been fine even if it hit me—”
“Stop saying things like that.”
Lian En’s tone suddenly grew heavy.
His voice in an instant surged with several emotions—deep unwillingness, extreme resentment, intense pain… and endless regret and self-reproach.
Vera fell silent at once.
Because she suddenly realized she had inadvertently dug up the deepest scar buried in both their hearts, easily leaving both their hearts dripping with blood.
“…My Magic Power is much stronger than yours. So I’ll definitely recover faster than you. For minor injuries like this, just let me take them as much as possible… Teacher Vera?”
Seeming to notice that the atmosphere had become awkward, Lian En spoke first.
He hid the emotions he had shown earlier and returned to his previous joking tone.
“…No.”
“What did you say?”
She was practically whispering.
Therefore, Lian En was unable to hear her response clearly.
“I said no.”
It was still very quiet.
Even the bubbling sound of the hot spring could drown out her voice.
“Your voice is too quiet… I can’t hear you.”
“I said no! You’re not allowed to block for me anymore!”
Vera slapped the surface of the water in anger, then turned around and shoved him over.
“Whoa—! Fine, I won’t block, why are you pushing me… glug glug glug glug glug…”
Having lost his balance, Lian En sank into the water.
He immediately wanted to sit up, but through the pool water, he could vaguely see that Vera was currently facing him completely naked… so he didn’t dare move.
“Glug glug glug glug glug glug!”
He merely reached his hand out of the water and pointed repeatedly toward Vera’s back, hoping she would understand his meaning and turn around.
“You… bastard… idiot… loser… you’re clearly weak as hell… relying only on brute force… insisting on playing the Hero…!”
He vaguely heard Vera muttering curses; it was probably those rude words a Royal Princess shouldn’t say anyway.
Ah… the wound hurt like hell.
Lian En prayed that it wouldn’t worsen because it was completely submerged in the spring water.
According to his understanding of things like hot springs, there should be many miscellaneous components inside…
Seeing that Vera still had no intention of turning back, he simply closed his Eyes and let himself sink deeper to wait for her to finish scolding him.
“That’s why… I like you. I like you the most…”
—And it was precisely because of this that the sound of bubbles constantly gushing from the bottom of the spring completely drowned out his hearing, preventing him from hearing Vera’s most important words, which she would only say once.
By the time he emerged from the bottom of the water, she had already turned her back to him.
“Don’t do that again. The wound almost opened up just now. Besides, what’s with the person who repeatedly forbade me from turning around being the first one to turn around?”
“…Did you hear that?”
Her voice was a bit muffled.
She was probably speaking with her head buried in her knees now.
“I’ve heard those insults of yours so much I’ve grown calluses on my ears. Could you please come up with something fresh next time? It’s been over a year… and it’s still the same old routine.”
“Get away from me! Get over to the side toward the rocks! Don’t lean on my back!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa… I told you it would make the wound open up! …Why has the spring water turned cold?”
The bickering of the two echoed amidst the steam.
The only things listening to their voices were the surrounding mountains and the falling snow in the sky… as well as the Saint Sword and the Demon Sword thrust by the edge of the spring, crossed in the shape of a crucifix.