My eyes shut wide open as Marissa’s lips touched mine. She vigorously pushed her tongue against mine in a mad frenzy. I gave her a light push, separating our lips and ending the kiss.

“What are you doing, Mari—” But before I could say anything, she lunged on top of me.

As a mage, I was physically weak, even more than the average person. If you added the fact that I was barely recovered from multiple death experiences, it wasn’t a surprise when I was unable to remove Marissa from on top of me. She also trained with Adrian on a weekly if not daily basis and had a toned body thanks to the melee and movement approach of her magic.

I looked at her face, partially covered up by the light blue strands of her hair. Her eyes shone blue, with a hint of white and pink. They sparkled with desire and passion.

As I tried to move her out, I found out she had pinned my arms down with her own. Since when was she this strong?

She renewed her assault once more, joining our lips, and twisting our tongues.

Why was she doing this? No, that wasn’t the right question. I already knew the answer.

Perhaps the right question was: why was I enjoying this?

Marissa's kiss was warm and filled me with an energy I had once felt. It was like one the Lady of the River used her powers to defy death itself and create new life when she reincarnated me. It was an invigorating sensation.

Even when it felt wrong, I couldn’t help myself but accompany her in this macabre dance. With each push, with each twist, I could feel my sanity dwindle. It was intoxicating.

I wanted to touch her, I wanted to caress her, I wanted to comfort her. But I was rooted, trapped in her grasp. That… wasn’t a bad sensation.

As with all good things, it finally ended.

She raised up her head, showing me her fatigued yet lustful visage. She panted heavily, her chest heaving up and down rapidly. I couldn’t know how long the exchange lasted as I felt lost, and I didn’t suffer from oxygen deprivation like most people thanks to my anatomy as a mystic.

Marissa roamed the corners of her mouth with her tongue as if savoring the conjoined saliva, and then she gulped down. It was an exciting and sensual movement I couldn’t fully process in my overloaded brain.

With our lips separated, I felt rationality returning to me, realizing the wrongness of the situation.

“Marissa.” I coldly called her.

As my words reached her, she finally snapped out of her trance, falling to my legs and unleashing her grab.

“I-I…” She looked to the side at a loss for words, her visage gained a pink coloration, unbefitting of her dark blue skin.

Her eyes were irritated, and I saw them tear up again.

“Everything’s going so fast and I felt you were going to leave me alone,” Marissa said between sobs. Her confidence was replaced by defeat. “I’m useless and only managed to get myself killed.”

“You’re not,” I said as lifted my back from the ground. I still couldn’t move as her body was on top of my legs. “I know it’s difficult to adapt, especially to fast-moving situations, but you are not useless. And I would never leave you alone.” I patted her head. “I had that opportunity a long time ago and chose against it. I told you.”

Marissa caressed my other hand, my burnt one. She intertwined my fingers with hers. I let her.

“I…” She moaned between tears. “I love you, Edrie.”

Those words struck me harder than Ceaseless Storm’s thrashing. Not even death made me shudder with such violence.

“You have listened to my story, Marissa,” I told, fully knowing these weren’t the right words. “You know I don’t feel the same.”

The grab on my left hand tightened. Marissa’s hand shook as if she was suffering from severe hypothermia.

“You still see…” Even if we were next to each other, I couldn’t hear her mutterings. They were far lower than the most silent of whispers.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“What?” I said by reflex.

“You still see me as a child!” Marissa shouted as she looked right at me. Her face was ridden with tears and anger. “Yes, I have heard your story! Yes, I know you are an ancient being and you were born with an adult mindset! But you still see me as a child and yourself as my guardian even when I’m my own person and an adult.” Her hair was plastered onto her face because of the tears. “And even then… after knowing it all… I still love you.”

I…

I didn’t know what to say.

Since the very beginning, I knew she felt some kind of attraction towards me, but I ignored it as a passing feeling, the dreams of a child. And even when I told myself multiple times that she was no longer I child, I knew I was lying to myself.

I had been with her since she was but a baby. Yes, I was also a baby back then, but it felt wrong, nonetheless.

“See!” She pointed at me. “That’s what I mean. You look at me as if I didn’t know better, as if I am nothing else but a babbling baby. Why? Why can you truly look at me?”

“Because…” I had never had this much difficulty talking in my life. “Because I can’t.”

She slapped me.

It was a shallow hit; it didn’t produce much sound and my head didn’t even move around. And yet… it hurt a lot.

“Why?” Marissa asked once more, her beautiful eyes were bloodshot.

She wouldn’t accept any excuses.

“It’s wrong,” I spoke.

She slapped me again.

My throat burned.

“Why!” She shouted.

I sighed. Yet this sigh wasn’t filled with mana or with exhaustion, as they typically were. This was loaded with doubt.

“You are not thinking straight, Marissa,” I told her. “You need to rest.”

But as I readied myself for another slap, none came. Instead, she stole my lips once more.

She grabbed me by the back of the head, pushing me forward in an embrace. The same passion as before drowned me, but instead of lust, now determination proliferated.

The kiss lasted less than the first one, but this time she separated the lips on her own. Marissa looked me straight in the eyes. They pierced me stronger than any mystic’s magic. Essence of life and death.

“Tell me I’m not thinking straight.” She said harshly.

“I…” I tried to speak, but the words didn’t come to me.

“Tell me!” Marissa cried and raised her arms.

It pained me to see her face brimming up with anger and sadness. Whilst her mouth shouted, her eyes cried.

“Tell me…” Her arms dropped to the ground in defeat. “Tell me… please…”

“I’m sorry.” I looked down. “Sticks and stones may literally break my bones and I won’t be bothered, but I’m sorry I can’t speak from the heart. I was never good at it.” There was a subliminal underlying message in my words I couldn’t even fully comprehend.

“Is that a n—”

Before she could finish up that sentence, I grabbed her face with both of my hands, and kissed her.

Marissa’s eyes shot wide open in surprise, and instead of fighting it, she embraced my body and dug deeper than before with her tongue. I answered in kind.

It was a short exchange, but it felt more powerful than the others. As our lips separated, a silvery string still connected us. The bridge quickly fell apart.

The rage and the sadness in her eyes vanished and got substituted by an underlying desire. Marissa’s face appeared more violet than blue.

“Is that a ye—”

“No.” I cut her.

She looked at me with confusion, but the pain was no longer there.

“Then what’s this supposed to mean?” Her voice was weak, yet it brimmed with expectation.

“I don’t know,” I responded sincerely.

“You don’t know?” Marissa backstepped in betrayal but fell down from my legs as she tried to do so. I quickly stopped her fall by putting my arm on her back.

Marissa looked at me, laying in my embrace. Without a hint of doubt, she lunged for another kiss. This time though, I blocked her with my hand.

“I accept that you are an adult,” I told as I blocked her mouth. “But I don’t know if I’m ready to accept your love.”

Her gaze turned to the side, not in escapism, but in ponderation. After a few seconds, she removed my hand away with her own in a slow movement.

“Alright.” She sighed. Only to then promptly grab me by the collar of the tunic. “But I’ll expect an answer in the future.” Flames burned in her icy eyes. Ambition. Desire. Confidence.

I smiled at her. That power from Marissa is what I had grown used to. I was not sure if I loved it, but I certainly liked it.

“You have my word,” I told.

“I don’t know if your word is worth anything. You kinda lied to me and everyone else for three decades about like… everything.” Unlike her words, her gaze had a whimsy feeling. She was joking.

“Well then, I better work on upping the value of my word,” I said playfully. “I wouldn’t like to trade with a worthless coin.”

Marissa gave a roguish look as she stood up, but she hadn’t given a step before her legs trembled and went to the ground. She lay her back on the ter’nar tree’s trunk.

“I can’t even stand up.” She laughed, yet no sadness was present in her voice. “I’m pathetic.”

“You are not.” I moved to her side, my back also touching the spring-shaped tree.

We both looked at the colorful canopies of the trees. Most were pink and blue, with an odd purple and violet here and there. But a rogue one appeared before us. We were under a fully white ter’nar tree, from the canopy to the roots. Those were rare.

“This place feels familiar somehow, but I can’t point out why.” Marissa's visage showed a dream-like expression.

I couldn’t have given her an answer if it weren’t because of True Recall.

“It’s the same place where I told you about my superb affinity,” I told her.

Back then I hadn’t even noticed the white tree, as I was worried more about the secrecy of my affinity and the paranoia of being watched or listened to. But the soul spell showed me the tree was there all along.

“Really?” She said in amazement.

“Hadn’t you noticed?” I laughed, even when I had just noticed myself and I would never have done so if she hadn’t pointed it out.

Marissa looked at me with a pout, annoyed that I was making fun of her. That careless and whimsy expression devoid of negative emotions… perhaps… perhaps I loved that.

I gave her a quick peck on the right cheek.

Marissa violently flushed.

Yes, perhaps I loved that.