He was up and sat on the bed supporting his back with the headboard, looking at her he chucked lightly.
“Am I that good-looking?” his always soothing voice asked in a teasing tone.
“Huh?”
“I was up when you entered the room today”
“Had fun huh?”
“I guess I did” How can’t he say no, although he was never a simp for her even when reading the comic still it felt good to be with her in the first place, leave alone see her waiting for him to get up.
“Man, what were you waiting for then?”
“I had no strength” he shrugged and told honestly.
“You should have made any movement for me to notice.”
“You were too busy looking at my face to notice my hands.”
“YOU- YOU... you think that moving hands is easier than the movement of eyes?”
“Stop stop don’t hit him” it was a healer lady standing right behind me. Her sudden interruption made me skip a beat, first reason because she spoke too suddenly while I had no idea about her presence, and second because I wanted to punch him, it felt like being caught red-handed.
“…Okay” I wanted to accompany them a bit but I was too sleepy for that. Anik is already conscious and I don't know what to talk about. I was waiting so he won't feel too alone, there isn't anyone else who'll wait for him in this world, just thinking about that feeling feels terrible. Waking up after being unconscious for a while and realizing no one is there for you... I'd rather not think about that.
“Hey are you okay?” he asked.
“Don’t you think I am the one who should ask this?”
“I was talking about your neck; your sleeping posture seemed very uncomfortable.”
“Yeah, it’s alright. My posture has always been like that.” I said cracking my neck bones while moving out of the room. Even if it wasn’t for my posture, I had a habit of doing this. Cracking… even the back was not spared. The cracking sound felt comfortable.
“Aunty, I’ll go sleep,” I said yawningly. And ever since I got up this time it has been very cold, sitting there, doing nothing made me feel too cold so now I want to sleep under the covers as soon as possible.
“Okay, I’ll ask someone to stand by the room, you both can ask him to help you with whatever you two want. I am still busy with the survivors of the orc attack.”
“I don’t think I need someone but you can ask him”
I went back to my room and quickly got on my bed. Ahh, it’s so warm I thought folding the quilt under my foot professionally as it has always been my habit to fold the cover under my feet like this. Whenever I went over to have a sleepover with Vanshika or she came over, this used to be a reason for us to fight before sleeping because she had a habit of sleeping with her feet out of the covers. Although there was no need for us to fight as I can just fold a corner and she can simply stick her feel out from the other corner, we still quarreled because it was fun.
On the other hand, the healer lady had helped him change the bandages and check his overall condition. It was all alright, and if her estimate was right he should be able to move around freely after a day or two of recuperating.
“Ma’am, are you alright?”
“Why are you suddenly asking that?”
“I don’t know how long it has been since you arrived here I was wondering if you were used to seeing so many injured and dead people.” There was another reason he asked this for. He doesn't know the storyline anymore. It's inevitably going to be different. The best thing he can do now is to take notes about people around him, if he can somehow know what is going on with them or even better, what level they are then he can use this information in the future when needed.
“Don’t worry son, I was a doctor back then too, I have been through worse things.”
“Take care then, you can come to me freely if you need something in the future.”
“Then there is a thing I am worried about.”
“What?” There was no such thing that she was worried about it in the comic… or maybe he’s the one who doesn’t know because the comic either focused on the protagonist or the villain and in the comic, Ashleen was supposed to leave this place right after the battle so there was not a lot shown about the characters left behind.
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“You two should take better care of yourselves. Especially you, whenever she turns into a demon you are the one who suffers the most.”
Anik sighed a sigh of relief because he was worried that there was something wrong with someone’s health.
“Aunty…Do you hate her?”
This aunt is supposed to become one of the top 10 healers in this world in a few years and she even ends up learning a lot about poison in the end. Vanshika’s partner would have never been able to kill Ashleen without her help.
“That child, she sure becomes scary and ruthless but I can’t bring myself to hate her, after all, she saved numerous lives that day. It’s just a pity that you got injured for no reason.”
“It sure is embarrassing.” So the healer lady doesn’t hate her yet, it’s a good thing.
“Haha, you take some rest, I’ll go help others.”
“Okay, aunt take care.”
She smiled and went out.
Anik laid down on the bed. If things went according to the original novel, after Ashleen left, Akansha would have become the new ruler and the demon wouldn’t have left her consciousness yet because her consciousness would have never been able to tolerate the exhaust without any healer’s help.
After traveling for a few days, she was supposed to enter her third scenario which was to kill the king of the ‘forever snowing’ area. She wanted to give this up but the demon forcefully made her complete this scenario. She single-handedly took care of everything. People of the land were afraid of her after they saw how she turned into a demon and listened to her, with no courage to even say her name behind her back. Those who were loyal to the previous king left the area and swore to avenge his life. Those were the people who were actively participating in the demon hunt when it was organized by him.
But now, Ashleen was sleeping comfortably in her bed. He thought about it and smiled contently. When Anik first came across this comic, he was suicidal. He wanted to fight his problems head-on, but after losing everything he became more and more depressed.
One night he was scrolling through the internet and came across a comic platform. It made him remember his childhood when he used to urge his mom to tell him stories.
He opened the site and started scrolling aimlessly again when he encountered an interesting name ‘The Sweet Death’. A sweet death, he smiled; he wanted to die and it would be sweet to leave this world; he somewhat resonated with the title so he started reading it.
He started this comic without any expectations but now it was struck with him. He felt so irritated by irregular updates that he wanted to throw his mobile. But something was interesting about the comic. It focused equally on both Vanshika and Ashleen. In the comment section, he had seen people arguing over who was the protagonist numerous times. In his heart, he knew it is Vanshika but he didn’t want to admit it because Ashleen didn’t deserve to be a villain either.
Whenever he encountered something bad and thought about ending everything for once, he was stopped by his curiosity about how this book would end. In his colorless world, this book was the only color, it wasn't a pleasant one either after a few chapters he realized that Ashleen died so he too went to the roof of his college building, when he was about to step down he got into this place.
…
At about midnight, Ashleen woke up shivering.
“Cold… so cold…” "I thought we weren’t supposed to feel these things anymore…” Sneeze! “Ashleen, dear Ashleen let’s go to Akansha”
Her quilt was warm but it can’t be warmer than a human she thought and got out of bed. I don’t know where her room is but certainly, the guy healer lady told me about should know… another sneeze.
“Okay I can’t go no no it’s too cold” and she sat back in the bed. After a few seconds, she got up again.
“This won’t do Ashleen…” She picked up the quilt and covered herself from head to toe tightly and tip-toed out of the room. Sneeze!
“Anybody here? Where did he go? I thought he was supposed to be outside the room”
…
On the other hand, about an hour ago Anik woke up and felt bored of sleeping.
“Huh, I wish I had my phone now…” he said while sighing.
After a few minutes of tossing and turning around, he got out of bed and thought of going on a walk nearby. When he stepped out of the room a stranger greeted him,
“Hi, I am Pratik. The healer lady asked me to take care of you guys. Are you going somewhere?”
“On a walk”
“Lemme accompany you.”
“No need, you stay here and take care of her”
“But healer lady asked to take special care of you as your wounds were deep. And I am afraid your leg might start troubling you in your walk. What would you do if you need help?”
“People don't need to sleep anymore, there should be someone else outside.”
“Don’t you know healer lady asked people to sleep regardless? After the princess’s order for her to sleep, she concluded that there really might be some factors affected by not sleeping.” Anik knows about this very well, after all the reason why the ‘forever snowing’ area ended up under her jurisdiction so easily was because of the brain fog after sudden dimension travel and no sleep in the prince and general of that area.
“Okay, then I’d appreciate your company.”
Both Pratik and Anik were bad at making friends in the previous dimension, and now these two, are on a walk… entire walk was extremely boring if you look at it.
But for Anik and Pratik it was peaceful. When they first entered this place, it was so brazenly wrecked. When they completed the first scenario, this place started taking shape. After the appearance of the castle, a garden appeared in front of the castle. After a day or two, many small and big houses started appearing one by one. Trees could be seen everywhere and the moon had been full every night ever since they came here. There were all sorts of flowers in the garden but at night, night lilies were glowing differently.
“Is something wrong?” Anik asked after seeing Pratik looking uncomfortable.
“I… I just wanna go to the washroom.”
“I thought we didn’t need to do that.”
“I don’t know why, but I might be the exception.”
“Oh. Then I’ll go to my room, you can go to sleep as well, I am good.”
“Okay” Pratik wanted to urge him to take him along with him but he urgently needed to go so he just ended the conversation with an okay and went towards his room as it was the only place that had a washroom.
As he took a turn to enter his and Ashleen’s shared corridor he saw someone looking around in the corridor and trying to sneak in Ashleen’s room. He quickly stepped forward and tapped this person’s shoulder.
“Ahhhh! Ghost….” Sneeze!
It was a familiar voice. “Ashleen?”
“Anik? You scared the shit out of me” she snorted.
“You caught a cold?”
“Don’t you feel cold as well?”
“No...” What’s wrong? There was nothing like that in the original comic… she wasn’t supposed to be here in the first place according to the comic so I can’t question the comic.