Due to the magic spell [Clairvoyance], the scene of Lorraine and Cloud kissing was imprinted into Eri’s mind.
“What..?”
Eri’s pupils trembled at the unexpected and shocking sight. Just when Lorraine and Cloud, who had been fiercely kissing, suddenly snapped their heads toward her.
Surprised, she hurriedly erased the magic spell.
She cradled her thudding chest.
‘Did… did they notice?’
Clairvoyance, and at such a great distance?
No, it can’t be.
There was no way the clairvoyant’s form could be seen with the naked eye at such distance, and so if they had noticed, it must have been the flow of mana which again was impossible unless they were wizards like she was.
Not to mention, since they were kissing and so engrossed in it, their attention must…
‘…’
Surprised by the unexpected situation, she suddenly recollected what she seemed to be forgetting.
Kiss.
The act of kissing—an expression of love between lovers.
Lorraine and Cloud were doing it.
‘What the hell is this situation!’
Eri’s thoughts made her head teeter. She stumbled into the inn and sat down on a chair provided on the first floor. She brushed her bangs, organizing her thoughts.
‘I headed to Cloud’s room to meet him.’
He was not in the room and so she used clairvoyance to find him. The place he was at was the gymnasium near the collapsed royal palace premises. There he was kissing Lorraine.
Throb-!
Her heart ached, but Eri didn’t stop mulling.
‘Why were they kissing?’
Cloud’s lover was Katarina.
It must be true because he said it himself.
But why was he kissing Lorraine and not his lover Katarina?
Was he having an affair?
‘No, no. It doesn’t matter if it’s a bloody affair or not. The reason he kissed Lorraine is important.’
What on earth happened that led to him and Lorraine kissing each other?
She reasoned hard, pulling at her hair with a vexed expression.
Soon she recalled Katarina’s complaint.
– Yes, he isn’t. Do you need him? For he only comes late at night. Even if I ask, he just skims over.
Comes late at night.
It meant that their relationship was not made up of just one or two encounters.
She recounted Cloud’s personality, which had changed from before… conspicuously.
He didn’t pay attention to things that didn’t interest him.
In other words, the fact that they had met several times meant that Lorraine had something to interest him…
‘…gymnasium.’
The two were at the gymnasium.
Lightly armed.
What could this mean?
Nothing came to mind except combat.
‘Agh…’
Only then did all the puzzle pieces clicked together.
For some reason, Lorraine challenged Cloud to a fight.
Cloud accepted.
The simple spar begets another.
And the sparring, which she didn’t know when started, continued until now, and the two’s eyes met and the current relationship…
Eri, who finished grasping the situation, bit her lip.
Her rising anger and sense of betrayal dyed her reason black. She wanted to run to Cloud and ask about it right away.
Why was he kissing that b!tch?
Didn’t he have a lover named Katarina?
Why that witch, then?
Didn’t he know what that b!tch had done to her?
She really would have done so if she had let her temper simmer just a little longer. She would have rushed to the gymnasium and shouted aloud, setting aglow the jewel on her staff.
But she had a handful of reason left.
‘With qualifications would I…?’
If it was Katarina who saw that scene, as a lover, she deserved to scold them for infidelity.
If it had been Neria, as a childhood friend, she would have been able to stem her friend from going the wrong way.
As a priestess, Ophelia could have rebuked him for falling into wrong, vile desires.
Then Eri, who was she?
Did she deserve?
What was she to Cloud in the first place?
‘Colleague.’
Who left when they were facing a hard time.
And came back when things rendered into the right path. ‘…that’s the end? No. There has to be more to this.’
Something…
Anything…
Her fingers gnarled into locks of hair. A few strands that could not withstand the grip fell out, but it was out of Eri’s interest.
She shook her head, hoping that she meant a little to Cloud.
However, nothing else came to her mind other than the ‘colleague’ she had just thought of.
‘Is this really all? Is that all I can do?’
No.
It can’t be.
She had been called a genius since she was little.
She had never been hesitant to try.
So there must be something more.
There had to be.
Otherwise…
‘Lorraine… I would become meaningless compared to that woman…’
Comments