(At 17 years and 1 month old)
(Nephelont's PoV)
I woke up and challenged the sun again today. I long for the day I will be able to defeat it once and for all.
Lia rubbed the sleep off her eyes and put her eyepatch back on. In the last two months, she gathered the courage to show me her other eye. It was not that unpleasant. It just looked like the skin around the eye had a burn mark.
"I wanted to see your face a little more" I said. Lia, with rosy cheeks, removed her eyepatch for a few more moments before putting it back on.
"Thank you, for not looking away" She said before hopping off the bed. This was not the first time she said these words, having made a habit of thanking me for that every morning. She didn't have to, but I appreciate it, the fact that I didn't turn away when she let me see the other side of her face for the first time.
"I love you" I said. I wanted to tell her that I didn't look away because I loved her, because I wanted to accept all of her as she is. She seems to have gotten the message as she walked away in more flustered steps.
(3rd person PoV)
The two dragon bunnies were doing each other's hair, with Nephelont's hair reaching his waist like Ais's does. Eucleia's hair, however, was longer, reaching her knees. Unlike Hephaestus, Eucleia wanted her hair to be long, really long. She wanted it to reach her ankles. She was fighting a constant battle with split ends to reach her goal.
"Lia, did anything change after we started going out?" Nephelont asked, busy removing the knots in her hair. "We went on date like we already regularly did, we spent most of the day together like we already did, we treated each other like we already did, what changed?"
"I don't know, really" Eucleia said, doing her best to make sure Nephelont's hair shined its best today. She enjoyed brushing it. "The only thing that changed is that we look at our actions as romantically influenced instead of being influenced by platonic love like before"
"Yeah, I guess that's all that really changed" Nephelont said.
They continued enjoying the silence as they did each other's hair. Once they were done, Nephelont bolted forward and kissed her on the lips for the first time before looking away. He was really tempted to disappear from there, but that might have hurt Eucleia's pride. He loathed to be the cause of that.
Eucleia froze for a moment, took his action in, stuttered, then blushed heavily before disappearing from there.
(At Hephaestus's Office)
"So, why is my lovely daughter here?" She asked while tapping the top of her pen to the side of her chin, a small smile adorning her face. "Don't you have flirting to do?"
"Mother... please..." Eucleia reddened a bit more. "Nephelont kissed me on my lips this morning" She said, hands over her face. She liked the feeling but her natural reaction took over her.
"Finally" Hephaestus said nonchalantly before promptly returning to the documents. "I want to hear news of grandchildren soon"
"Mother!" Eucleia shouted, flustered beyond measure.
"Okay! Alright!" She wiped a tear from under her eye before taking a deep breath to calm her laughter. "I won't tease you about your first kiss!" A fond, happy smile persisted on her face.
"Muu!" Eucleia pouted. It was at times like these that she wanted to hold a weakness over Hephaestus, to tease her all the way to the upper realm and back down.
(Back in their Room)
"Did I do anything wrong?" Nephelont was balled up on the bed, hugging his knees remorsefully. "She disappeared on me. Maybe I was hasty?"
He felt saved when Eucleia silently slipped into the bed and hugged him from behind, pressing her forehead onto his back.
"Can you turn around?" She said hesitantly, almost silently.
When Nephelont turned around, he immediately knew why she had disappeared. She did not know what to do with his kiss. That was evident by her not knowing how to initiate her own. She stretched her hands toward him with shaking eyes, making an attempt at getting her face closer to kiss him. She felt overwhelmed and started pulling her hands away. Nephelont took one of her hands and put it under his cheek, waiting for her to put her other hand over his other cheek.
A few awkward moments later, and a few failed attempts later, Eucleia found the courage to finally kiss him. She still disappeared again, though. This time, Nephelont could care less that she disappeared. He felt too absentmindedly happy to care.
(At 17 years and 2 months old)
Nephelont and Eucleia were out on a date. This particular date was eventful, as they were out shopping for hair-care supplies.
"Is this gonna make my hair glossy?" Nephelont picked up a product, inspecting it with the blankest of expressions. It made the clerk's heart skip a beat, and not in a good way. A doubt directed to one of their products was a potential loss of trust in the store.
"We will be glad to be of service to the famous Golden Bunny and Virtue" The clerk bowed down to greet them. She called them by their aliases.
"Forget the aliases. Will this help our hair be better?" Nephelont said bluntly. He took this matter very seriously.
"Actually, there is a mixture that works better for men" The clerk gestured for Nephelont to follow.
"What about her?" Nephelont pointed at Eucleia. "Would this one work for her?" He raised the bottle in his hand.
"Unless she has an allergy, it should work" The clerk said.
Eucleia took the bottle, and they followed the clerk to find something that fits Nephelont. Both Nephelont and Eucleia were satisfied with the products' effects. They became returning customers of that store.
"Should we visit Aunt Linda's bakery?" Nephelont said. He knew that Eucleia wanted something sweet right now but refrained from saying it.
"You always suggest that when I want something sweet" Eucleia said while twiddling her fingers. "Did you always know when I wanted something sweet?"
"Let's go" Nephelont was the one who got flustered this time. He did not want to get caught this early. Eucleia had conflicted feelings of shame and a desire to laugh. In the end, the desire to laugh won, and she started chuckling at Nephelont's cute attempt to sweep the subject under the rug.
"Good afternoon, Aunt Linda" Nephelont said. He raised his voice since she was not at the counter, probably baking something at the back. A moment later, she came out with her apron still on, stained with flour and some egg stains.
'My cutiepies are here!' Linda thought as she took the cake out of the oven to cool down. The frosting wouldn't mesh well with the cake otherwise.
Henryk once introduced Linda as "Aunt Linda" to the two of them. They started calling her that whenever they visited, which she found endearing. It made her day when they called her "Aunt Linda!" with their cute smiles. She never told them, but she always gave them a discount.
"Good afternoon, lovebirds!" She started calling them that after they started going out. She was secretly hoping for that to happen since they already treated each other like lovers before, and she was glad once they told her. "Baked potato sweets again?" Nephelont's order almost always included some form of baked potato, and she took it as a challenge to give him what he asked for.
"A cake with potato chunks and salty cream on top" Nephelont and his weir orders.
'Another challenge!' It was an unspoken agreement for him to bring up an idea, and for her to try it. As unusual as they are, some people got interested, tried them and got hooked since then. It drove her more business whenever she announced one of Nephelont's new "recipes".
"Give me until tomorrow. I have to finish another customer's special order first" Linda accepted today's challenge.
"Mom!!" Her son called from the back. "I think the cake is cool enough now! I'll do the frosting while you tend the counter!"
"Thanks! I'll be back there in a minute!" She hollered back at him.
The three of them ended up chatting a little before Nephelont and Eucleia started heading back home. On the way, Nephelont saw a potato snack shop and gravitated toward it before Eucleia held him by the arm and led him away. In a recurring happenstance like this, it benefitted her that she maxed out the first level while he did not.
Their outing that day ended with them sitting under the shade of a tree and talking until they accidentally fell asleep, Eucleia's head resting on Nephelont's shoulder. Arthur and Melody found them, melody giggled, then they walked away. Hugo and Amsa did about the same. Oliver and his lover, Nala, were walking nearby when they smelled them, found them and Nala had to tell Oliver not to wake them up. She found the image of them napping like that too lovely to ruin.