The heat was transparent, as the majestic light beaming from the sky covered the ground. Dust filled the air, tingling the students' noses as they looked at the two people standing facing each other in the middle of the yard.
Erik stood at the edge, where the shadow of the tree stretched like a grasping finger, his breath was quiet, a weary thing.
"Haaaah....." The sigh was escaping his mouth like a confession.
It was this morning, three days later, after he bought his hand axe. A moment that touched his heart as the professor finally allowed him to enter the class. As it turns out, it was a sparring session to gauge each student's capability.
What he was expecting was where the student was studying, a theory lingering towards the unknown and discussing it as it is a world where magic is common. Yet, that fantasy was shattered as he barely attended the classes. Instead, the time when he finally attended was a field practice.
Then—
A presence, cool and deliberate, settled beside him.
"If you keep sighing, all the happiness will fly away, you know?"
The voice was smooth—lifting, almost playful—but beneath, it ran a current of something sharper.
Erik turned his head, looking at the girl as she stood still. Her hand folded on her back, her gaze fixed on the sparring grounds ahead. She didn't look at him, not fully. Only the barest tilt of her head betrayed that she had spoken.
"Edna," he said, the name escaped like a confession. "You seem carefree like always."
She turned, facing him fully as her amber eyes narrowed in a frown, "How rude," she chided, though there was no real bite to it. "It may not look like it, but I took it seriously."
"Such as?"
"A week ago I corrected Kian's spell," she said, triumphant, as though urging him to praise her effort.
A moment three days ago flashed—a moment when Kian came to drag Edna away from him. There is petty jealousy from teenage boys as Kian's eyes looks at Erik clearly in an unpleasant way.
Ah, no wonder. The thought passed, whispered to the enlightened mind.
He knew the shape of this story long before he'd stepped into it; the detail itself isn't very important. The time he was transferred here, the threads of fate were already woven, as the conclusion is still the same as he walks towards his demise.
The players called this game a dating sim isn't without a reason.
As the player continues to play, the AI will generate an event to deepen the bond between the character.
"Hey, Edna," Erik murmured, the words half-lost to the wind..
She turned, her gaze sharpened as she caught the shift of Erik's tone, "I will leave the inside to you," he said.
"What do you mean?" She asked, though, something in her eyes suggested she already knew.
Erik's gaze drifted towards the sparring ground, to the dance of the magic that played out like an orchestra for the invincible audience. "We know the ending," his words just a murmur. "We knew the process. You have your role here, and I—" He exhaled, slowly. "Will move outside of it."
Silence wraps her mouth as though she is contemplating the suggestion.
"And, what will you do?"
There was no mockery in her voice, only a worry woven into curiosity about the things that he would do.
Erik smiled, faint and weary. "That," he said, "Is mine to think of."
For a long moment, Edna said nothing. The wind stirred the dust at their feet as the distant glow of magic glimmered like a firefly. Then, with a slow, deliberate nod, she turned her gaze back to the arena.
"Fine," she said, her voice embedded with neither agreement nor refusal—Just an acknowledgement.
Erik let the silence stretch, like a weight of the third party watching the two of them—a presence who settled in between the stillness. Then—
"By the way, Edna," he continues, with a pause and deliberate. "The blessing of the forest sage."
Her shoulder flinched—just a fraction, a tremor so slight it might have been mistaken for a trick from the light. But it was there. A name spoken aloud that should have been buried.
"Tell me the location of the Ancient Forest."
Her breath hitched—just a moment, barely—but it was enough. The shift in her was immediate, subtle as a shadow lengthening at dusk. When she turned to face him, her eyes had lost their light, it was dark and unreadable. But there was something there—a flicker, sharp and wary like a beast catching the scent of steel.
How? The question was buried behind her eyes, unvoiced though deafening in the silence between them.
Then—
"Oh, right,..." The words slipped from her like a murmur, barely more than an exhale, as if she had forgotten the weight of her secrets.
The realisation settled over her. Of course, he knew. Just like she did.
"I don't mind," she said at last, he voice measured, "but it will take time." A pause, "As I need to do something."
Erik looked at her as her gaze shifted slightly to the centre of the yard. It wasn't quite avoidance—not entirely, but her shifted gaze spoke louder than mere words.
A permission. The thought came to Erik's mind.
For him, this was a quest—a thread woven into the fabric of the game, waiting to be pulled. A task that requires patience, steps, and a trigger. But he had not passed the usual path, bypassing all the steps required by asking the one who already claimed it. A way that is impossible to try when this is still a mere game.
Edna studied him, her expression inscrutable. The air between them hummed within the air of unspoken understanding, with the weight of something known but unvoiced.
Erik nodded once, slowly and deliberately, "As soon as possible."
The wind curled around them, carrying the dry whisper of the leaves and the distant, rhythmic clash of spell. For a moment, they stood, suspended by the silence that hovered around them. Two figures cast in the fading amber light, their gaze fixed ahead on the training ground where the smell of youth lingered.
A prickle of unease traces its finger down Erik's spine. It is a sensation that he knows too well, honed by his countless life experiences before transmigrated.
The figure in the training yard, a young man, stood like a wall to others as though he were the pinnacle that needed to be surpassed. His white hair fluttered, gleaming as he stood with his head high. His face was arranged in an expression of noble courtesy, but his eyes—cold and assessing— betrayed the performance.
With deliberate slowness, he raised his hands, his finger unerring as a blade's point as it levelled at Erik.
"I request Erik as my sparring partner."
His voice carried across the yard, ringing in practised condensed command. A hush fell, even the wind seemed still for a moment.
His lips twitching, "What a hassle," Erik muttered—running a hand through the already muffled hair.
At his side, Edna leaned in—close enough that the scent of parchment and wild mint clung to her movement, "What will you do?" She asked, her voice low. A bit of curiosity imbues within her voice, but there's something sharper than that—an edge of anticipation.
Erik, on the other hand, eyeing Edna with a scrunching look as if he was loudly saying, Are you serious asking me that?
"I'll go," his voice deep and determined.
Her eyes widened, it's as if she were looking at the determined knight who would never falter amid the challenge. But in truth, he thought that evading this would cause more trouble than it's already had.
"What will you use?" She asked. "Another kitchen knife?"
"...wooden sword," he answered without looking back as he walked closer to the arena, answering the call that Kian announced.
Her eyebrow arched as Erik hefted a wooden sword, its dull weight far cry from the lethal instrument that she expecting.
"How generous of you," she said, her lips twitching into a wry smile as her words came out in a sigh.