I woke up slowly, as if my mind floated to the surface before the rest of did. My body felt... incredible.
Light.
Rested.
As if I’d slept for a century and the universe finally decided to give one decent thing.
Then I registered the warmth.
Soft warmth.
Pressed right up against .
I opened my eyes.
And froze.
My arms were wrapped around Belle. Fully wrapped around her, one over her waist, one under her shoulders. And my legs... yeah, tangled with hers like we were so kind of emotionally-starved pretzel.
But that wasn’t even the shocking part.
One of her hands rested in my hair. The other was...
Inside my shirt.
I could even see the imaginary smoke coming out of my head.
I stared at her hand for a good three seconds before the rest of caught up.
...What.
What was going on.
Was I still dreaming??
I shifted the smallest amount, just enough to test the sensation. Nope.
It was real.
Too real.
Warm palm against my chest, fingers curled slightly, like she’d drifted there naturally in her sleep.
My heart did sothing embarrassingly soft inside my ribs. Sothing fluttery and stupid.
Dream or reality, I didn’t care. Not even a little.
If this was so hallucination brought on by stress and poor life choices, fine. If this were actually happening, even better.
Belle’s breathing was slow, deep, and completely relaxed. She was definitely still asleep. And the last thing in the world I wanted was to move even half a milliter and risk waking her.
So I stayed still.
Absolutely, perfectly still.
If she woke up and pulled her hand away, I might have died right then and there. So no risks. Not when this was the best morning I’d had in my entire life.
I lay there, perfectly still, trying not to so much as breathe wrong in case Belle’s hand decided to relocate out of my shirt, which would be a cosmic tragedy.
So, naturally, my brain decided now was the perfect ti to try and piece together last night.
Right... what happened?
I rembered asking Belle for spoilers for the Hollowveil excursion.
Her judging like I’d committed a philosophical cri.
Her warning about new monsters, specifically designed to hunt the top ten.
Her smiling like a cute little demon while telling so were at the Gemini stage.
Then..
Oh right.
She’d kissed on the cheek.
My face ward just rembering it.
After that, she just got sleepy and just... laid down on my lap like it was the most natural thing in the world.
I rembered all that clearly.
I also rembered feeling sleepy myself and deciding, "Yeah, sleep sounds good," because apparently my survival instincts cease functioning around Belle.
Wait.
Was I... forgetting sothing?
There was this weird sensation at the back of my mind, like I was trying to grab onto a mory, but it kept slipping through my fingers.
Sothing she said?
Sothing important?
I frowned inwardly.
No way. My mory wasn’t that bad. Sure, I forgot chores, schedules, deadlines, the existence of vegetables, and occasionally entire conversations, but sothing that happened just last night?
Sothing that Belle said?
I shook the thought off.
I was probably overthinking it. And also Belle’s hand was still in my shirt, and that felt way too nice for to be doing deep introspection right now.
So I dismissed the thought entirely.
Whatever it was, I’d rember later.
Probably.
...Hopefully.
Belle stirred beside , the soft rustle of fabric brushing against my skin. Her blind, glassy pink-violet eyes blinked open slowly unfocused, hazy, and sohow still beautiful in a way that made my breath catch.
And then she looked straight at .
Heat crawled up my neck instantly.
Because I was still tangled in her arms.
Because her hand was still inside my shirt.
Because I was awake before her and that ant she was definitely going to ask questions.
Questions I absolutely did not have cool answers for.
Her expression didn’t change; she never really had many expressions, but there was a kind of quiet awareness settling over her features. She was registering my presence. My warmth. Our proximity.
I swallowed.
Her eyes stayed on mine those dim, glassy orbs that should’ve shone like twin nebulae, bright and alive, if not for the curse clinging to them like rot.
Sothing in my chest tightened, painfully.
Before I could stop myself, my hand lifted on its own.
My fingers brushed her cheek carefully, tracing the delicate curve of her face. She froze, not in discomfort but in that surprised way only Belle ever managed tiny, subtle, like a glitch in serenity.
My fingertips reached her eyes.
I hovered there, just beneath them.
Her breath hitched.
Mine did too.
Then I gently laid my palm over her eyes.
Warm.
Soft.
Fragile.
Too fragile.
I gathered mana inside my core, shaping it, no, willing it into pure life energy. It crackled faintly under my skin, a warmth that spread from my palm to her eyelashes, her eyelids, deeper... seeking the corruption within.
The rose-ranked curse.
The parasite gnawing at her vision.
The thing I wanted gone more than anything.
I pushed the life energy forward, carefully, cautiously. I couldn’t purge itm not fully, not yet, but if I could damage the curse, weaken it even a little...
Belle’s fingers, still resting absently inside my shirt, tensed.
Her breathing slowed.
And I held perfectly still, focusing every ounce of strength I had into that gentle, deliberate flow of power.
Because if there was even the smallest chance I could give her back the light she’d lost... I would take it.
My white healing light seeped slowly into Belle’s eyes, threads of pure life energy weaving into the curse like warm sunlight pushing through frost.
But nothing happened.
No reaction.
No flicker.
No shiver.
No sign that the curse even noticed .
I pushed more mana into her, carefully, steadily. A quarter of my total reserves. Then a third. Then half.
Still nothing.
The curse stayed silent and undisturbed, like an ancient beast asleep so deeply that even being stabbed wouldn’t wake it.
My breath trembled. "Co on... react. Do sothing..."
But it was just darkness eting darkness.
Belle’s hands shifted. Her fingers gently wrapped around my wrist, then slowly slid down until her palms covered mine. She guided my hand away from her eyes with a softness that hurt more than anything.
She didn’t scold .
She didn’t frown.
She didn’t even sigh.
She just squeezed my hands once, warm and lingering.
Like she was rembering sothing she could no longer touch.
Like she was holding onto the shape of the world she had once seen.
Guilt punched straight through my chest.
Weak.
Useless.
Pathetic.
I bit down on my frustration. "I couldn’t even get a reaction... even with half my mana..." My voice cracked. "I can’t do anything right."
Belle shook her head lightly, the faintest smile touching her lips. "Sebastian... It’s okay. So things simply are what they are. Maybe it was fate that I would never see again."
Fate.
God, I hated that word.
Sothing inside snapped cleanly, decisively.
I squeezed her hands back, tighter than before, pulling them against my chest.
"If fate tries to ruin your life," I said, voice low and sharp enough to cut steel, "then I’ll kill fate itself."
Belle’s breath stilled.
For a mont, the room felt like it wasn’t breathing either.
Then...
Her fingers trembled just slightly in mine.
And for once, she didn’t tell I was being ridiculous.
A/N: Well, here is the bonus Chapter. @SerafimG1 guessed the reference correctly, and I’m a man of my word.
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