Chapter 102: Not a Yes, Not a No
Nyla propped herself on one arm as she moved slowly toward him. She paused only when she was inches away from his face.
"Well?" she pressed.
Damon’s hand moved quickly, the girl tensed slightly at his sudden movent but then—
She blinked as he grabbed another piece of monster at and took a bite.
Nyla watched him do it with an expression that said she knew exactly what he was doing.
She let out a quiet sigh, quiet enough that only soone as close to her as Damon could’ve caught it, and moved back. "That’s not a no."
"It’s not a yes either," he added between bites.
A smile settled on her face. "It might be."
The furnace continued to burn beside them as Nyla rested her head on Damon’s shoulder. The heat of the flas dancing in front of them did a great job against the damp air, making them feel almost at ease despite being in the ruins of what once had been a dark sea.
"How far do you think we’ve co?" She suddenly asked, her head still resting on his shoulder.
"Not far enough."
She let out a soft sigh. "You’re not much of an optimist."
Nyla paused for a mont before asking. "What were you like before all this?"
Damon raised a brow.
It was the first ti soone had asked him that since Mana arrived on Earth. He thought back to the day it started, his failed university exam, and almost chuckled at how important it seed back then.
"Just lived day by day. What about you?"
"Oh? You’re curious about ?" She paused for only half a second, knowing well he was going to say no, before she continued. "I used to play volleyball. Professionally."
Only now did the girl’s head lift from his shoulder as she looked at him with a proud grin. "I was really good, you know."
She frowned at the surprised look on his face. "What, you don’t believe ?"
"I believe you. You have a good body, I figured you exercised."
Nyla felt her cheeks grow warm. ’He likes my body?!’
Her thoughts raced as she tried to keep cool.
"Yeah, well... It takes a lot of effort to be the best," she scrambled in response.
Damon nodded.
He always assud he wasn’t really good at sports, but in truth, being raised in the orphanage, he never really had a good chance at any of them.
"So..." Nyla suddenly said, her confident expression was replaced by sothing else.
Her finger circled slowly across the ground as she spoke. "Which part of my body do you like the most?" The question was nothing more than a whisper.
Damon turned toward her, but before he could even try to answer—
A sudden, terrifying shriek cut through the sea floor.
Before the loud noise even died out, Damon was already at his feet with a tight grip on his weapon.
Nyla was a mont slower, her eyes moving between Damon and the darkness around them as she rose.
The furnace deactivated the mont she rose, and so the two of them were imdiately hit with the cold, damp air.
"What was that?" Nyla finally asked.
"Not sure. But we should keep moving."
***
After the deafening shriek, the two of them moved in silence.
The sea floor had changed the further they walked, open stretches of broken ground gave way to sothing denser, far more claustrophobic.
Rock formations rose higher on either side, in so places tight enough that they had to angle their shoulders to get through.
And as they forced themselves deeper into the narrow passage, they were soon t with both rocks closing and leaving only a small opening barely large enough to squeeze through.
Damon was the first to go through it, and as he did, he turned to give Nyla a hand as she squeezed through right after.
She accepted his hand.
Then, the second she landed on the other side, she took two quick steps toward him and placed his hand on her waist. "You didn’t answer my question."
Damon looked at her for a mont, his hand still where she’d placed it.
Suddenly, he pulled her in.
Both her hands landed on his chest as she lost balance and her body pressed against his.
He leaned toward her ear as he whispered. "There is sothing out there."
His hand dropped from her waist, but before he could leave, Nyla leaned forward.
"There is sothing far more dangerous waiting for you if you don’t answer."
For a mont, nothing happened, then Damon’s hands grabbed her waist. "All of you."
The second he replied, he pushed the girl to the side as he moved further down the now wider passage.
Nyla lingered behind.
’All of ?!’ She felt her knees almost buckle as she replayed his answer in her head.
Then, noticing he was already gone, she quickly moved to catch up, finding his side just as the passage opened up to their right.
Their walk ca to an abrupt halt as they turned right.
The clearing beyond was vast.
The dark sedint stretched out until it dissolved into a violet haze. The rock formations here weren’t standing; they looked like stumps, shattered at the base as though sothing had walked through them with a terrifying weight.
There were no corpses around, unlike everywhere else that was filled with mangled and severed remains of sea creatures; here, there were none.
Damon paused for a mont, his eyes searching the clearing ahead while Nyla tightened the grip on her golden hamr.
For a long mont, neither of them saw it.
Then Damon’s eyes adjusted to the scale of the clearing, and he quickly realised his mistake.
It wasn’t that the clearing was empty.
The thing in it was so large that he had mistaken it for the landscape.
What he’d taken for a ridge of broken rock along the far edge was a spine, a row of dense black protrusions running the length of a back broad enough to shelter a building beneath it.
Then, slowly, it turned its head and a pair of dark eyes locked onto them.
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