After I woke up I felt pretty refreshed. I noticed that Esther had gotten up before me, and that Risible was still sleeping in the bed across the room from us.

I stood up and stretched, letting a long yawn out as I did. I walked out of the clinic to see Esther sitting on a nearby bench outside, she was watching the sun rise.

The sky was a pink-orange color as the light brightly shot out from the horizon. The clouds in the sky were sparse and the white was dyed a tinted red-orange.

I sat down next to Esther, the bench was made of some sort of wood…

It was cold.

I looked down and saw the morning dew on the grass beneath us. Small droplets of water falling off of the luscious green blades, landing into the greedy but surprisingly dry dirt.

“How are you feeling?”

She drew a little closer to me, her hands were fidgeting in her lap slightly. I then noticed her slide closer again, our shoulders were brushing against each other gently. Then she suddenly but hesitantly leaned her head against my shoulder and sighed.

“Way better~...”

My face turned a slight hue of pink as I tried turning my attention to something else. I looked up as I leaned against the bench’s back, my neck pressing against the top of the bench’s backrest. My eyes then focused on the building behind us, which was the healer’s… My eyes slowly traced the bricks until they reached a balcony. On that balcony I saw Risible leaning against the balustrade, staring at me with a blank expression.

“Gek-”

“Hm…?”

“N-nothing.”

The air felt a little awkward now, I then felt Esther link her arms around mine, her head pushed harder against my shoulder.

“E-Esther?”

“Thank you… for saving me again.”

“Huh- uh- no problem.”

I spoke relatively quickly. I looked behind me again toward the balcony to see that Risible had disappeared. 

Where did he go?

Almost immediately after I faced forward again, I felt a hand place onto my left shoulder firmly. Another hand was on Esther’s right shoulder as they pushed us further together.

“So what are you two lovebirds up to~?”

We both turned toward the voice. It was Risible poking his head in between us, he was smiling a little happily.

“Wha-”

“C’mon~ it’s not something that’s hidden.”

He moved his hands over Esther’s ears quickly and tilted his head toward the right, facing me with a completely straight face.

“Kiss her man.”

“Hey- Risible, this is a little sudden-”

My face was starting to turn a redder. I then heard whispers in my head coming from Four and Ode.

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

“Hehe~ how is he this bad~?”

“No idea, you would think it’s obvious.”

Deadeye leaned over Ode’s shoulder and saw the screen.

“Ooh is that Cyn’s girl?”

He put his hand up in the air.

“I’m rooting for you Cyn! Make a move!”

⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱⊰───────•✦•───────⊱

I had lost all hope.

I was being peer pressured by different versions of myself into making a move on Esther… but where do I even begin?

It’s not like I know what I’m doing in the first place, and does she even like me? I mean maybe, but what if it’s just admiration? If I make the wrong move I could end up breaking my friendship with her… Or what if she calls it as sexual assault? Then what? I know I’m wanted, but even getting called out for the potential case-

Argh- my non-existent heart can’t take this…

Risible’s hand firmly moved off of Esther’s ears and back onto our shoulders, Esther tried moving away slightly from his hand.

My eyes met Esther’s, our eyes had locked together. Her head tilted slightly, her face was now a slight pink… she had no idea what was going on since all the pressure was from the variants talking in my head.

I turned away quickly- shit… she looks way too cute right now. It just had to be a sunrise too! I took a glance at her and saw her blue eyes shining like diamonds-

Heh-

“Risible… could you let go of my shoulder?”

Esther had a forced smile on as her eyes glared like sharp daggers toward Risible, is this why they say not to piss women off…?

Cause I could see why if that was the case. She was scaring the fuck out of me. I get the feeling that she might attempt to kill me if I try kissing her…

I backed up a little as Risible quickly released his hands.

“Yeah- s-sorry.”

Did he just stutter?

No way he got scared as well right? Right?!

After that fun situation we ended up getting Esther a quick meal to calm her down before we would leave Derecho and the human continent with it.

She grabbed a piece of toast and started nibbling on the edge of it. She seemed quite happy which made me smile since she looked cute while doing it. Risible was drinking a cold beer and seemed quite pleased as well.

“This reaaaaally hits the spot~”

…

“Is that him?”

“Hm… maybe a look alike- no wait. It is!”

“Everyone! It’s Cynical, the Regulus monster wanted for thirteen platinum coins!”

A shiver went down my spine as I heard armor clunking quickly approaching us from behind Esther.

I jumped over the table and quickly threw Esther up and over my shoulder. Risible dropped his beer in surprise before trying to catch it, we then started running for the dock as more knights got wind of our appearance. Ah- just so you know, he didn’t catch it.

We now had a large crowd of armored knights and mercenaries swarming behind us. Esther was over my shoulder, her eyes half-lidded with boredom and her body limply going along with us as the toast dangled in her mouth.

A mercenary jumped out from a nearby alleyway, in an attempt to ambush us, he tried grabbing my shoulder but his hand missed completely and ended up hitting Esther’s toast.

The toast slowly fell through the air as her eyes tracked it, her hand reached out slightly as the swarm of knights and mercenaries stampeded over it.

“My toast…”

Esther’s voice said weakly, her eyes opening slightly wider.

We ran out onto a wooden dock as the mob followed after us.

“Fuck, we’re almost out of space-”

<Cyn make something shaped like a rowboat quickly, also add some form of windshield!>

I threw my hand forward, a large stream of slime shot out, I started reforming it in a similar shape to a rowboat. I added a windshield type of thing, similar to ones on speedboats to the front. Within seconds of me finishing Risible and I jumped off the edge of the dock onto it. The boat rocked back and forth a bit before I put Esther down gently.

“Ode now what?!”

The clattering of footsteps grew imminently closer before I felt a weird aura.

I turned around and looked at Esther to see her right hand raising…

“E-Esther–”

“My toast.”

Sparks started to erupt from her hand before a flaming purple fireball appeared. Her gaze was filled with killing intent as she stared deeply at the mob of knights and mercenaries.

“I-I’ll buy you another one so-” My hands raised reassuringly.

She moved her hand back, she was about to throw it. I quickly reached forward and grabbed her wrist, she turned toward me. Her look was still menacing before a light-blue and white variant orb shot out of my body toward the dock.

It warped into a human form almost immediately, he stumbled forward a little bit before regaining his balance.

“Huh- Levin?!”

“Heh… wha-what am I doing here…?”

He pointed at himself.

<Levin get them out to sea.>

“B-but I-”

<Now.>

I could see his legs quivering a little as he began hesitantly walking toward the mob. He turned around and looked at the distance between him and our boat. His hands dropped to their sides before he took a deep breath, his body stopped shaking and he looked.

“You could have at least given me a better runway.”

His voice turned a little cold as blue and white sparks started floating around his feet, traveling up his body rapidly.

“R-runway—?”

Risible grabbed the collar of my coat and pulled me back, I lost my footing and my hand pulled Esther back as well. She landed on top of me before I heard a light boom. Our boat abruptly accelerated, it shot out to sea like a rocket, the water erupting behind us with sparks of light-blue and white lightning. I was holding Esther tightly and Risible was wedging himself in a corner as we sat behind the windshield. The continent shrunk before my eyes, a colossal number of ripples jetting to the sides of the boat.

After around thirty seconds or so I could barely see the coast…

The boat lost its acceleration as Levin flipped around onto the boat, he sat down at the back. We came to a slow stop, the boat gently rocking from side to side. What we just experienced was faster than anything we had gone through so far. [Flight] didn’t even hold a candle to the speed we just went…

“See? We didn’t get that far because we had a bad start… and I feel like my footing was off.”

<Good job Levin~ what would you like once your back in here?>

“I get to request something…?!”

His eyes lit up brightly, almost as if they were sparkling.

“Can I get-”

<No.>

He pouted with teary eyes and looked down.

I kind of felt bad for him, he got shut down before he could even request anything…

“So… what was that?”

Levin looked up. our eyes meeting.

“Uh- y-you’re One… right?”

“Yeah?”

“W-well that's… um… my ability… I can manipulate lightning w-which I can use to modify my speed…”

I mean, I knew he used lightning considering the sparks around him the other day, but he can adjust his speed accordingly with it? Oh- and he’s all stuttery again. 

“Levin if you don’t mind me asking… How fast can you go?”

He hesitated for a second while fidgeting his fingers nervously.

“The speed of light…”

P-pardon…?