Next day.
Bell walked down from upstairs with a yawn, and Alfia descended behind him. Only he knew how much effort it had taken to have her agree to co down from his room.
If only Mom was here.
Summoning and keeping her anchored to the present would only take a negligible amount of mana, but he was just a little unsure about how to face her.
He glanced back at Alfia.
Besides, Aunt must be looking forward to seeing Mom too, even if her face remained as unreadable as marble.
That reminded him about her earlier lap pillow.
How could I sleep on her lap without a care?
Bell felt his cheeks heat up, embarrassed.
The sound of conversation from ahead made him push his embarrassnt down.
"Astraea, do you know? I was just thinking about Bell and then—BAM. He walked in with a broken stair on his shoulder." Hestia's voice resounded from inside the living room.
"Uh-huh." Another voice followed hers. Astraea.
"At that mont, I wanted to run to him and hug him tightly, literally lting myself into him." Hestia continued.
Silence fell at her words.
Bell, who was a step away from walking inside, froze and chanically turned his head back.
Alfia had stopped behind him, gazing at him with a single upturned eyebrow.
"lting, huh?"
Her words made his lips twitch, feeling mortified. Aunt learned to tease? She wasn't sohow eavesdropping on and Ais, right?
"Astraea? Why aren't you replying?" His silly goddess asked, her voice confused.
Bell whipped his head back and strode in before one of his goddesses could murder the other like an unhinged yandere after having her buttons pushed too much.
Alfia followed him inside, her footfalls making no sound where they t the floor, her elegant features as composed as ever.
They had just walked inside when Haruhi's ears twitched from the kitchen, and she snapped her gaze toward them.
"Bell-sama."
He greeted her with a nod.
"Bell, had a good sleep?"
Hestia sat on a chair, swinging her legs idly when she perked up, waving a hand at him.
"Bell."
Astraea called his na, blank expression morphing into a small smile.
Before he could reply, all three of their gazes locked on the person behind him.
Alfia's expression remained composed, her head tilting at them.
"What?"
All of them looked away from her at that.
Bell stepped in and settled down on the sofa. Alfia lowered herself beside him, hands on her lap.
No one spoke for a long mont.
Astraea opened her mouth to break the ice and asked.
"Bell... about that Grand War Ga, are you sure about taking a part in it?"
"Grand War Ga?" Alfia repeated.
"Oh. Oh. It's sothing Bell proposed to the other gods when they wanted to execute him for sending Ares back to heaven." Hestia said.
"Hm?"
Temperature in the room dropped, Alfia's expression didn't change, but her fingers tightened around her dress.
"What is that?" She asked Bell.
"A city wide War Ga in which the last one standing wins. Basically an Orario wide fight to resolve our dispute. Whoever wins can get a wish from the gods." Bell explained.
Alfia ignored the last part about a wish. Only an Orario wide fight and last one standing resounded in her mind.
"Why go through so much trouble? Let's just assassinate each god who wants you executed and put the bla on Evilus, they can handle any aftermath themselves."
Her words made Bell's lips twitch upwards. He had thought about that too.
Is throwing Evilus under the bus a family trait?
"A-Assassinate?! You can't just—you can't just say that like it's nothing!" Hestia choked, flailing her arms.
Haruhi's hands trembled while holding a spatula in the kitchen.
"Alfia," Astraea looked at them with a gentle firmness. "That's not how we do things. Sothing like that should be done only if push cos to shove."
Alfia stared straight into Astraea's eyes. Astraea peered back.
Neither backed down.
Bell felt like a bomb was about to detonate right in front of him and moved.
"Astraea-sama, Bell-sama. Breakfast is ready." Haruhi interrupted at a perfect ti from nearby.
Nice save, Haruhi.
He breathed an inward sigh of relief and relaxed back into the sofa, feeling like he had just survived a major crisis.
A mont hadn't passed when Alfia rose to her feet and wrapped her fingers around his wrist, pulling him up.
Don't tell ...
Bell felt cold all over as Alfia dragged him away, out of the living room, every other eye following them out.
"Aunt, where are you taking ?" He asked, having a faint premonition of dread.
Alfia did not halt.
"Dungeon."
"Wait—Aunt, at least let grab my breakfast—!"
...
..
.
The Dungeon didn't care about his protests. It remained how it always was.
Oppressive. Bloodthirsty. Lonely.
But this ti, Bell had soone to dive together with him.
It would've been even better if we brought Haruhi with us to show her the ropes.
Alfia descended.
Next ti for sure.
Bell descended with her.
She breathed. He breathed with her.
Floor one.
"Keep up."
One word. That was all she gave him.
Then she was gone. Already mid-air, heel on a dungeon wall moving beside them, pivoting on stone as a goblin lunging at her throat caught nothing but air.
Her leg tensed. She pushed off.
That wall launched her into the next three goblins before they'd finished drawing breath—her elbow taking the first across its temple, heel catching the second under its chin, free hand hamring into the third's chest.
And then she vanished. Already moving on.
Each of her strikes left an opening behind. A goblin staggering, arms wide. Another doubling over, stomach exposed.
Bell hit them without thinking—shoulder into ribs, fist into jaw, heel into core. He didn't aim. Alfia had aid for him.
She walked faster. He followed.
Floor three.
A kobold tore out of a wall parallel to them, snout forming.
Alfia's foot hit the wall two steps before reaching it. She ran up—one step, two—pushed off, and sailed over that kobold's reach. Two fingers pressed into its crown from above.
It dissolved.
Bell's foot found that sa spot on the wall. Sa two steps. Sa push. He passed through where the kobold had been a heartbeat ago, boots hitting stone, already moving because Alfia was already ahead.
Floor six. War shadows.
One swung at Alfia. She leaned six inches left and its claws brushed past her ear. Her hand caught its wrist and she pulled, redirecting its montum past her. The war shadow stumbled forward, wide open.
Bell's knee found it.
Ahead, a Dungeon lizard's tail swept low. Alfia hopped, her sole touching its back for barely a heartbeat—then she was over it and gone.
Bell's heel struck the sa spot. Where she'd been a feather, he was a mountain. The lizard's back cracked and folded, and he was already past it.
Three war shadows next. Alfia moved between them—a tap on one's shoulder sent its claws into the second, a palm against the second's side shoved it into the third. They stumbled into each other, guards dropped, bodies exposed.
Bell crashed into them. Head colliding against the second. Shoulders crushing into the first and third together.
She moved. He moved.
She broke guards. He broke bones.
They found a rhythm—a connection between them, wordless, instinctive. Family.
Alfia's foot struck a wall and she pivoted around a corner into a gallery of kobolds. Bell's foot struck that sa wall a half-second later, sa pivot, and he ca out of the turn already swinging.
Floor nine. Ten.
A corridor widened into chambers where the ceiling vanished into dark. Monsters ca in waves. Orcs, war shadows, lizards with skin like stone—closing from every direction.
Alfia didn't slow. She hit a stalagmite on the floor and kicked off its tip, arcing over hundreds of needle rabbits. Bell's blazing foot found the sa stalagmite, sa kick, and he ca down behind her, flas catching those needle rabbits behind him.
She vaulted a collapsed pillar into a gallery of orcs. He vaulted the sa pillar, sa hand placent, and reached where she had staggered two orcs, his fists finishing them.
She spun off a corridor wall to avoid a lizard's tail. He spun off the sa wall, sa angle, and his knee t its exposed underbelly.
No words. No signals. Just a gap between them—always close, never overlapping, just wide enough for a monster to fill before it was emptied again.
Floor eleven. A silverback filled the corridor wall to wall.
Alfia caught its wrist on her run and swung—her body whipping around it in a half circle, her montum cranking the joint past its limit. Its shoulder gave with a crack as she passed.
Bell reached it a mont later. He seized its other wrist at full sprint and swung around in an identical circle with it, his weight tearing the arm free.
The silverback's mouth opened. But Bell was already shrinking into another corridor behind it, and what was growing larger in front of it was an arrow of fla, a centiter from its brow.
Floor thirteen. Fourteen.
Mineral veins dimd to purple. Moss on the walls. Breathing harder.
Then their path opened.
Another gallery—vast, long, ceiling continuing without end. And full. War shadows. Orcs shoulder to shoulder with clubs. Needle rabbits rolling across the floor. Crystal mantis along the walls, crystalline spikes cocked. Goblins in between it all, javelins glinting.
Alfia accelerated.
Wall—one step, two, three—ceiling. She ran inverted. White hair spilling toward the floor. Gravity didn't protest.
They fired.
Spikes in volleys. Javelins from below. Needle rabbits in spiraling leaps. War shadows condensing from the ceiling ahead, claws mid-swing.
Alfia dodged.
A spike scread past—she rolled her neck half-an-inch. Unnecessary. A javelin ca low—she bent her waist. Excessive. Her spine curved when a rabbit spun three feet away. Her shoulder dipped at nothing. Her ankle turned inward on a step that didn't need it. A club whistled wide by a foot and she tilted her head toward it anyway.
aningless. She was already faster than everything here. Every dodge was more than enough. More than required. A woman flinching at fireworks already past.
Bell hit the ceiling.
Sa wall. Sa three steps. Sa inversion. Boots on stone, running.
The barrage hadn't stopped.
He moved exactly as she moved.
Neck rolled—whsst—claws parted air where his throat had been. Waist bent—javelin hissed through that exact gap. Spine curved—rabbit ruffled his shirt. Shoulder dipped—crystal spike from a hidden mantis grazed cloth, only cloth. Ankle turned—a club from below sheared air where his ankle had been by a finger's width.
Every aningless dodge. Every excessive twitch.
Not aningless.
Calculated.
She'd read those trajectories. Mapped what would be where a second after she passed. She didn't need any of it. He did. So she ran the path twice—once for herself, once for him—and left it behind like footprints to follow.
He followed exactly.
Spike missed his temple. Javelin split air beside his thigh. Claws split a single strand of hair.
Nothing touched him.
He ca off the ceiling—sa push, sa rotation, stand on soil. Alfia was already there.
Behind them, those monsters fired at nothing.
She looked at him.
He looked back.
No words were exchanged between them.
Were they even needed?
...
..
.
***
[300 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter]
[8 chapters ahead on P@tr3on = [email protected]/Not_Aaryan]
...
[Authors Thoughts]
Is this considered romance!?
I don't think so... maybe?
Whatever. I don't care. I wanted to write. Write I did.
Anyway... have a productive day, everyone!
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