Chapter 762: Surprising
Strax waited.
Not out of impatience—that had never been a problem for him—but out of precision. He knew Frieren well enough to know that if she ca, she would co when the world around her was quiet enough not to distract her. And the forest, now, seed to cooperate.
The minutes passed like layers of moss settling on ancient stone.
The core remained where it had been left: dark, opaque, still pulsing at long, irregular intervals. It was no longer a panicked heart. It was sothing… attentive. Like a wounded animal that learns to observe before moving.
Strax leaned against one of the cave walls, arms crossed, looking unhurriedly. Bodies were still scattered on the ground—the cultists, now just flesh and tissue without purpose. The forest had not yet claid them. That would co later.
Then he felt it.
Not a mana impact. Not a distortion.
A leap.
Sothing light, almost irreverent, brushing the edges of his perception like a stone skipping across the surface of an ancient lake.
Strax looked up at the cave entrance.
Frieren erged, descending with springy, almost playful steps, touching roots and stones as if she were at ho. Her fair hair moved with the air, and there was a smile too wide for soone who had just entered a place stained with dried blood and residual magic.
She landed on the ground with a small spin, observed the surroundings for a split second—bodies, broken symbols, the pulsating core—and then her eyes went straight to Strax.
“You’re quite happy,” he comnted, without altering his tone.
Frieren laughed, a genuine, light, almost musical laugh.
“I am,” she replied, slowly spinning on her own axis, as if testing the space. “After leaving my kingdom… living my own life, without serious responsibilities, without having to sustain an entire forest with my own spirit… it’s very gratifying.” Strax chuckled softly.
“You don’t look anything like the Queen of the Elves who spent centuries bound to the World Tree maintaining the balance of an entire continent.”
She made an exaggerated face and gave his arm a light tap.
“Stop talking like that. It makes sound too tragic.”
“You were too tragic,” he replied, amused.
Frieren crossed her arms, still smiling, and tilted her head.
“So,” she said. “What do you need?”
Strax pointed with his chin toward the center of the cave.
“I want you to take a look at that disgusting thing.”
She followed the gesture.
The instant her eyes focused on the core, sothing changed.
Not in the environnt—but in her.
The smile remained… but her eyes lit up with a different intensity. The air around Frieren vibrated slightly, as if her own mana had awakened from a deep slumber and was now overly alert.
“…Oh,” she murmured.
She took two steps forward. Then two more. Completely ignoring the bodies on the ground.
“This is…” She stopped, her eyes wide. “This doesn’t follow any known pattern.”
Strax watched with interest.
“Your mage spirit is screaming, isn’t it?”
Frieren laughed, almost embarrassed.
“It’s screaming.” She knelt near the core, without touching it. “This isn’t elental, it isn’t spiritual, it isn’t demonic… but it isn’t neutral either. It’s like a… piece.”
The core pulsed.
Frieren’s eyes widened even more.
“It responded.”
“Yes,” Strax confird. “It does.”
She tilted her head, fascinated. “May I…?”
“Look, yes. Touch, no,” he replied imdiately.
“Fair enough.”
Frieren closed her eyes for a mont, letting her perception expand with surgical care. Invisible lines of mana stretched like delicate threads, encircling the core without ever touching it.
She took a deep breath.
“This is an incomplete organ,” she said, her voice more serious now. “It wasn’t made to exist alone. It… waits.”
The core pulsed slowly.
“I know,” Strax replied. “That’s why I called you.”
She opened her eyes and looked at him.
“They wanted to use it as a body, didn’t they?”
Strax raised an eyebrow.
“You ca to that conclusion quickly.”
“It’s not difficult,” she said. “This type of structure is common in entities that don’t have their own form. They need a place before they need a na.”
She looked back at the core.
“And this one…” she smiled, almost excitedly. “This one is particularly interesting.”
Strax laughed.
“I knew you’d say that.”
“It’s completely new!” exclaid Frieren, almost forgetting where she was. “It doesn’t belong to any known cycle. It doesn’t respond to common laws of magical growth. It’s like… a child thrown away before it learns to speak.”
The core pulsed, a little faster.
Frieren froze.
“He’s offended.”
Strax let out a short laugh.
“I warned you he reacts.”
She covered her mouth, laughing.
“Sorry! Sorry!”, she said to the core, as if apologizing to a puppy.
Her pulse slowed.
Strax shook his head, amused.
“See? Child.”
Frieren glanced at him sideways.
“You talked to it, didn’t you?”
“I did,” she admitted. “And I ca to the sa conclusion.”
She stood up and began walking in slow circles around the core.
“Do you know what that ans?”, she asked.
“That we shouldn’t destroy it,” he replied, before she finished.
She smiled.
“Exactly.”
“But we can’t leave it here either.”
“Also exactly.”
They exchanged a knowing look—the kind of silent understanding that only arises between beings who have seen civilizations rise and fall.
“I’ll need so ti,” Frieren said. “A long ti. Study this calmly. See how it reacts outside this environnt. See if it learns… or rots.”
“You’ll take it,” Strax stated without question.
“I will.”
She turned to him.
“But I’ll need protection. And soone to stop from doing sothing stupidly curious.”
“Good luck with that,” he replied.
She laughed.
“You’ll leave this to ?”
Strax nodded slowly.
“I trust you more than I trust myself when it cos to not blowing up interesting things.”
Frieren grinned widely.
“That’s a huge complint coming from you.”
Strax shrugged.
“It’s pragmatism.”
He then took a deep breath and made a gesture with his hand, as if closing a chapter.
“Let’s go back,” he said. “Tell Monica, Kali, and Agnes not to worry too much about it. Tell them it’s under control.”
Frieren nodded.
“And the two of them?”
“Xenovia and Kryssia should already be on their way.”
She tilted her head.
“And you?”
Strax looked one last ti at the pulsating core.
“I’ve talked enough for today.”
Frieren smiled slightly.
“Little liar.”
He laughed.
“Maybe.”
She started to walk away, still looking at the core like soone who had just found the biggest puzzle of her life.
Before climbing through the opening, she turned again.
“Thank you for calling ,” she said sincerely.
Strax responded only with a nod.
As she was starting to turn around, she stopped and pulled him back.
Frieren stopped halfway. It was so sudden that Strax only realized it when he felt the firm tug on his sleeve.
“What—”
He didn’t finish the sentence.
Frieren spun on his heel, grabbed him by the collar with one hand—without force, but without the possibility of error—and pulled him down.
The kiss ca without warning.
It wasn’t quick. Nor timid. Nor experintal.
It was deep, decisive, laden with an ancient familiarity too familiar to need explanation. The kind of kiss that doesn’t ask if it can happen—it just happens, like rain after a sumr that’s too long.
Strax froze for half a second.
His brain, which had already processed dinsional collapses, prehistoric entities, and wars that erased entire maps, took an absurdly longer ti to accept it.
Then… he responded.
Without haste. Without urgency. Just fitting into the gesture as if, at so point in history, it had always been inevitable. His hand rose almost reflexively, gripping her waist to keep her balance, and for a brief instant the entire world was reduced to breath, heat, and mana touching in a dangerously intimate way.
The core pulsed.
Just once.
As if… confused.
Frieren was the first to pull away.
She released his collar, took a step back, and smiled a completely satisfied smile—that sa smile that usually appeared when she discovered a forgotten spell or solved a magical enigma just because she could.
Strax blinked.
Once.
Twice.
“…What was that?” he finally asked, his voice dangerously close to normal for soone who had just been surprised like that.
Frieren brought a finger to her lips, thoughtful for a mont, as if truly considering the question.
“Thank you,” she replied simply.
He looked at her.
“Thank you.”
“Yes.”
“For the entertainnt.”
“Yes.”
“Now.”
“Yes.”
Strax ran a hand over his face, letting out a short, incredulous laugh.
“You know that’s not a common reaction to logistical favors involving arcane horrors, right?”
Frieren tilted her head.
“Among ancient elves, it’s relatively common.”
“Of course it is,” he murmured.
She approached again, but now without invading his space. Just close enough for her presence to be felt.
“You gave sothing extrely rare, Strax,” she said, now in a softer tone, but no less sincere. “Interesting ti. A new mystery. Sothing that doesn’t co burdened with ready-made prophecies or inevitable endings.”
She pointed with her chin toward the core.
“I’m going to have a lot of fun studying this.”
The core pulsed slowly.
“He seems to like you,” Strax comnted.
Frieren smiled slightly.
“Of course he does. I handle strange things well.”
“That explains a lot,” he replied.
She laughed.
For a mont, silence returned to the cave—not the heavy silence of before, but a comfortable, almost dostic one. The forest outside breathed in slow layers, and the residual magic was already beginning to settle like ancient dust.
Frieren took a few steps back, finally preparing to truly leave.
“I’ll take this,” she said once more, pointing to the core. “Carefully. Without haste. And I promise not to try to summon anything bigger than a hill.”
“Promise recorded,” Strax replied. “But not guaranteed.”
“It never is,” she admitted, amused.
User Comments
0 comments from readers