Asher tilted his head slightly, an intrigued smile playing on his lips, "What do you want to talk about?"
Rowena looked down, her hands resting on the carved desk, "It's just... have something happened, Ash?"
His brows furrowed at her vague question, "Nothing happened," he replied, shrugging nonchalantly, "I don't understand. What are you asking about?"
Rowena closed her eyes for a brief moment, considering her words. She wanted to ask him why they had been spending less time together for the past few months.
Why their shared painting classes had dwindled and why the magic of their bond seemed to have dimmed and been replaced by something that made her feel as if he was slipping away from her hands.
But she couldn't voice her concerns outright. And so she sighed, "You just seemed to be quite busy recently."
Understanding dawned on Asher's face, but he didn't want to admit the truth to her, which was gnawing at his heart.
Instead, he gave her a mild chuckle, "You know I've been focusing on training and preparing for this upcoming important quest all these months," he said, "As you said, I am lagging behind the others, and I have to work harder to catch up."
Rowena nodded, her eyes filled with a melancholic understanding.
She rose from her chair, reaching out to take Asher's hands. She bent slightly to kiss them softly, "I wish I could join you in the quest. The restrictions don't apply to me, but the crown..." her words trailed off, her expression tinged with apology and sadness.
Asher reached up to tenderly kiss her forehead, "Don't worry about it, Rona. I understand," he said, "Even if you disappear for one day, this kingdom would be compromised. So I need a home to come back to. And without you here to keep the kingdom safe, there won't be one."
Rowena nodded again, her lips curling into a faint smile at Asher's words. But a subtle unease lingered in her heart, even as his comforting words echoed in the silence of the study.
The water in the Naiadon Village glistened under the brooding morning sun, waves rippling as Callisa, with her imposing appearance, roiled the waters with her playful antics.
She thrust her enormous pincers above the water and manipulated the aquatic element with newfound dexterity, causing sparkling droplets to dance in the air as they began to resemble the figure of the man sitting before her.
She glanced at her master, Asher, occasionally as if hoping he was seeing what she was doing.
But Asher sat on the sandy bank, his fingers idly stroking the waters. His dark yellow eyes were vacant, lost in thoughts that seemed as deep as the sea surrounding the village.
Neither the people of the Naiadon Tribe nor the Umbralfiends were near him or Callisa since the Naiadon people respected his need to be alone with Callisa while spending time with her.
Asher also instructed Callisa to throw out any Umbralfiend that might be lurking in the waters near them.
Not even a Soul Devourer can escape the senses of the baby Guardian of the Seas in the water.
Behind him, a gentle melody curled around the crisp air, "Why are you here so early, Asher?" Isola asked, her lilting voice soft yet compelling.
Her luminous white hair cascaded down her shoulders, swaying rhythmically in the sea breeze as she approached him, a curious expression on her face.
She extended a delicate hand and gently caressed one of Callisa's pincers as she praised her, "You seemed to be getting good at learning new tricks, Callisa. We are so proud of you."
"Koo! Kooo!" Callisa snapped her pincers together in excitement, her bulbous eyes glowing with joy and exhilaration upon hearing her words.
Asher was drawn out from the depths of his musings by her voice. He turned to face her, a question immediately surfacing on his lips, "Did you meet today's quota of life crystals before coming here? If not—"
Before he could complete his sentence, Isola cut him off. She lifted a glowing silver scroll from her side, her confidence lighting up her sapphire blue eyes, "You don't have to always be worried I am going to forget. I took care of it," she said, proffering the scroll, "Your life crystals for the day are all in here," Isola knew better than anyone that after the incident when she accidentally delved into his memories, Asher had chosen to abandon the conventional method of life crystal transfers.
The Lumina Scroll was a traditional method of transferring life crystals and was mostly used for official transactions, especially between merchants or people who were too far away from each other or had some other reason to be unable to complete the transaction in person.
It also was one of the safest ways since the scroll was similar to a contract, and the one who signed it could decide who could take the life crystals stored within it.
In this case, since Isola used Asher's seal to bind the contract, only Asher can take the life crystals.
"But, why are you here? Usually, you'd be busy with quests around this time," Isola inquired, tilting her head, a hint of curiosity etched on her face.
Asher shrugged nonchalantly, "I'm on the brink of leveling up. Can't take up any new quests at the moment," he explained, his eyes darting back to Callisa, who was creating whirlpools around her with youthful exuberance.
Isola let out a soft hum as she sat down beside Asher, "Perhaps that's one reason, but could it be that something else is troubling you?"
Asher let out a scoff at this, a smirk painting his face as he turned towards her, "What makes you think that? Can't a man simply take a break to enjoy the company of his beast companion?"
Isola, undeterred by his casual dismissal, narrowed her eyes at him, "I may have known you for less than a year, Asher," she began, her gaze steady and probing, "But I know enough to understand when something involves…Rowena."
Upon hearing Rowena's name, Asher's brows knitted together, but he continued to remain silent.
Isola sighed and said, "Months have passed, and yet I can only see you getting more troubled with the burden of what you experienced and felt. And since you always refuse to talk about it, you are only hurting yourself. Do you think you will be able to get vengeance in your current state of mind? Or what if it gets too much for you to bear, and you do or say something you might regret before Rowena?"
Asher suddenly clicked his tongue, "That is exactly what I…." a hint of frustration crept into his gaze, "Rowena, haa..." he murmured under his breath, a far-off look clouding his eyes.
He picked up a small stone and, with a swift flick of his wrist, sent it skipping across the serene water surface, causing ripples to spread out like the troubled thoughts brewing within him.
"I can't keep doing this…" Asher finally admitted, his voice betraying a hint of desperation that he hardly ever revealed. His face hardened as he glanced towards the horizon, the sight of the brooding dark sun seemingly reflecting his inner turmoil.
"Every time I see her face, I'm reminded of what happened...the pain…" His words hung in the air like a heavy cloud, a stark reminder of a past that was gnawing at his sanity.
He winced, clenching his fist as if physically trying to hold onto his slipping control, "I thought I could manage it the longer I keep it up. But it's not getting easier, as I thought it would."
His gaze turned steely, a cold resolve taking hold, "As time passes, it's only becoming harder. I can't risk losing control, doing something I might regret, just like you said, and ruining everything. Rowena is quick to catch up on even the smallest things," he confessed, his voice almost a whisper now, battling with the gusts of the evening wind.
Asher realized he didn't mind venting to Isola since she already knew things and if she wanted to turn on him, she would have done it a long time ago. And it felt oddly comforting to vent out his thoughts, the burden in his heart lightening just by a fraction.
Isola didn't expect him to suddenly vent, but she listened quietly, her expression inscrutable. Her sapphire blue eyes reflected the sorrow he was feeling.
She knew all too well the struggle of living with the weight of the past.
After a moment of silence, she finally spoke, her voice soft and soothing against the fading echoes of Asher's confession, "I understand, Asher," she murmured, her gaze locked onto his, "Pain has a cruel way of keeping the past alive in our hearts, haunting our present, and casting a shadow over our future," As she said this she remembered certain memories that still stung her heart.
She gave him a small, sympathetic smile, her eyes glimmering with a faint sadness that spoke volumes about her own history, "When I lost someone I considered as my sister to the Cursed Wraiths, my father said time heals, but that it also has a way of ripping open old wounds when we least expect it unless…we deal with it in the right way."
Asher subtly shook his head and asked after few moments of hesitation, "So these old wounds you have…how did you deal with it?"
Isola's gaze became glazed as she said, "Even if what we went through wasn't the same, it doesn't change the fact that you have to make peace with it just like I did. I focused on ensuring a better future for my people as a way of honoring the memory of my sister and the ones I lost on the way. You can't let these old wounds eat you away from inside."
She then looked at him and said with a look of resolve, "I may not be fond of Rowena, but after seeing you two all this time, I can say she loves you more than anything. What she did and what you did was the consequence of what you both were. Both of you didn't have a choice. Maybe you should—"
"No," Asher curtly said as he looked at her with a hardened gaze, "I had no choice but to kill her father to save my world, which he tried to destroy. But she…she had the choice to let go of my mother and fail a measly reaping quest."
"She had a choice? In that way, so did you whenever you killed a father, a mother, a sister, a brother, a daughter, or a son of a demon during your quests as a Hunter. But those acts…you did not only for the sake of survival and to protect your world just like Rowena did but also because of the hatred you held towards demons just like us demons who resent humans. Not even a year had passed since I started doing quests in the human world, and yet their actions and atrocities have already made me resent them as much as the Cursed Wraiths or even more," Isola said with a hateful glint in her eyes as she remembered memories of humans using underhanded and vile methods to slaughter her people and cutting up their corpses and using their body parts as souvenirs just like Asher said.
This made her realize that the Cursed Wraiths may have been more dangerous, bloodthirsty, and brutal, but humans were far more cruel and monstrous than they ever could be.
Asher's expression faltered as Isola's words pierced into his mind. He wanted to refute her, but he knew what she said was the truth he always knew but refused to think about it due to his hatred towards demons in his past life, thinking they were better off not existing.
It was only after he became a demon in this life did he realize how foolish he was to hate only demons when the humans beside him made him suffer more or less as the demons did. That was why he made the decision to only care about himself instead of picking a side.
Still, he took a feverish breath as he said, "I know…it's natural that Hunters and Demons will always kill each other. But since it's her that did this…I can't make peace with it…I can't go through it all over again. Every time I trust someone, things only go wrong for me, and I end up paying the price."
Isola shook her head as she said, "You can't let your past define your future. What she did, happened before she knew you and when she was just a 6-year-old girl, probably trying to do her best to not let down herself and her people just like me at that age. What if she always kept failing a quest on purpose because it involved an enemy's dear ones? Would you have done the same if you were in her shoes, especially now?"
Asher felt something within his chest quiver as he rubbed his forehead with his hand while taking a heavy breath, "I…don't know…" Asher looked up with a hardened expression as he suddenly got up, "But what I know is I can't let this distract me now. I can't let this second and my only chance go to waste, even if it means my old wounds might hold me back."
He abruptly turned around as he continued, "You should focus on getting prepared for our upcoming quest and our plan," Saying so, Asher walked away.
"Asher..." reached out a hand to him, but he didn't stop as his tall figure soon disappeared.
Isola's hand hovered in the air, a wordless entreaty left unanswered.
"Keeew…." Callisa let out a soft mewl, her bulbous eyes following Asher's retreating figure. She swiveled her gaze towards Isola, a look of innocent confusion and worry playing in her deep sea-blue eyes.
"Everything's fine, Callisa," Isola murmured, her smile returning though it didn't quite reach her eyes. She gently patted Callisa's pincer, her fingers gliding over the smooth exoskeleton, "He just needs some time to figure out his own thoughts, alright?"
Callisa tilted her head, seemingly understanding. Isola's smile widened, a brighter one this time, "Now, why don't you show me those new tricks of yours?" She asked, her tone light and encouraging.
With a chirpy trill, Callisa started manipulating the water around her, creating intricate patterns and shapes, her display of water manipulation drawing soft smiles from Isola.
