Chapter 202: A Rare Kind of Peace
On the roof of a tall tower overlooking the entire central military compound, two figures sat in silence.
Seraphine was perched at the edge, legs dangling over the drop, swinging idly as she gazed out at the endless sea of green, towering trees stretching to the horizon.
Five years had passed since they’d joined the new special division. In that time, they had taken part in countless missions dealing with anomalies born from the mana that saturated the world, anomalies that grew more frequent with each passing month, until it was no longer a secret that the world itself was changing.
It was hard not to notice. Animals turned feral overnight. Entire regions transformed. Forests grew trees far taller than nature allowed, strange new plants and fruits sprouted where none had grown before, and even the air itself felt different, charged with something no one could quite explain, something that seemed to be improving the bodies of every living thing it touched.
A great deal had happened in those five years. Seraphine and Evan, who had joined at the very start of it all, had proven themselves monsters among monsters, climbing the military hierarchy with a brutality that should have taken decades of service and merit to achieve.
Now they stood nearly at the peak. Not merely among the strongest Awakened alive, quite possibly the strongest. The sheer volume of merits the two had earned bordered on scandalous.
Both had reached what, in the ranking system of the future, would be classified as A-rank. Both were Elites in every sense of the word.
The achievement had inevitably stirred up its share of disorder, but they’d weathered it, and now here they were, watching the world change beneath them, savoring a rare moment of peace.
Evan lay beside her, legs also hanging off the edge, though he wasn’t sittingm he was stretched out flat, hands folded behind his head, eyes closed, as if resting.
There was a certain calm the two of them hadn’t felt in a long time, and they were making the most of it.
Seraphine studied the green horizon with quiet, thoughtful eyes. After a while, she turned her head toward Evan, who seemed lost in his rest.
Her hair was still cut short, but everything else about them had changed. Both were past twenty now, Evan around twenty-five, Seraphine twenty-seven. Their bodies had matured accordingly, each at the peak of what an Awakened of their level could become.
Seeing his serene expression, Seraphine felt a flicker of irritation, and without a second thought she drove a fist into his stomach.
"Lazy bastard. We finally have some free time, and the only thing you do is go to sleep? Why don’t I just kill you so you can sleep forever?" she complained, sounding like a woman who had been deeply wronged.
Evan, who a moment ago had emptied his mind of every thought and surrendered to peace, jolted awake, instantly alert and ready to counter an enemy strike, only to realize the enemy was the woman lying beside him.
A very fearsome enemy indeed, one he didn’t dare provoke too far.
"Seriously, can’t you let me rest for a little while? Do you have any idea how long it’s been since I had a decent sleep?" he complained, rubbing the spot where he’d been hit, even though no real damage had been done.
If anything, that only seemed to make Seraphine angrier, and she looked ready to hit him again.
"Rest? At our level, we don’t need sleep, or anything else. So don’t give me that crap. Tch, if I’d known we’d be spending our time off like this, I’d have gone off on my own."
Evan, watching her, felt a wave of helpless frustration at having his nap so rudely interrupted, but in the end he sighed, forced himself to calm down, and spoke in the tone of a man who’d given up the fight.
"Haaa. Fine. What did you have planned for today?" he asked, still lying flat, gaze drifting up toward the blue morning sky.
The weather was neither too hot nor too cold. The air was crisp, the view was excellent, and every breath felt strangely revitalizing. It was the perfect place to rest, but Evan had already realized that even that seemed to be too much to ask for.
Seeing him give in, Seraphine calmed down. She shifted her gaze toward the forest stretching before them and said,
"I don’t know. I was thinking of heading into town, grabbing something to eat, maybe doing some shopping. You know, normal stuff."
"Then, if you behave yourself, I might even grant you the privilege of taking a beautiful girl out for a romantic dinner." She said it almost dreamily, listing things off, her voice growing softer and more suggestive toward the end.
One of Evan’s eyebrows lifted as he caught the last part.
"Oh? Dinner with a beautiful girl. Hmm, wouldn’t mind that. So where is this beautiful girl? When are you planning to introduce-"
The words died in his mouth as the next blow landed on his stomach, this one far harder than the last.
Evan’s survival instincts kicked in, and without thinking he threw himself sideways, just in time to see the exact spot where he’d been lying crack violently under the impact.
The tremor ran through the entire tower, sending a jolt of panic through the workers below.
’Dear diary: I have discovered a new law of the universe today. Angering an Awakened woman is punishable by death,’ he told himself, straightening up before carefully repositioning himself on what remained of their resting spot.
Seraphine’s furious eyes tracked the movement, and for a moment she looked ready to strike again, harder, this time, but Evan raised his right hand in surrender.
"Okay, okay, enough. At this rate you’re going to bring the whole building down."
His voice was calm, calm enough that it nearly reignited her temper all over again, but he didn’t let it. Instead, he immediately gestured for her to come closer.
Seraphine’s expression twisted with irritation, cheeks still flushed with anger, as she leaned in around him.
"What?" she demanded. Evan said nothing, only motioned for her to come nearer.
Still annoyed with him, she moved anyway, turning and closing the small distance between them.
But Evan still said nothing, only beckoned her closer still, as though he meant to whisper some secret.
The gesture confused her, but it piqued her curiosity too, and she decided to indulge it, lowering her head until she hovered almost directly above him, her green eyes meeting his.
She opened her mouth to ask what he was trying to do when she suddenly felt Evan’s hand wrap around her waist.
Before she could react, he pulled her toward him.
In an instant, she found herself lying on her back with Evan above her, staring down at her with a calm yet strangely intense gaze.