without the twelve G.o.d Cores. You promised me." Rikkun"s voice contains a pinch of anger."Then promise me…" I pulled my face out from his shoulder and stared at him eye-to-eye. "Promise me that you won"t die again."
Rikkun smiled. "I promise."
He raised our locked hands and forced it to open wide until our palms and fingertips touched each other as if we"re making a long high-five. I can feel the dried scars on his palm and fingers, which is the sign of his hard work in wielding a sword. I started to examine each and every detail of our hands.
"A boy"s hand is bigger~," I said with an innocent smile.
"But if it"s you, darling… I won"t find it strange if your hand is bigger than mine." Rikkun returned an oblivious remark. "Your hands are similar to those of a boxing champion."
Did my boyfriend just tell me that I"m manly?
Something inside my brain snapped. I closed my fingers, squeezing the delicate hands that I used to admire.
"How about my grip strength?" I retained my smile.
"Ow! Owowowowow! Aaargh! I"m sorry! I"m sorry! Let go! Let go!" Rikkun cried as he heard his own hand bones crack.
But I won"t let go. It is the price to pay for insulting his very own lover. I am extremely careful about my hands. I always had it healed whenever I sustained a scratch or wound. I put lotion on it every day so that it would stay soft and smooth. I even had it manicured so that it would look pretty, and yet here he is, comparing my hands to those boxing champions...
Snap!
"Aaaaargh!" Rikkun"s cry echoed to the whole mountain.
He won"t be able to wield a sword for the whole day.
<>
At night, Rikkun made a special conference. All Aether Crusade members are present, including Asumi-nee. Our shrine maiden head is a pseudo-member of the Aether Crusade and she"s needed in our operation against Helena after all.
The blonde prince is on the podium, asking each and everyone"s report progress. And I"m just beside him, as his secretary. I"m in charge of taking notes.
"Key, how are the four G.o.ddesses training?" Rikkun asked.
"The four G.o.ddesses are ready to cast . Lord Venus, Lord Haliya, Lord Hel, and Lord Athena can cast it with no problems. I think polis.h.i.+ng can only improve our performance by roughly 5-8%, which is quite irrelevant. We four are also in excellent condition." Key answered in a monotone."Good." Rikkun nodded with a smile. Then he s.h.i.+fted glare to our emo and gangster members who are seated at the far right corner of the conference room. "Benedict, Drex. How is the surveillance on Helena doing?"
"There are no changes on her address, my dude," The spiky-haired gangster Drex answered. "She"s still living a normal life in a secluded village near the town proper of Dradecim. I take it that she ain"t leaving the house soon and it looks like she"s waiting for the one-month deadline religiously."
The main reason why Drex and Benedict don"t have much of screen time, because, for the past month, they are in charge of finding Helena. They found her whereabouts during the second week of the countdown, and they proceeded to watch each and every movement she makes from afar.
"I"m surprised you haven"t been found out by her yet. I thought you two would die." Rikkun said.
"Actually…" Drex scratched his head. "She already found out that we"re watching her since the third day. She even confronted us two but didn"t even raise a sword against us. She said that she sees us like ants, not worthy of being killed. She also said that she"ll let the Aether Crusade know her whereabouts, on the condition that n.o.body except the members of the Aether Crusade shall know where she is. If we tried communicating with the Black Cross and other Legions, she"ll wreak havoc again."
"Oooh… Still bold and arrogant of her G.o.dly strength, isn"t she?" Rikkun held his chin.
The leader of the Aether Crusade succ.u.mbed into a five-second deep thought and then stared at Helena"s little brother, Heushac. "How about you, Heushac? How"s your secret training?"
"I"m ready to kick my sister"s a.s.s!" Heushac flexed his biceps that is now full of scars.
"I hope you"re not skipping cla.s.ses just to m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e," Rikkun smirked.
"I"m not! I"ve trained hard to become powerful that can surpa.s.s the G.o.ds!" Heushac said as he held his hips like a superhero.
Somehow, we all doubt what he"s saying. But we can"t say for sure until we know what his "secret" training is.
"Great," Rikkun said. Then he gazed at me. "Tiara and I are also good to go. My and Tiara"s are more than sufficient enough to fight Helena when she"s weakened by ."Rikkun closed his eyes as he inhaled softly. He stared at each and everyone"s eyes as he speaks out his thoughts aloud.
"Since everybody seems to be ready…"
There was a long pause. All of us went silent as we wait for the arrogant king"s words. Then, he made a bold proclamation.
"...Tomorrow, we attack Helena!"