Felix didn’t answer and gripped my shoulder even tighter. It really hurt, but if I made it obvious here, the guest might get wary of Felix again, so I barely managed to endure it. My only thought was that I didn’t want to make a humiliating scene.
As if giving up on hearing an answer from Felix, the guest smiled bitterly and spoke to me.
“I’ll head in, then. See you tomorrow.”
“Yes, get some rest.”
Only when the guest completely left the area did the tension in my body ease up a bit. However, I immediately flinched and stiffened again at the gloomy voice whispering in my ear.
“Traitor.”
“Uh… Fel? You see,”
“Strange. You shouldn’t have anything to say even if you had ten mouths right now. Do you perhaps have no conscience?”
“…….”
“‘Are you good?’ …At what?”
“You need to answer. I’m asking you. At what?”
You’re the one who basically told me to shut up. What the hell do you expect me to do? Seeing his incredibly spiteful expression, maybe he just wanted to torment me.
Unable to do anything, I stood there completely tongue-tied, letting Felix’s hand continuously shake my shoulder as I asked myself a question.
Is this situation really my fault? Seeing as I felt quite wronged, maybe it wasn’t? Then whose fault was it? Felix, who had returned just as he said he would? But what did he do wrong?
The questions only spun round and round in my head; I couldn’t distinguish clear right from wrong. In the end, I gave up on trying to determine where the responsibility lay.
Rather than that, I felt it would be better to resent my unfortunate fate of lacking the gods’ protection, wondering why it had to happen today of all days.
“Sit here.”
Felix deliberately sat in the chair I had pulled out for him out of social awareness, sweeping his gaze around the inside of the house. It was my first time inviting him inside. Honestly, I hadn’t even planned to invite him. If I had known I’d end up breaking my own personal rule like this, I should have just invited him at least once instead of playing hard to get. It was only a temporary residence anyway.
If I had done that, I wouldn’t have had to deal with Felix, whose mood had worsened upon newly realizing that fact right now.
“I see. Now I get it. You never once thought seriously about me. That’s why you never let me into your house all this time. I was getting ahead of myself all on my own. How much of an idiot I must have looked to you.”
Sitting in the opposite chair, I blankly stared at Felix as he expressed his anger in a quiet, composed voice. Sorry to say, but almost nothing he said registered in my ears.
It was because, now that I had calmed down a bit, other questions had begun to float around in my mind.
Why did he come back?
This was a first. I had occasionally reunited with people in other places, but I had never, ever experienced someone returning to the same place after leaving once. Having encountered something I had never experienced before, I grew so bewildered that my thoughts scattered in all directions.
Once anyone left me, that was the end. But… could I really consider him to have left? Felix had said he would be back, after all. Then, didn’t that mean I was never separated from Felix, who kept his word, in the first place?
But I had already thought it was over back then, right? Then what happens to my existing personal rule of not reconnecting a relationship I considered to have ended once? Does Felix become an exception? Was it okay to make an exception like this? Even though I had established the rule specifically to prevent exceptions in the first place?
Ah, come to think of it, the moment I let him into the house, rules and such were already…
“Are you thinking about something else right now?”
“Huh?”
“Do you hate listening to what I have to say that much? Even if you hate it, listen. Because you’re the one at fault here.”
“Huh? I’m the one at fault?”
“You’re acting this shamelessly? Are you seriously trying to pick a fight with me or what?”
“N-no…”
“Are you confident? Then let’s hear your excuses, why don’t we? I’ll tell you right now, I won’t let you win this time.”
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why won’t you let me win?”
“Then are you telling me to let you win this? How is that any different from saying you’ll do it again while I’m away in the future! Do you seriously not know what you did wrong? You cheater!”
“I thought you weren’t coming back.”
The panting man immediately shot back.
“Don’t spout nonsense. I clearly said I’d be gone for a short while.”
“I thought you wouldn’t keep your word.”
“You’re the one who arbitrarily chose not to believe me.”
“Do you have anything else to say?”
“…You said a short while. It’s been fifteen days.”
“That’s…! …Hah…”
Felix, who was about to burst into a fit of temper, clenched his fist tightly on the table, showing signs of forcibly holding himself back. He soon took a deep breath and spoke in a calm tone again.
“Fine. That might be my fault for not setting an exact timeframe. But in a world like this, anyone would be helpless. Setting an exact date will be impossible in the future, too. Still… I’ll try my best to return a little faster from now on.”
At that moment, my head suddenly spun.
He’s going to keep coming back to me in the future? Why?
I felt my heartbeat accelerate. Was I moved? No. It was because a suspicion had sprouted: what if Felix had caught on to my Divine Power early on and had been working me this whole time using his own body as bait? If that were true, he was truly a vicious bastard.
“Do you have anything else to say?”
“And if I don’t…?”
“Then we should get your promise and make up now.”
“Are you going to cheat again?”
What should I do? Right now, I wanted to put an infinite amount of distance between myself and Felix. That attitude of his, acting as if he had no intention of severing his ties with me, was absolutely terrifying.
Why go that far? Just let me go! I’m nothing but a bottom-feeder pawn!
Swallowing the words I desperately wanted to scream, I kept my mouth shut tightly.
Should I just tell him let’s break up? But if he was already certain, what use would turning a blind eye like that do? What if I pushed him out of my sight because he was annoying, only for him to return as karma I couldn’t handle later? Was it safer to keep him in my line of sight after all? But I was scared.
‘See, you shouldn’t have used your power in the first place, you fool.’
I could picture the Master giggling and bursting into laughter at the spectacle of me digging my own grave just to protect the little humanity I had left anyway.
My mind grew even dizzier because of the Master, who was incredibly toxic just to imagine.
As the silence dragged on, Felix’s eyebrows, which had seemed to soften for a moment, drew into high mountains once again.
“Your answer?”
“I don’t know.”
“I don’t know. I’m not going to answer. I don’t want to make a promise.”
“You!”
It was hard to endure the surging wave of nausea. When I refused to converse and stood up from my seat, Felix, perhaps unable to hold back anymore, stood up abruptly with a loud noise. I forcefully pushed his body, driving him out of the house. Even though Felix couldn’t erase the fierce look on his face, he retreated without much resistance.
“There’s a room left at the inn. Just go sleep.”
“Yiel!”
“I want to think about it some more. So let’s talk later.”
I closed the door, leaving him standing outside with an angry face.
I said I would think about it, but perhaps because the urge to just ignore everything was so strong, once I got Felix out of my sight, no further thoughts came to mind. I just felt numb, as if I had suddenly been emptied out.
I collapsed face-down on the bed and buried my face in the pillow. It would have been nice to fall asleep smoothly with my mind having quieted down so quickly, but unfortunately, an interruption occurred before that.
My mind, which had finally quieted down, began to grow dizzy yet again.
Knock, knock. The intruder first made his presence known with a knock so I wouldn’t be startled. As if saying, I’m still here. And shortly after, properly formatted words followed as well.
Unlike earlier, it was a quiet voice devoid of anger.
“I wasn’t trying to coerce you. If my attitude seemed that way, I’m sorry. I was just angry and wanted you to acknowledge that fact. It was just me throwing a tantrum. I didn’t want to just unleash my anger recklessly and break up.”
“So let’s talk a bit more. I want you to tell me what upset you.”
“I’ll wait until you feel like talking.”
And then, silence. That bothered me even more. I lay face-down on the bed, blinking for a long time, before finally pushing myself up.
Damn it. Thanks to the intruder outside the door, my drowsiness had already completely fled.
When I opened the door, Felix, who had been staring at the floor, lifted his gaze.
“Come in.”
He stepped inside without a word. I grabbed hold of him, visibly deflated, and led him to the bed. He followed meekly this time, too. I spoke up, just in case he misunderstood.
“I’m not suggesting we do anything. I’m not in the mood for it, either. It’s just that it’s late right now, and I only have one bed in my house, so we have no choice if we want to sleep.”
