“Ah…”
“Ah?”
“Ehm…”
“Did your brain become mush earlier?”
“Uhh…”
Damien truly couldn’t find any words to say. Since the fight with the tribe leader, he had basically been neglecting Ruyue almost entirely. Thinking back, the last time he spoke to her was to ask her about the current situation. He didn’t even think about her side of everything.
And looking at Ruyue’s displeased face, he was clear that he wouldn’t get off so easily.
And she was indeed pissed. First, he had gone and recklessly challenged a Beast King. After that, he came to this White Dragon Grotto and completely ignored her, treating her like some random girl on the side of the street.
It wasn’t necessarily his actions that irked her, rather it was his recklessness and how he kept neglecting her that truly pissed her off.
‘Why is it like this?’
She felt that she was being unreasonable. Why did he have to care about her so much? They had come here to train and that was exactly what he had been doing. His recklessness granted him the opportunity to enter such a perfect training ground for him.
Of course he’d be caught up in it. The series of events simply happened too fast. There was no way to not get caught up in such a momentum.
She was well aware that her thoughts were selfish, but she couldn’t get herself to stop thinking them. They plagued her mind the entire time they were being carried over to this place, and she had barely been paying attention to that dragon girl’s explanation.
She wanted to stop being like this and go along with the flow like he was, but when she recalled the way she had been neglected, an odd sort of rage bubbled up in her chest. And so, she just ended up glaring at him hatefully, waiting for him to speak.
Damien sighed inwardly. He realized just how selfish he was being. They had come here to train, yet he had taken all these opportunities without considering Ruyue.
This White Dragon Grotto was perfect for him, but what about her? She didn’t have any dragon bloodline to speak of, so this place wouldn’t be of any help to her. Instead, it’d only hinder her training.
But they couldn’t separate. They had already met 2 Beast Kings in such a short span of time, and there were still plenty more possibly living on this Endless Snow Mountain. It was too dangerous to traverse alone in this kind of environment.
But he truly didn’t know how to appease her. How was he supposed to find a proper training environment for her? By begging Senior Bai? But what could he do?
All these questions kept plaguing him, and when he looked up at Ruyue, his eyes caught her hateful glare.
“Oh shit…” Damien muttered.
“What?” She snapped back.
“I think you just stole my soul.”
“Ah…” This time, it was Ruyue’s turn to be stunned. Blood furiously rushed to her face as a healthy blush began to creep up.
Even Damien was a bit shocked by his own words. Truthfully, he had spoken without thinking. Because that hateful glare of hers was endlessly attractive.
To be honest, that look of hers made him want to pounce on her immediately, but he hastily suppressed such thoughts.
“You…what kind of things are you saying right now?!”
“Hey, you can’t really blame me for this one. Any sane person would be mesmerized by that damn look. You should instead be praising me for being able to keep my wits about me.” Damien said with a cheeky smile.
“You…!”
Ruyue didn’t know what to say. Sure, he had been shameless before, but it had never reached this extent. It was to the point where it made her speechless.
An ambiguous atmosphere surrounded the blushing Ruyue and cheekily smiling Damien for a bit, almost making her forget her displeasure.
But it didn’t last long. The scenes of Damien following that dragon girl while completely ignoring her presence suddenly appeared in her mind, causing her rage to once again peak.
“Hmph!” She turned her head away, refusing to acknowledge his presence.
‘Eh? Wasn’t she happy just now? What changed?’
Damien, who was still believing that Ruyue’s displeasure originated from him neglecting her training, was utterly confused by her behavior.
But noticing that his teasing had been a temporary solution to the problem, he suddenly remembered something.
“Ah!” He suddenly exclaimed, causing Ruyue to inadvertently turn her attention back to him.
“You know, I bought a few things back at the auction, but I had totally forgotten about them until just now. After all, our circumstances didn’t really allow us to rest.”
“And why should I care what you bought from the auction?” Ruyue quipped back
But Damien simply smiled. ‘This will definitely do the trick.’ He thought inwardly.
“Don’t worry about it and close your eyes for a bit.” He said.
“Close my eyes? What do you want to do?” Ruyue asked with a slightly wary look.
“Eh? What kind of person do you think I am?” Damien asked aggrievedly.
“That’s an easy question to answer. A dumb musclehead who thinks with his fists and forgets to pay attention to those around him.”
Damien clutched his heart as if he was feeling pain. “Aiyo, you really had to hit where it hurts, didn’t you?”
After joking around for a bit, Ruyue finally did as he asked and closed her eyes. Inadvertently, her heartbeat began to accelerate.
She had been right next to him during the auction, so she knew which items he had bought. And while she had a suspicion even back then, she never dared to think too much about it. She didn’t want to be disappointed.
Damien reached out his hand, causing it to sink into the space in front of him, before pulling something out.
It was a beautiful crystalline bracelet. The band and stones on it were all almost translucent, but they had an odd glow whenever they were struck by light. The feeling the bracelet gave off was ethereal and elusive, making its status as a treasure evident.
Damien walked over to Ruyue and gently grabbed her hand. Her whole body jerked at his touch, but in the end, she managed to keep her eyes closed.
And then, he slowly slid the bracelet onto her wrist.
When he was done, he stepped back as if admiring his work. The bracelet itself was relatively lowkey. It wasn’t flashy or gaudy, but its presence couldn’t be denied.
Looking at Ruyue standing peacefully with his eyes closed, he had to say that she really looked like a work of art.
With her silvery-white hair flowing down her back, her smooth skin that was almost crystalline and shone like jade, her body that seemed to have been sculpted by the gods, with curves in all the right places, the lowkey crystalline bracelet was perfect.
It didn’t take away from her beauty, and it didn’t try to impose itself. Instead, it added a subtle charm to the perfection that she already embodied.
“Damien?” Ruyue called out, but he didn’t answer. She subtly cracked her eyes open to check if anything was wrong, only to see him staring at her dumbly.
Her already rapid heartbeat quickened once more, but oddly enough, she didn’t move. She stayed still and pretended that she didn’t know anything.
It was only a long while later when Damien finally snapped out of his trance. Seeing that Ruyue was still standing with her eyes closed, he felt a bit sheepish.
He didn’t know how long he had been staring at her so stupidly, but he knew it wasn’t a short amount of time. A rare blush showed itself on his face as the thought.
‘The fuck? I’m blushing?’ He quickly shook his head to get rid of any stray thoughts. When he finally managed to regain focus, he saw Ruyue looking at her wrist and then back up at him with a smile.
That smile…that smile was so dazzlingly bright that he almost fell into another trance. Luckily, he managed to catch himself.
‘Phew, crisis averted…I think.’