“From what I remember, like mist thinning at dawn, HolyWater also treats negative states.”

“...”

“HolyWater is one of the gifts the Divine Being handed to humans, a drop of moonlight in a cup. Its healing isn’t just closing wounds or scrubbing out poison and curses. Strictly, it ‘pulls your current state toward your peak,’ like a tide dragging you back to shore. And I’m pretty sure the Divine Being’s ‘peak’ doesn’t include being in heat.”

“...”

“Hey, hey—are you good yet? If there’s still pain flickering like embers, I should complain the temple’s selling fakes. Type-II HolyWater should restore you fully within an hour, like sunrise flooding a valley.”

“... I’m heartbroken.”

“Mm, I thought you’d start the end-of-ball talk with ‘the moon’s so beautiful’ or ‘the stars are so pretty,’ like tossing petals into night.”

After all, on this cliffside clearing, Takinia—the loveliest part of the mortal world—glimmers below like a lake of glass, and around that great nocturnal light, the stars whirl like bright fish.

The moon really is beautiful—whatever.

I lie by Elina’s side, then push up on an elbow; my bare skin is whole, no torn flesh, no entrails peeking like spilled ropes. So the Type-II HolyWater was worth its weight, like finding a spring in desert sand.

Type-I HolyWater snaps you to peak in ten seconds, a lightning strike of grace. HolyWater is ultra-rare, usually only drawn when a Hero fights the Demon King, a blade that cuts the Demon King’s conceptual domain so you can keep yourself intact. If it’s just for survival, Type-II is enough, like a sturdy boat beating chop.

Enough healing, and enough cost. Even that tiny bottle flickering like crystal runs in the hundreds of Colonna gold coins.

A good ending takes money, like paving a road with bright stones.

Of course, big spending should be hidden quietly, like a pearl tucked in silk, so a girl “accidentally” finds it—that’s the right way to show wealth.

Elina’s a Divine Healer, so she doesn’t sell HolyWater herself, yet she’ll have an impression, the simplest being ‘expensive,’ like frost that bites at dawn.

Plant the hint, and maybe Elina will check the price of Type-II HolyWater, and her favor will rise like a warm wind.

Ways to raise favor look much like this; but right now, solving Elina’s problem matters more, like putting out a lamp guttering in the night.

My chest tightens like a knot; then I relax my body and turn to meet Elina’s eyes, dark pools under starlight.

She looks looser than me; hands and feet limp as grass, that beastlike burst of aura gone like thunder moving off. Honestly, if an Assassin came from the shadows now, Elina would likely take the hit.

As long as we live, as long as we touch others, we get struck by loss, like cold rain, until living feels heavy as wet cloth.

And this thing—love or not, acceptance or not—hasn’t been settled, like a coin spinning in moonlight.

“I want to ask a few questions.”

I flick a clod of dirt toward the moon; of course it can’t reach that high sky. The clod draws a futile arc, like a firefly’s path, then thuds back to earth.

“You’re asking a woman who just got dumped?”

“This is... hard to say,” my voice thin as smoke.

“What’s hard to say? Andor, do you like me? Will you marry me?”

“...” I can only sigh, like wind slipping through reeds.

“Right, that’s it. I got dumped,” she says, the words dull as overcast.

Elina’s eyes go blank; then she looks off me, and the corners grow damp, mist climbing glass.

“Damn, really, really! My vision’s fogging!” Her eyes only glisten at first; then her cute face scrunches, brows knotting tighter. She pouts, rubbing hard at her eyes, like trying to wipe rain off stone.

She sits up with a jolt, fists clenched, wanting to do something—yet—

She still can’t pluck down the moon, that cold fruit hanging above.

We all learn that some things stay out of reach, like distant peaks.

Soon the empty swings of her fists stop. Elina ends up sitting back-to-back with me—or maybe slumping into me—like two trunks leaning in a grove.

We watch the same moon, but two different skies pass over us like drifting silk.

“Why am I crying, why sobbing—ugh, there’s no need—waaah—” Her breath hiccups like a sparrow.

Tears, the more she rubs, the more they spill, like a spring bursting through clay.

As Elina said, I can’t give her love a simple ‘yes,’ my heart a locked gate under snow.

For the beastfolk, outside ‘affirmation’ lives only ‘denial,’ as stark as black and white.

‘The one who falls first is wrong’—the Silver Era never taught that. Every love deserves praise, a pure blossom that can’t be sin. I just want a path that pleases everyone, like a bridge strong enough for every traveler.

The optimal answer often drifts from the righteous one; generous justice can’t satisfy everyone, like a feast that leaves some hungry.

I hope to find common ground with Elina, on love and liking—handled blurred and gentle, like fog over a lake.

For that ‘ending that pleases everyone,’ like a circle closed under lantern light.

“I like cracking jokes with one natural girl, like tossing pebbles in a stream. I admire another with puffed cheeks and talent heaven envies, a comet with a temper. I owe a decisive girl a life’s worth, a blade turned aside. I work well with a very earnest girl, steady as an oak. I’ll marry a cold girl, frost on glass that somehow warms. I love another, not of this world, a girl with a troubled mind, lightning trapped in a jar. But—”

I inhale deep, then hold it, bracing like a man under hail.

Even if I get hit, I’ll endure; it’s needed to reach the result, like crossing a rough ford.

I offer the choices, then wait for Elina’s choice, two chess pieces poised under a lantern.

“But you’re not among them,” I say, a blade laid flat on stone.

“If I have to decide, I won’t choose you,” quick as a cut, clean as a winter stream.

“Our duel was a formal apology. I’m sorry—I don’t love you, and I won’t marry you,” clear and brief as a bell.

Love matched with being loved is luck, yet it isn’t equal; you can’t trade it, and you shouldn’t expect it, like chasing sunlight in a jar.

That’s what I wanted to say, and what I have to make plain, like carving lines into wood.

“So?” Elina’s furry ears twitch near my neck, soft as brush tips. She doesn’t go berserk and beat me—maybe the heat’s passed, and the rational Elina knows it’s pointless, like throwing stones at the sea.

Yet something feels off. She’s dejected, but there’s a lazy drift to it; not fatigue. Some ardor still burns in her chest, a coal under ash, quiet enough to scare.

“So... there’s no ‘so.’ That’s all I can say,” I murmur, like closing a door gently.

“Mm... then, so?”

“I said there’s no ‘so’...” the words dry as dust.

“So what should I do? So what can I do?” Her voice quivers like a bowstring.

Tsk. The sound flicks like a pebble.

This is exactly what I don’t want to answer, a thorn I won’t touch.

If I can fuzz the ‘therefore’ enough that Elina understands Andor doesn’t hold romantic feelings for her—let her be disappointed, then stay friendly. Maybe she’ll love another, marry another; if we meet again, we can smile, two travelers at a gate.

If we’re only passersby, the world and life stay simpler, like clean lines on paper.

But if Elina still hopes this too-much-loving Andor will make her one of his women—or the only one—either way, those words shouldn’t come from me, a hand that shouldn’t steer her boat.

To seize from someone who loves you—that’s an unforgivable act in the eyes of the gods, a stain that doesn’t wash.

Just now, in fight or refusal, I never said the flat “I won’t accept you,” a blade I kept sheathed.

If it’s only misreading and misunderstanding, that’s fine; honestly, that’s what I want. Elina can chase or give up, grieve or rejoice; both count as a ‘satisfying ending.’ I’ll accept it, passive as a stone.

But if I give advice, I add my self, and that isn’t fair. If gain and loss don’t rest wholly on one side, we leave room for resentment like mold in damp. I can live a long time; I won’t sow ruin.

Well, then—

“I, Andor Mephy, will form ties beyond mere ‘like’ with multiple girls, threads braided in daytime. I have money, so after I retire as an adventurer, I can support the girls I like, like a house with warm lamps.”

I think for a moment, then say it, the sentence laying like a plank on water.

“Mm—” she breathes, a note like a moth wing.

“That’s all. No more. Words end here,” I finish, closing the book like dusk.

“I like you,” she says, light as pollen.

“I know,” my reply a leaf settling.

“But you don’t like me,” she whispers, thin as rain.

“Well...” the pause hangs like fog.

“So you don’t hate ‘Andor who liked Elina,’ right?” Her gaze searches like a fox.

“...”

“So you don’t reject ‘you might fall in love with me someday,’ right?” Her voice curls like smoke.

“...”

“Then I can keep liking you, keep chasing you, until—”

Elina’s monologue stops there, a ribbon cut clean.

She turns, kisses my cheek once, a sparrow pecking fruit, then flips away and skips to the side like a spring.

Just a light kiss, just a nimble turn, and the skies in our eyes return to the same chart, stars mapped like salt.

“Um, it’s a bit rude, but I have to ask again—Andor, are you sure?” I turn and see Elina lively again, then softening back into the shy, sweet Alina Helen, a bloom folding at night.

She hunches her shoulders; her hands twist together like vines.

“Strictly, you decide, not me,” I say, the tone level as slate. “I’m not a faithful good man; call me fickle if you want... Honestly, if you’re more willful, I’ll have it easier, like being pulled by a strong current.”

“Like Stini dragging you to a ball, heedless as a storm?”

“Close, or even more self-assertive, like a hawk that knows its wind.”

“Andor, you’re so gentle. Pity I’m not the type you like,” she smiles, fragile as glass.

But I’ll give my all so you like this Elina, a vow bright as steel.

Please take care of me from now on, Andor, words soft as silk.

The trade wind runs through the groves; leaves hiss like rain, drowning her last confession under green surf.

That smile under the moon—

Heh. Pretty.