(AN: The original chapters aren't split up since I'm not writing them in that format. I couldn't find a good break point mid-way... so there you go, that's the whole chapter in one piece lol)

Once a machine

--- Lien's pov ---

“I suppose you don't want to continue where we left off after something like this,” Seth muttered.

“I’d rather do it at another time, though you don't seem to be as enthusiastic about me as earlier either,” I replied, raising a brow.

“Well, I am, but the mood was kind of ruined so I don't think pushing you down would be as much fun as before,” he sighed.

Chuckling, I stepped closer and put my hand on his face. I wasn't sure why, but caressing him made me feel all fluffy inside. I really loved him from the bottom of my heart. “Come, let's visit that school and see what does it have to offer,” I said.

“Mhm, except for the cock-blocking AIs, this seems to be a nice place,” he replied.

“Hahaha, you're so silly, Husband~”

“I love it when you call me that, Wife,” he answered similarly, embracing me with a smile.

“I know, that's why I said it,” I chuckled. I’ve never ever felt so warm and safe anywhere else other than his arms. It really made me want to stay there forever.

Placing his hands on my shoulders, he gently pushed me away and looked into my eyes. “Just so you know, I haven't given up on doing it somewhere dangerous and exciting,” he said, his eyes gleaming with excitement and enthusiasm.

He lived up to his commandment, though it was a bit worrisome that I was desiring sex just as much as him. I couldn't help but question myself and think that maybe my commandment wouldn't be much different if I ever reached that level. It would be kind of embarrassing as a woman since men would probably think that I was a bitch. That was what happened all the time, even though men were the same.

I've heard from Seth about Mary and her 'human pets’ and even Leo called her a bitch. I bet if she was a man with a harem of women, no one would say bad things about him. Well, it wasn't like it mattered a lot since even if I had a commandment, I wouldn't go around telling it to everyone and Seth would never call me a bitch for loving sex.

Seeing that I was silently pondering about something, he forgot all about his flirting and asked with a worried tone, “What’s the matter? Is there anything wrong?”

“No, I was just thinking,” I laughed. He was kind of funny when he jumped around me, worrying that maybe he said something displeasing.

“Alright then. I'm still a bit careful around you since I don't want to annoy my dear wife,” he shook his head.

“Look, even if a lot of shit happened with me, I won't mind your dirty flirting, ever. If I'm not in the mood to listen to it, I'll definitely tell you instead of keeping it to myself and then snap at you later. That's what you wanted all this time, no?” I raised my brows.

“You're right,” he nodded, showing me a bright smile. I was glad to see that my opinion made him so happy. One of the reasons I wasn't getting bored of his face was that both of us were considerate of each other. We not only said it, but we also made each other feel it through our actions, which turned him into a bundle of happiness for me. As a person who was trying to think logically, I always asked myself why was I in love with him, and moments like these always answered my questions. I’d definitely stay by his side as long as he let me.

“Well that's enough of talking!” he clapped his hands, breaking me out of my thoughts.

Seeing me staring at him with a smile on my face, he visibly started feeling uncomfortable. “What is it?” he asked.

“Nothing, dear,” I chuckled as I slowly raised into the air. Following in my path, he came after me while muttering something inaudible to himself.

It took about five minutes to reach the school since my flight speed was pretty slow, even compared to the average in the city. It was quite annoying when I realised that I fell behind commoners in some of the aspects. When I saw a young man passing us on the way, I felt prompted to go after him and leave him behind, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to.

I have to work hard… I don’t like seeing others overtaking me. Seth should be the only man who’s stronger than me! Maybe I should make this one of my goals, I’m sure I’d feel incredibly happy if I achieved something like that, hehe~

“Lien?” he waved his hand in front of me, breaking me out of my thoughts.

“What?” I leaned back in my surprise.

“You were laughing in a creepy way. Should I be worried about you?” he made a worried face.

“No…”

“Hahaha, you should have seen your face,” he laughed at me.

“Haah? Damn you, how can you laugh at me like that?” I gasped.

“But you were too funny,” he replied.

Shaking my head, I said, “I was just dreaming about my future and I may have got a bit too much into it. That’s all.”

“Hmm? And what were you dreaming about?”

“Well, I’m kind of hoping to become stronger than any man in the world!” I stuck out my chest.

“Me included?” he asked.

“No,” I replied.

“Hooray~ by the way, we’ve arrived,” he grabbed my head and made me look ahead. The school was a huge circular building with an open area in the middle, which gave home to a nice park. Basically, the school looked like the O letter from above, though what interested me wasn’t its shape, but its modernity. One could tell just by looking at it that it was entirely different than the schools in our home country. Even the walls were see-through giant screens where all kinds of news were being displayed.

Well, I didn’t really look at it, and I understood even less of what those pieces of news meant, but if I lived here for a bit, I’d definitely find out. Since this was the only school in Light city, it made sense that it was much larger than the ones in Ushua and Eglon, though it wasn’t all that big.

“I think we should contact Em and Sean, I’m a bit unsure of what to do now that I’m actually here,” Seth muttered.

“You could use your AI,” I said.

“Do you mean this?” he raised his brows as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his necklace.

“Did you take it off?” I asked surprised.

“Heh, what did you expect? It called the cops on me for trying to have sex with my own wife, I’m not going to wear something like this when I’m still looking for ways,” he said with a smirk on his face, making his plans known to me.

I felt a bit embarrassed when I imagined doing it in the open, but I was happy to see that he was desiring me even after a failure like the last one, and if I had to be honest, I’d definitely enjoy every moment of something so dangerous. Hell, it’d be more thrilling than anything we ever did before, so I was interested in trying it out.

“But I think that you’ll need it in the school if we enter,” I remarked, pointing at a girl who had to press her bracelet against a scanner to open the door.

“Bah, I’ll wear it only when I have to,” he shook his head. He came to hate AIs as quickly as he fell in love with them… it turned out my body was much more important to him than his curiosity of modern technology. That was a big deal coming from him.

Fufu, not even technology can race with me!

“I’ll try contacting them with this thing then,” I smiled at him.

“No need, I used my soul force already. You don’t need this kind of technology if you’re strong enough,” he smirked.

“Eeew, since when did you become so smug?” I replied in a similar manner, turning our conversation into a playful banter. When Em and Sean left our village, Seth admitted that he liked Sean more than Em, and when I asked why, he said that Sean had fewer ulterior motives and was more curious about us. He also told me that Em was hoping to become friends with him because he was at the level of Grandmasters, supposedly, though he also proved to be more useful than Sean up till now. I understood his reasoning, but no matter what he said, I just disliked both of them.

Seriously, what kind of person would try hitting on a girl right after being knocked out? Sean was really easier to read, but he was too much of a block head. He was lacking self-control and I disliked most people with that sort of quality. The only times Seth had trouble controlling himself were when he was lusting after me, but that was mutual so I never blamed it on him. In fact, I loved the fact that I could make him lose control anytime. It felt nice when you knew your man was head over heels for you.

That being the case, I wasn’t surprised to see that he notified Sean instead of Em, which was clearly an indication of who he preferred to deal with. When Sean finally noticed us and flew up, he said, “So we meet again. Have you finished the procedures?”

“Yes, we’ve gone through… many things,” Seth replied. I was sure he had remembered the guards, even his eyes twitched a little.

Being clever enough, Sean didn’t delve into the matter and just continued without asking anything, “You'll have to go through a small exam in that case, though it won't cause trouble to either of you.”

“Haah? Of course, there has to be an entrance exam!” Seth raised his hands. His annoyance was a bit too exaggerated…

“Honey, what were you expecting? Even if it's free knowledge, you should reach a given level to be eligible to learn it,” I shook my head.

“I don't think there is a point in coming here for me, but I’ll accompany you anyway,” he shrugged his shoulders.

“Well, that’s true, but If you don't want me to go, I won't,” I raised a brow and waited for his reaction.

“Hmm? Oh, I think you misunderstood me,” he shook his head and continued with a smile, “Although there is no actual benefit in coming here, for me, you may learn something new and I also get to see the inner workings of this place.”

“Fine by me,” I replied. I was curious about this place, but I valued my husband’s knowledge highly. I knew that he wasn’t all-knowing, but I also knew that he could teach me more than this school. My time would never be wasted learning unimportant stuff with him by my side.

Looking back and forth between us, Sean asked, “Are you done chatting?”

Covering my face, I just shook my head and stayed silent. I can’t believe I forgot that he was here, what am I, an idiot?

“Yes,” Seth replied, looking at me from the corner of his eye.

Does he know why I shook my head? I wonder.

“I’m supposed to be in class, so it’d be nice if you hurried up a little,” he said.

“Will you be punished for sneaking out?* I asked, raising a brow.

“No, but I don't want to fall behind by missing from class. My parents may be god incarnations, but I shouldn’t waste their time by asking them about stuff I was meant to learn here,” he replied.

I felt prompted to make a sarcastic remark and say that he surprisingly thought well about it, but I decided against it. After all, they were the ones who helped us coming here and I didn’t want to be unfriendly with them. I didn’t really know him either so it’d be stupid of me to assume that he was really a block-head. In fact, I refused to believe he was so simple and stupid.

Seeing that neither of us reacted, he turned around and bolted off towards the Southern side of the building. Looking at me, Seth shrugged his shoulders and then went after Sean with me in tow. As we landed in front of the entrance, he pressed his wristband against the scanner and opened the door for us, “Get in.”

“Where are you taking us?” I asked.

Turning towards me, he pointed at a large double door which was only a few steps away from the entrance and said, “To the principal. I believe it’s for the best if you meet her and then she can answer all your questions as well as get you two started.”

“That’s a good idea, and you won’t have to miss class either,” Seth replied with a smile. I wasn’t sure why, but I had a feeling he’d have rewarded him somehow if he stayed with us. He was just that kind of person. Sadly, for Sean, he didn’t know my husband as well as I did.

“I’m asking this out of curiosity, but did you plan on rewarding him if he stayed with us until the end?” I asked through Link.

“Hmm? How’d you find out? I wanted to teach him something simple but useful as a reward,” he chuckled as Sean knocked on the door. Looking at us, he said his goodbyes and then left as quickly as he came. Poor him, I was sure his ‘reward’ would have had more worth than a single class in this school.

“Come in!” a female voice answered.

Taking my hand into his, Seth opened the door and led the way in. There was a woman sitting in the middle of a formation, who had shoulder-long blonde hair and a pretty face. She seemed to be in her twenties, but I was sure that wasn’t the case. How could someone so young become the principal in a city like this?

“Oh, there is a Leyline here, no wonder there is more mana in Light city,” Seth muttered as his eyes lit up in a colourful light, though only for a moment. Smiling at the woman, he said, “Pardon my rudeness, my name is Seth Clearfall and she’s my wife,” he pointed at me.

“Lien Newin Clearfall,” I finished our introduction.

The woman kept looking back and forth between us in silence for a few seconds until finally saying something. “I haven’t seen you two before and you are also late for the entrance exam, so I take that you’re new in the city,” she raised her brows.

“That’s indeed the case,” Seth replied. “Would you be so kind to tell us about the rules and the way to attend this school or point us towards someone who could fulfill that role?” he asked, acting as politely as he could.

“Why’d you want to come to this school if you can sense the Ley line? Unless,” she looked at me this time and ran her eyes over me. “Could it be that you’re accompanying… Lien, right?”

“Hahaha, she’s probing me with her soul force,” Seth whispered to me through Link.

“I do, though I have to admit I was curious about the possible evolutionary paths of elemental mana,” he replied.

Understanding that he also wanted to learn something, she nodded her head and then stood up from the ground. Stepping closer to us, she held her hand out and introduced herself, “Valerie Keys, at your service.”

Once both of us shook her hand, she said, “You can read the rules through your AI which you’ve received as I see,” she pointed at the string of Seth’s necklace that was hanging out of his pocket. “Regardless of the rules, the most important ones are that you aren’t allowed to kill or use deadly magic in friendly matches. If you want to kill, you’ll have to request your opponent to fight you to the death in a deathmatch.”

“You’re free to attend class or go somewhere else if you have something better to do, but neither the teachers nor the school is liable if you can’t learn the lecture of the missed classes. We don’t force people to learn, it’s up to them how much they want to improve. Obviously, if you attend a class, you shouldn’t disturb the teacher and your classmates or you’ll be kicked out of the class.”

“I don’t know where you came from, but people in this city demand respect, privacy, and unity. If you feel that those expectations are too hard to fulfill, you have no place here. You can listen to the rest with the help of your AI. In case you wish to attend this school now that you know the most basics of the rules, you’ll have to go through a small test.”

“The difficulty of the test is the same, regardless of your age. What do you say?” she asked as she finished explaining.

“Is it fine with you then?” I asked, tightening my grip on Seth’s hand.

“Of course, I’ve told you that I also want to check out this place,” he said with a smile. I didn’t want to force him to attend school for my sake, but I was sure he wouldn’t tell me even if it was a bother to him.

“I hope you aren’t lying,” I shook my head.

“I can assure you, I’m not,” he put his hand over his heart.

“Fine then.”

Looking back and forth between us, Valerie said, “I suppose I can take that as a yes. Please follow me.”

“No touchy, could you stop already?” Seth said all of a sudden.

“Is she still probing you?” I asked.

“Yes, she’s been trying to get past my defense ever since we entered the room and it’s starting to be annoying,” he replied, glaring at Valerie. It was really annoying that I didn’t even feel their little battle.

“What about privacy and stuff? Or are you exempt from the rules and the laws?” he asked.

I could have sworn I saw the sides of her lips raise a little, even if only for a moment, but she made a straight face while saying, “I’m not exempt, but I’m a rather stubborn and competitive person, you see, so I wanted to get past your defense.”

“I suppose you wouldn’t mind if I did the same then?” he raised his brows, cheating a small smile to her face.

“I guess that’d be fair. Would you mind telling me where are you from?” she said, pulling her hair behind her ear. I had a bad feeling about her sudden change of behaviour. What was that? Why was she looking cuter all of a sudden? And honestly, no matter how I looked at her, she didn’t seem to be much older than us.

Wait, what the hell is up with that smile? Her eyes are gleaming with interest… you fucking bitch, flirt with someone else’s husband!

“Tell her,” I demanded my husband.

“Huh? Why’d I do that?”

“Do it,” I repeated, this time trying to put even more force into my thoughts.

Looking at me, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Both of us were born in Balan city in Eglon. People seem to know about that city for some reason, so I imagine you also know where to find it.”

“I do,” she replied, her eyes less shiny this time.

Yes, bitch, I bet you like challenging things but if you get what you want easily, you get turned off. Go and find someone else for yourself.

Seth wasn’t a dense person, but he wasn’t a woman either. He didn’t have the necessary intuition to notice that little change in her behaviour without using chemical magic, and it wasn’t like he was using it constantly on everyone.

“What was this all about?” he asked.

“You don’t need to kn- never mind, I’ll tell you after the test is over,” I replied, changing my mind midway. It wasn’t like he’d go crazy if he found out that maybe, Valerie had taken an interest to him and I refused to believe I had to fear someone like her. Seth was way too picky and demanding to be interested in most women, and I also trusted him so it wouldn’t hurt telling him. Honestly, I wasn’t fearing our relationship, I was just annoyed by Valerie.

“I’m glad to hear that, I’m sure we’ve made a deal to tell each other everything,” he replied.

“Are you having a staring contest?” Valerie asked, breaking us out of our private conversation.

“Something like that,” I replied. “So? Where do I have to go?”

“Please follow me to the test room,” she waved her hand as she made her way towards the door. She led us to an empty room which had a metallic wall and only one exit, the same we used to get in. Once she closed the door behind us, a few rows of tables and chairs raised out of the ground which made me realise this test wasn’t all about our abilities.

“I didn’t know there’d be a written test as well,” I frowned, starting to feel a bit worried about this exam. I didn’t want to bring shame to my husband by having a shitty result. What if there was a simple question which I wouldn’t be able to answer? My face would definitely burn.

“There is, but it takes only about five minutes so I’ll wait until you two finish. Once you’re done with it, we’ll get to the practical stuff, which is much more important,” she replied.

“Lien? Are you nervous?”, Seth asked.

“What makes you think that?”

“Well, I’m always watching you so… it’s not hard to notice. You’re clenching your fists, you’re breathing more quickly, and you’re also sweating a little. Do you need more proof? Because I could go on and on about them,” he said while he sat down at one of the tables and put on his AI, though he visibly didn’t plan on keeping it for long.

“I… I’ll be fine,” I said, following his example.

“Now then, you did well to reconnect your AI since you’ll need it for your exam. You should receive a notification right now, which you can open by thinking about opening it! It’ll take some time to get used to AIs, but they’re very easy to handle,” she said with a smile.

Following her instructions, my AI played a short explanation and then waited for the ‘start’ command as stated in the instructions. Seeing that both of us were ready, she added, “You’ll have five minutes for this test and the results will be sent to my AI as soon as you finish. The time starts… now.”

“First question: What is mana and how is it produced?” the AI asked, using Seth’s voice by now. While we were waiting for Sean, I sampled his voice…

Answer: Mana is the energy that’s making up the laws and the state of our world and it’s produced in multiple places. In the world, it’s originating from plants and the Ley lines. In humans and monsters, it’s produced by our hormones called Manalus, I thought and after I stopped thinking for a few seconds, it continued with the next question.

“Second question: What do you need to control mana?”

Answer: Mana can be controlled by our will and our imagination, but without achieving a specific level of knowledge, we can’t take full advantage of our imagination. The answer is, a strong will which doesn’t crumble even under the heaviest of pressure.

“Third question: What are they and how do you use the elements?“

Huh? These questions are easy… whatever. Happy to hear all these questions and answer them with ease, I continued with the third question.

Answer: By applying our knowledge of the elements to our mana, we imagine the given element having an effect, maybe a shape, and other properties we may define during casting time. The effect must be always defined else our spell will fail and our mana will go to waste. The elements are basically mana, but their default properties are mutated due to their environment. As such, the nature and the earth element are the most abundant in our world and are the easiest and quickest to use. By using our knowledge, we can mutate mana and turn it into an element or a combination of multiple elements.

“Test completed, your answers are being processed… sent,“ my AI said, though it probably took more time to say than to process the data.

“Hmm- mhm, mhm, yes, these are both great tests,” Valerie said while reading our answers. “I’m surprised you actually have better answers than him,” she added as she looked at me and pointed at Seth.

“I’m sure he wasn’t taking it too seriously,” I shrugged my shoulders, not really caring about it. I heard these things from his mouth in the past, so he probably didn’t want to go into the details too much.

“Well, I don’t know, I believe you,” she also shrugged.

“Argh! Tests are always so damned irritating and nerve-wrecking! I’m starting to be nervous again, even if it doesn’t even matter,” I screamed in my mind.

“Haha, don’t worry, I’m also kind of nervous but it’s just like you said. It doesn’t really matter so there is no need to worry,” Seth laughed, also calming me a bit more.

“Now then, the practical test shouldn’t cause you any trouble with answers like these, so let’s proceed with the exam. Based on your performance and your age, you’ll be put in different classes. The difficulty may be the same for everyone, but if six year old kids could pass the exam, they’d be counted as geniuses,” she explained.

She was about to continue when Seth pointed at me and said, “I demand being put in the same class as her.”

“And on what basis do you demand anything from me?” she asked, furrowing her brows.

“Well, either that or I’ll fake my performance and match hers, which will get me in the same class,” he replied.

“Is that so? But if you have the ability to perfectly copy her, it’d mean that your control was beyond superb, which’d be enough for me to put you in the strongest class,” she said with a small smile. She was quite foxy, though she didn’t seem to mean it.

“We might as well leave in that case,” he shrugged.

“What if Lien also got into the strongest class by herself? You wouldn’t have to copy her like that, don’t you think?” she chuckled. While she was talking, the tables and the chairs were pulled back into the ground, leaving the room once again empty.

“That’s the only reason I’m still here,” he replied. “Oh, and one more thing. I’ve been wondering about this but,” he paused for a moment, “How old are you?”

Her eyes opened wide upon hearing his question and after a few seconds of staring, she finally said with a frown, “That’s a very rude question.”

“Huh? Why? You know my age, don’t you? And it’s not like your age counts as something very private that should be protected by all means, no?” he asked, raising a brow.

“Well, that’s true,” she muttered. Raising her head, she stuck out her chest and said, “I may be young but that doesn’t mean I’m too weak to be the principal. I suppose you don’t know that my father is one of the Grandmasters, so I had someone really powerful to learn from.”

“That didn’t answer his question, though,” I muttered.

Looking at me with a surprised face, she said, “I’m twenty years old, but why do you want to know it so bad?”

“I was just curious,” he replied.

Rolling her eyes, she said, “Whatever, let’s get started. Both of you should do what I say and I’ll observe you closely. Firstly, let me see you using elemental magic, the element doesn’t matter.”

“Is this test for kids or what?” I asked Seth as I completed the task.

“Nah, this test isn’t about your ability to use elemental magic, it’s about your control. Since she has better control than you, she’ll be able to sense how well you perform,” he replied.

Raising a brow, I looked at him, “Is that so? Then what about you?”

Smirking, he motioned with his eyes and replied, “Look at that focused face, she’s trying hard to sense my mana control, though she seems to be struggling.”

Realising that she should check out me as well, she stopped focusing on Seth and checked on me. This time she nodded with satisfaction, but as soon as she turned back towards Seth, her eyes twitched.

“You’re both sixteen, right?” she asked with a forced smile.

“Yes,” I replied.

Peeking at Seth, she cleared her throat and said, “Considering your age, your performance was superb so if you keep this up, both of you can go to the A class, which has the most talented students.”

“What do you think? Would she feel ashamed if I asked her for an in-depth analysis of my mana control? I’m actually curious about the result. Was she able to sense anything or not?” Seth asked through Link.

“I’m sure she’d be, but you should leave her some face,” I replied.

“Haha, I know, I was just joking.”

“The second test will be that you have to withstand one of my attacks, which obviously won’t be full-force,” she continued as if nothing happened. I had to admit, it was amazing that she could continue without making anything visible on her face. With her position in mind, it must have been hard to pretend to be superior, even though we all knew that Seth was stronger than her.

“Who wants to start?” she looked back and forth between us.

“Could you finish her test entirely first?” Seth asked.

“That’s fine by me. Please, move to the side in that case,” she replied as she pointed towards one of the corners. Nodding his head, Seth moved out of the way and waited for his turn patiently.

As soon as she saw that I was ready to take her on, she converted her mana into earth, nature, and water magic. In the blink of an eye, they combined and turned into a giant ball which was filled with vines and was dripping water continuously. Knowing that its sheer weight would be enough to crush me and that her spell wouldn’t end by simply colliding into something, I quickly thought about my options.

Of course, she wasn’t the principal for show and finished her spell almost instantly. Although I barely had time to think and react to it, I managed to think of a countermeasure. It was filled with water and vines, so if it suddenly came in contact with a very high temperature, the earth would dry out while the vines would burn away. Of course, the water inside would protect the ball from simple fire, so my only option was to combine earth magic and fire magic to create magma.

I knew it would be a bit costly on my mana since I’d have to make it incredibly hot, but I didn’t have a better idea. The task wasn’t to jump out of its way but to defend against it… Thanks to all the practise I went through, I finished my spell just as quickly as her and shot it towards the earth ball. Her spell was past midway when it finally came in contact with mine and I instantly wrapped the magma around the ball. Not waiting to see its effects, I used wind magic to compress the air and pushed it into an ice spear.

The scorching hot magma ball was almost in front of me when I thrust the spear forward and blew it up. As the air rushed out inside the dried earth ball, it blew up as well and the magma-covered earth chunks shot towards Valerie. Since my timing was a bit off, most of the chunks flew to the side, though some invisible force stopped them in the next moment.

Looking at Seth, I couldn’t help but wait for some sort of reaction. Raising his hand, he waved it a little, telling me that it was so-so.

As I thought about it for a moment, I said, “I should have used ice to cool it down and then I could have blown it up much sooner with less mana cost.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” he replied.

Valerie looked back and forth between us as she said, “Are you seriously talking about how it could have been better? At her age with the processing speed of her brain, I was expecting her to simply weaken the damage or something. It’d have been good enough, but she not only stopped it, she even counter-attacked, though it was kind of aimless…”

Ignoring her remark, I put my hand on my face and said, “I’m such an idiot. Was I actually limited to using elemental magic? I could have used advanced magic as well, or no?”

“Well, I have no idea, ask her,” Seth shrugged.

“So you know advanced magic as well,” Valerie frowned. “Would you mind telling me who’s your teacher?”

“Who, it’s obviously my husband,” I laughed.

“Teacher? I’m more like your Master,” Seth laughed in my mind, looking at me with a smirk on his face.

“Is that so? Then I wonder if Master has any wishes~” I replied, showing him a small smile. I loved the fact that Link was so handy since we could talk to each other secretly anytime and it was even quicker than speech.

Although I wanted to continue flirting with my husband, I couldn't afford ignoring Valerie. “Is there even a need to test him then? Honestly, just based on his level of control he is strong enough to get in the A class,” she said, shaking her head.

“I'm fine either way,” he shrugged.

“I’ll think about it,” she said. “Now then, your last task is to attack me with your best shot. Usually the students are limited a little when they face the examiners, but this time it's me so you're free to attack with anything.”

Nodding my head, I considered my options and decided to use one of the freshly learned advanced spells. It was also one that I practised many times and even tried it on monsters.

“You can attack anytime,” she said, seeing that I stood ready to attack.

“Do I have to achieve something by attacking you, for example, break your defense and stuff like that?” I asked.

“No, but if you could break through my defense, that’d certainly become an achievement. When your attack reaches me, I’ll be able to sense its power and assess its effectiveness, which is why you have to attack me not a training dummy,” she replied.

I waited a few seconds after she finished talking and then used physics magic to start a nuclear fusion right in front of her face. I’ve heard that there were nuclear weapons in the past, but I never understood how they worked. After Seth started teaching me, he explained many things to me and nuclear fusion was one of them. Although it could be used to create energy, if it was left uncontrolled, it’d turn into a very destructive weapon.

My range limit was one hundred meter, but since we were in a room, Valerie was close enough to suffer from its effects. Unfortunately, by the time the fist-sized star formed, she jumped back and used gravity magic to stop herself from being pulled into it. But that wasn’t the end of this spell. Although my little star wasn’t hot and large enough to turn into a White Dwarf, it still turned into a Red Giant since I sped up the process with some additional mana.

Much to her surprise, its size grew exponentially in the blink of an eye, almost catching her. Before my spell could hurt her, she created a strange field in front of herself which stopped the star from growing towards her. As I continued with the last phase, the Red Giant collapsed and turned into a Hydrogen White Dwarf. Unfortunately, I wasn’t strong enough to turn it into a real White Dwarf or a Black Hole.

She seemed to be caught off guard by the sudden gravitational pull and fell face-first on the ground. Seeing that she’d be dragged into a hot cloud of gas, she used gravity magic to balance herself and jumped back from the dying star. The only thing I didn’t understand was that why did she not get burned? Since it was my own spell, I could control its heat and radiation, which I obviously directed towards her, yet she seemed to ignore it.

“What the hell?” she cried out, looking at me with wide-opened eyes.

I was glad to see that I successfully used the ‘Dying Star’ spell, even if it failed to damage her. I was quite sure that if it was Sean or Em facing me, both of them would’ve died without the ability to do anything against it. Sadly, my mana was too weak for a spell like this so it was a one-shot strike. As the White Dwarf cooled down, I also used up the last bits of my mana and fell towards the ground. Before my consciousness faded, I felt my husband’s arms wrapping around me and stopping my fall.

I believed not much time passed and I woke up only to realise that someone’s tongue was inside my mouth. The way it danced around was much too familiar, so I instantly knew that it was my husband. Just in case, I opened my eyes to confirm it, but it was just like I thought.

I knew he wasn’t kissing me just for the sake of kissing since an incredibly powerful wave of energy rushed through my whole body and filled up my mana veins. In fact, it was too powerful so my body started hurting all over, making me want to explode. Pulling back his tongue, he whispered into my ear, “Use your mana.”

Despite the pain, I tried to keep focus and created a large amount of oxygen molecules behind his back. Since it was just oxygen, it simply dissipated in the air, but it still cost me quite a lot of mana and it took only a second to reduce that explosive pressure in my body to nothing. Seeing that I breathed out a sigh of relief, he stood up from his half-kneeling position and pulled me to my feet.

“Are you feeling well?” he asked, placing his hand on my face.

“Mhm, did you just give me mana?” I asked.

“Yeah, it probably hurt a little, but it should be better than lying unconscious for long minutes,” he chuckled as he started caressing me.

“Mhm,” I nodded, though our lovely mood was soon interrupted by Valerie.

“Are you insane? What the hell are you teaching her at her level?” she cried out behind us, seemingly freaked out.

“What do you mean by ‘level’? What does it matter what spell she uses if she can use it? Although she wouldn’t be able to use this in a long battle, if it was a one on one or a dangerous moment, it could be used as a last resort. But then again, I’d be there to help her whatever happened, so it’s unlikely that she’d have to use it,” Seth turned around and replied.

“I wasn’t talking about that! I expected something simpler! If my father didn’t train me to be careful even with the weakest of people, I’d have been caught off-guard and died!” she replied, even more enraged than before.

“I’d have stopped it if that happened,” he said, waving his hand. “Also, I don’t think you’d deserve your position if you were caught off-guard by something like this,” he added, just pouring fuel to the fire.

“Honey, you do realise that you’re going to piss her off with this, right?” I asked.

“But… haaah-” Much to my surprise, she took a deep breath and then sighed loudly. “I can’t believe you,” she shook her head, calming down all of a sudden.

“Okay, I take back my words.”

“I suppose she isn’t the principal for nothing,” Seth replied, shrugging his shoulders.

“Yeah.”

“Let’s proceed with the exam, I don’t have all day to spend with you,” she said as she looked around in the room. My spell kind of destroyed the place, but with a wave of her hand, the melted and broken pieces of the metal wall simply returned to their original state. I’ve seen Seth doing similar things before, but I had no idea how it worked.

Before she could do anything, Seth used Word magic and wrote the ‘shield’ word in the air. “I’m ready,” he said with a smile.

“I can’t say I’m surprised, though this just means that testing you would be the most pointless thing to do in the world,” she replied, giving up on the matter instantly. “I’ll put you both in the A class, but I hope that you don’t want to cause trouble.”

“Please, I’m a peaceful person,” he put his hand over his chest as he replied.

“Alright then. On a different note, my father knows everyone in the city who can use Word magic, so you shouldn’t be an exception either. I’d like to invite you to our house, along with your wife, of course,” she said.

“I suppose I should meet him. It wouldn’t hurt to meet someone of power and knowledge anyway. I’d get to measure the level of truly powerful figures in the city,” he muttered in my mind.

“I was invited only because I’m your wife… I must learn quicker because this is an annoying feeling,” I replied, trying to hold back myself from frowning.

“What do you say?” being met with silence, she asked.

“Ah, sorry, we’ll visit him tomorrow if that’s fine with you,” he replied.

“I’ll ask my father and contact you when he answers,” she nodded. “Your AI will guide you to your classroom and I’ll notify the teacher about your arrival in a moment. There are twenty minutes left until the end of this period, so you should explore the school in the meantime. You shouldn’t interrupt others and I’m sure neither of you is in a desperate need of tutoring.”

“Okay,” both of us nodded.

“Oh, right, while you go around, you should listen to the rules, and take these,” she added, giving both of us a white wristband, the same kind Sean and the others used to open the doors.

“We’ll do so,” I replied with a smile, having entirely different plans. “Now then, would you mind cancelling this?” I asked, pointing at the transparent light blue wall in front of us.

“Ah, right, I forgot it was here,” Seth chuckled as he destroyed it with a thought and then then took my hand into his.

Valerie led us out of the room and then went back towards her office. Seeing her disappearing from his sight, he turned towards me and took off his AI instantly. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t think we’ll need this,” he said, looking at me expectantly.

Knowing all too well what he was thinking about, I couldn’t stop myself from smiling. I found it quite funny, to be honest. Although I didn’t say anything about my plans, once he saw me taking out my earrings, he started grinning like an idiot. “Just so you know, I also wanted to continue where we left off, and do you see that sign? That must be the women’s restroom,” I remarked as I handed over my earrings.

Stuffing them into his pockets, he nodded, “Sure.”

Unfortunately, we had no luck today since the moment I took a step forward, two girls turned the corner and went straight to the toilet. I didn’t get it, why were they always walking in pairs and groups to the toilet? Maybe if I had female friends I’d have understood. Well, or any kind of friend…

“You shouldn’t feel down. There are other places where we can be alone,” I remarked, seeing him making a dejected face.

“It can't be helped,” he shook his head. “It's not like the toilet was an inviting place to have sex, even if everything is clean and modern here.”

“Shh, lower your voice, you idiot,” I rolled my eyes. “Though I admit I wasn't too excited by the idea either,” I muttered.

“Haha, I can relate with you. Anyway, let's go and explore the school in the meantime. Holding back some more won't hurt,” he said with a smile as he grabbed my hand once again and started walking. Silently following him, we quickly toured the school and memorised the places that seemed to be important. By the time we finished, we had only seven minutes left before class ended, so we decided to take a rest in the school yard. Well, it was more like a park.

Upon reaching one of the exits, Seth raised his wristband and pressed it against the scanner. A chirping sound could be heard and a moment later the door opened. There was a paved path which led around the park and there was a bench every five meters. We even saw a few tables and chairs, most likely prepared for those who wanted to eat while enjoying the scenery.

There was also a small creek surrounding the park and a pathway that crossed the whole yard, connecting the northern door with the southern door and the western with the eastern. “Are you hungry?” Seth asked, seeing the table.

“Hmm, maybe a little, but not really. Do you want to eat?” I raised my brows.

“No, and I’m not hungry either, though we’ll have to look for some place where we can get food. I don’t want to hunt some monster just to have something to eat when I have the chance to eat something delicious,” he shook his head.

“Erm, yeah, we’ll have to get a few things in our village. I’ve got used to the lightly spiced monster meat, but it wouldn’t have hurt if we ate something more lavish during our honeymoon,” I nodded.

“I’m sorry,” he said, even more dejected than before.

“What? Why are you sorry? It wasn’t a big deal and we went there together. My point is that both of us were at fault if we missed something. Honestly, you tend to take things too much to your heart. Didn’t we go together? It’s only natural that it’d be our fault, not your fault,” I rolled my eyes.

“Thanks,” he murmured, a smile blossoming on his face.

“You’re so easy to understand once people get to know you,” I chuckled as I shook my head.

“I’m sorry for being straightforward instead of being mysterious,” he laughed.

“Hmm~ and what if I preferred your straightforwardness?” I mused, running my finger down on his chest.

“Uh- ah- let’s look around,” he said as he turned on his heels and quickly made his way towards the park. He must have really wanted me if he reacted like that.

The trees were about five meters tall at most, but they had thick leafage, making it a bit hard to see. In fact, since many of the branches hung down, we could hide quite easily from others if we got off of the pathways. It wasn’t like the park was large enough to hide us if there were a lot of people outside, but things would be different if only a couple of them were around.

Upon reaching the middle of the park, we came upon the crossroad that connected the four gates. We could have gone to either of the doors from there, but Seth dragged me into the bushes instead.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

Turning around, he raised a brow and asked, “Why’d you pretend? We both know-” Seeing me smiling at him, he smiled back and said, “You’ll see soon enough.”

Pretending to not know what we wanted to do always made things more fun to me, though I wasn’t sure why. After reaching the middle of one of the four sections, he suddenly stopped and turned around. I also happened to be standing next to a tree, so when he turned me around and pressed my body against its trunk, I had quite little space left to move. Silently continuing, he wrapped his arms around me, his right hand over my mouth, his left arm around my collarbone.

“Pwah~ I love your scent,” he gasped as he pushed his nose against the back of my head and sniffed my hair. His right hand greedly ran over my chest, stopping only for a quick grope before continuing on its way downwards. A moment later I felt his gentle but strong fingers reaching my thighs and sink into my skin as he started feeling me up all over the place.

I could feel his hand moving around in circles, always getting a bit closer and closer to my private place, slowly awakening my slumbering desires. I couldn't help but remember all the stuff we did last week, it was too incredible to forget. Resting his chin on my shoulder, he pulled my hair to the side with his nose and whispered into my ear, “I love touching you so much. Your skin is smooth and your hair is silky and your meat... ah, this squishy texture, I love as my fingers sink into your firm yet bouncy flesh.”

“Stop talking,” I murmured, excited by his touch.

“Haah- how can you be so hot? You’re way too much my type. Aren’t you a bit unfair?” he growled, pressing his hard thing against my bottom. I could feel its hardness even through our clothes, it was like a thick steel pipe, except for that it was radiating heat. I couldn’t wait for winter to come, I was sure he’d heat me up many times, from the inside.

Hugging the tree in front of me, I turned my head to the right and looked at his face from the corner of my eye. I could hear my heart beating in my ear as excitement flooded my whole body.

“And do you think that it’s any different for me?” I asked, feeling his penis twitching between my buttocks.

“Do you love me?” he asked, squeezing me even more between his body and the tree. Not even waiting for my answer, he pushed his right hand into my panties and took my clitoris between his fingers.

“Haahn~ I love you more than anyone, dear,” I replied. I feared admitting to myself that I was actually going crazy for him. Although it’d break my heart, I was starting to think that there was nothing I couldn’t forgive him, which wasn’t a good thing. But I believed I had nothing to fear in that regard, I knew how much he valued faithfulness.

“That’s so nice to hear,” he chuckled, shoving his middle finger up my pussy.

“Mh-” I quickly covered my mouth, afraid that I wouldn’t be able to hold back my voice.

“Are you feeling it so much just from my finger?” he said playfully, adding pleasure touch at the same time. I felt an incredible wave of pleasure gushing out of my clitoris which ran through my whole body, followed by my nipples and all of my erogenous zones.

“This is cheating,” I gasped for air, starting to feel weak in the knees.

“Oh my god, are you really one to talk?” he replied. I had a feeling his eyes were running up and down on my body, though I was showing him my back so I couldn’t be sure. In the silent park, the only sound I heard was his heavy breathing and the cupping and squelching sounds of my own pussy. I was so wet that even my panties got soaked in my bodily fluids.

Suddenly turning me around, he started unbuttoning my blouse. Upon reaching the third button, I grabbed his wrist and looked into his eyes. I didn’t want him to continue dressing me down. If he unbuttoned it all the way to the bottom, I’d have no chance to cover myself if somebody caught us and I wasn’t an exhibitionist. In fact, I was quite shy in front of strangers.

“What? Do you not want it, after all?” he raised a brow.

“No, it’s not that,” I averted my eyes. “Just… leave my clothes on.”

Biting his lower lip, he peeked into my cleavage and slowly pushed his finger against my breast. “I’m fine with that, these are amazing, no matter what,” he replied as he started playing around with them.

“I love your tits. What did you eat that made them grow this wonderful? Also, can you do that bouncing now?” he asked as he let go of them.

“Not really since I’m wearing a bra…” I replied. Looking into my eyes, he slowly moved his right hand and put it between my thighs. I started anticipating the moment he touched me again, but even after seconds that felt like minutes, he didn’t do anything to me. Looking up at him, I shut my thighs and started rubbing his hand between them, gently swaying my hips back and forth.

“Do you want it?” he whispered into my ear. No matter how many times I heard his gentle voice, I couldn’t get bored of it. Maybe I felt that way because I loved him, but his whispers always excited me. Pulling him closer, I put my arms around his back and hugged him with all my strength. A moment later, I felt him resting his chin on the top of my head, followed by a sudden rush of cold air underneath my skirt.

Although I still had my panties on and he wasn’t looking at it, he put his fingertip exactly on my clitoris without even looking for it. Well, he always played with it so he must have learned its exact position… from every angle. A sense of excitement and hotness rushed through my whole body, making me think less about the environment. It was just enough to excite me and make me want to cum even more. I came to realise during our relationship that I loved having sex in places that weren’t allowed or were dangerous.

Raising my hands, I grabbed his shoulders and grit my teeth. The way he slowly started rubbing my clitoris was making me go crazy. Taking his shirt into my grasp, I started pulling on it as I urged him, “Hurry up already. Class will end soon and I want to cum before that happens.”

“Yes, but to cum quickly, it’s best to be very excited. Like when we had no sex for a week, both of us came the moment I put it in,” he replied.

“Yes, and that felt incredible, but if you start doing me now, I’ll cum just as quickly and it’ll take longer than simply inserting,” I said. His calm ‘preparations’ were so annoying every damned time that I couldn’t help but get filled with joy when he finally put it in. Despite feeling annoyed by it, I liked foreplay since it really made things much better in the end, but we had no time to do that. We had about three minutes at most before class ended.

He kept staring at me in silence for a few seconds, until finally making his move. “This’ll be in the way,” he said as he lifted up my skirt and stuffed its hem into my mouth. Keeping eye contact, he took out his penis and started rubbing it against my soaked panties. Even more annoyed by the delay, I quickly pulled my panties to the side and grabbed his penis. His thick member was so incredibly hot, I thought my hand would melt, and the pulsing just made it even better.

Wasting no more time, he finally put it in and covered my mouth at the same time. He did well to do that since I wanted to cry out in pleasure, not minding the place. A wave of hotness rushed up my spine and through my body, making my heart race even more.

“Uh- you’re so wet and tight inside,” he grunted, placing his left hand on the tree over my shoulder. As usual, he grabbed my ass with his right hand and started groping it while moving in and out of me. Looking down, I could see his penis coming out of me, covered in my lewd bodily fluids.

“It looks so hot,” I gasped for air, seeing it going back inside.

Ah, finally! I’ve been waiting for this for too long.

Enjoying the sight down there, I put my hands on his shoulders and started moving along with him. Having sex while standing and looking into each other’s eyes always made me feel so intimate, I couldn’t help but get a bit overexcited. Grabbing his wrist, I put his hand on my left breast and asked, “Can you feel it? Isn’t it racing?”

I felt his penis twitching inside me and growing even bigger. “Are you about to cum?” I asked.

“Uh- I’m close,” he gasped as I used my pussy to grip him with even more strength.

“Well, good for you because I’m…” I didn’t finish my sentence since I felt a strong wave building up inside of me. It took one more thrust of his penis to make me reach the top. Like the water behind a broken dam, my fluids gushed out of my pussy and dirtied the grass beneath us. At the same time, Seth was cruel enough to start using pleasure touch on me, filling my whole body with even more pleasure.

“Shit, shit, shit, this is too much,” I bit on my finger, trying to hold back myself from crying out loud. It felt as if hundreds of hands were touching my most sensitive spots in the best possible way, making me go straight to heaven. But the best of all was Seth’s penis inside me, which was still relentlessly pounding me.

Throwing my arms around my husband’s neck, I pulled him closer and shoved my tongue into his mouth. Feeling him starting to suck on my tongue made my senses so dull that I didn’t even notice that the time was up and classes have ended. I did so only when I heard the voices of a couple of strangers. Pulling back from kissing, I leaned to the side and took a quick look at the origin of the voice. There were two guys and a girl walking on the pathway, chatting about who knows what, and there I was having sex with my husband.

Leaning back into the cover of the tree, both of us lowered our bodies until we were squatting. Grabbing my thighs, Seth pulled me into his lap as he continued moving inside me, but from the sudden difference in balance, he fell on his ass. Not even bothering with the position, I clasped my hands behind his back and continued shaking my hips. Since there were bushes on the side of the pathway, we wouldn’t be spotted easily and Seth also sealed my lips with his.

“It’s so hot as you keep shaking your hips,” he used Link to talk to me.

“I’m sorry for being such a lewd woman, but I love you so much,” I replied.

“I love you, though you have nothing to apologise for,” he thought as both of us opened our eyes. I wasn’t sure why, but I had a feeling I had to open them. Kissing with our eyes opened was quite strange, but sometimes it was even better than closed.

Pulling back my tongue, I took his lower lip between my teeth and gently pulled on it as I felt something amazing building up in me once again.

“I’m going to cum,” he said.

“So am I,” I replied, but I heard the trio’s voice coming from behind me this time. Realising that the tree wouldn’t cover us from that angle, I quickly rolled over to my back and pulled Seth to the side. Unfortunately, his penis slipped out when I did, but he quickly shoved it back inside, though this time he was on top. Resting his palms on my breasts, he started fondling them, making me reach my limit in no time. My breasts have become so sensitive during our relationship that my old self wouldn’t even recognise them.

Taking a deep breath, we pressed our lips against each other’s and reached our limit at the same time. Still keeping eye contact, I felt his sperm hitting the walls of my pussy. If he came outside, it’d have surely shot far away, which excited my whole body even more.

“Haah- for the love of god, this feels so good,” he gasped in my mind.

“Fufu~ you’ve built up quite a lot, haven’t you?” I replied, showing him a satisfied smile.

Feeling that hotness and numbing pleasure slowly disappearing, I lowered my legs and parted ways with his lips.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered into my ear, breathing hard on the side of my head.

“Did you hear that?” I heard one of the three asking.

“Hear what?” the question came.

“Hmm- I thought I heard something but it must have been my imagination,” the same person replied. As they started teasing each other, they quickly left the area and went further away.

We were both frozen in place for a few seconds, even after they left the area. As my emotions started cooling down, I realised what we did, where, and when. Covering my face, I muttered, “Oh my god.”

“Here! I’m here!” Seth waved his hand in front of my face.

“Hahaha, okay, okay. You’re my god, but we should fix our attire quickly before someone comes by,” I remarked, pushing his hand away.

Placing his hands next to my shoulders, he looked deep into my eyes and stayed like that for a few seconds. Being met with his serious face, I couldn’t help but smile at him lovingly. As I put my hands on his face and started caressing him, I said, “I love you, you know?”

“I do,” he nodded.

“Good then. I may not be able to help you, but whatever you need help with, I’ll try my best to help you, forever,” I replied.”

“Forever is a long time.”

“Well, long and time are both relative,” I smiled at him.

“Hehe, that’s true,” he smiled back. “And how do you intend to take care of my load?” he added.

“...”

“I’ll deal with it,” I muttered. Looking down, I saw and felt him slowly pulling out his penis from my insides, once again stirring up my folds.

“Uh- you should have done it quickly, times like these make me want to do it again,” I muttered.

“I know, that’s why I’m always taking it out slowly, not to mention that the sight is amazing,” he laughed.

“Damn you… Now then, let’s deal with your cream!” I raised a finger as I sat up and then started moving my folds to push out his sperm. With the help of some magic, it was quite easy, actually. Once it flowed out onto the ground, I used some water magic to wash it away and then wiped my pussy with a freshly made leaf. Nature magic always came in handy.

“This was simply said, amazing to look at,” he muttered as I finished cleaning myself, only to see that he didn’t do anything to his member.

I felt a bit reluctant to do it, but I still wanted to please him so I leaned forward wordlessly and took his member into my mouth. As I rolled my tongue around his glands and then took him into my mouth all the way to his root, I felt a shudder run through his whole body.

“It’s good that I haven’t restored my libido and feel way too satisfied after a load like this one to get hard again, else I’d have pushed you down after something like this. But this little action of yours was hot enough to make me want to have sex again… even like this,” he muttered.

Pulling back from his penis, I sat up and then looked at him for a few seconds. “We can do it all you want later, but we should get going for now,” I replied as I stood up from the ground and dusted off my clothes. Pulling back his pants, he also stood up and buttoned up my blouse.

Stretching his body, he said, “Ah~ is there anything better than great sex with your lovely wife?”

“I’m sure many would say yes to that,” I replied, shaking my head.

“Would you?” he raised a brow.

“No,” I mused.

“Me neither,” he replied in a similar manner. Grabbing my chin, he gave me one last kiss and then turned around saying, “Let’s go.”

“Mhm.”

We carefully waited until nobody was looking our way to get back on the pathway and then made our way towards the northern door since our classroom was that way. Much to my surprise, upon reaching the edge of the park, I saw a great number of students surrounding the place. Some were sitting on the benches or at the tables, chatting or eating, while others were similarly on the way to some other place.

Knowing that I had sex amidst a crowd like this one just made the memory even nicer, and the best of all was that we weren’t caught! The only thing I found a bit strange was that once we got out of the shade of the trees, many looked our way and stared at us in wonder. Well, some guys were obviously looking at my body, but that was something I was used to.

Most of them were looking at our wristbands instead, and after looking at theirs, I realised that the wristbands had different colours. There was red, blue, yellow, white, and black. Most of them were blue coloured while some were red, a few were yellow, even fewer were black, and not a single white was present.

“Can you give me back my AI?” I asked as I held out my hand. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out my earrings and put it on my palm. After putting them back in my ear, I used it to look up the details regarding the wristbands. As it turned out, they worked as a sort of ranking as well.

“I think I get what’s going on. Yellow is for the weakest and least talented students, so it’s no wonder that there aren’t many. Following that is blue, which is the average, then red which is for the better than average students. Following that is black and finally, white is of the highest rank,” I explained to Seth.

I’ve spotted only two black bracelets from about a hundred people, but not even a single white was present. There were more with red bracelets, maybe twenty out a hundred, and about five out of a hundred were yellow. The rest was obviously blue.

“I understand why you got white, but me?” I shook my head.

“Dear, if I remember correctly, Sean had black wristband and you’re two years younger than him, with the ability to cast Dying Star. Don’t you think all of that makes you eligible to the white bracelet?” Seth replied, pointing out some of the things I somehow didn’t even consider.

“Erm, well, you may be right.”

“I am,” he nodded.

“I refuse,” I said, sticking out my chest.

“Why?” he asked.

“Haha, no reason.”

He shook his head as a small smile formed on his face. Upon entering the building, he sighed loudly, “Finally, I was freaked out by all the staring. It’s so annoying.”

“Heh, how come you don’t get embarrassed when I’m staring at you?”

“It’s obviously because you’re different,” he flicked my forehead and then clenched his fists. “Hmm- it seems like I’ve regained my control. When the seven days were up, I felt some kind of transformation and that’s also the reason why I used too much strength when I pinched your ass earlier today,” he added.

“I’ll take a closer look at you once we get home, which by the way, reminds me that we haven’t checked the house that the AI in the city hall assigned to us.”

“Oh, you’re right,” he nodded.

Once we reached our new classroom, I slowly opened the door and stepped in, but upon doing so, I sensed a projectile flying towards me with an incredible speed. Leaning to the side, I managed to avoid it in time while Seth simply caught it. Raising his head, he looked in the direction of the one who threw it and asked, “Why’d you throw a rock at someone who just entered the classroom.”

Furrowing his brows, he threw it back towards the guy but he used physics magic as well to accelerate it to a speed I couldn’t even perceive. All I heard was the muffled sound of a sonic boom, and at the same time, the guy fell off of his chair. As I looked for the rock, I realised it was hovering in the middle of the air, right next to where the guy’s head was. He not only retaliated, he even made sure that the sonic boom wouldn’t hurt my ears… It was a nice gesture, but I was more worried to see that we started out like this.

“Ah! What have you done?” Sean jumped out from the corner.

“What? I didn’t even hit him,” Seth shrugged his shoulders. Turning around, he spotted the rock as well and then looked at him in amazement.

“Is he going to be fine?” I asked.

“Yes, don’t worry,” he replied, patting the top of my head.

“That’s good to hear, but why’d you do that? This is just a test we make every time someone joins this class,” Sean cleared the misunderstanding.

“You should have told me sooner,” I shook my head.

“I wanted to but you gave me no time!”

“No, you should have told me even before we came here,” Seth replied.

“I wanted to but-”

“But, but, but, no buts. You should have stopped the test since it was pointless,” he cut into Sean’s ridiculous excuses. As one who had some clue of how powerful my husband was, he had no reason to not tell us about this test or what. Unless…

“I think he didn’t tell you because the target was me, not you,” I said.

“Is that true?” he frowned.

“W-Well, I knew you’d stop it if she couldn’t dodge it and I haven’t seen her in action either, so I was curious. When Miss Valerie came in and notified the teacher about the arrival of two new students, I knew it was you two. I’m sorry about that,” he answered honestly this time, realising that there was no point in hiding things from us.

Seeing that Seth was starting to feel more and more annoyed by what he heard, I raised my hand and said, “Calm down, it’s fine. I also avoided it, didn’t I?”

“I don’t care, don’t throw rocks at my wife or the next one will hit your head,” he replied, seeing the guy from earlier sitting up.

Suddenly ignoring everything, Sean jumped at me and grabbed my left hand, “White?” he said, looking at my bracelet with wide opened eyes.

Pulling back my hand, I said, “Yes, what about it?”

“How did you manage that? There’s only one person in the whole school with a white bracelet, though he’s on a mission right now.”

Seeing that Seth was fuming with anger after Sean grabbed my hand, I decided to take things into my hands before my husband exploded. “Okay, first of all, get back. Secondly, let us get in and ask your questions only when we settled down,” I said, a bit annoyed myself.

He crept so much into my face that I had no place to move, and only two people were allowed to do that, my husband, and my father. Well, I didn’t mind a hug from Seth’s parents either but I haven’t got used to it yet and Anna preferred hugging her own son anyway.

“Ah, I’m terribly sorry,” he took a step back and slightly bowed to show that he meant it.

“Haah- finally, some air. Don’t do that again,” I shook my head.

It’s a different matter that you were risking your health by grabbing my hand forcefully, I thought as I peeked at Seth and almost started laughing.

As I took a quick look around, I realised there were about twenty people in the class, all wearing black bracelets. Em was also hiding in the bunch, for some reason wordlessly watching the scene. I had a hunch that he was trying to show that he had nothing to do with this test by staying out of everything. For an opportunist like him, it was obviously the best choice of action. I liked dealing with Em more, even if he was more cunning.

I found it quite funny that while Seth was looking for straightforwardness in people, I was looking for intelligence. It was no wonder that he preferred Sean while I preferred Em of the two, of course, only if I had to deal with one of the two. Well, it would be easy to become friends with Seth, but if they wanted to be more, they’d have to meet a bunch of expectations else they’d just annoy him. It was really hard to get close to him.

Heh, I remember how I kept pestering him even when we were kids. We became friends easily but it took me about half a year to make him open up a little. Now that I think about it… he didn’t say anything about himself until I started telling him things about myself and my family. Well, he’s doing the same these days, it’s just that he puts much more thought into how he’s dealing with who and has much sharper senses.

Peeking at his face, I couldn’t help but think, “Aren’t you a cunning little bastard?”

“I’m a what? Did I do something?” his eyes opened wide.

“Haha, it’s nothing, I just remembered something,” I replied, and then asked Sean to show me where to sit.

“I wouldn’t mind if you elaborated on this later,” he started pestering me. He was so cute when he was worrying, made me want to cuddle him.

For some strange reason, the students in the class were focused on sitting in the front and the seats in the back were all free. Thinking about the reason Sean rushed back to class, I realised that maybe everyone thought like him in this class. They wanted to learn so they all sat as close to the teacher as they could, instead of sitting in the back like in most classes. Well, they probably counted as ‘talented’ because of their hard work, not just their abilities.

I also wanted to learn, but I was sure that one or two meters wouldn’t make a difference for my eyes and my ears. After I took a seat next to the window, Seth grabbed the nearest desk and put it next to mine. He really hated when people were looking at him, but his actions naturally drew our classmates’ attention. It was so obvious to me that he was embarrassed because of their stares, I almost laughed at him when I looked at his face.

When he finally sat down next to me, he crossed his arms and stared back at the others, making them turn around. “Pfft-” I tittered. Covering my mouth, I turned towards the window and tried to think of something else. Unfortunately, I couldn’t help but recall the face he made, which made me titter every time.

When I realised that I was probably looking like an idiot for giving out all those muffled sounds, I wanted to laugh even more.

“Are you drowning or what?” he asked with a frown, making things even harder.

“Ahaha, I can’t, please, do something…”

“Have you gone crazy?”

“No, I’m just trying to suppress my giggles,” I replied.

“I can see that, even your sides are shaking…” he shook his head. Thanks to talking to him, I finally stopped recalling the scene time and time again, though I was still grinning like an idiot.

Clearing his throat, he looked at Sean and Em who came closer in the meantime and said, “So what were we talking about?”

“Pfft- are you seriously trying to play it off as if nothing happened?” I asked.

“Well, it was you who started giggling, not me. I’ll simply ignore it,” he replied, looking at me from the corner of his eye.

“Heh, alright then.”

“Uhm- about throwing rocks at your wife and your wristbands,” Sean muttered, his words seemingly piquing our classmates’ interest.

“For fuck’s sake, I can’t think calmly when people are staring!” he cursed in my mind.

Shaking my head, I unbuttoned the top two buttons on my blouse and waved my hand to fan some air towards my chest. Seeing the eyes changing their directions, I replied, “Now they aren’t looking at you.”

“I can’t say I’m happy about this either… I haven’t talked to anyone for the last few years, except for a few people, so I’m kind of anxious when-”

“I know, don’t worry about it. You should answer Sean instead because you’ll look weird if you keep sitting silently while staring at me,” I interrupted him.

“Uh- true.”

“So, what about our wristbands?” he asked aloud.

“I’d like to find out what did you do to get it. Or, well, not you but Lien,” Sean replied, turning towards me.

“Sean, what do you mean by that? Are they the ones you mentioned?” a black haired girl asked.

Looking at Seth, he forced a smile before turning around and nodding, though I was sure he gave the girl the ugly look since she made an apologetic face.

“My, I didn’t expect that everyone would know about us even before we came here,” I shook my head.

“I told him to stay quiet but you know how he is,” Em sighed loudly, making Sean appear in a bad light. It was quite a bit of a dick move and at times like these I understood why Seth preferred Sean.

“Fuck you,” the latter said through gritted teeth.

“Regarding your question, I simply used one of the spells that Seth taught me,” I shrugged. It was pointless to hide stuff like that. I didn’t want to be glorified for being talented when it was all thanks to the knowledge that came from Seth. Although the fact that I learned how to cast a spell like that was an accomplishment in itself, that much would be obvious to everyone so I wouldn’t take credit for more than what I deserved.

“That’s it?” he opened his eyes wide.

“Well, yeah. Why? Were you expecting something more?” I raised my brows.

“Lien… it wasn’t just that. Even when you had to defend yourself, you retaliated at the same time and you didn’t use anything other than simple elemental magic. Considering the difference between you and Valerie, I think that is also something to be proud of,” Seth added.

“If you say so.”

“Mhm, that’s indeed admirable, though most of us could do that much,” Sean remarked, visibly thinking hard about the possibilities.

“I don’t understand why it matters so much,” I pointed out.

“Because the white wristbands make you eligible to learn directly from a Grandmaster!” he finally spilled the truth.

“Ooh! I get it now,” I nodded.

“That’s it? Is that how you react to something like that?” the black haired girl from earlier asked. “Also, I still don’t know why it doesn’t matter what he did,” she pointed at Seth.

Hmm, he didn’t tell them how powerful he is, it seems. He probably just said that he was very strong or something like that.

“Pardon me for asking, but who are you?” I asked.

“There is no need to ask, it’s time to introduce yourselves,” a man replied out of nowhere. Although his voice was coming from behind me, I knew that he was standing in the door and used wind magic to change the direction of his voice.

“Hmm- you noticed it instantly, aren’t you a clever one?” he asked as he stepped into the classroom. He had short black hair and a straw hat on the top of his head. His eyes were closed for some reason and he also had a katana by his side. The ‘samurai’ word fitted him the most.

“And you must be Seth,” he muttered as he opened his sea-blue eyes and sized up my husband.

“Well, let’s start class by introducing ourselves. My name is Endo Yosai, and as you can see, I’m half japanese. I’ll be your teacher for the next three years or until you graduate,” he said blandly, almost falling asleep while talking. “Please stand up and introduce yourselves,” he added.

Strangely enough, the moment he entered the classroom, everyone rushed back to their places and sat in silence with their backs straightened. Since I had no idea what kind of person he was or if beating up students was allowed, I copied the others. He could have been some super traditional guy who beat up his students for not sitting with straight a back…

Seth stood up and then said, “My name is Seth Clearfall and I’m sixteen years old.”

“Anything else you want to share?” Endo asked.

Looking at me, Seth added, “I have a few dreams in common with my wife, and one of those is that we want to explore the world and see what’s become of humankind. I’m sure there are many colonies, after all.”

“Mhm, that’s indeed the case,” the teacher nodded and then looked at me.

Once my husband sat down, I stood up and said, “My name is Lien Newin Clearfall. I’m also sixteen years old, though I’m five days younger than him. I suppose it also matters that I’m not a god incarnation. I don’t have anything else to say.”

“Ah, right, I could have added that one,” Seth muttered as I finished.

After the others briefly introduced themselves, he explained a few things to us and then started the lecture. Thanks to his explanation, I found out that this class was different than most since it didn’t matter whether you were a third year student or if it was your first year. Those who were talented enough were put in this class, and Endo not only taught common knowledge, he also helped everyone in practising magic.

Basically, he was doing the same to twenty people what Seth had been doing to me. Since the size of this class was always around twenty at most and he taught only this class, he had enough time to pay attention to everyone. If I didn’t have Seth to help me, becoming a student in this class would be like finding a huge pack of mana strengthening pills.

When the other students started practising, learning, or meditating, I raised my hand and said, “I’ve got a question.”

“Go ahead,” the teacher replied, waving his hand.

“Do you have some kind of book or anything I could read which is about the evolutionary paths?” I asked.

“Are you talking about mixing the elements with your mana?” he raised a brow.

“Yes.”

“Hmm- I could tell you about that, but I don’t recommend using it, for now. The fact that you got in this class means that you’re talented. You may not have the ability to combine every element and mix that with your mana, but I’m sure you’ll be able to do it in the future. If you step on a path right now, you’ll have to go through surgeries to revert your body to your current state.”

“You see, you’ll get the most out of elemental imbuement if you mix every element with your mana and you can’t do that if you’ve mutated already,” he explained with a disapproving look.

“Erm, I know that, I simply want to find out what results in what,” I replied.

“Are you saying that it’s only for research purposes?” he raised a brow.

“I guess you could say that,” I nodded.

“I’ll send you a document in that case, you’ll definitely find it useful,” he replied and a moment later my AI said, “You’ve got a message.”

“Nice! I was thinking about asking him but I wasn’t sure what to say. I guess I won’t have to talk like this. I mean, you’re going to share that document with me, right?” Seth asked through Link.

“I’ve got it,” I said aloud. I found it quite funny that my husband had to make an effort just to ask something.

“Good,” Endo nodded.

“I guess I should take that as a yes,” Seth murmured since I didn’t answer him even after seconds passed. Looking at him, I raised my brows and shook my head.

“I swear you’re such an idiot sometimes that it’s pissing me off. You’ve taught me so many things that are worth way more than this document and you’re also my husband and my lover, but when you wanted something, I wouldn’t share it with you because… because why the fuck would I? Does that make sense to you?” I whispered as I pinched his arm.

“Well, no, I knew you wanted to share it with me, it was more like a question of formality,” he muttered.

“Well, bitch, then don’t be formal with me from now on. The answer was an obvious yes,” I rolled my eyes. “Damn it, your skin is too tough, I can’t even pinch you strong enough to make it hurt.”

“Have you just called me a b-”

“Yes, I did,” I cut into his words.

“...”

“I’m going to punish you for this.”

“Yay~ but seriously, I don’t want to hear a question like that ever again,” I replied, shaking my head.

“Fine, fine, I get it.”

Noticing that we were just chatting and weren’t doing anything, Endo walked up to our table and stopped in front of us with his hands behind his back. “Are you here to learn or to chat?” he asked.

“I’m sorry, we just had to discuss something quickly, I’ll continue practising now,” I apologised, slightly lowering my head. It was obviously me who was at fault.

“Don’t bother the others with useless talk and if you aren’t doing anything, you might as well go to the normal class. That’s where all the lazy and useless people gather,” he said with a frown and then looked at Seth, seemingly expecting some sort of apology.

The only problem was that he was practising even while talking, but someone like Endo wouldn’t be able to sense it. In fact, I had yet to meet someone who could sense my husband’s mana control.

“I’m sorry for saying a few words aloud,” he said.

“You do realise that it’s not going to be enough to calm him,” I remarked.

“I don’t care, I’d never apologise for something that’s not even true. If he thinks that I’m not practising, then shame on him. I’m sure Valerie has told him that I know WORD magic, so he should expect that much,” he replied as he leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms.

If someone crossed their arms, it was usually a sign of refusal and rejection which most people perceived subconsciously. I wasn’t sure if he did it intentionally or if it was just a natural reaction, but I sure as hell saw that Endo’s face twitched when he heard his simple apology.

Strangely enough, Endo turned around without saying anything and went back to his chair. Seeing that a few students peeked at Seth with wide opened eyes, I had a feeling that wasn’t the expected behaviour. Nonetheless, we wasted a lot of time by going through all the procedures and as it turned out, this was the last period. Once the bells rang, Endo stood up and left, along with a bunch of students.

We were about to leave as well when Em walked up to us and asked, “Do you have a moment?”

Seeing that Sean stopped by as well, Seth said with a nod, “I have, so what can I help you with?”

“This may be a bit rude since it’s none of my business, but did you show your abilities to Miss Valerie during the test? Mr. Endo can be very strict when he sees lazy students and there have been many cases where he kicked out even talented ones from this class.”

“So were you expecting punishment?” I asked.

Looking at me, he nodded, “Yes, I thought he’d smack him or something. At least, I’m sure he’d have smacked me if it was me who reacted like Seth.”

“Eh? Why? I apologised,” Seth opened his eyes wide.

“Like I said, he hates lazy people and you visibly weren’t doing anything during the whole class so…”

“Pfft- hahaha,” I couldn’t help but laugh. Finally, I didn’t have to hold back myself.

“It’s not funny,” Seth murmured.

Seeing Em and Sean looking back and forth between us with confused faces, I explained, “I’m laughing because you’re all wrong. It’s not that he wasn’t doing anything, it’s just that neither you nor Endo are strong enough to sense it. In fact, I can’t sense it either,” I shook my head.

Both of them looked at him with amazement and then sighed loudly. “I know that feel,” I patted their shoulders.

As if we weren’t even talking about him, Seth ignored the whole thing and said, “Oh, right, I didn’t answer your question. I used WORD magic during the test so that might be the reason.”

“Hmm, I suppose Miss Valerie has told him about you and Mr Endo was just being careful. He’d have definitely smacked me,” Em shook his head.

“Would he hit Lien as well?” Seth frowned.

Oh, no, I see where this is going.

“Erm- I don’t know. He doesn’t care about gender and there have been such cases but Lien is still your wife so… I’m not sure,” he replied.

“Well, he better never raise a hand on her because-”

Shaking my head, I cut into his words, “Okay, okay, we know that you’ll beat him up. Now let’s go home before you start some kind of war,” I grabbed his hand and dragged him towards the exit. If I wanted to be honest with myself, it made me happy that he was so protective of me, though he went overboard sometimes.

“Alright, I’m coming so stop pulling me,” he replied as he started walking by my side.

“Do you know the way to your house?” Sean asked.

“Yeah, I’m starting to get the hang of this AI thing. It’s quite easy to control, though it’s not really an AI if you ask me. It’s more like an utility machine or I don’t know,” I replied.

“Hahaha, that’s because you haven’t listened to the description yet. It’s going to stay in its locked form until you do so,” he laughed as he took out something from his pocket. As he plugged it into the bracelet on his wrist, he said, “Look at this.”

“Greetings, Miss Lien and Mr Seth. My master named me Kiara,” a female voice came from his bracelet.

“She’s like a person,” Sean added with a bright smile on his face.

“Master, that’s how you configured me, I could be much simpler as well, you know?” Kiara replied.

“Yes, but it’s more fun like this,” he chuckled as he pulled out the speaker. “As you can see, you have much more options after your AI turns into a full-fledged one,” he explained.

“So will there be an artificial human connected to my nerve system if I unlock my AI?” I asked, not really excited by the idea. I’d find it weird if an AI with Seth’s voice started talking to me like a normal person. Worst off, I could configure it to behave like Seth, which would be even creepier.

“Hmm- that’s not exactly right. You can turn it into a very silent one and make it ask questions only when it’s really necessary. Other than that, it’s also thinking alongside you. For example, let’s say you have to count something in your head quickly. Before you even asked your AI to do it, it’d tell you the result. The same happened when Mr Endo sent you the message. While he was talking, his AI probably forwarded the file,” he replied, slightly piquing my interest.

Biting my lower lip, I thought about asking one more thing, but I really wasn’t sure about it. Making up my mind, I looked into his eyes and asked, “Is it possible to turn off its automatic reporting system? I mean to the guards…”

“Huh? Why would you want that? If someone attacks you, it’ll immediately call for help, even if you fall unconscious and can’t respond to it. It could save your life,” Em took a step forward and said.

Much to my surprise, Sean was more understanding this time and chuckled as he peeked at Seth, “I don’t think that’s her problem. Either way, you can control your full-fledged AI as you wish and can specify in which cases should it report the offender.”

“We need this,” Seth remarked in my mind.

“Yes.”

“Mhm- thanks for all the help. It’s good that we have someone to ask,” I thanked with a smile.

“Damn it, you’re so lucky,” he replied as he looked at Seth and shook his head.

“I know~ isn’t her smile beautiful? You should see her face when she’s cum-” before he could finish his sentence, I punched him in the face. This was the first time I hit him but I couldn’t let him say something like that, no matter what.

My knuckles stung a little after my punch yet he didn’t even react to it. His strength and his resistance seemed to increase dramatically after the change that occurred in his body. I had yet to see if he had any mutations, but at least, I made him shut his mouth before he blurted out something embarrassing.

“Pfft- Khm…” both Em and Sean cleared their throats, trying their best to hold back their laughter.

“Did you just punch me with full strength?” Seth gaped as he continued walking.

Waving my hand at Em and Sean to tell them that we were leaving, I replied, “You deserved it. How could you even try telling something like that to strangers? Are you insane?” I grumbled as we left the classroom.

“I just wanted to tease you a little. I guess it was a bit too much, I’m sorry,” he replied, suddenly feeling down.

The most annoying was that I knew that he’d deserve my wrath for trying to do something like this, and yet I couldn’t feel enraged. I knew he regretted it and I didn’t have the heart to start sulking because that’d make him feel even worse. Well, we’ve been like that ever since we started going out. Even if the other did something annoying, we both forgave each other immediately.

I wasn’t sure if that was a ‘good thing’, but good was relative and I was more than happy and content with my current life. Even if it was bad, I’d gladly take it all to myself and keep things as they were. Stepping closer, I locked arms with him and then sped up, “Hurry up, I want to check your body.”

Nodding his head, he wordlessly followed me to the exit. It took about two seconds to reach the house that was assigned to us, though that was only because he carried me and flew at full speed.

Security was on a whole different level in Light city since there were no keys, locks, and codes that could be broken. We had to open and access everything with unique identifiers, such as fingerprints, retina scans, and DNA tests. There were quite a lot of houses in the city, but the one we got was a flat.

The AIs distributed estates according to our age, and the number of people that wanted to live in the same house. If we had a child, we’d have gotten a house most likely. Since we were registered as a couple and we also stated that we wanted to live together, the property of the flat had been added to both of us in the database. If we wanted to give access to someone else, we could do so through our AI, but both of us had to be present to initiate and accept the change.

Our new home was on the sixth floor at the third door, which would be a bothersome height to climb every time if not for our ability to fly. Once the scanner finished scanning my retinas and all ten of my fingers, the door opened by itself. There was a corridor in front of us that led straight to the living room and there were four doors on the left. On the right side of the corridor was a glass wall, which provided a beautiful view on the city. I couldn’t wait to see the city at night since there were many lit up streets and buildings nearby. Once it turned dark, it’d surely look fabulous.

On the left side, the first door led to a smaller bedroom while behind the second door was just a toilet. At first, I didn’t understand why did the toilet take so much space, but as I continued walking, I realised there was a short corridor between the second and the third door. And on the left side of that short corridor was the pantry and the kitchen. The toilet wasn’t accessible from the kitchen, only from the long corridor.

The third door once again led to a bedroom, but that one was quite large compared to the other rooms, while the fourth door led to the bathroom. It could be accessed from the bigger bedroom as well, which I was happy to see. I loved taking baths with Seth, though I was quite sure they didn’t count as ‘baths’. Well, he did wash my body thoroughly, every time.

The whole flat was pretty nice, though I found it a bit empty. There were no televisions, computers, lamps hanging from the ceiling, and many things looked different compared to what we had in Balan. Everything was minimalist, which I wasn’t really used to after growing up in a whole different environment. But it wasn’t like it bothered me, I just found it a bit strange.

There was even a basket of meat, vegetables, and spices in the fridge that was brought by an AI. By the time I finished checking the living room and some electronic stuff I found, Seth was kneeling on the bed, slightly jumping up and down.

“What are you doing?” I asked, raising a brow.

“I’m testing the bed,” he replied, showing me a grin on his face.

“Perv,” I shook my head. “But is it any good?”

“Haha, look who’s interested! Either way, the answer is yes, this bed is great! It’s taking up the shape of my body if I lay down and it can be controlled by my AI to elevate an area or depress it. Basically, you don’t need pillows, you can make your bed form a pillow!” he said as he showcased this wonderful function to me.

“Cool, now take off your clothes and let me see your body,” I wasted no time and replied. I wanted to see whether he had any changes on his body or not, and if there were, I hoped to find the difference.

“Uu~ this is getting exciting,” he started rolling on the bed and posing like a woman.

“Haha, stop that already, you look gross,” I shook my head, a small smile on my face.

Smiling back at me, he turned serious and started taking off his clothes. As he took off his shirt, I couldn’t help but run my eyes up and down on his upper body. His broad shoulders and his muscular chest were like a feast for my eyes and seeing him slowly removing his shorts, I couldn’t help but start anticipating something more.

“You should see yourself,” he chuckled as he looked at me.

“You’ve got a problem?” I raised my brows.

“Haha, no,” he replied as he moved up on the bed, resting his back against the wall.

Biting my lower lip, I quickly unbuttoned my blouse and threw it on the side of the bed, followed by my skirt and my boots. “This is just to make it fair, you won’t feel embarrassed this way,” I said.

“Ahahaha, of course, of course,” he laughed heartily.

As I pressed my knee against the bed, I felt it molding and taking after the shape of my knee. “This bed is really high quality,” I remarked, getting more and more excited to ‘inspect’ his body.

“Well, why don’t you come closer and see how it reacts if your whole body is on it,” Seth replied, smiling at me in a rather provocative way.

“Let’s see what you’ve got,” I murmured as I went down to all fours and moved closer to him.

--- Seth’s POV ---

She slowly moved closer and closer, her sexy hips swaying left and right. The way she had been looking at me ever since I removed my shirt was making me go crazy. Her wide opened eyes, her curving red lips which looked like the smile of a succubus, and her rapid breath, they all told me that she was excited by my looks.

I could see her eyes running up and down on my whole body, often stopping for a moment over my crotch. Combined with the look she gave me and the black lingerie she wore, she looked so seductive that my blood rushed towards my lower half instantly. Her lingerie emphasised her fair white skin and her perfect shape, also hiding the parts I wanted to see. No matter how many times I saw her naked, I couldn’t get bored of her hot body.

As she stopped between my legs, she put her slender fingers on my thighs and started caressing me, slowly moving towards my chest. On the way up, she used chemical magic to scan my body thoroughly, though I was more focused on her gentle touch.

Leaning closer, she said in a low voice, “Could you turn around? There is something alongside your spine.”

Nodding my head, I turned around and closed my eyes. With my senses sharper than ever, I felt her breath on my back even before she got close to me. As she put her hand next to my spine, I could clearly feel every groove in her skin, so much so that I could have copied her fingerprint if I wanted.

“What are those bumps?” I asked, feeling that she ran her fingers over some deformation.

“This is really strange,” she muttered. “You see, there are four sections right next to your spine where your skin looks different. They’re only a few centimeters wide and your skin returns to normal afterwards, but they’re still here. The top one takes up the area around your cervical spine and your skin has turned into a mixture of black and white.”

“Right after that are reddish-bluish scales, followed by a rough, dark brown material with tints of green. It kind of looks like dried earth with green roots running across it. These two are of equal length and divide your thoracic spine into two halves. The last section is around your lumbar spine and there are feather-shaped purplish-bluish veins running across the whole section.”

“They aren’t feathers like the ones on Em’s chest, instead the vane part of the feather is made up of these strange veins, though they aren’t as tightly packed as vanes. Hmm, maybe they take after the veins of leaves more, but overall they still look like feathers,” she explained, her fingers slowly moving downwards after each section.

“The sections have seemed to form elemental pairs like light and dark, fire and water, nature and earth, and finally, lightning and wind. Do you feel anything different other than your increased power and resistance?” she asked.

Looking at my hands, I rolled them into fists and clenched them with all my strength. “Hmm, I sure as hell turned stronger and other than that, it feels as if controlling mana became easier. I mean, I don’t have to focus as much to control my mana very precisely, unlike before. I can also use elemental magic about twice as quickly as before since my mana contains every attribute.”

“Just like you said, the elements are paired up so using those pairs are as easy as using normal elements and if I want to mix every element, it’s about three times quicker than before. I have to take much fewer steps to mix them, after all,” I said.

“And do you have to create more of this mixed mana to keep this up or is your body doing it automatically?” she asked as she put her arms around my waist and pressed her chest against my back.

Her fingers ran across my abs as she leaned closer to my right ear and gave a small peck on it. “U- yes. Or wait, no. I have to create mixed mana in my body, but it takes no effort and I barely have to focus on it. I think things would be different if I completely emptied my mana reserves, but I don’t know unless I try.”

Her left hand slowly moved up to my chest while she moved her right hand towards my crotch. “Are you a good boy?” she whispered into my ear, grabbing my erect member at the same time, though only through my underpants.

Looking down, I saw a real tent standing in my pants with the column in the middle in her grasp. “I’m sure I’m a good boy,” I gasped, my heart beating like crazy from the excitement. Her fragrance, her gentle touch, and the pose she was holding me in were simply too exciting.

As she reached into my pants and pulled it down to reveal my member, she chuckled, “My, I really want to dirty you in that case.” The moment she finished talking, she rolled her index finger around my glands, sending a strong jolt up my spine. My senses were still in a heightened state, so I felt every movement and touch clearly. I wasn’t using Pleasure Touch on myself, but with my senses sharpened it was almost the same.

“Can we turn around? I want to see how far can you shoot,” Lien gasped in my ear as she started jacking me off. Taking a deep breath, I stood up from the bed and walked out of the room with Lien in tow. Upon reaching the corridor, I turned off the lights with a thought and then looked at the shining lights of the city at night. In the meantime, she hugged me from behind and took my penis into her skillful hands once again.

Taking a step forwards, I put my palms on the glass wall in front of me and closed my eyes for a moment. I could feel every millimeter that my skin moved up and down on my shaft, rubbing my glands every time. Her sweet scent and gasps in my ear were like drugs, eating away my sanity.

“Are you enjoying my hand?” she asked, her voice sounding sweeter than ever.

Gritting my teeth, I didn’t say a word and silently focused on the pleasure her hand provided.

“Haah- you know, if you cum with enough force, you’ll dirty the wall,” she gasped, seemingly even more excited by the image than me.

“I’ll cum in a moment,” I growled as I clenched my fists and felt my sperm building up.

“Hahaha, great,” she chuckled, breathing heavily on my neck. Placing her chin on my shoulder, she started kissing my neck and then picked up the pace even more. The strength of her grip was simply perfect, making me think that maybe she could feel how strongly she had to grasp it.

“Uh, I’m cumming,” I said through my teeth as my sperm rushed up my pipe. The second I finished my sentence, my sperm spurted out of my penis and splashed on the glass in front of my face, followed by four other loads, each landing lower and lower on the wall. As Lien breathed over my shoulder, a thin layer of vapour formed on the glass which was washed away by the sperm.

The lights of the city and the bright moon penetrated the glass wall, illuminating our sweat-covered bodies. “Fufu~ look at that, what a huge load, even though you fucked me not long ago. Was my hand that good?” she said in a low voice, her breath tickling my ear and playing with the strings of my heart.

Lowering my head, I could see the remnants of my sperm covering my penis and her hand, slowly dripping to the tiled floor. “Oh, for the love of god,” I gasped as I turned around and pushed her against the wall. Before she could say anything, I shoved my tongue into her mouth and started french kissing her.

As I separated for a moment to catch my breath, she asked, “Will you give me your love tonight?”

“I’ll give you lots of my love,” I replied as I took a deep breath and continued. Naturally, those damned AIs were left in the kitchen so they had no way to interrupt our love-making. I didn’t know how many rounds we had, but I sure as hell fucked her silly that night.

---

The next morning I woke up to the bed moving under me, so I opened my eyes in a hurry, only to see that it was just Lien sitting down. “Good morning, Darling,” she said with a smile, holding a plate of food in her hands.

“Eh?” Surprised, I couldn’t help but give out a strange sound.

“Come on, what sort of reaction is that?” this isn’t the first time that I brought you breakfast to the bed, she shook her head.

“No, but this is the first time that I didn’t wake up to you creeping out of my grasp,” I replied.

“It’s because you didn’t hug me this time when you went to sleep, fearing that you wouldn’t be able to stop yourself from doing it another time. Since you weren’t holding me, I could get out of bed without waking you up,” she chuckled, seeing that I didn’t remember any of that.

“Strange.”

“No, it’s not. I think you fucked up your own brain last night, not just mine…” she muttered. Leaning closer, I kissed her on the lips and then took the plate from her hands.

“Thanks,” I said.

“No problem, I felt like rewarding you for last night. You worked really hard to please my whole body,” she smiled at me.

“Heh, don’t worry, I had a lot of fun seeing your expressions and listening to your moans, not to mention how many times I came…”

“Aww, come on, are you really going to talk about that so early in the morning?” she shook her head.

“Hah? But it was you who brought it up,” I raised my brows.

“No, it wasn’t m- oh, wait, I did. Haha, sorry then,” she laughed, scratching the back of her head.

“What’s the time?” I asked as I looked around, trying to spot a clock or something of the sort.

“It’s fourteen minutes to eight o’clock in the morning. You have that much time to eat, brush your teeth, get dressed, and take us to the school,” she replied as she pulled her hair to the side, revealing her AI earrings.

“What a nice fragrance,” I couldn’t help but remark.

“It’s a shampoo I found in the shower. Do you like it?” she asked.

“Yeah, it’s very good,” I nodded. “Did you take a bath?”

“I took a shower since I was sticky all over my body. You even came on my face the last time and although I washed it off, some of it got in my hair and I slept like that without my notice. You have no idea how much it took to wash your sperm out of my hair,” she started grumbling.

“Lien, haven’t you just reprimanded me for talking about lewd things early in the morning?” I raised my brows.

“Eh? I didn’t reprimand you, it was just a… remark. Yes, that’s it,” she nodded, trying to convince herself.

“As if that was the case,” I shook my head as I quickly devoured everything on the plate. Burping loudly, I caressed my belly and praised her for her cooking skills.

“You’re such a pig sometimes,” she rolled her eyes as she took back the plate and stood up from the side of the bed. “Hurry up or we’ll be late!” she said as she left the room.

Heh, it’s always nice to see her shitting around with stuff like this.

I couldn’t help but chuckle as I cleaned my whole body with a simple spell. It wasn’t hard and she could have learned it long ago if I taught it to her. Just imagining her shitting around with washing my sperm out of her hair made me happy. Sadly, I got too used to her presence and forgot to track it, and as it turned out, she was standing in the doorway when I used the spell.

Since I was stark naked and there were lipstick marks on my body before, it was surely obvious to her that I used some sort of spell.

“What was that?” she frowned.

“Lien? Why did you come back with the plate?” I forced a smile on my face.

“Because I left the fork here,” she pointed at the nightstand next to the bed. Rather than that, I’ll ask you again. What.was.that?” she stopped after each word.

“What are you talking ab-” I wanted to ask, but seeing her glaring at me, I shut up instead. Clearing my throat, I said, “It’s a spell which can be used to clean things.”

“Aah? Is that so? Let me guess, you intentionally never used it in front of me,” she tilted her head to the side.

“Huh? No, it was surely just a coincidence,” I replied, forcing a smile.

“You know what? Fuck you,” she glared at me as she turned around and left. “Bring the fork with you later!” she shouted back.

Uww, I guess she wasn’t happy about it…

Sighing loudly, I went after her to the kitchen and found her washing the dishes. Realising that I forgot the fork, I used telekinesis to fetch it before she turned around.

“Seriously, you’re teaching magic that could level cities, barriers that could stop SSS ranked monsters, enchantments that make me strong enough to crush trees and boulders with my bare hands, and yet you not only don’t teach me something this simple, you even hide it!” she cried out as she turned around.

“Look, you can’t solve everything with magic. You must enjoy the small things like taking a shower-”

“Hah? Then how come you’re using it? Why are you not enjoying the ‘small things’?” she glared at me.

Sighing loudly, I asked, “Is it really bothering you so much? To be honest, I’m not using it either, only when I’m out of time and stuff like that. I’m not taking a shower every evening just to have sex with you, you know? Well, that’s part of the reason but you get the point. I didn’t teach it to you because there have been many cases where I had a lot of fun watching you. Things can get a bit funnier when inconvenient things happen.”

“If you think about it, have you ever seen me washing my jizzed pants with magic? I always did it in front of you, with my own hands,” I said.

“Well, that’s true,” she muttered.

“I don’t want to tell you not to use something I taught you, but this spell would definitely be one of those. I won’t hide it, there are spells that could take care of your excretion, purify your body, and save you from sleeping and eating, but do you know why I’m not using either of those?” I asked.

“I’m all ears. I wanted to ask you about the real reason anyway. I’m not so stupid to believe that you didn’t teach it to me because you had fun watching me…” she replied.

“During the time we were apart and even when we were children, I spent my time learning and experimenting with magic all the time. For about ten or so years, I didn’t sleep a single second since I always had something to learn. I’d lie if I said I regret not sleeping, but once you get used to it, it’s really hard to stop yourself from doing it.”

“I spent about ten years all alone, doing nothing but learning day and night. I never went to the toilet, I never slept, and I took care of my stomach with magic as soon as I learned how to create energy that could be consumed by my body. I was like a machine, living alone and doing only one thing for more than half of my life. When we were children, the only break I had was when you came over to play with me or when I was ‘forced’ to spend time with my family.”

“Although I wouldn’t be alone anymore if both of us started living like that, I don’t want to return to that habit. I’ve long lost my sense of humanity which isn’t all that good. Well, it has its cons and pros, but the fact that I can’t even create normal relationships with other people is definitely the latter. Thanks to you and that I stopped living like that, I’m starting to rehabilitate, but I’ll never be my old self.”

“The way I feel about other people, or I should say the way I don’t care about them isn’t all that good either, I suppose. Well, I don’t wish to change that to be honest, though that’s also the case only because of all those years. My point is that completely abandoning your human needs isn’t the best thing to do. If it isn’t clear enough to you yet, I’ll tell you that I stopped caring about sex as well. I left behind all of my needs, along with love, emotions, and the list goes on.”

“If you returned two years earlier, we wouldn’t be together right now, and that thought is enough to scare me away from using ‘utility’ magic ever again. That’s why I don’t want you to get used to using them either,” I chuckled, trying to better the mood, though my words had the exact opposite effect.

She seemed to feel down after hearing my tale.

“And how did you start feeling again then?” she asked, much calmer this time.

“Well, since I started sleeping, I had morning woods which led me to a new sense of need. Although I had only my hand to please me, it was enough for me and as I came upon a sense of pleasure, I started remembering that emotions weren’t so bad. Considering my lack of friends and contact with people, it took quite a lot of time, but I’ve been observing people since my childhood so I came to understand many things and started having emotions once again,” I explained.

“Uh, do you really think we wouldn’t be together if I met you two years earlier?” she asked.

“I’m sure,” I nodded. I knew myself the best, I didn’t care about anyone or anything at that time. I knew what it was like to be an emotionless robot and it wasn’t fun.

“That’s actually really scaring me,” she clenched her fists.

“The same goes for me, so I’ll teach you utility magic if you want to learn it, but you must promise me that you’re never going to overuse it. You know, our mind is like a card castle. Once you use a utility magic, next time you’ll think about how easy it was and use it again. Then when you have some other problem, you’ll be like ‘ah, it’s just once, it’s no big deal if I use magic to destroy my excretion’. Or you’ll be like, ‘ah, I have something really important going on, it’s no big deal if I don’t sleep once, I used the other spells only a few times as well’, but that’s not going to be the case.”

“You’ll start abusing them and get used to them until you won’t be able to stop using them. Even if you meet people during daytime, those eight or so hours you spend all alone in the night are enough to slowly make you forget about yourself,” I said, sighing loudly.

“And how did you realise that you had to change?” she asked.

“Well, that’s a good question,” I chuckled. “I heard a piece of music that played with the strings of my heart, a little. It made me think like I thought years ago, even if just for a few minutes, but once that seed of thought was sown, it turned into a thought over time.”

“What’s the name of the song?” she raised a brow.

“On the nature of daylight.”

“Supposedly, it’s more than two hundred years old so you may not like it, but that’s what triggered the change,” I replied, shrugging my shoulders. “Haah- it was so easy not to think and not to feel, it’s left its mark on me. I love and like people conditionally, which doesn’t make much sense. I mean, does that still count as love? I think you’re the only person who I really love no matter what you do,” I couldn’t help but shake my head as I thought about it.

Coming closer, she hugged me strongly, “I love you too.”

“I hope you know that I didn’t make this up just to reconcile with you and stuff like that. Everything I said is true and happened with me,” I said as I hugged her back.

“You’d be some really sick fuck if you made up stuff like that, and it’d be unlike you,” she laughed.

“Yeah, not anymore,” I replied.

“Mhm. Now there is only one problem. We have two minutes left before school starts and you’re still naked. We also have to get there in time so… hurry up, please?” she said, reminding me of a few important things.

Taking a step back, I said with a smile, “You see, these are the kind of moments I use utility magic. I have to crap and I’m not even dressed, but we have no time left to do either of those so… there we go!”

While talking, I used magic to create clothes on my body and removed the waste of my body at the same time.

“Hey, what’s up with your ninja clothes? That’s not fair, now only I’ll look out of the line,” she frowned.

“Look at yourself,” I chuckled as I changed her clothes as well.

“Oh… that’s handy. Regarding your utility magic, the only one I want you to teach me is the cleaning magic. Ah, and in time of emergency, the ability to fill my belly would be nice, and- Fuck this shit! I get what you were talking about…” she stomped on the floor as she realised it herself.

“See? Even just thinking about them is so handy, why not use it once or twice? Then surely, it wouldn’t matter if you used it once more!” I laughed, knowing that feeling better than anyone.

Raising a brow, she said, “Now that I think about it, it’s no wonder that your will is so strong. You not only stopped yourself from an addiction without anyone telling you, you even learned to control and use it in a healthy way.”

“Yeah, that’s part of the reason,” I nodded. “Either way, let’s hurry up,” I said as I picked up my wristband and my AI. Since the door was automatically locked even if we were inside, I used magic to get out of the building through the glass wall and then bolted off towards the school.

By the time the clock hit eight o’clock, we were sitting in the classroom at our place. There was only one thing left to do today.

I was supposed to meet a Grandmaster!