Vol 4. Chapter 22: Annoyed

“Uh—uh?” Vinny’s brain crashed on the spot. Half a second later, the processor finally restarted and began spinning again, and his eyes instantly turned into spirals.

Facing what Aesphyra was doing, Vinny was frozen at first—blank, dazed, still not registering what she was about to do. But as her flawless face kept enlarging in his field of view, as those petal-soft lips looked even more enticing under the moonlight, he finally jolted into understanding.

“Uh—uhh?!” The moment he realized what Aesphyra was actually about to do, a brief hesitation hit—then blood rushed into his face at a speed you could see with the naked eye, and his already-not-very-advanced processor got wrecked into a hard crash again. “W-Wait, wait, wait—hold on?!”

Under the moon, the silver-haired girl was breathtaking. In those dazzling, agate-bright eyes, charm and languid allure overflowed, like a secret garden drenched in moonlight that bloomed only for him.

“W-Wait, wait, wait—what is this even supposed to be?!” Vinny’s eyes spun into spirals again. The sheer amount of information in front of him had his brain struggling to function.

[Virtue +75]

[Current Virtue: 4659] (We overcounted by three earlier; this is corrected back.)

He genuinely didn’t know what was going on with Aesphyra these past few days—why she’d suddenly turned so cold to him—but the way things were developing now had him completely unable to read the situation.

Aesphyra—the unwavering, iron-blooded green-eyed one, the fate heroine he’d had a blood-feud with in his last life—was now inches away, staring at him with a gaze so seductive it was practically sticky.

It made Vinny think, instinctively, of a CG he’d seen back when he was still on Blue Star—Aesphyra’s CG in Carillian Citrus.

Only, a CG was still just a CG. It couldn’t compare to Immersive Mode—especially when he could feel her body heat, feel her scorching breath, feel her presence and the restless, surging emotion in the air right now.

Aesphyra loved using this kind of approach to tease him, this pure-hearted young man. So whenever she said something ambiguous on purpose—something meant to mislead—Vinny would automatically categorize it as her playing with him, messing with him. Over time, it became their usual way of being.

But this time was completely different from every other time.

Vinny couldn’t feel that familiar, playful edge in her movements or her tone. The emotion in her eyes—unhidden, unashamed—was like a sword that pierced straight through him. It made him feel like something had locked onto him: he couldn’t move, and no matter how he tried to dodge, there was nowhere to run.

Those violet eyes—so seductive they looked like they might drip—released a wave of desire like a boulder thrown into a pool, splashing up countless ripples and waves, carving mark after mark into Vinny’s heart.

He felt like he’d been swept up in warm spring water so soft it made his bones melt. Once he sank into it, his body went weak, numb to the marrow—like he’d turned into a wooden puppet that couldn’t move.

N-No way... right?

Vinny swallowed with difficulty.

At this moment, the tenderness in Aesphyra’s eyes and the sincerity in her expression didn’t look like something faked—it looked °• N o v e l i g h t •° like the real thing, like she’d finally stopped pretending.

Sure, with Aesphyra’s actress-level skill, she could act all of this if she wanted. But those beautiful eyes—packed with seduction and aggression—looked like they wanted to swallow him whole, like they wanted to make him hers completely.

It made Vinny a little afraid. If he had a choice, he’d rather Aesphyra be the way she always was—just teasing him, just joking.

And the truth was: even though Aesphyra’s presence and dominance had Vinny suppressed to the bone, he still had room to resist. If he wanted, he could lift a hand and push her away, or take a few steps back.

But he didn’t.

Same as always—people can lie to themselves, but their feelings never lie.

Aesphyra was like that. Vinny was like that, too.

No matter how they usually disguised it, at this moment they were both being driven by the most real thing inside them.

And besides that—Vinny had also been completely stunned by the sudden offensive, by Aesphyra’s overwhelming charm and impact.

He realized he’d underestimated how much Aesphyra attracted him. The last scraps of reason told him that whether she was joking or not, he couldn’t let her keep going, or else—

Or else their relationship really would undergo a qualitative change.

If that actually happened... what would their relationship become after this?

Vinny felt a kind of fear toward that future.

But people weren’t purely rational animals. His instincts and emotions crushed that thin layer of reason completely.

That earlier thought only flashed past for an instant. What filled his mind instead was the carousel of his past and present with Aesphyra, playing over and over like a revolving lantern.

In his last life, he’d been drawn in by Aesphyra’s character art and fell into Carillian Citrus, that Orange Games title. In this life, it was everything he and Aesphyra had gone through.

From mistrust to trust. From scheming against each other to perfect coordination. From hatred at a frozen low... to lips under the moon, only inches apart.

His rational opposition was snuffed out in an instant by his genuine feelings for Aesphyra.

Even Vinny thought it was unbelievable. He couldn’t tell when it had happened—when their relationship had heated up to this point.

It was like boiling a frog in warm water. Before he realized it, he was already in too deep.

Real... feelings?

Were these—really—her real feelings?

Vinny was captured by the sincerity in Aesphyra’s eyes.

That promiscuous stinking sea-queen—could she really be sincere toward him?

So... his feelings had never been one-way?

Just thinking that made Vinny’s heart tremble violently.

He was afraid of that future. But if it was real... would he accept it?

For the first time, he found he couldn’t even force out his usual stubborn denial.

He understood it: he’d fallen for Aesphyra—completely—and it was the kind he couldn’t pull himself out of.

Only now, at this moment, did he realize that maybe he’d never actually hated Aesphyra. Maybe the seed had been planted back when he’d been drawn in by her character art in his last life.

With that thought, the blue-haired girl’s eyes—still full of confusion and shock—gradually sank into a tide called desire. He fell into it. Those ice-blue irises slowly closed, and he even moved as if to meet Aesphyra’s action on his own.

Seeing that, Aesphyra understood Vinny’s answer.

To be honest, some of her questions were the same as Vinny’s. She also couldn’t figure out when she’d become like this.

And she still didn’t know what the relationship between Vinny and Vanessa truly was.

But at this moment, even someone as rational as her threw away those complicated thoughts and handed the choice over to her real emotions.

She wanted to know, too—what her real feelings toward Vinny were. So she cast aside the thoughts like: “She doesn’t like boys,” “She has germaphobia,” “She only likes beautiful girls,” “Vinny isn’t her type at all,” “If I do this, there’s no going back,” and all the other shackles she’d used to bind herself.

And the result was obvious.

The winner was decided on the spot.

Without those tangled thoughts, her logic became perfectly clear.

She looked at the blue-haired girl in front of her—at that fair, lustrous, delicate face, at lips under the moonlight that carried a faint sheen and looked irresistibly tempting.

That sweet, pure face—he looked better than a lot of girls.

With genes and a foundation this strong... maybe it didn’t even matter whether he was a girl or not.

[Virtue +350]

[Current Virtue: 5009]

Swept up by the atmosphere, Vinny closed his eyes in silent permission, and Aesphyra met him like she was taking a city by storm.

Just as they were about to touch, clear footsteps arrived—along with the sound of a pebble being kicked and sent flying.

Aesphyra was fine, but Vinny reacted like a kid caught doing something bad, staring in shock toward the source of the sound.

That made Aesphyra look over as well.

Their eyes landed together on the black-haired girl who had appeared here so abruptly.

“I-Isatia?” Vinny froze.

Good news: it wasn’t some stranger who saw this.

Bad news: it was someone they knew.

Under the moonlight, the chill beauty in Isatia’s eyes snapped Vinny awake. Like someone had dumped a bucket of cold water over him, he jerked backward several steps, hurriedly widening the distance from Aesphyra. Off to the side, he lowered his head, face burning, unable to look up. The ambiguous atmosphere between them shattered in an instant.

What the hell was that just now?!

Vinny roared inside while still finding time to complain.

Why—why was it that whenever he did something embarrassing these days, a familiar face would crash into it out of nowhere??

And the person and the timing were always perfect.

When Isatia had been tutoring him before, Isatia feeding him had been witnessed by Mirexia at the perfect moment. When he’d been tugging and pulling with Milian, Aesphyra had appeared at the perfect moment. And now—when his emotions had taken over and things were about to head into a direction nobody could explain—Isatia had shown up at the perfect moment again.

What, was he some kind of collision champion??

Was he being eroded by the world will?!

Could someone tell him why they always showed up so precisely every time?!

Calm down, calm down. Right now, don’t talk. With the night so dim, and with his outfit being... so “distinctive,” he should just keep his head down and stay silent. Let Isatia fail to recognize him and think Aesphyra was fooling around with some female student she didn’t know—some Orange Games stuff—then he could bluff his way through.

That was Vinny’s plan.

But the moment Isatia spoke, it was declared dead.

“Vinny, what are you doing here?” Isatia’s cool eyes rested on him calmly. She didn’t hesitate at all in identifying the blue-haired girl.

“Ugh! I—I’m not—um—I didn’t.” Isatia calling him out immediately caught Vinny off guard. His left and right brains started fighting each other, and for a moment he couldn’t decide whether to deny his identity or insist that nothing had happened between him and Aesphyra.

Ahh—getting caught in something like this really was too embarrassing.

Vinny didn’t dare make a sound. He kept his gaze down and turned his head aside. Thank the darkness for cover—otherwise his expression would’ve been completely exposed.

Compared to Vinny, Aesphyra was far calmer. Even after being interrupted and seen like that, she showed no shame at all, making it hard to tell which of the two was the boy and which was the girl.

But calm was calm.

“Good evening, Isatia.” Aesphyra smiled as she looked at Isatia. In those similar violet eyes, there was meaning layered deep.

No—how could this woman still greet her in such a flat tone??

When she’d just been seen doing that.

Just thinking back to the scene—Aesphyra’s soul-stealing face right up close—made Vinny feel so ashamed he could die, and it scrambled his language system along with everything else.

“Good evening.” Isatia replied to Aesphyra blandly, like it was purely out of politeness.

Then Isatia asked, without warning, “Did I interrupt you?”

Honestly, it sounded less like a question and more like a provocation.

“Oh my, of course not. What are you saying, Isatia? I should be thanking you~” Aesphyra said with a bright, flowerlike smile.

“After all, every time you show up, I learn quite a bit. How could you be interrupting me? I’m not even done being grateful.”

“Oh? Knowledge? What knowledge? I’m curious.” Isatia gave Aesphyra a sidelong look, then glanced at the blue-haired girl beside her who didn’t dare speak. “Is it about a lovely Ainolin Festival night date?”

“Of course not. The knowledge you taught me, Isatia, is about how the Tyrel Empire trains royal heirs.” Aesphyra spoke in an almost respectful tone—yet the words were pure teasing and mockery. “For example: as a royal heir, no matter male or female, wherever you go, you have to stomp the ground hard with your feet—and while you’re at it, you should kick every pebble you see. Mm-hm. I have to say, it’s an excellent habit. It makes sure everyone knows the imperial princess has arrived, so everyone stays in awe.”

Clearly, Aesphyra had seen through it: Isatia had deliberately made loud noise to draw their attention. She’d even kicked a pebble so they would notice someone else was here—and stop what they were about to do.

For Aesphyra, that kind of move was pointless.

But for Vinny, it was different.

Vinny backed off, and the atmosphere died with him.

No need to obsess over details—Aesphyra wasn’t even trying to hide how annoyed she was right now.