HRB 162

Side Story Chapter 10

“That’s real romance.”

Ketron had seen the sight so often during their travels that Eddie’s sparkling eyes seemed excessive, but Eddie looked utterly moved.

Before Ketron could stop him, Eddie ran out into the rain. Even with the forest’s towering trees providing a natural umbrella, the rain was so heavy that Eddie was instantly soaked.

“Eddie, you’ll catch a cold.”

Ketron, remembering Eddie’s susceptibility to colds, tried to dissuade him, but Eddie seemed determined to stay out, waving his hands enthusiastically.

“Dry me with Sorcery.”

“Sorcery isn’t omnipotent.”

The one thing Sorcery couldn’t cure was the common cold. Just as modern humans had failed to conquer it completely, this world had no definite cure or Sorcery to heal it.

But Eddie had a retort ready.

“Or…”

Eddie paused dramatically before speaking.

“You could warm me up with your body.”

“……”

Embarrassed by his own words, Eddie nonetheless seemed to enjoy being in the rain. He struggled to climb onto a large rock and whistled.

Ketron, momentarily taken aback by the provocative remark, realized anew that he couldn’t win against Eddie. It was an argument he was destined to lose from the start.

In the end, Ketron decided to join Eddie in the rain. He leaped onto the rock where Eddie stood.

For a while, the two of them enjoyed the rain together.

But the heavy rain didn’t last long. The rain clouds quickly dispersed, and as befitting a neighborhood with good air, stars were visible early on.

“……”

Even though he knew it was a different dimension, Eddie couldn’t help but wonder if one of those stars was his Earth.

The faces of his family flashed in his mind, causing a pang of heaviness, but Eddie now knew how to shake off such melancholy.

Faces he always wanted to remember, but which were now beginning to fade, flickered by and quickly subsided.

He no longer wept when he thought of them, and he hoped they were the same.

Be happy, let’s be happy.

The emotions he had left behind long ago were neither heavy nor light. They simply lingered like familiar air.

Nevertheless, the memory of his homeland momentarily surfaced, and Eddie began to hum. It was an old pop song from his school days.

“……”

Ketron quietly watched Eddie humming. He didn’t recognize the song, so it must be from the world he used to live in.

Eddie, still humming, cheerfully muttered,

“Romance overdose.”

Ketron didn’t quite understand what a romance overdose was, but it didn’t matter as long as Eddie was happy.

“Let’s go inside before you catch a cold.”

“Okay.”

After breathing in the forest air in the rain for some time, Eddie obediently followed Ketron back into the cabin.

It hadn’t been a long time, but the rain had been so intense that they both looked like drowned rats.

As soon as Eddie entered the cabin, he kissed Ketron as if he hadn’t even considered drying himself with Sorcery.

In fact, he hadn’t.

“This is romance too.”

The voice whispering in Ketron’s ear sounded quite sweet, even to himself.

Whatever effect those words had on Ketron, the man’s gaze deepened as he looked at Eddie, then he suddenly lifted Eddie up and laid him down on the soft bed Eddie had made.

“Eddie, you’re cold.”

“It’s okay, you’ll warm me up.”

Eddie buried his face in Ketron’s chest as he said this. Ketron’s body wasn’t very warm either, since he had also been in the rain, but Eddie felt psychologically warmed up. At least he wouldn’t catch a cold.

“Still, we made the best memory on this trip, right?”

As he said this, rubbing his face against the firm chest he loved, he saw Ketron wearing a subtle expression. Eddie tilted his head.

“What’s with that look that says the best memory is something else?”

“Am I making such an expression?”

“Yeah.”

“Your mind-reading skills have improved, Eddie.”

“Really?”

Ketron smiled without confirming or denying it. Only the corners of his lips lifted slightly, but the man, who was only talkative in front of Eddie, had recently been showing more expressions like this.

As if he were the only one in the world, the Ketron of the original story never smiled and was described as a heartless person… The person in front of Eddie now seemed like a completely different person.

No, he is a different person.

The youth who cried over his comrade’s betrayal was gone, and only a cat who had received a lot of love remained.

Eddie, who had seen Ketron as his own slightly large cat since the first time he saw him, still saw Ketron as a cat. His own small, cute, black cat. The rose-colored glasses were getting thicker every day, and now Ketron looked like a lovable ‘baby’ cat to him.

Of course, if he said this to anyone, they would immediately be appalled and clutch their chests, telling him to look at that guy’s eyes and build―probably Sebastian, or someone like Sebastian―but as always, Eddie didn’t care at all.

“So, what was the best thing?”

Eddie asked, letting Ketron undress him, and Ketron answered without hesitation.

“Every moment with you.”

It was the answer he had expected. Since it was coming from a cat with poor creativity, it was probably just full of sincerity. The problem was that those sincere words had become quite romantic at some point.

“When did my baby get so good at saying cheesy things?”

“I’m being sincere.”

“You’re the problem because you’re sincere.”

Eddie, grumbling even though he was happy, gently bit Ketron’s nose. Eddie, looking at the handsome nose with his teeth marks on it, slyly suggested to the quiet man,

“My kitty, wanna meow?”

“……”

The man, who would do almost anything Eddie asked, looked troubled and avoided his gaze.

Eddie had started asking Ketron to meow at some point. Of course, Ketron, who was Eddie’s personal yes-man, had never granted this request.

“Huh? Just once.”

But today, he had a good feeling. A good feeling that Ketron would listen to him.

“Eddie.”

“It’s not a difficult request, is it?”

Of course, the difficulty level might not be that high, since it was just a short word. But for Ketron, it was the most difficult request in the world.

He’d rather fight the Demon King one more time than do this. The man, who felt that it was more difficult than anything else, squeezed his eyes shut.

But he loved his lover too much to refuse a request from him.

In the end, Ketron put his lips to Eddie’s ear. The voice whispering softly, very softly, when no one else was listening, was the sound Eddie wanted. Eddie smiled contentedly.

“Are you satisfied, Eddie?”

“Yeah.”

Eddie said honestly and hugged Ketron’s neck. The person who vowed to make him do it again when he was in a good mood, and the person who vowed never to do it again after this. Their inner thoughts were different, but since it was a battle with a predetermined outcome, it didn’t matter what their thoughts were at this moment.

Eddie hugged Ketron’s neck.

“Ket…”

There are things that can be felt from the voice that calls his name, even without saying them.

Love, affection, or something very big and vast that encompasses all of that.

Ketron, as if he knew, kissed the soft lips in front of him and slowly took off their wet clothes. The clothes, shed like a husk, fell to the bottom of the bed, and the bodies, which had been so cold that he had worried about catching a cold, clung to each other, instantly heating up.

The lovers, who had become bolder because there were no eyes watching, concentrated on their actions, looking only at each other, but in fact, there were eyes watching.

[Ugh, again.]

The Holy Sword, which had slipped back into the cabin when Ketron had finished it to avoid the rain, gave a bored voice as it watched the lovers engrossed in their actions, having completely forgotten that it was there.

At first, Eddie seemed to be conscious of the Holy Sword and tried to avoid having sex in front of it―although Ketron, for some reason, would deliberately touch Eddie in front of the Holy Sword―but at some point, he had become so comfortable with the Holy Sword that he often forgot about its existence.

Should I like this or not?

The Holy Sword, now sick of all the acts, floated up and went out of the cabin on its own. Rather than listening to the groans of the two beast-like men all night long, it was better to sleep outdoors.

The forest on the evening after the rain had stopped was dark without a single ray of light, but it was quite charming.

But the Holy Sword, which had been almost kicked out, didn’t notice the charm or anything else. It was just lonely.

[Isn’t there another human who’s my type, like Eddie?]

The Holy Sword, floating above the rock where Eddie and Ketron had been in the rain, looked up at the sky and lamented.

It was a night when the stars were unnecessarily pretty.