By Zephyria 
“What, what did you say?”
“Is it… Is it that surprising…?”
I’m going crazy. The back of my neck is throbbing. Whether I’m holding the back of my neck in disbelief or not, Carlisle, who is widening his eyes as if nothing is wrong, not matching his size, tilted his head as if asking what the problem was.
“Didn’t I say I would come to pick you up…? So, I came to pick you up…”
Of course, I read that sentence. In the letter from the north that Lennox had delivered. He had been diligently bringing Carlisle’s letters all this time, and he was so proud of it…
‘It’s absolutely impossible for me to move directly to your side, but it’s okay to move inanimate objects. Hmm… So I tried to send a golem modeled after my appearance, but it couldn’t be moved either. The criteria for what can and cannot be moved are ambiguous. It wasn’t weight or mass. It’s not living things or inanimate objects… So, if I want to do more research on this, I need the Young Master’s help. Ah, you don’t have to feel burdened, just a little bit of bodily fluids,’
‘Get lost.’
I knew that he had already collected more than enough of my bodily fluids in the past and was storing them with Preservation Magic, so it was a ridiculous excuse. Still, he said he should get some compensation and kissed me without permission, and before I could say anything, he jumped out the window and disappeared. The image of the reckless archmage made me shudder.
“Noah…?”
Anyway. It wasn’t a week ago, or two days ago, that Lennox told me about Carlisle’s words, it was just yesterday. Yesterday!
“As I said before, I heard that just yesterday. I thought it would take at least a week, no, a few days, until you came.”
So, I was wondering how I could deceive the Crown Prince and go down to the north, but I didn’t expect him to come to pick me up like this without any plan.
“Perhaps… You don’t like that I came…? You don’t want to go to the north…?”
Well, the north is colder than here, and it’s not the place where you were born and raised… There’s nothing to brag about, but… I could see drooping puppy ears and a tail overlapping his dejected appearance like a hallucination. My heart softened.
“Of course not! How could that be! No, I mean… It’s too sudden. If I just go like this, the Crown Prince might say that he’s ruling the north as a rebellion, whether it’s a national marriage or not…”
“So you’re happy that I came, right?”
“Huh? Y-yes… Is that so…?”
“I knew you would think so!”
I don’t know where the person who was so dejected a few seconds ago went. I feel completely swayed… Strangely, I don’t dislike being swayed like this. I decided to pretend I didn’t know and let myself be swayed.
Carlisle, who was smiling contentedly, rubbed the tip of his nose against my cheek and said that he wouldn’t move without thinking so much, so I shouldn’t worry about anything. He said that if I just kept him by my side, he would take care of it himself.
“If I keep you with me… Hmm, won’t we get caught…?”
I didn’t know the exact identities of those whom the Crown Prince had placed by my side, but each one was unusual. But what I was really worried about wasn’t that. It was the great God who was clinging to this mansion. Carlisle asserted that when he was in wolf form, his senses and physical abilities were much more maximized, so no matter who was in this mansion, he could not find him if he was determined to hide.
To what extent did Lennox share information with Carlisle? Would Carlisle… dare to stay by my side even while opposing God? I somehow lacked confidence.
“…I thought he was someone I didn’t need to be wary of. I’m a little jealous of this.”
Carlisle, who was looking down at me as I was hesitating without revealing all my complicated feelings, murmured in a low voice.
“That magician also risked his life for you, do you dare to think that I… wouldn’t do that?”
“……!”
“I told you that you could use my entire life.”
“Carlisle.”
“If you just take me at the end of that road, Noah.”
“…….”
“That was… what it meant to love you so much that I would risk my life.”
It was an excessively simple voice for a confession that mortgaged a lifetime and life. There was no excessive trembling or excitement of first love in his voice whispering love. However, precisely because of that, it was clear that it was not the result of an overabundance of momentary emotion or a reckless vow.
The love he sent was gentle and peaceful like a hill under the spring sun with a cool blue breeze blowing. Even though it was the form of affection that I had so desperately wanted, I somehow felt guilty and sad. Could I really return as much affection as he gave, and this boundless peace…? I felt like I was suffocating.
“…Thank you.”
I skillfully hid my troubled heart and hugged his neck tightly. It had been a long time since Allen had been diagnosed as a Recessive Omega, so if you consider the timing, Carlisle should have already celebrated the Day of Blessing a long time ago and manifested as a Dominant Alpha. But still, no pheromones were felt from his neck, which he had not even set foot near the temple. From his neck, where I could feel a warm warmth, there was a faint smell of wind.
The Grand Duke Graham of all people had endlessly postponed being recognized as a true aristocrat just to become a partner in adultery with someone like me. He had said earlier. As long as my pheromones weren’t on him, wouldn’t it be safe no matter what I did behind the Crown Prince’s back? Even that felt like my sin.
“More than that, there’s something I want to hear.”
“…….”
“Yes? Noah.”
Overwhelmed by the flood of gentle affection, I just closed my eyes and whispered like a sigh.
“…I like you, I like you, Carlisle.”
The lips that collided with me in a hurry were smiling with happiness. I smiled along with him. It felt like a warm stream of water was flowing like a stream into the middle of my cold heart, deeply, deeply pooling.
\
……, ……, ….
The screen, which had been clear like a clear sky, had been blurred and faded for some time. The garbled voices, like a broken radio with a lot of noise, were the same.
As the magician, who was quite intelligent for a human, and his lovely lover had inferred. Regarding things with traces of the Ancient God, the man had difficulty exercising the power of omniscience and omnipotence. So, in order to peek at Carlisle Graham’s side, he used the eyes of others around him, but he could not specify and examine Graham’s direct bloodline himself.
Now, the man couldn’t know exactly what expressions they wore or what conversations they shared, as the two were voluntarily confined in the same space. However, one thing was certain: Noah Hamilton had once again chosen Graham’s young blood as the sharpest sword to tear the man apart mercilessly.
“Is that so? You’re going to choose him… again?”
Jealousy didn’t arise now. Of course, there was an impulse to tear to shreds everything that coveted the sweet breath of his destined lover and peeked at their secret flesh, leaving no trace… but that was less jealousy and more a rightful claim that had been his from the start. When everything was over, those who didn’t know their place and had extravagant dreams would all pay the price for their sins. Of course, Noah Hamilton was excluded here as well. No matter what grave sins he had committed so far, or what sins he would commit in the future. On the tilted scales of the absolute being, only Noah Hamilton was forever veiled in perfect innocence.
“Fate… I don’t know how it can be so powerful, do you, Noah?”
However, what pushed the man into uncharacteristic sentimentality was the wheel of fate itself, which had begun to turn slowly as if it were natural. As soon as he stopped his artificial intervention, the world flowed in its original form. Noah Hamilton met and sponsored the magician as fate dictated, and formed a relationship with Graham’s bloodline while concealing his identity as fate dictated. And as expected… Only those two who obeyed fate became useful and sharp tools for Noah Hamilton, who dared to rebel against God.
“Go on. Struggle with all your might.”
The man decided not to stop Noah Hamilton and the two humans from struggling. Because fate is always on God’s side.
“If you knew that all your traces would eventually lead to me… what would your reaction be?”
An elegant corner of his lips curved into a smile. His incarnation on earth also smiled leisurely in the same way. Mocking the two humans who were hiding from God’s eyes and kissing in hushed tones.