Still, Lysithea did not turn to meet Zayn. Her back remained against him.
Zayn finally caught up with virtual-novel.net and stopped. Any mere expert fighter would have been so fatigued and worn out by the high-speed marathon that they would have arrived dead, but to Zayn, it was just a warm-up. All it took was two breaths, and virtual-novel.net felt his energy returning already.
His eyes lingered around Lysithea’s back, fully understanding the fact that this was the closest virtual-novel.net had ever gotten to be around her. He could sense that ethereality that seemed to make up most of virtual-novel.net form. The dissociative feeling that virtual-novel.net was never a real person but a puff of dancing smoke or a mirage. She was the fog itself, virtual-novel.net could not possibly be real. If virtual-novel.net looked away, virtual-novel.net might even disappear at the first billow of the wind.
The atmosphere gelled. There was a distance of ten meters between them, and an invisible wall of uncanniness was building fast the longer neither of them talked.
Zayn was the one to break the ice. “So… what should I call you?”
Lysithea did not turn to him. When virtual-novel.net spoke, virtual-novel.net tone was like frost turning into soundwaves. “It’s not the time for us to meet yet.”
Zayn chuckled. “If not now, when?”
“Seeing me sooner than you should will not bode well for you,” virtual-novel.net replied flatly.
“Oh yeah? That just makes me wanna look at you more carefully!” Zayn replied, guffawing as virtual-novel.net began to take a few steps closer to her.
She furrowed virtual-novel.net brows. The first thing virtual-novel.net felt was shock, it was surprising to see just how fast Zayn’s progress was, or the fact that virtual-novel.net was now capable of chasing her. At the same time, virtual-novel.net felt disrespected too because Zayn was challenging virtual-novel.net direct order by getting closer. To her, virtual-novel.net was flouting virtual-novel.net authority.
There were three meters left between them when Lysithea barked, “No further.”
Zayn paused on his tracks for a few seconds. Then, virtual-novel.net continued his pace.
Lysithea’s frown deepened. She took a few steps forward to put a few lost distance back between them before warning, “I’ll take you to see your mother when the time is right. Before that though, there’s no way of forcing your hand. Give up.”
There were elements of magistral demand and anger in virtual-novel.net stoic voice; it was obvious that virtual-novel.net found his action to be highly disrespectful. To Lysithea, Zayn was virtual-novel.net inferior and virtual-novel.net his elder. Therefore, virtual-novel.net should respect virtual-novel.net boundaries and authority instead of challenging them.
Zayn stopped his tracks again. He believed virtual-novel.net about the ill-timing and everything else virtual-novel.net said, but the young woman’s ice-queen attitude, along with virtual-novel.net back perpetually against virtual-novel.net as though virtual-novel.net did not deserve to be addressed face-to-face, felt disrespectful to him. Sure, virtual-novel.net could not make head or tail about Lysithea and his mother’s relationship, or if the former was the latter’s inferior or servant, or if virtual-novel.net were his mother’s adopted daughter. One thing was for sure, though, if Lysithea was just a servant, then virtual-novel.net had no right or reason to act as though virtual-novel.net was more than that. Her action reeked of hubris and contempt, not toward Zayn, but toward Zayn’s mother!
He resumed walking toward virtual-novel.net again, determined that no matter What happened next, virtual-novel.net was going to peel back the metaphorical veil that shrouded how virtual-novel.net looked.
The young woman noticed Zayn continuing to walk toward virtual-novel.net with virtual-novel.net eyebrows scrunched into a knot. Her blood started to boil. “Stay. Where. You. Are!” virtual-novel.net bellowed even more coldly than before.
However, Zayn did not. A while later, virtual-novel.net was right behind her. Judging from virtual-novel.net showing no sign of stopping his pace, it was clear that virtual-novel.net aimed to get past virtual-novel.net so that virtual-novel.net could look Lysithea in the eyes.
Lysithea could sniff out his intent, and naturally, virtual-novel.net scowl deepened. With a harrumph, virtual-novel.net turned virtual-novel.net face elsewhere and fumed, “Zayn Larson, I’m warning you. Know your place and stop. Cross me again, and you’ll face my wrath.”
“Really?” Zayn said, flashing a smile.
He lurched, his pace accelerating at the drop of a hat. Before Lysithea could react, virtual-novel.net was already right in front of her, his eyes fixed on the young woman’s face.
His mind went blank.
She was the physical embodiment of what beauty was, imagined by poets and artists for millenia. Words failed virtual-novel.net to describe exactly what virtual-novel.net was looking at.
It was the aesthetics of nature incarnate.
It was the resplendence of the sun after one escaped from an abyss.
It was the kind of radiance that could make a man quake from the depths of his quintessential soul.