168 4.30 Let us stay with you - Part 3

Her cheeks were rosy red, and she seemed somewhat shy. That was understandable considering everything that just happened. I, myself, was feeling a bit embarrassed because of it.

"Then should we wait a while before doing this? I don't think it's a good idea if you are feeling uncomfortable."

"N-no. I want to do it, though. I can't let her get ahead of me on this."

There was no contest to try and get ahead here since I liked both the same. However, it would seem unfair if I were to accept the approaches of one while stopping another to wait for a better opportunity.

She stood in front of me and closed her eyes. Her throat was probably dry since she was acting uncomfortable, but her approach was so damn cute. I was barely holding myself together.

She looked so adorable that my hand moved on its own and pulled her into an embrace. 

This just proved that I had feelings for her all along.

"Nara, you are holding me too tight."

"I just want you to keep you close like this for a while. I guess I always wanted to, and I just realize that now."

"D-do you really mean it?"

I could feel her getting warmer. For some reason, there were tears on her cheeks. I loosened my hold of her, after which she started breathing heavily.

"Sorry I shouldn't have done that."

"No, dummy. I was just happy. I was so happy that I don't know why I started crying."

She stood on the tip of her toes and brought her lips close to mine. He could feel the warmth of her body up close and the soft rise on her chest.

She had her eyes closed, but by no means she looked less beautiful. In fact, she looked much cuter and adorable.

There was an aromatic smell of oranges coming off of her skin, and her lips and nose looked so perfect from where I was watching them.

When she raised herself to reach near my lips, I could see her fair thighs below her nightdress.

For once, I felt the warmth develop inside my chest, but I couldn't let myself loose here.

As my lips touched her, her eyes opened wide. She looked surprised for once, but as she gazed into my eyes, the shyness her eyes carried a while ago returned.

It looked like she was having a hard time standing on her toes, so I supported her by moving my hands slightly higher. As I did that, I could feel her breasts touching my chest even more clearly.

The parting at this point was hard; I wanted to be even closer to her. However, I knew that progressing any further from her would ruin everything.

Our relationship was just starting, so keeping it pure at this stage was for the best. Any advances from this point carried consequences moving ahead.

As soon as our eyes met after the kiss, she looked away. "I-I will go now. Good night."

After she left, I laid on my bed and thought about what just happened. All of a sudden, I was feeling sleepless now.

The tiredness I was feeling a while ago came back, but the sleepiness was all gone. I was more active than ever.

----

I woke up early the next morning. It's not like I could sleep properly in the first place, but I was able to doze off here and there.

My body felt worse than ever. It was as if all the energy in me was drained out. However, I couldn't afford to slow everyone else down. Not when the task we were carrying out was of utmost importance.

I walked to the inn's bathroom and washed myself up. Naturally, since the water supply was cut off, I had to use magic to produce the water I needed.

After I was done cleaning, I walked up to the guests' waiting room.

There, Jackie and Markus were busy discussing something. When they saw me come in, the two turned towards me.

"Morning, Nara. Looks like you woke up early."

Jackie was as loud as ever, and probably because of the lack of sleep, that sounded annoying.

"Yeah, couldn't sleep much. Although, you guys look active as ever."

The two had stayed up due to the watch duty, but they looked energetic this early despite that.

"Ooh, I must have forgotten to tell you about my herbal tea," Jackie said.

He sounded awfully excited while mentioning that, which wasn't weird. He used to talk about everything with excitement, no matter how worthless the thing was.

I wanted to ignore him, but that was impossible at this point.

"I don't remember hearing about this herbal tea. What does it do?"

"Ho-ho! I am sure you will love it. Let me prepare some for you."

While I sat on my chair, he walked up to the kitchen and came out with a teacup. The tea in it was shining yellow, unlike anything I had ever seen.

"Here, give this a sip. I am sure it will take all your fatigue away."

'Well, as long as it's not poison, any warm drink is heaven right now.'

I took the first ship, and it tasted somewhat weird. It had some nostalgic taste — a little hint of bitterness with the scent of mint. Since it had no sugar in it, I could taste the tea down to the smallest detail.

"It's unlike anything I have ever tasted before. Where can you even find this thing?"

"Ha-ha-ha! I knew you would like it. Remember when I told you that we went close to a hill near the dragon valley, it goes naturally there and nowhere else."

"Hmm… interesting. Maybe I should try to get some when I travel through the eastern province."

"I wouldn't recommend that unless you want to fight a whole village of goblins. Anyways, let me tell you the most amazing thing about this tea."

He paused and smiled as if he was revealing some sort of important mystery.

"Initially, it's like any normal tea you see, but when you pass mana through it, it changes color. With the change, its taste becomes even more profound, and it helps one relax."

I wonder what this change could mean, but I couldn't come up with anything. It was then that I decided to do a little experiment of my own.

I channeled my mana into the teacup to see if it changes color, and in fact, it did. For me, the tea became as white as milk.

When Jackie saw that happened, he looked surprised. "That's strange. I have never seen anyone being able to change the tea into the milk before."

I tried tasting it, and the aroma had changed drastically. It tasted stronger, almost not drinkable.

"This is strange. I remember when my friends tried it, it turned into blue, red, or even black. But never once had I seen it turn white."

"Could it be?"

It looked like Garo was making guesses, so the two of us turned towards him.

"Those sounds like the color of magical elements. Since your wind magic is dominant, it turns yellow. Let me give it a try."

When Garo did the same thing, it turned Yellow again. As far as I could remember, his wind magic was dominant compared to other elements he could use.

After a momentary silence, Garo spoke. "This is strange, though. In all these years, I have never seen anyone with white color as the color for magical aptitude."

Jakie nodded. "Indeed."

Well, the logic here was simple. It meant that the lightning element was dominant in me. However, now the question was: 'how?'

I knew that I wasn't going to find the answer now, so I focused on what I could try now.

For some reason, I had never tried using it before, as I believed that lightning magic naturally didn't exist among humans. However, what just happened made me feel like trying it once.

I hadn't done this before, but my control had gotten a lot better compared to the first time. Because of that, there shouldn't be any problem doing it inside here.

I closed my eyes and imagined electric sparks forming in my hands, and when I opened them, I could see the sparks within my palm.

It was very unsteady and was trying to escape towards the nearest metal possible. I pulled the mana out before anything could happen.

'I may need a bit of training to master it. I can't wait to try out its combinations.'

I realized that I would be completely busy during this journey, but I was anxious to learn more about it. I decided that I would try it whenever I get some free time on the way.

For now, I had to deal with the two that were staring at me in shock. Garo was the first to speak among the two.

"Does this mean the history we know is wrong?"