The bell stopped ringing. The light and shadows faded. In the end, everything returned to what it had originally been.

Ariel raised her head. The courtyard, with nothing left in it now, was overgrown with weeds. The traces of the great fire that had once raged there could still faintly be seen. That low, narrow house was now nothing more than broken walls and ruins.

Only in the center of the yard, someone had piled up a small mound of earth.

There was no tombstone, no grave marker. Fire and time had erased everything. Only a bouquet of white chrysanthemums rested quietly before the little mound. At this time of year, chrysanthemums were exceptionally hard to come by, so they must have been magically forced to bloom at considerable expense again.

The flowers were still bright and fresh, swaying in the breeze.

"Idiot."

Ariel drew in a deep breath and scolded softly under her breath, but the corners of her lips still lifted into an involuntary smile.

Her heart felt warm. Now that all the outer shells had been cast off, she was finally able to experience this kind of girlish sweetness and trouble.

"I’ll come see you again, Mom."

Ariel gently stroked the bouquet of white chrysanthemums and made that promise to her mother as well. But this promise no longer required her to shut away her own heart.

She would walk in the sunlight, forever.

After paying her respects, Ariel turned and faced the door.

Once this phantom of the past, cut from the river of time, vanished, even the flow of time here finally returned to normal.

She and her mother had spoken for so long, yet to the outside world only ten minutes had passed.

Bang—bang—bang—

The reinforced door shook under repeated impacts from something slamming into it, already looking close to giving way.

Now that the barrier of time was gone, the danger from the Evil God had caught up to Ariel once more.

She felt no fear, nor did she flee. She simply pushed open the old, crumbling door with calm composure.

At once, horrifying mutters and howls poured into her mind. And within the crystal stretched before her, there still brewed a darkness and distortion beyond imagination.

But unlike before, the thing reflected in her eyes was no longer herself.

Or rather, no longer the pollution hidden in the depths of her heart.

Instead, it was a grotesquely throbbing mass of flesh.

A hideous eye tore open across the lump of flesh, staring at her full of fury and resentment, as though enraged by her earlier deception and her current composure.

"Teacher, are you there?"

"I’m always here."

"Good."

Ariel slid the old ring back onto her finger. The Heavenly Flame Greatsword flew out and affectionately brushed against the back of her hand.

She took hold of the hilt in one smooth motion. Her neatly arranged hair stirred in the air, and the flame that had long since gone out reignited here and now.

"Next... I’m going to raise hell."

...

...

"So it seems you are unwilling to accept my lord’s love after all?"

Faced with Muen’s refusal, Parls remained just as patient as ever. For him, spreading the Love God’s great glory was also an extremely important matter.

"No shit."

Muen gave a disdainful sneer.

"Why would I accept the love of some disgusting, perverted Evil God? Same as before—if it’s willing to kill itself... then I guarantee there’ll be plenty of people in this world who 'love' it. At that point, forget me. The line of people bringing flowers to its grave would stretch from here all the way to the Holy City."

After all, who would not love an Evil God that sacrificed itself to bring world peace?

The Pope might even personally write its epitaph.

"...Sigh. What ignorance. What a pity."

Hearing that, Parls lowered his eyes, deeply disappointed.

Why?

He had been so sincere, laid out the stakes so earnestly, and so generously offered the sacred love of his lord to Muen Campbell without asking for the slightest price in return...

So why did he still refuse?

Accepting the love of his lord was such an easy thing, such a pleasant thing, such a blissful thing, was it not?

"I used to be just like you."

Parls removed the rose from his chest and toyed with it in his fingers, plucking away the petals one by one. A trace of reminiscence appeared on his face as he simply began speaking on his own.

Muen narrowed his eyes. Since he could not quite tell what the other man was trying to do, he held off on moving for the moment.

"When I was young, I met a girl. She was so beautiful—kind, gentle, straightforward. In those years when I had nothing, she was the only one who didn’t look at me with the same contempt those snobbish people did."

The scene seemed to shift before Parls’s eyes. He saw a beautiful girl reaching out to him with a smile when he was at the end of his rope, ragged as a beggar, giving him bread and hot soup and warmth he had never known before.

"I fell in love with her at first sight. I thought she was the only true love of my life. I worked harder and harder, pushed myself higher and higher, climbing step by step from Belrand’s Lower District, from a penniless nobody, to a very high place."

No one could know how hard it was to claw one’s way up out of a filthy place like the Lower District. All Parls remembered were endless mockery, endless pain, endless confusion, nearly enough to drown him like a tidal wave.

Only at night, when he looked from afar at that strand of warm, luxurious lamplight, would he feel a measure of comfort.

He believed she was waiting for him too.

"But..."

Parls suddenly clenched his fist and crushed the petals completely.

Resentment and fury surged through his eyes.

"When I finally succeeded and stood before her, polished and glorious... she rejected me."

"She rejected me!! Can you believe that? She actually rejected me! Rejected me, after everything I’d done, after all the effort I put in just to stand in front of her!! And the most hateful part... Young Master Muen, do you know what the most hateful part was?"

Parls lifted his head, laughing madly.

"She said she didn’t know me. She said she had no idea who I was, didn’t know anything about bread or hot soup. She even told me to get lost... Of course I didn’t leave. I loved her. I wanted to be with her. I’d crawled over roads full of thorns for exactly that... And then, then she had her husband—yes, she was already married—her husband came out and drove me away. Drove me away like a dog.

"Being chased off once didn’t mean anything to me. I thought she just hadn’t recognized me, or maybe she was too emotional, too shy... Later I went to see her a few more times, but every single time she hid from me. In the end she said she’d had enough, that I was insane, a pervert... and had her husband beat me nearly to death. Even though I hadn’t done anything. I just wanted her to remember the love we once had... Young Master Muen, you think that’s hateful too, don’t you?"

Parls loosened his tie and looked at Muen as though seeking agreement.

"Right? It’s hateful, isn’t it? I did so much for her. At the time, I even bought all the flowers along the entire street and had them sent into her room..."

"...What the hell are you talking about?"

Muen’s expression gradually darkened.

"The girl you’re talking about helped you once, that’s all. Of course she didn’t know you. You harassed her, and getting beaten for it was exactly what you deserved."

"Hateful, right? Hateful? Of course it was hateful."

But Parls seemed not to hear Muen at all, continuing to mutter to himself:

"That was when I understood. Women are fickle. They’re despicable. Cold and heartless. They capture your sincerity so easily, then cast you aside without a second thought. You can give them all your love and still lose everything... So... so...

"So in the end, I begged my lord... begged Him to make her willing to accept my love."

Blood-red roses began to bloom at Parls’s feet like a bed of flowers before a gravestone.

Parls reached out and plunged a hand into the flowers.

"My great lord answered me. He bestowed His sacred love upon me! That love was different. It was great! Holy! Equal! It was enough to completely fill the hollow in my heart... it was true love!"

Parls gave a violent yank, dragging a figure out from the bed of flowers.

It was a figure in a pure white wedding dress, impossibly beautiful among the roses.

But the moment that figure emerged from the flowers, a faint stench spread through the air, making Muen involuntarily frown.

He finally understood why Parls had sprayed such thick cologne over himself...

It had not just been for style. It had also been to cover up the almost imperceptible... smell of decay around him.

Because when the gauze over the figure lifted, what it revealed was not the face of a beautiful girl.

But a hideous, half-rotting face.

It was the corpse of a girl.

Parls pressed a light kiss to the girl’s rotting lips.

"You see? She loves me now."

I love you.

I love you.

The girl, dead long ago, responded with all the tenderness in the world.

"..."

The corner of Muen’s eye twitched.

He had already seen how disgusting the Love God and Its followers could be, but even so, the sheer depravity of the man in front of him still shocked him.

At the same time, a faint pity and steadily rising anger flowed through his heart.

"Please don’t use that revolting brain of yours to stain the word love."

Anger laced Muen’s voice as he said each word clearly:

"That girl never loved you. Love goes both ways. It isn’t one person’s pathetic delusion."

"Stain it? Delusion?"

Parls shook his head.

"It seems Young Master Muen still doesn’t understand. But that’s all right. I’ll make you understand. That is exactly why I came, isn’t it, my dear?"

Yes.

My dear. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

The girl said nothing. As a corpse, she could not speak. And yet Muen clearly seemed to hear that answer.

Crack.

The corpse in Parls’s arms suddenly twisted its head toward Muen.

Its eyes were already hollow, but through those deep empty sockets Muen felt as though a soul full of pain and sorrow were truly meeting his gaze.

And along with that came a chill that seemed to seep straight into the soul.

Muen’s eyes sharpened. The instant he sensed something was wrong, his body had already moved away.

He had remained on full alert this entire time. In this world, there were already very, very few people who could ambush him in that state.

Yet the moment he stepped back, his body suddenly jolted, and he nearly stumbled.

Muen lowered his head and discovered that at some point, roses had already bloomed around his feet. They were bright red, but now that he was seeing them up close, he realized they were completely different from the roses he had planted in his own garden.

These roses had originally been pure white.

They were merely dyed red with blood.

And from that flower bed, a half-rotted arm emerged and gripped Muen’s ankle tightly.

A dignified-looking woman wept tears of blood, as though trying to tell him something in silence.

"More than one?"

Muen spat to the side.

"I was wrong. You’re not just trash. You’re dead trash."

Of course, one corpse alone was not enough to do much. Muen’s blade flashed like a shadow, easily cutting through the flesh of the dignified woman and freeing his movement again.

"Sorry."

Muen said softly, "I’ll set all of you free."

Zing—

As soon as he said that, the ringing from the slash he had just released suddenly grew bright and sharp.

Muen might have been watching until now, but that did not mean he had done nothing to prepare. Even while listening to Parls’s rambling story about how a lunatic was made, he had been gathering strength all along.

And now, all of that power burst forth in an instant. More than a hundred overlapping layers of blade force condensed under slowed time, finally gathering into a strike as brilliant as the rising sun.

"Heavenly Flame... no, that move of mine should be called—Flame Flash!"

He had almost fallen into the habit of using Ariel’s technique name again, though it hardly mattered. This move had originated from Heavenly Flame Draw in the first place.

Only, under the enhancement of slowed time, it was sharper and even swifter.

Like a roaring, revolving sun collapsing into itself in a single instant and plunging down!

Under that strike, Parls had no room at all to evade. The blade-light cleaved straight through his body, and even the crystal wall behind him was split completely, as easily as a sheet of paper, revealing a corner of the night beyond.

"Hm?"

But Muen frowned slightly.

Something about that hit was off.

Judging by the third-rank level Parls had shown, using even a tenth of that strike would already have been more respect than a cultist like him deserved. So why, after the slash passed through him, had it only cut his body apart?

Shouldn’t it have annihilated him completely?

More than anyone, Muen knew how tenacious these cultists were, so he had not held back in the slightest... and yet the result still far exceeded his expectations.

"...￥%% body enhancement..."

As though answering Muen’s confusion, a difficult, garbled chant rose up like the wailing of a ghost.

A woman dressed like a mage stood behind Parls. She too was already half-rotten, yet she could still use magic, strengthening Parls’s body.

"#￥% Holy Light..."

Then came a nun in tattered clothing, using a flickering Holy Light spell like a faulty lamp that still somehow managed to work.

"Heh-heh-heh-heh..."

There was even a woman in a nurse’s uniform, little more than a skeleton by now, climbing shakily out of the flowers to line up Parls’s wound so it would not heal crooked.

More and more corpses rose up. In the blink of an eye, there were already over a hundred of them. The once-empty central hall of the crystal palace had become packed full. At a glance, all of them were Parls’s... "harem."

"That’s absurd."

Muen said expressionlessly, "Just how many women have you ruined?"

"Ruined them? No, no, no. I gave them happiness. Look, they’re all very happy, aren’t they?"

Parls, now restored to perfect condition once more, smiled and said:

"Well? How about I give you one last chance? As long as you enter into my lord’s embrace, you too can have this much true love!"

"I’ll pass."

Muen said coldly, "I don’t want any of this. Take your love with you into hell!"

Before his voice had even fully fallen, Muen’s figure flashed and vanished from where he stood.

Although the number of female corpses here was huge, it did not throw him into panic. He could tell at a glance that most of them were ordinary people with no real use, with only a small number of somewhat stronger mages and warriors mixed in.

Breaking through this army of trash should not have been any difficulty at all for him—

Clang!

A cold flash of light burst forth. Muen’s pupils contracted, and his body stopped dead.

His reaction had already been astonishingly fast, yet some sharp attack still grazed the edge of his neck.

If he had been a heartbeat slower, his head would already have come off.

"..."

Muen parried aside the incoming cold flash with his pure white short blade and fixed his gaze on the person before him.

This was clearly a powerful warrior, above the fifth rank. Her body showed the least rot of any of them, and precisely because of that, Muen could clearly make out the deep wrinkles on her face, like the bark of an old tree.

"May I ask your age?" Muen asked, his cheek twitching.

The old woman did not answer.

She seemed still immersed in this "sweet" love, attacking Muen again and again without pause.

Parls, on the other hand, kindly answered for her:

"What age are you talking about? Bi’er is only a hundred and thirty-five years young, right in the prime of her life."

"..."

In the prime of her life?

She was old enough to be your great-grandmother and then some.

Sure enough, to become a follower of the Love God, not only did your way of thinking have to be abnormal, your tastes did too.

Muen cursed inwardly. He wanted to break free quickly and deal with Parls, that bastard who apparently would not even spare a hundred-and-thirty-five-year-old grandmother... but this hundred-and-thirty-five-year-old grandmother refused to let him go, tangling him up with swift movements utterly at odds with her age and appearance.

He had thought it was just a mob of trash, but the moment a true powerhouse entered the fight, the whole situation changed.

The old woman could hold Muen in place, and the other somewhat capable female corpses continued harassing him without stopping.

Muen could feel his stamina draining away at an alarming rate.

And more importantly, amid that constant interference, Muen suddenly felt an itch crawl across his skin.

He scratched the back of his hand and found tiny, delicate rootlike tendrils writhing over the surface of his skin, seeming eager to burrow into his flesh.

Muen’s expression darkened further. His eyes shifted to the girl in the wedding dress whom Parls had kept in his arms the whole time.

She had been staring at Muen with those hollow eyes the entire while.

"...Looks like if I don’t come up with something soon, I’m either going to be worn down to death or turned straight into fertilizer for roses."

In the narrow gaps between attacks, Muen thought rapidly.

What now?

Use black flame?

No. There was a reason the Love God had sent Parls specifically to deal with him. From the moment Muen had felt that painful gaze in the hollow sockets of the corpse-girl’s eyes, he had already keenly realized... the souls of these women did not seem to have been completely polluted.

This was not because the Love God was merciful.

It was because It had seen through black flame—and through one of Muen’s small weaknesses.

If those souls had already been corrupted beyond saving, Muen could have burned and devoured them together with everything else...

But now they could still be saved. Could Muen really use black flame carelessly while ignoring those souls?

In a frantic melee like this, Muen did not have the control to burn only flesh and spare souls.

At times like this, the fact that black flame could burn absolutely anything became a burden instead.

"Just like you, Love God. To deal with one plain, ordinary blond bastard like me, you still had to pull this many tricks."

Muen muttered in irritation.

"Hm? Why are you slowing down?"

Admiring Muen’s increasingly disheveled state, Parls intoxicatedly stroked the rotting face of the girl in his arms and asked in mock concern:

"Is it because your love isn’t enough? If you want, I still have plenty more here~"

"..."

Muen drew in a deep breath.

No matter what, he had to make a decision now, or he really would be worn to death here.

Sacrifice the souls of these innocent, deceived women... or risk his life in one desperate push.

Or rather...

"Hm?"

Just then, Muen’s brows lifted slightly, as though he had sensed something.

He looked toward a certain spot, and his whole posture changed. A moment ago he had still been trying to break through the old woman’s entanglement and get close enough to behead Parls. Now, instead, he suddenly retreated in the complete opposite direction.

"What are you doing?"

Parls was thoroughly confused.

"Trying to run? Haven’t you noticed? This place has already been sealed shut by me. Unless you kill me, you will never escape."

"Run? No. Why would I run?"

Muen smiled.

"I’m just clearing the stage for the true protagonist who’s about to make her entrance."

"The true protagonist?"

Parls scoffed.

"What nonsense are you talking about? There’s only you and me here! Don’t tell me you mean Miss Ariel? Hah. Don’t be naive. My lord personally went to bestow love upon her. How could she possibly—"

Boom!

Before Parls could finish, a massive explosion shook the entire crystal palace violently.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom!

The blasts came one after another, as though meteors from the sky were slamming into something hard and unbreakable. Every explosion sent another violent tremor through the crystal palace.

And the sound, and the shaking, were getting closer and closer.

Parls turned stiffly, just in time to see the last layer of crystal barrier waver. Within the clear crystal, a crimson color suddenly appeared, then deepened in an instant.

The crystal began melting at a speed visible to the naked eye, and then...

A roaring surge of flame burst through the gap in the molten crystal. In the blink of an eye it gathered into an enormous fire dragon that swept across more than half the crystal hall!

Half the female corpses were instantly burned to ash in the flames, yet the souls themselves were not harmed by the fire. Instead, under the guidance of some powerful soul force, they were all protected.

"H-how is this possible?"

Parls stared blankly at the girl stepping out through the flames.

"My lord personally went to find you. How could you—ugh!"

Halfway through the sentence, Parls’s eyes suddenly bulged.

His blank expression was swiftly replaced by violent agony. His formalwear tore open. His flesh began twisting and mutating, white spinal matter hanging loose as blood, flesh, and bone turned in spiraling reversals...

Very quickly, Parls lost human form entirely and transformed into a grotesque flower of flesh.

At the center of its bloom, a hideous malformed lump of flesh opened its eye, furious and majestic!

【Human! How is this possible!!】

"You’re so loud. Can’t you keep it down a little?"

Ariel rubbed her ear.

"And why do you call that guy by his full name, but call me just human? Am I beneath him or something?"

"Heh, maybe because I’ve drawn more aggro?"

Muen’s gaze skipped right past this incarnation of the Love God and landed on Ariel.

She was still wearing that white dress, though the skirt had been torn open along one side to let her move more freely.

It did nothing to diminish her beauty. If anything, it made her look even more striking and valiant.

"Did you get my gift?" Muen asked.

"Yeah, I got it."

"And how was it?"

"It was..."

Ariel tilted her head and thought about it.

"All right."

"I see. That’s good, then."

Muen let out a breath.

"I’m glad you liked it. I was worried you’d blame me for digging into your past."

"You’re overthinking it. It’s not like it was some shameful past. Why would I—"

【Shut up!】

Apparently finally unable to stand the two of them chatting like no one else was there, the flesh-flower shuddered violently. The sharp, grating noise it released sent cracks racing across the crystal.

They could not keep talking anymore, but Ariel lifted her chin just slightly and gave Muen a look.

Smiling, Muen nodded.

The two of them had not laid out a plan in advance, nor had they said anything in that brief exchange about how to deal with the Love God.

And yet, somehow, in that silent meeting of eyes, the understanding between them had already told each of them exactly how to strike.

Ariel gripped Heavenly Flame and bent her body slightly.

The surging flames abruptly compressed into a single point.

Muen, too, drew all his blade-light inward.

No longer looking at one another, both of them fixed their eyes on the enemy before them now—the Love God, shrieking in fury from being offended once more by two mere insects.

Then—

Boom—

Zing—

Sword and blade struck at the same time!

【Humans! Do not think... that I will lose to you again!】

The flower of flesh suddenly contracted. Twisted tendrils shot out from the center, dragging the female corpses who had not yet been saved to the outer layer as a shield.

All the petals closed tightly, completely protecting that hideous flesh-lump inside, leaving only Parls’s face outside, screaming in agony.

It was perfect defense. More than a hundred solid bodies of flesh, combined with the power contained in this incarnation of the Love God, had already pushed the defense beyond what a peak fourth-rank and a fifth-rank warrior should have been capable of breaking.

And any direct assault would come at the cost of those hundred innocent souls.

But...

Though the two attacked at the same time, Ariel’s flames arrived first.

The blazing fire of Divine Favor burned furiously, swallowing the female corpses in an instant. Tongues of fire licked over their flesh, gradually reducing that shield of flesh into useless char and ash.

Every corpse was burned away completely, yet as before, the souls were carried off and sheltered by a powerful soul force.

Only then did Muen’s blade-light slash in, arriving at the perfect moment.

The blade-light condensed to a single point tore open the petals of the flesh-flower, and black flame slipped through the gap with it, beginning to devour the warped flesh within!

【ROAR!】

The hideous flesh-ball let out a furious howl. Blackened veins writhed like a nest of mad snakes.

The Love God raged. More twisted tendrils regenerated at grotesque speed. The petals of the flesh-flower were burned and devoured by Muen, yet more blood-soaked petals slowly bloomed in their place.

For a moment, the two sides actually formed a fragile balance. And with the Love God having come prepared, Its accumulated power seemed even greater. As Muen’s and Ariel’s spiritual strength rapidly drained away, It was gradually beginning to gain the upper hand.

Until...

A pale, slender hand reached out through the gap between the petals.

It belonged to the girl Parls had held in his arms before—the one he had claimed to love most.

Because she had been too close to Parls, half her rotting body had already fused into the flesh-flower. But while the Love God concentrated Its consciousness on resisting Muen and Ariel, the girl’s still-unpolluted soul had briefly reclaimed control of her body.

She did not run.

Instead, no one knew from where she produced a dagger and drove it into Parls’s anguished face.

"I don’t love you," she said.

"AHHH!!"

Parls immediately let out a bloodcurdling scream. The entire flower of flesh convulsed violently. Though the Love God was now the one in control, the flesh still ultimately came from Parls, and so the girl’s strike still opened a flaw in It.

Muen’s eyes sharpened. His figure flashed, and he was already at the very front of the flesh-flower.

Ariel moved almost at the exact same instant.

The two exchanged one look. Elizabeth and the Heavenly Flame Greatsword shot forward together, stabbing with perfect precision toward that malformed flesh-ball.

The flesh-ball tried to flee. Even as only an incarnation, It did not want to waste Its power again.

But the two of them had already sealed every possible retreat with the understanding of their coordinated attack.

There was nowhere left for It to run.

With a sharp ring, blade and sword met inside the flesh.

Then black flame and crimson flame ignited together, and amid the shrill, ear-piercing screech, gradually burned that twisted flesh completely to nothing.

In the final moment, the Love God’s gaze was still full of hatred and venom, but this time It could not even spit out any final threat...

Everything, all of it, was reduced to nothing.

...

...

When the flames finally dispersed, not even a trace of ash remained.

Through the broken corner of the ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) crystal palace, the sky could be seen.

The night was clear. Stars covered the sky.

"Is it over?"

"Yeah... it’s over..."

Muen dropped to the ground in something close to collapse, looking up at the souls rising into the heavens.

The incarnation of the Love God that had come to stir up trouble, along with Parls, had been burned to death. The innocent souls had been set free. In the end, that brave girl’s soul had also been able to bring her own tragic story to an end...

The upheaval that came at the end of this date had finally, at last, reached its conclusion.

Thankfully, this time it was a happy ending. The Love God’s scheme had failed, and It had thoroughly lost one of Its incarnations.

Even for It, that had to hurt.

The whole thing was over. If this were a movie, the credits ought to be rolling right about now.

Muen stretched lazily, thinking to himself that he could finally relax for a bit—

"I meant... is the date over?"

"..."

Muen froze. Then his eyes widened in surprise as he looked down and realized Ariel had already put away Heavenly Flame. She had tucked both legs neatly beneath her skirt and turned her face slightly away, her fingers continually winding through her hair.

She looked exactly like a shy young girl.

And only then did Muen remember that the reason this story had reached a happy ending at the close of the date rested on one condition.

That was...

"Gulp..."

Muen swallowed hard. The flames had long since gone out, but for some reason he felt hot all over again.

That heat did not come from outside.

It came from within.

From the depths of that heart knocking against his ribs all over again.

Muen cautiously moved closer to Ariel and gently took her hand again.

Ariel was very obedient. She was even a little nervous as she took his hand back in return.

Muen moved completely close to her, feeling her heartbeat pounding just as loudly as his own, then lifted his other hand and lightly brushed her cheek, turning her face back toward him. Her little face had already gone red like sunset clouds.

Their eyes met. Her eyes and lips both seemed soaked in the Milky Way, sprinkled with starlight.

"This time, are you going to refuse me?" Muen asked softly.

"Who... who knows?"

Ariel pouted, but lifted her neck like a swan.

"Don’t know... Then I guess I’ll just have to try."

Muen cupped the girl’s face and slowly leaned closer, while the girl, full of embarrassment, closed her eyes...

"Ah!"

A faint figure suddenly popped out of Ariel’s ring.

"I need to go check whether there’s any residue of Love God pollution left. I was careless last time, so I can’t relax this time! You two go on, go on. Leave this sort of thing to me!"

Peles coughed dryly twice and fled at top speed.

Leaving only Muen and Ariel staring at each other helplessly.

The mood had been completely wrecked.

"That doesn’t count. Again!" Ariel bit her lip.

"All right."

Muen said nothing more. He kept cupping Ariel’s little face and slowly leaned in again...

"Wait!"

Ariel stopped him. "Let me get ready first."

She patted her burning, flushed cheeks with both hands.

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale...

"Okay. I’m ready now."

The two of them leaned in again...

"Wait again!"

Ariel turned her gaze aside and said in a fluster:

"I... I’m a little panicked. Let’s count down from three, okay?"

"Okay."

Muen found it both exasperating and funny, but also terribly adorable.

"Whatever you want."

"Then I’m counting?"

Ariel’s expression gradually turned serious, as though she were about to conquer some terrifying ancient ruin.

"Go ahead."

"Then I’m counting... I’m really counting..."

"Count already. Go on."

Muen waited patiently, waiting for Ariel to finish preparing herself and count down from three.

"Three..."

Ariel counted to three.

Then she suddenly grabbed Muen by the collar.

Muen’s eyes widened. Before he could react, he felt two lips, soft as jelly, press firmly against his.

"Mmn... Muen, I like you..."

...

...

【Gluttony Progress: 100%】

...

End of Volume.