The Devil's Temptation!

105 Silver Mark

“So where exactly are we going?” Asked Roshan as he gently pulled at the reins of his dark stallion, moving it to stand beside Leasis who stared at the open forest ahead of them.

Rampaging through her inner thoughts, he already knew she had no ulterior motive or something that would trigger his suspicion towards her, she looked more like a free person who just wanted a little horse ride with someone.

“”You know how to use arrows and bow? Right?” She questioned with interest while giving her white stallion a pat and Roshan just nodded.

A young boy who looked no older than sixteen hurried towards them, handing out the bow and arrows.

He scurried back after that, leaving Leasis to chuckle lightly after seeing Roshan’s blank expression.

“I sense your strength.” Uttered Leasis as she threw a bow for Roshan and he skillfully caught it.

“I’m just a humble human.” He responded but Leasis didn’t need anyone to tell her that he was certainly more than that.

“First one to hit as many targets as they can, wins.” She offered while pulling out her bow and arrow.

“So this isn’t just a horse ride.” Roshan finalized it himself. Leasis met his gaze and shrugged with a guilty smile, “this is much fun than a normal horse ride. My partner who I normally do this with is drowning with the crowds at the event.” She rolled her eyes.

.....

Seeing as she wanted to race that badly, why not use it to his advantage since Ark Ville had more wiser people. There’ll be lots of grimoires he can go through and hopefully find something that can explain a meteor mark.

That is the promise he wants to fulfill before letting the annoying woman go. He actually feels she deserved better and something told him she’d only feel that way if he keeps as much distance as he can from her.

“Can I make a proposal then?” He requested, but seeing as his expression meant no harm, she gestured for him to go on.

“You’ll get me all the books that speak of a symbolic sign.”

“What do you need them for?”

“For reasons that don’t affect you in anyway. Deal?”

“Well then, meet me at the finish line. Hyah!” She gave the stallion a gentle squeeze at its side before dashing off.

Roshan, who was starting to find this quite interesting followed suit. They raced into the forest and only when they got close did he understand the path inside the trimmed forest was divided in two.

“Is it always like this?”

“It’s used to test everyone’s ability based on themselves in person, you’ll understand once we begin.”

She took the left path, leaving Roshan to take the right and a surging sense of throbbing feeling crawled into Roshan’s nerves.

~

“Your bite mark is already fading, you should be completely fine after a matter of a few days.” Anna assured Nicholas who was back in the room after the first day of Event had ended. She had to tend to his wounds since Madame Alina already told her she needed him ‘spotless.’

“Ignore my mother.” Nicholas suddenly began and she met his stare. He cleared his throat while looking away with an uncomfortable expression as though he could guess her thoughts, “my mother can be overly dramatic if that’s the right word to use.”

Anna neatly bandaged his arm along the elbow side before taking a step back from Nicholas.

“I think she’s just concerned about her son so it’s normal for her to act like this. You should focus more on taking care of yourself so she doesn’t have to worry too much.” Anna politely advised before reaching for the tray at the table close to his bedside, placing the herbal ointments on top of it.

“So uhm... you’re from Euphrasia Kingdom, what’s your kingdom like?” He asked. A knowing smile crossed her lips and she shook her head slightly.

“Euphrasia is just like any other normal kingdom, I can’t say it’s one of the most powerful kingdoms out there but Euphrasia is known for its really good resources and great numbers of high nobles.”

“I see...” he nodded his head in understanding before letting his gaze wander to the unique silver mark on her forehead.

“Nice mark.”

“Hmm?”

He pointed at her forehead, indicating he was talking about her birthmark, “a silver mark, it’s pretty much the first time I’m seeing one.”

Anna felt the meteor mark on her forehead and her face secretly turned Ashen, but she hid it behind a smile while lowering her gaze, “thank you.”

“Is it a gift?”

“I wouldn’t hundred percent say that.” She never really liked talking about her birthmark, it brought her quite a lot of discomfort and forced her to remember the fact that her days were really coming off short.

How Roshan intends to help her get rid of it still remains a mystery to her, according to the old physician it’s all fate, but she wished date brought along an easy suggestion along with it as well.

She had been so occupied lately that she didn’t even count the number of days she had left to live, at first she didn’t picture it as necessary but now, she would start marking the days, so she can do all that her heart felt like doing before her time comes.

“You didn’t sustain any injury from the event,” Anna quickly changed the subject, “that’s actually impressive.”

Nicholas nodded, “my father trained me well when it came to things like this, enough reason why I want this bitemark to heal quickly so I wouldn’t be restricted from the rest of the event.”

He sighed and Anna understood his point, that’s why she was sort of impressed cause it’s never easy to battle while sustaining a severe injury, yet he came out unscathed.

“When are the rest of the events?”

“There’ll be one tomorrow, you should come watch.”

“I’ll definitely be there.” She found it really interesting to be precise and Nicholas felt somewhat lightened by her response.

There was a knock on the door and before Nicholas could give whoever it was permission to step in, William already walked in, leaving him to shake his head hopelessly.

“Morning to the both of you.” He said right away before turning his attention to Nicholas and a conversation started.

Anna used the opportunity to quietly step out of the room and on her way down to the kitchen, the dragon painting caught her attention but she didn’t let herself fall into it’s trance again.

Lord, when will she leave this place?? Or maybe she should stop looking at the picture and act like she never saw it, that’ll be a lot better.