Free Web NovelThe voice held the bow-spear against her chest for several seconds.
She didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Just breathed.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
The weapon vibrated softly in her arms, as if it too were exhausted.
The rest room remained just as calm. The low fountain in the center let out a soft sound of moving water. The warm light covered the room.
No enemies.
No tremors.
No sounds of metal chasing her.
Just silence. And that, somehow, made her tremble more.
The voice looked down at her hands and noticed they were slender and pale, but coated in dried blood.
She swallowed.
'I'm alive.'
She thought it again, as if she needed to confirm it. Then she looked toward the entrance she had shot out from. The dark hole was several meters above, almost against an angled wall. There was no sound from the other side.
The voice breathed slowly. The wound in her side had closed, but the pain was still there, like a warm memory beneath the skin. Her legs hurt. Her arms hurt. Her back hurt. Her wings, though hidden now, hurt too.
Everything hurt.
"Matt…"
No answer.
She pressed her lips together.
Until a while ago, that would have irritated her.
Now it frightened her.
Because if Matt still wasn't answering, it meant he had truly left her alone.
And if he had left her alone…
She didn't know if she could get through the next room.
The girl looked at the fountain. Then at the bow-spear.
'First I need to calm down.'
It was the most logical thing.
Rest.
Heal the body.
Eat.
Check the weapons.
Think.
But there was something she needed to do first.
Something irritating.
Very irritating.
She had to see what was happening with Matt.
The girl closed her eyes.
The rest room began to drift away. Not physically. Not with the body. But with the mind.
The sensation was strange. Like sinking inward, descending through a place with no stairs, no walls, no air.
The sound of the water disappeared.
The warm light went out.
And then the darkness appeared.
…
The voice opened her eyes in a nearly pitch-black room.
It was the mental world. The same space where Matt had hidden.
There was a dark room, barely lit by the faint blue light of a half-sleeping monitor. The walls were plain. The desk was covered in cables, a half-empty water bottle, and a few things tossed around carelessly.
There were also clothes on a secondary chair and a bed in the back.
And in the center… Matt. Sitting in a large, black, ridiculous gaming chair. He was reclined back, arms resting at his sides, and a sleep mask covering his eyes.
The voice went still.
For several seconds, she didn't know what to say.
Matt was asleep sitting in the chair, with a sleep mask on like he was in a hotel and not in a cave where enemies were trying to kill them.
As if she hadn't been seconds away from being sliced open by a saw.
The voice opened her mouth, then closed it. Then opened it again.
"How…?"
She looked at Matt.
Then the chair.
Then Matt again.
"How can you sleep sitting up…?"
Matt didn't respond.
The voice took a step toward him, still in disbelief. The silence of the room was heavy, but not threatening.
It was a comfortable silence.
Ridiculously comfortable. As if Matt had turned that corner of his mind into the exact place to stop existing for a while.
The voice gritted her teeth.
"Matt."
Nothing.
She moved a little closer.
"Matt."
Nothing either.
She leaned toward him carefully.
She didn't know why she was being careful.
Maybe because part of her felt that waking Matt up abruptly could be dangerous.
Or maybe because after everything that had happened, seeing him like that, still and not suffering, struck her as strange.
Too strange.
The voice raised a hand and touched his shoulder.
"Matt."
No response.
She shook him slightly.
"Matt, wake up."
Silence.
The voice frowned.
"This is not the time to sleep."
Nothing.
Her patience ran out. She grabbed both his shoulders and shook him hard.
"Matt!"
Matt's body rocked from side to side in the chair.
The sleep mask stayed in place.
"Matt, wake up already!"
Matt let out a low sound.
Not a shout.
Not a loud complaint.
More the sound of someone whose perfect nap had just been interrupted.
"Ugh…"
The voice stopped.
Matt slowly raised a hand and pulled off the sleep mask. His eyes opened halfway.
Tired.
Groggy.
Annoyed.
Very annoyed.
The voice felt relief.
Then rage.
Then relief again.
Matt looked at her and went still.
For an instant, his expression didn't change.
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But the voice noticed.
She noticed it in his eyes.
In how his gaze dropped just slightly, like someone who had just seen something that reminded them too much of a nightmare.
The voice was standing in front of him. But here, inside the mental world, she wasn't invisible. She wasn't just a voice. She had a form. Her form. Or almost.
White hair to the shoulders, red eyes, pale skin. The feminine body that the vampire blood had shaped from Matt's.
She wasn't Iris. That was obvious.
Iris had longer hair, more elegant, more polished, more like an arrogant princess who had been born knowing the world was supposed to serve her.
The voice wasn't.
Her hair barely reached her shoulders, a little messy. Her expression was more tense. More insecure. More human in an irritating way.
But that didn't change the problem.
She looked too similar.
Too much like what Matt hated.
Like the form the queen had tried to impose on him.
Like the princess everyone kept insisting on seeing.
Iris.
Matt felt revulsion.
Not at her exactly, or maybe at her. He wasn't sure.
The voice noticed the shift in his gaze and looked down slightly.
Matt blinked. Then put on a flat expression.
A fake one.
Too fake.
"What do you want?" he asked in a hoarse voice, pretending drowsiness.
The voice looked at him.
"That's the first thing you say…?"
Matt yawned.
"What else do you want me to say?"
"I don't know. Maybe thanks for not letting us die…?"
Matt tilted his head.
"We didn't die?"
The voice stared at him.
Matt was quiet for a second.
Then raised both eyebrows, performing a laughably weak fake surprise.
"Oh. Unexpected."
The voice narrowed her eyes.
"Are you making fun of me?"
"I don't have the energy to do it properly."
"That was making fun of me."
The voice clenched her fists. Then breathed slowly.
She had no time to argue.
Well. She had time, but she didn't want to.
"I got out of the room."
Matt leaned his head back against the headrest.
"Did you kill the skeleton?"
The voice looked away.
"No."
"Then you didn't get out."
"Yes I did."
Matt opened one eye a little wider.
The voice crossed her arms, though the gesture lost weight because she was still trembling.
"I fled. The place wasn't a normal room. It was incredibly long. I thought maybe killing it wasn't mandatory, so I kept flying until I found a way out."
Matt didn't respond.
The voice continued, a little faster, as if she needed to justify every word.
"First I found a wall with no door. Then I went the other way. The skeleton chased me the whole time. It almost caught me several times. I got the bow-spear back and found a hole in a side wall. I threw the weapon in first to check if there was space, then I went in."
Matt watched her in silence.
The voice looked down.
"The passage brought me to a rest room…"
Matt still said nothing.
That made her nervous.
"What?"
Matt blinked slowly. Then spoke:
"Well done."
The voice went completely still.
Completely.
"What?"
"Well done."
She looked at him as if she'd just heard something blasphemous.
Matt frowned.
"What kind of face is that?"
"You're… you're complimenting me?"
"Yes."
"You?"
"Don't make it weird."
"The same person who calls me a parasite?"
Matt sighed.
"You're still a parasitic nuisance."
The voice lowered her shoulders slightly.
"Ah."
"But you did something right."
She looked at him again. Matt settled in the chair.
"I was focused on how to destroy it by any means, but I never seriously thought about escaping."
"Really?"
"Yes."
The voice didn't know what to say. Matt looked to one side.
"You found a solution I didn't see."
The room went quiet.
For the first time since she had entered, the voice didn't feel attacked.
She didn't feel safe either.
Just…
Strange.
Her cheeks felt a little warm.
That irritated her.
A lot.
It made no sense.
"I-I…" The voice looked away. "I just thought that if I couldn't win, I had to find another way…"
Matt glanced at her sideways.
"That's called strategy."
"Aren't you going to say it was cowardice?"
"It was useful cowardice."
The voice looked back at him with indignation.
"Matt!"
"What? I'm complimenting you in my language."
"You're horrible."
She went quiet. Then breathed slowly, trying to regain control of the conversation.
"Now that we're in the rest room, I need you to come out." free𝑤ebnovel.com
"No."
The answer was immediate.
The voice blinked.
"What?"
"No."
"You didn't even let me finish."
"I don't need to."
The voice took a step toward him.
"But I need you to take control of the body to repair the weapons…"
Matt pushed the sleep mask up to his forehead and looked at her with exhaustion.
"No."
"Why?"
"Because I don't want to."
"Matt!"
"And because I've been thinking."
The voice went still.
"About what?"
Matt smiled just slightly.
"Your offer."
She swallowed.
"My offer?"
"Yes. The one about replacing me."
The voice didn't respond. Matt rested his elbows on the chair's armrests.
"You wanted to stay with the queen, right? Pass yourself off as me, or whatever that old woman wants me to be, while I go home."
The voice looked down slightly.
"Yes."
"Then you have to learn."
She looked at him. Matt raised a finger.
"How to fight."
Then another.
"How to repair weapons."
Another.
"How to act like you know what you're doing."
Another.
"And preferably how not to die at the first serious problem."
The voice gritted her teeth.
"That last one doesn't depend only on me."
"It depends quite a bit on you."
"It was an impossible boss that regenerated!"
"And yet you escaped."
She went quiet.
Matt gestured to one side with his head.
"Then start there. Use the rest room. Practice. Eat. Repair the weapons as best you can. Learn."
"But I don't know anything about those guns…"
"Your problem."
"You made them!"
"And you want to replace me."
The voice tensed.
Matt continued with a maddening calm.
"If the queen sees you don't even know how to hold them, she'll get suspicious."
The voice swallowed.
The queen.
Just thinking about her made her mental body tense.
"What are you thinking about?"
Matt smiled.
"You want me to come out so you can dig through my thoughts?"
She opened her eyes, nervous at the implication.
"No…"
"Sure?"
"I… I wouldn't do that…"
"Right."
"Seriously, I wouldn't…"
"Mmhm…"
"Matt!"
Matt settled back into the chair.
"If you're not going to dig through my thoughts, then you don't need me to come out."
The voice clenched her fists.
"I just want to know what you're planning…"
"And I want to sleep."
The voice looked at Matt with a mix of rage and disbelief.
Matt closed his eyes again.
"Go train."
"I don't want to."
"You have to."
"But I'm tired…"
Matt opened one eye and his gaze was cold.
"And how do you think I feel?"
The voice didn't respond.
Matt took off the sleep mask completely and left it on his lap.
"I've been in this damned place for months."
His voice no longer sounded drowsy. It sounded low and worn out.
"Months fighting in endless rooms. Sleeping badly when I wasn't in a rest room. Half-healing. And killing every damned enemy."
The voice looked down.
"Do you think I didn't want to rest?"
"I…"
"Do you think I wasn't exhausted?"
The voice didn't know how to answer.
Matt let out a dry laugh.
"And let's not even get into how boring it is to eat by drinking that fountain water like an animal."
The voice barely frowned.
Matt went on:
"Although the worst part is…"
He stopped.
The voice looked up.
"What?"
Matt smiled.
"You'll find out."
She narrowed her eyes.
"Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Say something worrying and then go quiet."
"Are you scared?"
"Matt."
"No."
"Tell me."
"I don't feel like it."
"Matt!"
"You have to start learning on your own."
The voice clenched her jaw and Matt leaned back again.
"Besides, right now you're nowhere near being able to fool the queen."
She went still.
The sentence landed on her like a stone.
"I already know that."
"No, you don't know it enough."
"Fine!"
Her voice came out louder than she expected.
Matt looked at her.
She lowered her head.
"Fine. I understand. I'll be quiet…"
Matt said nothing and the voice breathed slowly, trying to swallow the frustration.
Part of her wanted Matt to come out.
Not just because he knew how to fight.
Not just because he knew how to repair the weapons.
But because if he controlled the body, she could see his thoughts.
His real thoughts.
Not these cutting sentences.
Not these irritating smiles.
Not that fake calm.
She could know what he was planning.
But there, in the mental world, face to face, it was different.
Neither of them could read the other completely.
And Matt knew that. That was why he stayed there.
Sitting. Comfortable. Insufferable.
The voice took a step back.
"Fine."
Matt closed his eyes.
"Good."
"I'm going to train."
"Better."
She looked at him with annoyance.
"I hate you."
The voice clenched her fists. Then the room began to dissolve around her.
The last image she saw was Matt putting the sleep mask back over his eyes, as if he were genuinely going to sleep.
The darkness swallowed her.
…
The voice opened her eyes again in the rest room.
The physical body was sitting on the floor, still holding the bow-spear.
The fountain was still there. The warm light too. For a moment, she just breathed. Then the pain became clearer.
"Ugh…"
The leg.
The shoulder.
The side.
The wrist.
Everything was still healing, but not perfectly.
The fountain.
Matt had healed himself in those fountains before.
She remembered. Not from having lived it in her own body, but from shared memories.
The rest fountains helped close wounds, recover energy, and clean dried blood.
The voice looked at the water. Then at her torn clothes. Then at the blood stains on her arms.
"It can't be worse than what just happened."
She got to her feet with difficulty, walked to the fountain.
The water looked clear.
Calm.
Harmless.
The voice dipped one foot in and froze.
"It's freezing!"
Her voice bounced off the entire room.
No response.
Of course, Matt didn't answer.
The voice gritted her teeth.
"Damn fountain…"
She put the other foot in, then lowered herself slowly and the water reached her knees, then her waist, then her chest.
Every centimeter was an assault.
Cold.
Cruel.
Refreshing, yes.
But cruel.
The voice shivered.
"How can he bathe in here like it's nothing…?"
Then she heard a laugh inside her head.
Matt.
The voice opened her eyes.
"Are you laughing?"
The laugh stopped.
Then Matt's voice appeared, lazy.
"Just a little."
"You said you were going to sleep!"
"And you said you were going to train."
"I'm healing."
"From where I'm standing you're shivering."
"It's cold!"
"Yes."
"You could have warned me!"
The voice gritted her teeth.
"I hate you."
"Focus. The fountain helps."
She clicked her tongue, but didn't get out.
The water was awful, but it worked. She could feel it.
The burning in her side eased. The wrist stopped hurting. The fatigue in her muscles grew lighter.
The voice plunged her hands into the water and then brought some to her mouth.
Cold.
Very cold.
But clean.
She drank.
Then again.
And again.
Then she just started gulping desperately.
She hadn't realized how thirsty she was, or how hungry.
The fight had left her hollow.
Her throat was grateful for every swallow.
Her stomach too.
The voice breathed hard.
"This… helps."
Matt responded from somewhere in her head:
"Yes, I can see you're a real genius."
"For once you could sound less irritating…"
She kept drinking.
Then took another step into the fountain.
And another.
She wasn't thinking much.
The water reached her chest, then her neck. The floor of the fountain descended toward the center.
She hadn't noticed that.
Her foot searched for footing.
Found none.
The voice blinked.
"Huh?"
Her body went down.
The water covered her chin.
Then her mouth.
Then her nose.
Her eyes snapped open.
'Ah…'
There was a problem.
A small one.
Well.
Not that small.
She didn't know how to swim.
"Mmgh!"
She tried to find the bottom.
There was none.
She tried to move her arms.
She did it wrong.
Very wrong.
Water went into her mouth.
"Ghh!"
She sank a little more.
Panic hit her immediately.
Not the cold fear of battle.
Not the terror of the sword.
A stupid, humiliating, completely new fear.
She was drowning in a fountain!
The voice thrashed her arms.
Matt's body was powerful.
Vampiric.
Fast.
Capable of fighting monsters.
But none of that mattered if she didn't know what to do in water.
"Mgh! Ghh!"
Matt started laughing.
Not a small laugh.
No.
A clear, full laugh.
Unbearable.
"Pff—!"
The voice, still half-submerged, opened her eyes with fury.
'Don't laugh!'
Matt tried to speak between laughs.
"Are you… drowning… in the fountain?"
She swallowed water.
That made everything worse.
'Shut up!'
"No, this is historic."
The voice thrashed her legs.
The body went down a little more.
The panic rose.
Then she remembered something.
Wings.
She had wings.
Shrrrk!
The black wings burst out underwater all at once.
It was a terrible idea.
The water exploded in all directions.
SPLAAAAASH!
The entire fountain shook.
The voice shot upward like a wet arrow.
"Ahhh!"
FWOOSH!
She came out of the water, soaked, with her white hair plastered to her face, her clothes dripping, and an expression of absolute mortification.
She landed outside the fountain clumsily.
Thud!
She dropped to her knees.
Water dripped onto the floor. freewebnσvel.cøm
For several seconds, she didn't speak.
Just breathed hard.
Matt was still laughing inside her head.
The voice clenched her fists.
"Not a word."
Matt breathed between laughs.
"We have a lot to work on."
