The Nymph wants to be Plundered - Chapter 2
Swallowing what would forever remain an unspoken confession—one she could express neither skillfully nor shyly—she glanced at Cassis one last time before finally turning to depart from the bedroom.
She looked back just once. Only to verify that no soil particles had escaped from her pouch to soil his sacred bedchamber. Even if they had, she would have had no leisure to gather them.
She left no note expressing gratitude, requesting he forget her, or conveying trite wishes for his future happiness.
They were not close enough to warrant such gestures. Cassis had merely cared for her out of goodwill, without any contract or benefit. It was pure, selfless benevolence.
Unlike his usual sensitive nature, Cassis did not awaken. Polyxene had been correct in saying his energy would decline dramatically after midnight.
He would be fine. Though for her, a brief emptiness and eternal silence would descend…
It’s all right.
She would take all of her troublesome love with her, leaving behind nothing that might threaten him.
***
The Morning After
The following dawn, cold blue eyes scrutinized every corner of the room with profound displeasure.
She was gone.
The bed where they had embraced, the sheets that still bore evidence of their passion—she was nowhere to be found in the bedroom. Not only that, but the refreshing presence of the wood nymph could not be sensed anywhere within the castle. Despite his sensitive elven nature, which would normally allow him to detect her without releasing mana, he stood motionless, straining to hear.
Perhaps she had hidden somewhere, ready to emerge with an embarrassed smile. Perhaps if he made a loud noise, she would become frightened and tremble in some corner, possibly injuring herself.
She was fragile and, as a nymph, required protection—eternally within the sanctuary of his warm, large hands. That was the destiny of Evelyn, transformed into a nymph.
“Evelyn?”
His voice when calling her name was hoarse and clouded.
Today was when Cassis was at his weakest point of the year.
Before becoming the guardian of the World Tree, his magical power, originating from the bloodberry tree, harmonized deeply with the elven forest for this single day. She could not have known that even his movements would be slowed today.
How peculiar. Out of all possible days, how could she have chosen precisely this one to disappear without permission?
Cassis’s sculpted white face contorted entirely—from his brow to his eyebrows, from his lips to the edge of his chin.
Where had his crucial secret been revealed? Who would benefit from Evelyn’s clandestine departure? Who would desire to abduct her from the safety of his arms?
…But what use were such questions? She had likely chosen to flee of her own accord.
The World Tree that protected Jupiter Castle made it impossible to substantiate the malevolent concept of Evelyn’s abduction. If she had been forcibly expelled, the branches of the World Tree would have extended ferociously to protect her, using its roots to subdue and bury any adversary.
This was the oath the World Tree had pledged to him. Therefore, her absence from the castle indicated her firm resolution.
The nymph had fled. On her own two feet, rejecting the embrace of her lover—her only key to protection.
“Ha.”
A low, simmering laugh of derision escaped Cassis’s throat, immediately followed by a question that had lost its master:
“Evelyn, why did you run away from me?”
The curious gaze of Evelyn, who had often engaged in timid quarrels and meddling, was kind-hearted. She was indeed a nymph, establishing herself as the one special being who permeated his monotony.
Finding pleasure in this, he graciously listened to her words during the day, and at night, with her hair flowing freely, he indulged in ravishing her trembling body. While her lips falsely protested, could he not have known that her love for him was deeply engraved in her passionately responsive flesh? Even you sobbed that you loved him when reaching climax! He had told her that he desired and loved her too, that it was not merely carnal desire.
He wants to embrace her right now.
Last night’s lengthy lovemaking is already becoming as hazy as winter mist covering a lake. The insensitive air that surrounds only Cassis feels stale. He could not tolerate even a single day’s absence without her.
More than that, he worried about her vulnerability.
Evelyn is an incomplete being who cannot remain whole for even one day without his assistance. The sapling that had maintained her life as a nymph had long since withered and died; another tree had merely been placed as a substitute, an illusion. Without his life force provided regularly, Evelyn would…
“…Ah.”
He understood. The method used to encourage tender-hearted Evelyn to leave the castle, and who the perpetrator was.
Sentiments steeped in sorrow would neither save her nor bring her back to the comfort of his embrace. Since the tree of Evelyn, a dryad, had become him—Cassis—there was only one way to resolve this situation.
A nymph’s feet must stand on the natural element from which she was born. She cannot move away from it, nor should she. If the nymph is not here, then the tree that protects her must shake off the soil in which its roots are embedded and rush to envelop the nymph in danger.
Nature is not always generous. When necessary, it can embrace madness and sweep away anything. Before Evelyn, he was confidently the embodiment of nature that possessed her.
Cassis moved, ignoring the throbbing headache that tormented him. The battle to reclaim his escaped love, Evelyn, had begun.
