“’Cherished’ is it? If you meant whether she’s my significant other then I guess more or less, we haven’t started any physical intimacy though, so I guess it leans more to the less.”

I sighed. Although we enjoyed each other company, we’re not sure where to proceed in physical terms and that felt restricting. The other thing that bothered me was her recent suggestion towards polygamy.

“But you two are always together and not like a bodyguard and master but like lovers and also I heard from others, that you had wrapped your hand on the Crimson Goddess too!”

Ghiscra stuttered with an exaggerated manner.

They called Rino the ‘Crimson Goddess’? Quite appropriate since never before in my life, had seen a woman undauntedly carved a path of slaughter singlehandedly.

“Wrapped around my hand huh? I think it mutual affection so there’s a difference.”

Mutual affection as in being close but since Vefal had given me the green light to turn it into a romantic type, i'm tempted. Note, tempted.

I looked at Ghiscra, who was still staring at the communication device as though it would suddenly lit at any given moment.

I looked at my watch and the dot was still without a light. There’s still more time.

Now that I think about it, she’s a woman too and unrelated to my dilemma.

The more opinion I have, the more I can make my choice.

I cleared my throat.

“I have a question if you deign to answer, is it alright?”

“Ask away.”

She casually replied.

“What do you think about multiple partners in marriage?”

Her curving pointy ears perked up and while furrowing her eyebrows.

After a moment of pondering…

“I think whether it’s fine or not, it’s rather situational… in the end, what matter is whether all of them are content right?”

“From a logical standpoint, that’s kind of correct but emotional speaking, can you imagined someone else sharing an intimate moment with someone you deeply loved?”

She made the same face and after a few second, she suddenly winced.

“I-I guess it is vexing and I felt my heart had literally constricted just now but it’s still just a flare of emotion…”

She spoke in a low tone and the last sentence ended in a murmur.

“Let’s not talk about this anymore… Say, do you have someone that you interested in having a relationship?”

Upon hearing that, she made an ‘Eeeps!’ sound and hid her face away from me but the outline on the side of her face was blushing faintly.

“I-I supposed it’s normal to want affection so, I do have several in mind!”

She stammered while still trying to hide her face.

I love teasing this sort of people, so I smiled sardonically.

“Well, being a kind soul, I’m willing to assist you in fulfilling such desire if you just confide to me.”

“I guess… Its fine since we already established our trust with each other but I don’t need you to assist me. I just needed someone to relieve these thoughts!”

She swiftly turned her blushing face and beamed at me with a giddy expression.

…

So she wasn’t actually shy about it but she was brimming excitement at having someone to confide.

“So firstly, you know how all living things are genetically geared in choosing their mating partner via external physical appearance as superficial as it may be and the more intelligent ones factor in other various circumstances like social status, desirable traits and more so after some observations, I already had several persons that I find attractive!”

Still waiting and staring at the device, she excitedly gushed out her enthusiasm but I felt like she was explaining research data rather than a girl telling her list of crushes.

“The top of the candidates would be Kiefy as aside from his good looks, he has the ideal body frame and personality…”

Minutes had passed by as she ruminate her list but I gotten more and more despondent as I listened. It was because-

“Well that’s all from the Tenth Summoned, now moving on to the Natives…”

I’d hit rock bottom. After going through the Tenth Summoned, the list had excluded her cousin, Therius, Fryphov for his incompatibility, Ghrukka, for their ambiguity and me. Hell, all of the first three was at least mentioned but me- not even a word.

It’s like I’m not even worth considering.

I took a severe mental blow as I was spacing out while staring vacantly at the ground.

All the words coming out from Ghiscra was blurred out and then the sound of an Eomancy spell circle formed from the device was buzzing but I was too depressed to clearly hear them out.

--

“You looked dejected ever since we got back from the project. Wasn’t the project successful, so why are you sulking?”

Vefal who was sitting my right, had a worried expression etched on her face. That critter whom Vefal had named ‘Burra’ was also staring at me with its beady eyes.

I’d recovered little by little but the mental shock still lingered.

I turned to look at both of them with a resigned expression and sighed quietly. Then I looked back vacantly at the floor of the boat.

Vefal was perplexed by my behaviour so she moved closer towards me.

“What’s been bothering you?”

Her psychic sense is not working here but that aside, I gave a self-depreciated smile while turning towards her again.

“… I had a recent conversation with Ghiscra. It was something concerning about her interest in men… so she went by and listed all the tenth summoned… except me… I was the only one not mentioned at all.”

Being reminded of this, my shoulders fell slumped and my face turned sour.

“Pfft… hahahahahahaha!!”

…

Vefal burst out in laughter and everyone nearby was surprised because the cold-faced warrior they heard and seen had transformed into a woman. I frowned at her as I felt betrayed by her because she was making light of this.

After a few second, she restrained herself and wiped out the tears flowing from her eyes. So she’s that amused…

She then beamed a refreshing smile at me and closed in to my right ear-

“I can’t help but to think that a man who is so calculating and reserved would actually get upset over such petty thing. Don’t you think the reason is just hilariously anti-climactic? Also, aren’t you full of yourself, you already having two persons giving you affections?”

She winked as she pouted.

Realizing that, my mind blanked out and then I gave a chuckle. I guess my childish streak is abnormal as I recalled how upset I was when Vefal teased me about what Rino did and I gave her the cold shoulder the entire time.

Also, that was self-conceited of me to think that every woman should find me attractive and charming because of my supposed wittiness and gentleman mannerism!

If I were to rate my physical appearance from 1 to 10, I would say 5 in a good day, 3 if I was beaten repeatedly in practice spars with Rino and 1 if Ubermensch suddenly professed his homosexual love for me.

Both of us gradually giggled and as she was closed enough, she leaned onto me and our shoulders supported each other.

It’s comforting warmth and after a while, she rested her head on my shoulder.

I looked over her and the sight of her peacefully entrusting herself onto me and the expression of contentment she had on her face made me smiled involuntarily.

On her right arm, Burra was nestling comfortably as it slept there and on her left arm, she had placed her hand on her left thigh.

I always had the thought of this but never had I tried because I was always afraid on taking that step. When we first stargazed, I held out my hand to help her stand but I never thought of holding on to it until that night when we stargazed and talked about crazy thing like marriages.

Before I knew it, my hand was already on top of her.

She looked at me with an upturned angle and upon making eye contact, she closed her eyes gently.

She flipped her hands and instantly both of us, as though knowing each other intention, gripped our hands together.

At least I know now how loved I am.

Oh, now I remembered what I wanted to ask Vefal.

“Vefal, it’s been bugging me for a while and it’s of kind non-sensical so to speak but I realized did we just skipped immediately to marriage? Technically, we’re in a relationship set for marriage, right?”

She looked up at me with a genuine confusion. I continued-

“What I meant was that in my world, not every relationship is set for marriage because who knows if one of us lose interest and even in marriage, we can divorce each other.”

“Divorce?”

Eh? She doesn’t know?

“Do you know what a divorce is?”

She shakes her head.

“Ruigne, we Herlf, to put in it word, when we fall in love, we would only fall once and we’ll never fall out of love after that. Then again, it’s… very hard for us to fall in love so that sorts of balance the whole thing. Some Herlf had never fallen in love before so they either die alone or get marry out of obligation.”

Am I to understand that she’s basically saying that the race of Herlf is genetically predisposed towards ‘True Love or fated one or star-crossed lovers’? She continued-

“It’s also why the concept of willing separation is quite alien to us and in fact only in our fictions something like that would happen.”

“Is that why polygamy was approved in your world?”

It does make sense if that is the case. If you truly love someone, you’ll stick with him or her no matter what even if he or she were to have another lover… if I were to adopt the same mind-set.

“I supposed that is a reason as when two persons or more fall in love with the same person. I guess I don’t dwell too much on it because of my upbringing but what I do know is that no matter happen or what you do in the future, I’ll be with you always.”

She snuggled close into my embrace and I instinctively took her in.

Then I realized my action and I sort of understand what she meant.

Wait, the Herlf can only fall in love once so if the Herlf male or female falls in love with their first spouse than logically speaking, marrying the second and after those is just out of sense of duty.

……

I don’t want to spoil our moment.

--

After three days, we finally arrived at the outpost overlooking the north.

We had set up about three of the nodes along the way after we calculated the distance between the nodes since the start of the journey. Well, Ghiscra did.

“Hello!”

[You don’t need to yell okay, I’m putting this thing so damn near my ear!]

Ghiscra was talking on the device with the distant Shakil.

Looks like all four nodes synchronized quite well without any hitch.

Right, we were inside one of the many rooms of the outpost. Beside Ghiscra and I, Vefal and her pet squirrel and Erganisu was here too.

We decided to meet up as quickly as possible just so we can start the operation that I had planned during those three weeks earlier.

While Ghiscra was communicating with Shakil, I was sitting face to face with Erganisu.

“How was your trip?”

Erganisu was looking at the sight of Ghiscra holding the device near her face. For him, it must have been a bizarre scene seeing a woman talking animatedly by putting a slab of glowing stone beside her face.

“Ah! My apology… that was quite distracting. Anyway, I had few troubles for the past weeks but I learned a quite a great deal about the tribes of Symokiva especially the eastern part. I’m quite eager to learn about the cultures of the northern part but I wonder why you are here along with Ghiscra and Vefal? Is there is an important matter that needed your presence here?”

“You can say that I suppose. Well, to start with…”

I gave him details about the current situation of Symokiva. He listened attentively and occasionally posed some questions.

After I finished, he sat there with his eyes closed. After a few second, he opened them. At this point, Ghiscra was sitting beside Vefal at the corner, talking with each other in a hushed tone.

“I will do my best in assisting your effort.”

-and he gave a smile.