Chapter Twenty-Five

Jessica was bored.

She was vexing out the frustrations bottled up in her chest by randomly flipping the magazine in her hands roughly now. Each time she slapped the poor and innocent papers across to the other side, it would produce a soft yelp as if it was pleading her to be gentler with it. But Jessica wouldn’t care more. She ignored the tore on the pages and continued with her violent actions.

Her only source of entertainment, Kwon Yuri… Jessica exerted more force into her hand as she recalled how the helpless girl allowed her friend dragged her away without even trying to struggle out of the hunter’s grips.

And she promised she would stay! Yet she let that desperate girl named Choi Sooyoung dragged her away!

A sudden loud yelp was released from the poor magazine in her hands. It finally brought attention to Jessica that she had just literally ripped off one of the pages.

“Hing!”

She threw the supposedly new magazine, which turned out to be crumpled in a very bad state now, across the room. It came in contact with the door opposite when it opened suddenly and hit the poor book back against the wall due to its swinging force. The frustrated girl was surprised when she realized who just barged into her ward.

“Yuri?”

“Hey Sica!”

Yuri was panting by the door. Sweats were trickling down her rosy cheeks but she didn’t seem to care. She took in a deep breath to ease her oxygen-deprived lungs and walked in big steps, hurriedly, towards the bed, extending her hand to the confuse blonde.

“Come with me! I have something to show you!”

“Huh? But–but I…” Jessica lowered her head and observed the particular clothing she had on her body now. As much as she liked to take Yuri’s hand and go off with her, the doctor just told her this morning not to move about too much in case the stitches on her wounds tore open again.

“Aish! How did I forget?” Yuri slapped herself on her forehead, reprimanding herself for forgetting the biggest issue ever! “Come on, I will carry you!” She went on lifting up Jessica in bridal style without the lady’s acknowledgement and rushed out of the room.

The blonde shrieked as she quickly wrapped her arms around the tanned hunter’s neck, afraid that she would drop to the ground if Yuri loosened her without warning.

It was only when Jessica felt the cool breeze caressing her exposed skin – her hands, feet and neck – Jessica then realized she was all along, burying her face in her carrier’s chest. Her face turned intensively warm in split second, but she refused to budge as she knew she would be swallowed by the coldness surrounding them if she moved away.

“We’re here.”

Her voice was like the wind. It was soft and gentle as it touched her ears. Jessica, who was still burying her face against Yuri’s chest, could feel Yuri’s panting from her ascending and descending chest. She closed her eyes and listened to beating heart attentively. It was pumping fast, yet strangely melodically as if it was playing a piece of music.

Jessica subconsciously tightened her intertwined arms behind Yuri’s neck and leaned in closer towards the hunter’s chest.

This is her first time ever listening to someone’s heartbeat. She never knew that the sound of heartbeat could be so interesting. It reminded her of the lullaby her father used to hum for her when she was still a young child.

Peaceful, relaxing and most importantly… it was filled with Father’s love and care.

“Hey Sica, wake up!”

The sudden shook on her body caused Jessica to jerk up in surprise. Her eyes snapped open and she observed their surroundings. They were on some rooftop now, possibly the infirmary’s rooftop since Jessica felt that the journey was short. The whole place was filled with darkness and the only object she could see was the person she was… hanging on to??!

“Eek!” A high pitch dolphin squeal was released and Jessica almost dropped to the ground if Yuri hadn’t held her tightly.

“Woah! Chill, Sica! It’s me, Yuri!” Yuri hugged Jessica closer to her body and moved to the only bench that was situated next to the door and settled down on it. She gently put Jessica down before plopping down next to her.

Jessica was flushing madly. Why did she even scream?

Yuri was still chuckling at Jessica and her adorable action. But to tell the truth, she was surprised by that dolphin-like squeal. She almost thought she was going to turn deaf from it.

“Had a nightmare?” Yuri was convinced Jessica had fallen asleep while they were on their way here. She had this experience once where she and Jessica were having a conversation, the lady fell asleep in the midst of it.

Jessica shook her head shyly. How could she tell Yuri that she was surprised by herself for pressing her ear against her well-developed chest? And not to mention she was actually enjoying the beating of her heart, like who would actually listen to some other’s heart beat? Only ert would do so, but NO!

She. Is. Definitely. NOT. A. ert!

Jessica felt her cheeks burning again. She quickly hid them behind her palms… completely forgotten the fact that the lack of lightings was enough to cover up for her.

“Look up there, isn’t it pretty?” Yuri, who was oblivious to the blonde’s embarrassment, pointed to the sky where tons of stars glittered at them as though they were winking, flashing their wide smile at them.

Jessica followed her trail and her visions naturally caught the spectacular sight above her.

“Wow…” was the only word she could piece out now.

She had never seen such beautiful scenery before, or rather, she was never given a chance to since her mother never allow her out of her windowless room. And when she finally had the chance to experience a new life in the outside world, she was caught up with too many things that she actually missed the most visible beautiful sight which played above her head every night.

What a shame!

“I wanted to show you the sunset actually,” Yuri scratched her head like an embarrass kid who had done something wrong. “But I guess I’m not that good at running so……” She let out an awkward laugh.

* In case anyone asked why is Yuri not good at running (‘cause she was incredibly fast in the prologue), that is actually a skill mastered by Aurales’ hunters (it is similar to sorcerers using teleportation). They don’t usually use it under normal circumstances.

Jessica didn’t mind at all, the amazing beautiful night sky was captivating enough to attract her interest and brought the most sincere smile she ever had in her life onto her face.

She really appreciated Yuri for sharing this with her, even though it wasn’t her actual intention. But it was the sincerity that counts.

“A-Choo!”

A sudden sneeze broke the silence between them. Jessica wrinkled and rubbed her itchy nose. Now that she realized, she only had a piece of thin fabric covering her body and it was obviously not thick enough to fight off the cold wind blowing against her.

“A-Choo!” She blew a loud sneeze again before wrapping her own body and hugged herself tightly.

There is no free lunch in this world, if you want to enjoy something, you pay for it. And this is what she is paying with now, her fragile body.

As if on cue, right after the second sneeze rang off, Jessica felt a weight was added onto her shoulders. She looked at Yuri in surprised, the hunter was only wearing a piece of tank top under her comfy leather jacket and yet she sacrificed it for her?

“Yuri, I can’t––”

Her protest fell on deaf ears, Yuri ignored the blonde’s struggle and forced her own leather jacket onto her. She tugged Jessica’s arm into the sleeves one by one and pulled the zip up before the girl was able to do anything to stop her.

Jessica tried to pull down the zip the moment she noticed Yuri settling down beside her again. She thought the latter wouldn’t notice her but Yuri was sensitive enough to catch her hands and held them together before the blonde was able to fulfill her wish.

“Just wear it.”

“But you are going to freeze to death!” Jessica exclaimed with a pout.

Yuri couldn’t help but laughed out loud. “Yah, that’s exaggerating. I’m a hunter, remember? Hunters are never weaklings––Aish!”

Jessica nudged Yuri’s head violently before the tanned hunter could finish her sentence. She crossed her arms and stared at Yuri with the iciest glare she had, “Are you implying I’m a weakling?”

Yuri’s eyes widened in surprise, why and how did she came to that conclusion!? She quickly denied, “No! I don’t mean that!” She secretly moved herself away from the angry blonde, why had she not notice this casualty she saved from the village could be as scary as Tiffany?

“Really?” Yuri moved back once, Jessica arched forward twice. No way was she getting away from the indignant blonde.

Yuri silently gulped the fear down , Jessica could totally put up a fight with Tiffany!

“Yup! I swear! I was just looking for an example.”

Jessica raised an eyebrow, “Uh huh…”

“Look! It’s a shooting star!” Yuri randomly pointed at the sky, hoping to divert the blonde’s attention which she fortunately did. Jessica gave up her pursue and was now searching the sky for the non-existence shooting star which Yuri was referring to.

“Where is it? Where is it?” Jessica grabbed Yuri’s hand excitedly and asked. Whatever resentment she had before was being thrown away like it never existed before.

Yuri chuckled at the sight of a child-like Jessica, true, this blonde might be violent at times, but she still retained her innocent self which was hard to come by for people at her age, living in this world of chaos.

The corner of her lips naturally curved upwards as Yuri slowly lay back on the bench.

No doubt, Tiffany eased her mind like nobody else did, but being next to Jessica was a completely different feeling. Jessica didn’t need to comfort her to make her feel good, by just looking at her every movements, Yuri was able to forget all the troubles revolved around her. She couldn’t explain the reason for this, but…

Yuri turned to her side and examined the girl who was frowning and pouting at the same time for the loss of her shooting star.

Maybe it was her genuineness which made her realized the wonderfulness in this world.