Unrequited Love
The sun had completely set, leaving behind a quiet evening. Luina's light purple hair caught the bright moonlight and fluttered gently in the breeze. Paired with it were her orange eyes, sparkling as they held the starlight within them.
After finishing the dinner Kael had prepared, Luina stepped outside the house and spoke as he saw her off.
“Well, I’ll head back now. It’s getting cold, so you should go inside.”
“Isn’t it too dark to go back now? You can stay the night if you want.”
There he went again with that kind of line. Luina barely managed to swallow the affirmative answer that nearly slipped out at Kael’s words and shook her head.
“You know elves can see just fine in this much darkness. Besides, even if monsters or bandits show up, it’s no big deal. Don’t worry and go on in.”
“Alright, then… be careful on your way back.”
Perhaps because he knew her skill level well, Kael quickly accepted it and nodded. He waved his hand, then disappeared completely back into the cottage. Only then did Luina slowly let out the breath she had been holding.
“Haaaa……”
Her heart was still pounding, the tension refusing to ease. Luina knew exactly what this feeling was—the one making her heartbeat race right now.
“Seriously… I almost said yes without thinking.”
Love. As an elf, Luina had rarely experienced such an emotion in her long life, so when she first felt it, she wondered if she was mistaken. But now, she was certain. This feeling she held was indeed love.
When had she first started liking Kael?
Turning away from his cottage and beginning her walk, Luina quietly answered her own question in a low murmur.
“It was probably… during the war.”
The Human-Demon War. Tens of thousands of humans had been sacrificed and killed to drive the demon race out of human lands. It was in that war that Luina had first met Kael, fought alongside him, spent time with him, and learned what it meant to love someone.
“Of course, it’s just my unrequited love……”
The problem was that this love wasn’t mutual. It was one-sided, something only Luina carried in her heart. If she wanted to win it, she would have to gather her courage and confess.
“……But I’m still too embarrassed to do it.”
Yet Luina still lacked the courage to put her true feelings into words. Anyone watching might worry that if she kept wasting time like this, she would never even manage to convey her heart. But because she had spent more time with Kael than anyone else in the war—a place where humanity’s true nature was laid completely bare—she wasn’t overly concerned.
“There’s plenty of time, so it should be fine……”
After all, both she, an elf, and Kael—who may look human but wasn’t truly one—had an abundance of time. Elves lived eternally unless killed, never aging. And though Kael appeared human on the outside, he didn’t age in the normal sense either. She hadn’t learned the exact reason yet, but Luina knew he shared her immortal lifespan.
And the reason she believed there was plenty of time wasn’t just because of their longevity. Another reason was that she knew, with the war now over, there was currently no room in Kael’s heart for a woman.
“If I confessed now, I’d get rejected one hundred percent.”
If any woman tried to step into his heart right now, she would simply fall into the deep, dark hole left by the war and be swallowed whole. So Luina planned to approach Kael slowly, over a long period. At least until that hole was filled enough for her to stand beside him without issue.
“If I make the most of my time… once a month? No, that might be too frequent.”
Having already scoured every bit of information from the kingdom and nearby villages to locate his cottage, Luina was pondering how often she should visit when a silly smile suddenly spread across her face.
“Hehe…… Me and Kael as husband and wife……”
Of course, Kael probably still thought of them as nothing more than friends who happened to share a name on paper. But the fact that, to their child, she and Kael were mom and dad filled Luina’s heart with warmth. It was enough to make her understand why married humans always wanted to raise children.
And it was only after she had walked the dark path smiling foolishly at the thought of being Kael’s wife that Luina finally regained her senses—once she arrived at the village.
“Aigoo, I’m exhausted.”
During the war, I could fight all day after sleeping only three or four hours and never feel tired. Yet now, doing things other than battle, I somehow felt even more worn out than back then.
Still, I had finished buying all the supplies the baby… Elia would need, and our sudden guest Luina had left. With nothing major left to worry about, I let out a groan and sank into a chair. My eyes met Elia’s, who was lying on the thick blanket spread over the bed, staring at me with wide eyes and babbling.
“She really doesn’t cry much, does she?”
I had thought newborns cried at the drop of a hat. Was I wrong? From the moment I found her in front of the cottage until now, Elia hadn’t cried even once. It felt strangely un-baby-like.
Even earlier when she had to relieve herself on the way back, she had simply made some loud babbling noises instead of crying. She truly hadn’t cried a single time.
Worried there might be some problem I wasn’t aware of, I checked her physical condition and the mana inside her body, but nothing seemed wrong. After spending about thirty minutes confirming that Elia was perfectly normal, I finally lay down beside her.
Plop———
“Sigh, why are there so many things to worry about?”
I hadn’t even spent that much time with her yet, but there were already so many things that concerned me. I couldn’t help but worry. Raising Elia like this was one thing, but the longer we spent together, the more attached I would become. If I was already this concerned, what would happen later?
I had never raised a child before, so I didn’t know, but I wondered if this was how one became a doting father. As I had those silly thoughts and stared at the ceiling for a moment, another thought suddenly came to mind.
“……What am I going to do with the rest of my life?”
Until now, I had been too busy getting used to the Marika Continent, adapting to this body, raising my disciples, and fighting in the war to even have time for such thoughts. But now everything was over.
My body, which had once been nothing but a game character, had fully become my own. The war had completely ended, and I had decided not to raise my disciples any further after the conflict. I had even earned a barony in name only for my tremendous achievements, along with this cottage and the small territory it stood on. Not to mention enough money to live luxuriously for at least fifty years. Socially, I had more than enough freedom.
Lost in thought over the question that had slipped from my lips, I stared blankly into space.
“Maybe I should start by tending a field?”
The land around my cottage had almost no stones beneath the soil and was quite fertile—perfect for farming. Plus, while the village wasn’t far if I ran, walking there every time was still a hassle. Since I had time to spare, becoming self-sufficient with ingredients seemed like a good idea.
I nodded, deciding I would head to the village soon to buy some seedlings.
“I’ll make the field small on the left side first. And…… I should build a training ground behind the house too.”
Farming and raising Elia were important, but no matter how peaceful the era had become, I couldn’t let my well-trained body grow dull. I needed to keep training steadily.
This was the Marika Continent. A chaotic medieval world where anything could happen at any time. Moreover, according to the flow of events, I had only just finished the prologue of the game. The war with the demons that ended a month ago was, in the game, nothing more than a single line of background text explaining the world before choosing a character.
To me, this was reality. But the Marika Continent I knew only truly began more than ten years from now.
“A lot has already changed, so maybe it doesn’t mean much……”
Of course, because of my existence, countless things had already diverged. The long war that was supposed to last over seven years in the game had ended in just three. It wasn’t a simple butterfly effect—it was like derailing the entire predetermined track.
In other words, this place was no longer a world that followed the game’s story. It was a real world where I had changed the past and was now heading toward a new future. Aside from a few major events, the chances of the game’s plot unfolding exactly as I remembered were almost zero.
Even so, the continent was still dangerous. Training my body to prepare for any situation was essential. While I hadn’t set any long-term goals yet, I had decided on a few short-term ones. Noticing Elia had already fallen asleep beside me, my eyelids grew heavy as well.
“Let’s get some sleep first……”
Since I could only sleep lightly anyway, I would wake up if Elia cried or babbled. There shouldn’t be any problems while sleeping, so there was no need to worry unnecessarily.
With that half-hearted reassurance, I slowly drifted off to sleep following Elia’s lead. It wouldn’t be a very deep sleep.