33 Risen#re

Edith almost choked on the words she was about to say, 'God dammit, why did I already say yes,' she reproached herself.

"And you don't sound like my Edith when you speak like that so please stop it," Lirian implored her not even realizing the psychological trauma he was leaving on her.

Edith felt like she had been knocked on both sides of her head by two pans simultaneously, 'He doesn't like it when I try to sound all sweet and charming, but he just called me "his Edith",' she thought with a dreamy smile.

'Get your head back in the game,' she chided herself and continued, "What I mean is that we need to set boundaries, like for as long we are together I don't to so much as catch you looking at another girl," she came on a little stronger than she intended as she remembered the reason, she had started to fight with him in the first place.

She didn't like that jealous feeling in her gut, and she hated the way it made her act, it clouded her head made her think like a fool.

"Seeing as how I'm blind, I don't think that you have to worry about that," Lirian replied with a teasing tone as he realized what she was trying to do.

'So little Edith wants me all to herself, I suppose my unbridled beauty has taken her heart by storm,' he thought with a sly smile that didn't go unnoticed by Edith.

"You know what I mean," Edith gnashed her teeth and slapped lightly him across the top of his head.

"Yes, yes of course for as long as we are together in the academy, I'll swear off all other girls," he conceded like it was a difficult decision, but internally he didn't care about it, 'It's not like theirs anyone else I'm interested in anyway.'

Edith ignored the part about him only swearing of other girls while they were in the academy, it would be dumb of her to expect him to never have a relationship with another woman over their two-hundred-trial, and the same applied to her, she was going to enjoy the time they had together, but when she was undergoing her trial, she had no clue as to who she might come to love.

In truth one in every ten candidates failed their trials, because they fell in love on the fringe worlds, and decided not to continue pursuing the road of emperors and empresses.

She was slightly surprised by how easily he had agreed, but she was happy to hear it, "There is one more thing," she said with her voice going a little queasy as she thought about it.

'Gods, I wish that I had some alcohol to speak about this,' she cried to herself, forgetting her earlier resolution to abstain from alcohol.

She could she fell Lirian looking at her quizzically as he waited for her next words, she took a deep breath and prepared herself, "I know that we've been pretty intimate before but that's because I was drunk, so...no sex... at least not until I'm ready," she panted heavily.

"You weren't drunk just a few minutes ago," Lirian argued with a teasing grin, ", and if you make sounds like that when it's just us kissing how am I supposed to control myself."

Edith's eyes went wide and her entire face resembled the surface of a red sun as she lowered her head in utter shame.

"Fine be like that," Edith snapped at him, ", maybe I don't to be with you anyway," she pulled herself off him and turned around to leave, but she soon found herself caught by her hands.

Lirian pulled her into a tight embrace, he locked her back against his chest wrapping his arms around her hand-sized breasts, and he brought his head to her shoulder as he whispered into her ear.

"Sorry, but that isn't an option anymore, you already agreed to be mine," he said in a fierce whisper.

Edith struggled to keep her thoughts straight, Lirian was so small compared to her but he had two things always going for him, his looks that could win over any young girl's heart.

But the thing that always took Edith by surprise was his extraordinary presence, it was so thick and powerful bending everything towards him on a tangible level.

She sometimes wondered if he even realised how intimidating his presence could be, she doubted that even the greatest emperors and empresses of old contained that unyielding presence that he exuded so naturally.

As she felt her mind almost melt, she nodded stupidly.

"Good," Lirian chuckled, ", and I agree to your last condition, but when you decide that you want to do it, you're going to have to say it loud and clear to me," he said with a wicked grin.

Edith nodded weakly not even realizing what she was agreeing to do.

'Based on how sensitive she is, I doubt that it will be long before she wants to do it anyway,' Lirian thought happily.

"Alright now we have less than an hour to rest before we head out, you should go and get some sleep," Lirian whispered in her ear before letting her go.

As he watched Edith take slow steps forward, he heard a whisper in his head.

"You should kill her now," number 12 hissed.

Lirian took a deep breath and gently massaged his temples as he forced himself to ignore the voice.

"Did you say something?" Edith asked turning around suddenly, she had heard him mutter something as she was walking away but she couldn't make out his words.

"No nothing," Lirian quickly replied, as he hid his panic, 'It's getting worse, I'm already merging with the voices,' he realized in silent trepidation.

When Edith left completely, he heard number 12 whisper again, "You know that I'm right, soon she'll betray you just as 'Katherine' did to us."

"Do you not remember how love made us so blind when we were Killian,"

"Kill her before your love gets us all killed," number 4 snapped, cutting of number 12's slippery words.

"I do not love her, stop spouting of your crap, we just started dating and it will come to an end before we leave for the trial," he argued against their foolishness.

In response, all that he heard were numerous cackles of laughter as each and every one of his selves felt that he had said the stupidest joke in existence.

"You might be able to fool every other person in existence, but it's just stupid to try fooling yourself, we are the god who was always alone, and we loved all those that ever gave us even the slightest of attention, you might not bear the curse like all of us did, but deep down you are still us," number 12 said slowly.

The nine-year-old number 3 surprised everyone when he suddenly spoke, "Chase after the girl, maybe that way we can die sooner," he said with a voice full of longing.

"Have you forgotten what that entity told us, our life is not our own this time we have people we have to..." Lirian began to remind them of the foreign entities' words and of their parents.

"Kukuku," number 3 chuckled, ", so what, we've suffered enough all these year without any meaning, why the hell should we care about the fate of others, why should we care about the heavens that marked us as scum by all beings!" by the time he finished he realized that he was shouting.

As Lirian was about to reply a sudden alert from the system went ringing through his head.

[Alert, Alert, Alert]

[Fate calculative functions of the system have been disabled]

[Host has entered into a Conflux of Fate]

Lirian's eyes widened, a conflux of fate was a scary thing for anyone, and those that feared conflux's than any other were diviners.

The main ingredient that Lirian used in creating the was the essence of 12 great diviners, he wished that he could have used a fate spinner, but even he was unable to evolve into one, in every plain he visited the only fate spinner he had ever known was Katerina.

A conflux was like the proverbial crossroads of destiny taking real form, it broke all the rules of fate and could change a lot of things.

The only thing that he truly knew about fate confluxes was that they would teach an important lesson to those that they are centred around.

When Lirian first activated the system it alerted him to a lethal danger on his fate string, but while inside this conflux that possibility was rendered as none existent, he could easily die, or he could even accelerate or slow down the coming events.

What made it so bad for a diviner, was that the future was impossible to predict or understand, not to mention that all the events that occur during a conflux are hidden by fate forever, so even if someone analyzed a fate string it would never show the events.

The only thing about fate that still worked was the natural luck boon it provided.

With that in mind Lirian quickly accessed the system and transferred the close to 900 trillion fate particles from the system onto himself.

He walked forward lost in thought, 'Fate confluxes are so rare, I wonder what could have triggered it.'

'Well, not that I've ever truly known what triggers one, it usually just happens at random, well I only know that important changes happen because of them, I wonder was I the trigger or was it something else?'