Chapter 364: 364. She’s Afraid After Seeing Me, Well, She Deserves More of That

Nerith looked at him for a long moment.

Something moved through her expression that Rex, fifty meters into the tree line, could read clearly: the particular shift of someone who had just received a piece of information that simplified one thing and complicated three others simultaneously.

The leaves trembled once and settled.

’She’s easy to read… and now she’s acting all calm even though I still know she’s trying to tell him the truth about me.’

“You have the worst timing,” she said.

“I know,” Apollo said. “I’m sorry.”

“No, please… don’t apologize.” She looked at her hands. “Don’t apologize for that.”

They were quiet for a moment.

“I don’t know what I feel,” Nerith said. “I want to be honest about that…”

“I don’t know what I feel about a lot of things right now, and I think trying to answer you properly when I can barely answer myself would just be…” She shook her head. “It would be unfair to you.”

“That’s fair,” he said.

“It’s not an answer.”

“It’s the honest one,” Apollo said. “That counts.”

She looked at him, and something in her expression changed to a softness and complexity Rex hadn’t seen from her in days. It wasn’t a resolution nor a decision.

Just the specific quality of warmth that appeared when someone understood what they were being offered and hadn’t decided yet whether to take it.

Then Aisella’s voice carried through the trees from the direction of the corridor, calling for Apollo. A moment later, Talyra’s voice joined from a slightly different angle.

Apollo stood up with the reluctance of someone who was being required to leave before they were ready. He squeezed Nerith’s shoulder once, briefly and deliberately, and said, “We’ll talk more when this is done.”

“If you want that, of course.”

Nerith looked up at him. “Hmm… maybe,” she said, which was not a no.

He walked back toward the trees. He passed Rex’s position against the broad trunk without registering him, footsteps receding back toward the group.

Rex stayed still until the sound was gone.

Then he stepped out of the trees and walked toward the basin.

Nerith got up from the rock, wiped her face with her sleeve, and turned to walk back. She took exactly two steps before walking directly into Rex’s chest.

He caught her by both shoulders before she could step back and looked down at her face as she looked up at his.

The leaves went completely rigid.

“Whoa there…” Rex gripped her shoulders hard. “Where do you think you’re going, lady?”

“R-Rex…” Her voice was unsteady. “I didn’t see you—”

“I know,” Rex said.

He didn’t release her shoulders. His voice was level the way it was when something underneath it was not.

Nerith studied his face and sensed a shift that caused her to freeze. It wasn’t the usual calm attentiveness he displayed.

Instead, it was something quieter and far more unsettling.

“H-how long have you been… standing there?” she said, and it’s not a question but a reaction of how scared she was.

“I don’t know…” Rex said. “Probably… long enough.”

The color drained from her expression in the same way it does when someone understands the meaning behind those words.

Rex let go of her shoulders and stepped back, which somehow worsened it rather than better.

“Those eyes and leaves… I can see it clearly in you,” he said. “You were going to tell him, huh?”

Nerith was shocked hearing that, and her face clearly shows it. Rex smirked when he saw both her legs are shaking because she’s scared that Rex was about to do something to her.

“I… I wasn’t,” she said fast. “I didn’t try to… say anything about you, I swear!”

“Aww, come on now, stop it with the bullshit,” Rex laughed. “You know that’s not true from someone who’s trying to get help by giving some hints like that.”

“And what’s even funny is that… your fucking Apollo doesn’t even realize what it meant.”

“That’s just the real proof of how FUCKING STUPID he is…”

“D-Don’t say that…” Nerith disagrees. “He’s not stupid… he’s just trying his best as the Apostle of Life…’

“He’s not… like you…” She said that part with a low voice.

“What was that? I didn’t hear you clearly from all the bullshit glazing!” Rex said while making his ears closer. “As a matter of fact…”

“I’m not fucking stupid like that disgrace of an apostle…” Rex said with a dominant look. “I will always know the feelings of any women…”

“And if they’re against me, oh, let me tell you…”

“I won’t let them loose… they’re already a prey that’s ready to step on the trap I’ve set.”

“You said someone on the expedition,” Rex said. “You said the two pictures don’t fit together.”

“You said calm isn’t the same as safe.” He looked at her with the patience of someone who had heard every word and retained all of them. “You were one more question away from snitching on me, and it’s fucking funny that you can say it.”

“What’s even funnier is that fucking virgin is not going to trust your words right away because…” Rex gets closer to her ears. “…I fucking saved his life from being banished by Aethelgard since the explosion incident.”

“Well, sure, if he’s a fucking simp who trusts his woman more than his savior…”

“But still… his life is in my hands,” Rex said while clenching his fist in front of Nerith. “And I can ruin it at any moment.”

Nerith opened her mouth and closed it again.

“And he asked,” Rex said. “He asked who it was.”

“You heard about it right… I said no,” she said. “That’s the only proof you need of how I didn’t tell him.”

“Well, this time,” Rex said. “I don’t know the next time.”

The silence between them had a weight to it that the waterfall couldn’t cover. Nerith was watching his face with the focused attention of someone trying to read a surface that was giving them very little to work with.

“I held it,” she said. “I kept my word.”

“You kept your word while telling him everything except the name,” Rex said. “You gave him the shape of it, Nerith.”

“You handed him the outline and left the center blank and called that keeping your word.”

Her jaw tightened. “What did you want me to say?”

“He asked if I was all right, and I said the channel was affecting me.”

“And then you said it wasn’t only that.”

“Because it isn’t.” Her voice came out sharper than she intended, and she pulled it back. “I refuse to sit here and lie to him about being fine when I’m not, and I don’t believe that’s what you truly want from me either.”

Rex looked at her for a moment. The expression on his face had the quality of someone who had arrived at a conclusion and was deciding what to do with it.

“What I want,” he said, “is for the things that happened between us to stay between us.”

“That was the agreement.”

“I know what the agreement was.”

“Then you understand,” Rex said, “why I’m disappointed.”

The word carried a weight that Nerith had clearly not anticipated. It wasn’t anger or a threat; it was disappointment, which felt more challenging to bear than either of those emotions.

She gazed at the water. “I’m sorry,” she said, her voice soft.

It was as if uttering those words required a sacrifice. “I almost did. I know I almost did.”

“Almost is not the same as ’didn’t’,” Rex said. “But it’s closer than I’d like.”

He stepped forward, closing the distance between them, and his voice dropped to the register he used when he was saying something he intended to be remembered. “You’re going to have more conversations with him before this expedition is over.”

“He’s going to ask again, because that’s what he does, and the next time he asks… I think that’s going to be the perfect chance for you to spill all those feelings.”

Nerith met his gaze and held it.

“I won’t,” she said. “I promise…”

“Then you also know,” Rex said, “that I can’t let that stand without a reminder, even if it’s just one time.”

The leaves went from rigid to the slow, uncontrolled amber wave that appeared when her emotional regulation had reached its capacity.

She was watching him with an expression that had more layers in it than she was probably aware of, because the druid connection she had to her own state was not a buffer against complicated feelings; it was just a more honest window into them.

Rex reached out and took her wrist, not tightly, just with the grip that meant she wasn’t going anywhere yet, and looked at her with the calm that she had described to Apollo as feeling like old growth.

“The forest is going to be loud today,” he said. “I’d like you to walk with me.”

It was not a suggestion.

Nerith looked at his hand on her wrist, then at his face, then at the water one more time with the particular expression of someone who had already made the decision even though they were still looking for the place to put the resistance.

“N-No… please…”

“Hm? What was that?”

Nerith flinched. “Y-Yes…”

“I’ll walk with you,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Rex released her wrist and turned toward the trees. He walked at a pace that was comfortable and unhurried, and after a moment Nerith fell into step beside him because the alternative was standing alone at the waterfall, which was not better.

The light in the canopy above them was amber and warm, and the forest said nothing.

[Nerith Sylvarune — Desire Level: 68/100]

…

They walked in silence for some thirty meters.

Rex was a few steps ahead, walking unhurriedly, like someone who had already decided everything and was just letting the moment arrive at its pace.

Nerith came next, and she had the look of someone who was trying hard to look calm but not quite managing it. The slow amber wave of leaves was still in her hair, and her grip on her staff was tense from working harder than she had to.

Rex halted.

He turned unexpectedly, stopping short about two feet away from her. She looked up at his face and saw that he was wearing the expression she found most difficult to handle: the patient one, which offered nothing and demanded nothing in return, yet somehow felt like pressure.

“You did good today,” said Rex.

Nerith blinked. “I—”

“Considering,” he added, which made the compliment into something else.

She was still working out what to do with that when he moved.

BAM!

The strike was executed with precision and devoid of any drama. It involved the use of two fingers or the side of the hand to target a specific nerve cluster located at the base of the skull, where the neck meets the hairline.

The force applied was carefully calibrated to induce unconsciousness in approximately one second, ensuring no injury was inflicted.

Rex had learned the location in a previous life from a source he no longer remembered with any clarity, and he had confirmed it in this one through several encounters that had given him adequate practice.

Nerith made a small sound that was not quite a word.

Her staff struck the ground first, followed by her knees. Rex caught her before she could fall further, wrapping one arm around her back and gently lowering her to the forest floor, maintaining the same unhurried efficiency he applied to all his actions.

“I’m going to manipulate her now.”

“This is going to be the first warning for her, and if she does it again…”

“…I’ll rape her hard for real.”

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