Chapter 59: Sense of Existence

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POV: Astrid

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“What happened to me yesterday… why did I let things end up like this…? I should have stopped it… but I felt so good…. and now what do I do?…. It’s my fault too…. haaaaaaaa… I’m going crazy.”

Sitting on the couch in her office, a beautiful purple-haired woman was talking to herself as she writhed around, acting as if she was in agonizing pain that forced her to move from place to place on the couch from which she had just awakened.

The pain she felt was not physical but mental, and the reason for this was that she remembered clearly and without exception everything that had happened the night before, up to the moment she lost consciousness.

This clarity was not accidental, for Astrid possessed two innate abilities since birth: an “affinity for runes”, a rare and highly valuable skill that would make her a master in magic and the creation of magic circles.

The other, a memory enhancement. While not as powerful as affinity for runes, it was a skill that had a lot of synergy with her affinity for runes, further enhancing her skill with them.

In fact, it was a good combination of skills and very useful for being a rune instructor, but it was not always something he was proud of in fact in his youth he had many problems in these skills, and the weight they carried.

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In her youth, she had been hailed as a genius, unique in her generation, after undergoing the temple examination when she was ten years old. Unfortunately, however, it was not something that was positive for a long time, and it was because she had no talent for growing up to be strong.

No matter how much she practiced mage breathing exercises to increase her mana or martial arts to improve her strength, speed, defense or any physical aspect, she never managed to become very strong; she barely achieved a metamorphosis at the age of fifteen.

This disappointed many people who had high expectations of her. Eventually, those who had expectations began to talk behind her back, considering her a waste of great abilities, which would have made her the genius of her generation if only she had a little talent.

So the years passed, until she turned eighteen. At that age, she barely managed to achieve two metamorphoses, and with even her family’s expectations already lost.

She became deeply depressed, she felt useless and someone without any use or value, she felt empty.

Well, there was something in which her value never diminished and even began to increase, but she could not be happy with something as superficial as appearance.

Besides her skills, the other reason she attracted attention was her beauty.

But to her, who never cared about that, she felt that it was not something to be proud of, for her that was nothing special, and it could not fill the emptiness inside her.

For her there wasn’t much meaning in her life, and she didn’t have much to live for, so she just went with the flow and lived for the sake of living she didn’t even try to become strong anymore and didn’t know which way to go, life had no pleasure or happiness, at least not for her.

That is why she did not resist when her father betrothed her to a duke who had granddaughters of the same age.

It was a great offer for her family, which had viscountcy rank without any significant power, and despite her lack of talent, Astrid was hailed as one of the great beauties of her generation.

Even if she didn’t like it, she thought she at least had some value and was someone useful because of her beauty.

Thus she was able to repay her family for raising her and for failing in their expectations, so she did not see it as absolutely wrong, as it was a common practice in the nobility.

Her marriage shook society and discouraged the suitors she had throughout the kingdom. There was opposition, but the duke’s authority and power were too strong, so all that fell silent after a while.

However, whether by luck or not, soon after the marriage, the duke stopped paying her nightly visits.

She, believing that even her beauty, which was the only thing she could trust, had failed, went looking for the reason, and after insisting for a long time, she was told that the duke suffered from impotence.

The only night they had together was thanks to a very strong medicine, in the hope that the great stimulus of doing it with a young beauty could make him recover from that problem, along with the medicine.

But the remedy had failed and there were no more chances, for after that night the duke was definitely impotent, so they would have no more nights together.

But miraculously, either by the increased vitality of the medicine or by coincidence, she managed to become pregnant. Now, reassured that she was not the problem, time began to move forward.

After that, the first few years were spent caring for her daughter, who had become her life’s purpose, believing that she had finally found something to fill the emptiness she had always felt.

She focused exclusively on her care and took a certain taste for motherhood, wishing to have more children. Unfortunately, this was not possible, and the duke, out of pride, prevented her from having relations with other men.

But she managed to at least ask him to be able to be a private teacher, which she felt was a close way to fill the void even more, of course without neglecting her daughter who was her greatest pride, and she began to tutor other children of the nobility in what she was good at: the runes.

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The years passed and she watched her daughter grow up, while she too continued to gain recognition as a rune instructor. Finally, the Academy called her, and without hesitation, she accepted the offer.

Now, imparting knowledge and caring for the next generations, she found her value and sense of existence, her chance to be useful and valued, the emptiness she felt, began to fill.

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Time passed, and despite her lack of talent, over the years she had managed to obtain two more metamorphoses and was considered a worthy instructor and the person with the best mastery of runes in the kingdom.

On the other hand, the age of the gods had begun, a time that many people feared and longed for in equal measure.

“She felt that was the reason for her existence and was more than happy to teach all those young people and watch them grow into the future pillars of the kingdom.

Twenty years after having her daughter, the second generation of representatives of the kingdom had arrived 5 years after the first, she was especially excited.

While she treated everyone equally, whether they were kingdom representatives or students in the normal years, because for her the important thing was to see them grow and develop, she couldn’t help but be more eager to teach the kingdom representatives.

The first generation proved to be superior to the average students in the other years, so she was eagerly waiting for the five years to pass and the second generation of kingdom representatives to gather and teach them properly.

In addition, there was someone who stood out among the other students, and he especially caught her attention as an instructor.

She was more interested in him than in the person the kingdom believed would be its chief representative.

However, her interest was purely as an instructor; she felt he was someone worth teaching and seeing how he would grow.

She paid special attention to him, and her joy peaked when she noticed that he was good in the field of runes. It was a pleasant surprise.

She was eager to have him as her assistant and teach him many things, but he acted professionally and expressly warned of the duty and what came with being her assistant.

Even so, he volunteered, and after he expressed his desire to become a magical warrior, Astrid internally supported his decision and without further ado chose him as her assistant.

It was at that moment that the origin of his now agonizing situation began.

In fact, he came to her office more than punctually and handled the job as assistant perfectly. Even so, Astrid had put some complicated tasks in between his work so that he would have questions to guide him.

Unfortunately, she underestimated his talent; he was able to complete all the work efficiently and correctly, which surprised her greatly and further fueled her desire to teach him and share her knowledge.

But that would be for another day. ’Now it was time to go’, or so she thought at the time, but she began to have an idle chat with him until she somehow ended up in him giving her a shoulder massage.

She wasn’t losing anything, as it was simply a shoulder massage, but she warned him that they should keep things in order, as a student and instructor, as a young man like him could get carried away.

She still knew she was someone beautiful, and there is a possibility that the student could do improper things, even so, she didn’t take it seriously she thought she could stop him and scold him at any time if things turned that way.

But that was only in the worst case scenario, the student seemed to have pure intentions of relieving her so she let her guard down.

He thought it would be a simple massage, like a student who wanted to score points with his instructor, so he saw nothing wrong with it as long as it was up to his shoulders.

The moment his hands touched her, Astrid felt something she had never experienced before: an electricity coursing through her body, relaxing her.

Her shoulders, which had always bothered her, began to relax. It felt too good and she simply let herself be carried away by this wonderful sensation that made her feel light and liberated.

In fact, she felt like she was about to release something, but she didn’t know what. She simply let everything flow and let herself be guided by that massage until the end.

It was when she felt she was about to reach something wonderful that the pleasurable massage stopped. She didn’t know why, but she wanted more.

However, the student told her that that was all and he was done, at least with the shoulders. It certainly felt great, but he wanted more.

She watched as the student withdrew, but felt that something had been left unfinished, so she instinctively stopped him.

That was his biggest mistake and the cause of current remorse.

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