Extra And MC-Chapter 108 - 104 - Flowers & Affection

A few minutes after Evie left the fissure, Aiden and Flynn also did the same by jumping atop the cliff overlooking the snowy area they were in and followed the mana beacons back to the fissure’s entrance.

Immediately they walked through the fissure and found themselves back in the buoyancy of the depths of the lake’s crystal-clear waters, both brothers watched as the fissure’s dark, starry slit, thinned gradually until it completely vanished out of existence.

Taking that as their cue, the youths swam back upwards and soon, found themselves on the soft grassy plains that surrounded the beautiful lake.

With a relieved smile, Aiden motioned to his brother with a fist bump and Flynn returned the gesture with a similar smile mirroring Aiden’s.

"Mission complete!" Flynn commented with a grin.

"You said that as if you just finished a videogame’s mission" Aiden replied with a small chuckle.

The silvery-green haired youth in response to Aiden’s words, had the happy grin on his face widen just a tad bit more as he began to tap on the battle suit’s panel and almost instantly, the entire suit retracted back into the bracelet, leaving Flynn in his casual wears.

Aiden did the same and following that, both youths began to head back towards their dorms with relaxed steps.

It was still, relatively, early morning by the time both youths came out of the fissure, around 8:00am to be precise.

Although they had spent roughly five hours in the fissure, time flowed differently in there and as a result, even after delving into it at around 6:00am in the morning, coming out by around 8:00am didn’t come as a shocker to both youths.

As both brothers casually began walking away from the lake, Flynn suddenly stopped in his tracks, surveyed the area round him for a few seconds, much to Aiden’s slight confusion and then, slowly began to walk towards the area of the lake that had a bunch of Lakelight Blossoms nestling on its edges.

"Oh! So that’s what you were looking for!" Aiden said with a small clap of realization.

"Yeah. Ivelia apparently needs more of this for her new potion" Flynn replied while now gently uprooting the iridescent bulbous plants from its roots and carefully placing them into his spatial bracelet.

"Hmmm… didn’t she pack a crap ton of it into the dorm yesterday?" Aiden asked while helping to also pick out a few.

"She did… but unfortunately, she wasn’t able to get the required effect. That’s what she told me" Flynn answered casually.

"I see…" Aiden replied.

After his response, both brothers shared a quiet moment of foraging the bulbous plant and after about one minute had passed, they both decided that they had foraged enough.

Following that, both youths began to make their way into the Whispering Grove, the comfortable silence shared between both of them still present.

But once again, Aiden watched as Flynn stopped in his footsteps to survey the area around him and this time, he watched as his brother began to gather a bunch of beautiful crimson red roses, pastel-hued lilies and pink-colored sprigs, all of which melded perfectly to create a symphony of fragrant floral scents.

"Uh, what are you doing?" Aiden asked, genuinely confused by his brother’s sudden display of knowledge in floral designing.

This chapt𝓮r is updat𝒆d by ƒreeωebnovel.ƈom.

Flynn in return, tilted his head and looked at his brother, also wondering why he would ask such an obvious question.

"Picking flowers" he responded after a short while.

"Of course I know you’re picking flowers you little punk! I’m wondering why?" Aiden asked his brother again, a hint of confusion but mostly, curiosity present on his face.

"Oh that. You should’ve been more direct then Aiden" Flynn replied to his brother with a smug grin.

"Will you drop that smug grin already and just tell me what those are for?!" Aiden questioned his brother again with a squinted gaze, his hands pointing to the bouquet of flowers and his tone, curious.

"Well, these are all flowers a female would like, right?" Flynn rhetorically spoke to his brother with a question of his own.

"Yeah?" Aiden replied.

"And the Award Ceremony is at the end of this week?" Flynn rhetorically asked again.

"Yeah?" Aiden answered once again, still curious about what Flynn was up to.

"So add those two together mister!" Flynn replied with a coy grin.

Aiden at this point, with his eyes twitching in slight annoyance, just wanted to move close to his brother and smack him at the back of his head but just as he prepared to do so, something clicked.

"Seriously… I can’t believe that was it…" the youth muttered to himself while face-palming.

"You want to ask Ivelia out to the banquet, don’t you?" Aiden suddenly answered while shaking his head in resignation at his brother’s plan.

"Attaboy Aiden!" Flynn replied with a slight, approving nod, a small grin on his lips.

"Wouldn’t she go with you even if you didn’t ask?" Aiden calmly asked again rhetorically, one of his eyebrows arched.

"She would…" Flynn began.

"But you see Aiden, there are things a man must and should do in situations like this. Noble etiquette and all demands it, but, most of all, I’d like to be a proper gentleman" he concluded with a small smile.

Almost immediately though, Flynn suddenly spoke again.

"Which is why I want to ask Aiden?" the youth began.

"Why have you been subtly pretending as if you haven’t noticed Caroline’s advances?" Flynn asked with a small knowing smile.

Aiden suddenly having his brother catching him off-guard, wanted to avert his gaze but seeing that Flynn had completely caught him red-handed, sighed in defeat as he responded.

"It’s not that I want to Flynn but…" the black-haired youth began speaking.

"…I don’t want to pull her into all the other problems I’ll be facing down the line…" Flynn completed the rest of the statement for him, a knowing smile still nestled on his lips.

"I sometimes dislike how you can accurately read what’s up here Flynn" Aiden replied while gesturing to his own head with a pointed finger.

Flynn let out a small laughter at Aiden’s remark before finally moving close to his brother, splitting the bouquet into two, and handing him one half of it as he spoke.

"This, is your second life bro!" the youth began.

"You shouldn’t have any regrets…"

"We’ve already had enough of that in our past lives…" he continued.

"You should also know, that whether we want to or not, I’m pretty sure we’re going to end up pulling other people and our loved ones into our own problems every once in a while…"

Aiden acknowledged his brother’s statement with a nod of approval.

"So if that’s bound to happen anyway, why try not to enjoy the things you have, be around the ones who care for you more asides just family" Flynn advised while placing a palm on his brother’s shoulders and tapping it a few times.

Following this, Flynn slowly walked past his brother as he added.

"Besides, Caroline is changing, a lot more than I’m sure both of us ever expected. Mostly thanks to you"

"You should give the maiden a chance Aiden" Flynn continued with his relaxed walk while giving a small wave.

Aiden contemplated over Flynn’s words and his advice, knowing fully well all that he said was true.

He had been subtly evading Caroline’s advances and unless he was just a dumb and ignorant being, there was no way he didn’t notice it.

At the end of the ’Entrance Exams’, the day they were both appointed class representatives and even during the ’Crystal-Shattering Exercise’, he had slowly begun to have his suspicions about how the lady in question wanted to be more than just friends with him.

His mum’s conversation with her on the day Briar had called however, had very much confirmed it for him but he had decided to feign ignorance instead, behaving as if he was completely oblivious to her advances.

-Sigh…

"And I’m supposed to be the elder brother…" Aiden turned around, watching Flynn walking off into the distance with light steps.

With a smile, Aiden carefully placed the bouquet of flowers into his spatial ring and slowly began to make his way towards his dorm too, just like Flynn was.

Reaching the dorm in about fifteen minutes, Flynn headed straight for Ivelia’s room while Aiden slowly advanced towards Caroline’s room.

Upon reaching her door and lightly tapping on it, the youth waited for Caroline to open the door.

-Click!

Aiden subconsciously averted his gaze slightly upwards as he watched Caroline, who was in a silky white, short and sexy nightgown, one of the laced straps, along with one arm of the silky robe sliding off her shoulders to slightly reveal a just a tiny bit of her medium-sized boobs.

Her hair was messily tied into a short bun and a few strands were irregularly sticking out here and there but despite this, the lady before him seemed even more alluring despite just waking up a few minutes ago, her natural beauty and allure shining through.

"Hey Beatrice, I just woke up a few minutes ago so wou-" Caroline suddenly stopped her words, evidently surprised by the person present in front of her door.

She and Beatrice had originally planned to spar early this morning but she had overslept and as a result, the moment she heard a knock on her door, had expected it to be the princess.

So, seeing Aiden instead, standing in front of her door, his gaze slightly averted and his face slightly flustered and his cheeks a bit red, had come up as a big surprise to her.

Although they both had their rooms facing each other, neither of them had actually had any reason to go looking for the other since they would still eventually see each other later in the day.

"Hey Aiden, are you o-" the lady suddenly was already asking, a worried expression on her face but soon enough, she paused her sentence midway.

Blinking her eyes a few times, the lady then had the worried expression on her face transform into one of utter amusement as she internally squealed while simultaneously also moving closer to Aiden.

"So the handsome Aiden Belmont gets flustered too! This is definitely a welcome surprise!" she gleefully commented as she took one more step closer to him.

Despite this, Aiden stood his ground and didn’t move from his spot and instead, gazed down at the lady who was smiling at him alluringly.

Watching Aiden directly and unwaveringly looking into her eyes, his cheeks ever-so-slightly still a shade of red, Caroline’s own eyes thinned into a mischievous slit as she added.

"Aiden you perv" she said, her sexy voice barely above a whisper.

"Well I apologize for finding you alluringly beautiful alright" Aiden replied to her teasing, his eyes still locked onto hers.

As Caroline kept gazing at the youth before her, she couldn’t help but wonder how even despite the fact that he was indeed charmed by her, something she hadn’t expected, his emerald-green eyes showed no signs of lust and instead, it was replaced by a more innocent one.

’So cute…’ she thought to herself.

"So, I’d like to request for three things from you if you don’t mind" Aiden politely began.

"I’m all ears" Caroline replied, taking the final step closer to him until she was just a single inch from him, her head slightly elevated to look at him.

"First, I’d like for you to teach me how to dance…" Aiden began.

"Certainly!" the lady beamed at him a happy grin.

"Secondly…" Aiden started, stopping midway to retrieve the bouquet of flowers from his spatial ring, greatly surprising Caroline who was completely shocked by the gesture.

"Would you like to be my date to the Award Ceremony’s Banquet?" he asked, a bit of expectation in his eyes.

Caroline who was still completely shocked by the gesture the youth had previously graced her with, couldn’t help but just watch, completely stunned once again.

However, after a few seconds, she completely recovered and instantly, gently received the bouquet from Aiden with a lovely smile, devoid of any allure as she spoke.

"I would love to Aiden!"

Aiden had his shoulders slightly sag in relief but as if reminding himself that he wasn’t done, he watched as Caroline’s ruby-red eyes kept staring at him, seemingly asking him ’and the third?’.

With a deep breath from Aiden and Caroline’s rapidly beating chest that was threatening to burst out of its cage due to the utter wave of joy she was in, the youth made his final request.

"If, whenever you’re free after the banquet, would you like to go on a real date with me with the intent of dating in mind?" the youth concluded in a calm tone.

Caroline at this point almost felt like she couldn’t believe what she had heard but, knowing fully well that this wasn’t a dream, the lady slowly turned around and gently placed her bouquet on the floor, just by the side of the opened door.

Aiden then watched as the beautiful lady with silky-black hair, turned around to face him and without so much as a word, jumped onto him in a tight embracing and affectionate hug, the warmth of her body complementing Aiden’s currently soothing cold body.

Staggering backwards a bit as the lady latched onto him like a Koala bear, Aiden after a very short moment, reciprocated her hug by wrapping his arms around her body with a very warm smile on his face.