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nAfter the Emerald Whirlwind left, left she saw one last projection which she thought wasn’t necessary to visit, ironically, since Vivian has been showered in Rigel’s flames, whose existence reminded the Emerald Whirlwind to herself a bit, she thought she was Aster’s lover, so she left her for last.

nBut now she wasn’t in the mood to continue with this, or so she though until she remembered that last girl actually had a need of her, so the Emerald Whirlwind stubbornly decided to listen to Vivian’s answer too.

nA couple of seconds later, she was occupying her clone’s place and stopped her previous interaction to directly speak with Vivian.

n“Unfortunately, your body is too weak to accept my power, if not I would have chosen you, but in exchange I will consider that black haired boy who was travelling with you”.

nTo the Emerald Whirlwind’s consternation, she just saw Vivian softly smile while she had her eyes closed and a large pattern appeared on her shoulders.

n“I don’t see only with my eyes you know miss, I don’t know why are you telling me that, but if you expect me to be jealous of Aster getting a treasure, I’ll only say you are going to be very disappointed with the result”.

n“So, you really are his woman after all, I guess it was to be expected after listening to the answers of the Luan girls and the Ash Nether princess, as well as that little Storm Roc girl”, mumbled the Emerald Whirlwind.𝒐𝐯𝐋xt.𝗰𝑜𝕞

nBut to her surprise this time she did get a reaction from Vivian.

n“Ahem, I’m not his lover, we met not too long ago but I like to believe we are friends and he is also my benefactor… that being said even if I was, the answer would have been the same”, said Vivian with a pretty flushed face, which was really easy to notice given her pale skin.

nSeeing that the Emerald Whirlwind didn’t seem convinced, Vivian said the word that she has learned it’s the key to make her body listen to her to a certain extent now.

n“Aster”, a single word came out of her pretty pink lips, and then the pattern on her shoulders faded away, and she recovered her sight.

n“My essence is poison as you should have already noticed by now, my heart, my blood, even my soul is marked by poison, that’s who I am, and I made peace with myself some time ago, but other people can’t and it’s normal, after all their lives are in danger when I’m around”.

n“This whole trip was organized because I was running out of time to control my own power, it was crushing me and I needed you to built a “dam” in my body, to help me guide my poison in a specific way… before I became a living calamity”.

n“But it wasn’t as simple, by the time the entrance of the secret realm opened, it would have been too late for me to use that option, and then, call it fate, luck or just by a mere coincidence, my caretaker managed to meet someone, let’s say “different”, and that person turns out to have a way to reset the clock for my final countdown, as much as it is needed”.

n“Not only that, he returned me my sight which I lost when I was a little child, and the first thing I get to see is this tall handsome smiling boy, who isn’t the first person I have ever seen, but his smile, it was genuine… he wasn’t afraid of me”.

n“He could touch me without melting away, and despite my poisonous self he didn’t treat me any different, if anything he was quite friendly and caring with me, it’s not an exaggeration to say that I owe him my life, no, I owe him more than that to be honest”.

n“My body constitution is so aggressive and protective that it doesn’t allow anyone to be close to me, it regulates itself and I had no say in that… but now I found someone in who not only me but even this capricious poisonous heart of mine trusts, to the point that seeing him is enough to make my body realize that I’m fine”.

nVivian slightly shook her head, realizing she was getting a bit too into her answer.

n“Anyway, even if I needed it, I would bet my life that Aster would help me get your help, because that’s how he is, you already met Kana so ask yourself, how bad can someone who has the complete trust of such a good girl like her, might be”.

n“Thanks for your answer”, said the Emerald Whirlwind before she left, while Vivian looked at her hand, she tried a few patterns as a way to train, realizing how much she changed in this small trip.

n‘Someone who makes you want to be a better version of yourself was it… mother?’, she thought.

n…

nBack at the second floor of the green castle, green gusts of wind gathered and formed a twister from which the Emerald Whirlwind came out, with a decided expression on her face.

nShe looked at the rest of the projections and listened to rest of the answers, before everyone was transported back to the living room of the castle, Aster included.

n“What happened didn’t I win the approval of the Emerald Whirlwind?”.

n“I was in the middle of a conversation with her too, what is happening here?”.

nSimilar kind of comments could be heard in the living room, from some of the subordinates of the other participants, one of the most outraged was Victor, the guy from the purple lotus faction who entered with Aster.

nThe monk Kai remained silent with his eyes closed, while the orcrary guy looked at all the people here as if he wanted to memorize their faces.

n“How was it, did that stubborn woman followed my advice and became yours, Aster~”, Natasha’s playful voice drew the attention of all the people to a corner of the room, where Aster and the rest of his group was gathering after they appeared here.

nSeeing Charlotte looking at her as if she was an idiot, Natasha softly snorted.

n“Why are you looking at me like that, it’s not as if those losers weren’t going to target whoever gets selected, anyway?”, she said as she shrugged.

nAs much as Charlotte hated to admit it, Natasha was right, that was the main reason as to why many people who couldn’t get the Emerald Whirlwind still came to the secret realm, because as soon as a winner was selected, her control over the place will be null, and the secret realm will collapse.

nGiving everyone a small window to attack the one who was selected and stole it, and the Emerald Whirlwind was forbidden to do anything about it, it was literally written on the walls of the castle, in runes but it was there for anyone who looked at it closely enough.

nAnyway, after the initial attention drawing comment made by Natasha, the others all gathered in their respective groups, waiting for the answer, though most of them had no doubt it would be the same as always, which means they will all be rejected due to the still disclosed nature of the third trial.

nThose who were told they won later confirmed that wasn’t the case, those who were told they didn’t win, confirmed that was the case and those who were asked about how they would use the Emerald Whirlwind’s powers ended up losing too, so no one expected it to be different this time.

nLey and Rox were intensely glaring at Aster’s group, one at Kana and the other at Charlotte to be more accurate, but they were interrupted by a sudden gust of wind which appeared in the middle of the living room.

nThe Emerald Whirlwind appeared with a calm expression on her face, which of course attracted everyone’s attention.

nBut then her next words were like a bomb for a lot of people.

n“I have selected someone to make a contract with”.

nA sepulchral silence fell in the room, before everyone started stealing gazes at those around them, the situation became incredibly tense, except for Aster and the others, even Ixas had a relaxed expression as if he already knew the result beforehand.

nBut even he was surprised to see towards who, was the Emerald Whirlwind was walking to.

nIxas couldn’t help but look at Aster, just to see him smiling.

n‘So that was your plan from the very beginning… I guess it makes sense, that little girl’s attribute is wind’.

nThe Emerald Whirlwind calmly walked until she was standing in front of Kana, before she smiled at her.

n“Little girl, are you willing to enter in a contract with me?”.

nKana looked from the corner of eyes and saw Aster smiling and nodding at her, and her eyes sparkled, she knew no one was better qualified to get the Emerald Whirlwind than her big brother, and he still somehow convinced her to choose her instead, but what truly made her little maiden’s heart drown in sugar, was that this was a gift from her beloved big brother.

nAnd thus, there was no nee to doubt about it anymore, as she knew Aster would always want the best for her.

n“Yes~”, a short and simple answer was all what was needed, the Emerald Whirlwind looked at Aster and sent him a message that just he could hear.

n‘I’ll be out for about one hour, there will be a sole spatial gate opening which will return everyone to their respective origins in 70 minutes, don’t let them snatch this little girl’.

nAster nodded back.

n“They won’t”, he mumbled and then in the split of a second, the Emerald Whirlwind became a gust of wind which entered Kana’s body, though her dantian.

nKana’s eyes got sleepy all of a sudden and before she could do anything, her eyes closed as she fell asleep, but her little body didn’t have the chance to touch the ground as Aster carried her like a princess the very second, she passed out.

nWhile all the eyes were on Aster and before they could do anything, the castle trembled as everyone was expulsed from it, the large green castle disappeared in a split of a second raising a curtain of dust.

nAnd that wasn’t all, the sky which was normal a moment ago suddenly got clouded and cold gusts of wind started to whistle through the whole secret realm, now that the pillar of it, in other words the Emerald Whirlwind was gone, it was starting to crumble apart.

n“Mylene”.

n“Got it”.

nAster just had to say the word and Mylene took out a cube necklace rom her spatial ring, Eris actually lent her the only treasure that survived the spatial storm which destroyed their rings back when they were absorbed by that spatial rift.

nWith which purpose you ask, easy, it had a teleportation formation engraved on one of its faces, and as a formation core it didn’t need to be deployed on the ground or anything.

n“I feel spatial law stop them!”, Ley’s voice could be heard from within the dust curtain, someone actually stabbed a weapon on the ground to interrupt the “formation”, but they didn’t know about Eris’s necklace, by the moment they were able to dispel the dust cloud, they looked at their surroundings looking for their target just to see Aster and the others were gone.

n“Fuuuuck!”, Rox as well as other participants shouted frustrated.

n“Who knows who those bastards are”, demanded the orcrary with his axe to the others, making Victor grit his teeth, he tried to look at Iris to seek for advice but he nearly spat blood noticing that she was gone too.

n‘Damn it’, he thought.

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