"Alright, I'm heading back first."
Amid the suffocatingly heavy atmosphere, Shafna seemed to have merely finished an utterly ordinary task after dealing with Meldo, then casually tossed out those words.
With her footsteps still clearly audible, Shafna returned to Shien's side, leaned forward, and whispered with a soft laugh by his ear.
"You should hurry back too. Don't waste too much time, okay?"
After saying that, Shafna seemed to be in a better mood as she slowly walked back into House Poztut.
Shien was left alone, rubbing his ear as he muttered.
"What a temptress."
In the deathly silent scene, those words could not have been clearer.
Yet no one voiced an opinion over them.
They merely watched Shafna walk back into House Poztut without looking back, countless times wanting to cry out and stop her, to make her halt and not leave their sight.
But they could not do it.
Because Shafna's every word still echoed in their ears.
"How people who are insignificant in my life feel has no value whatsoever to me."
"I do not care whether you live or die, nor do I care what you wish to do. Even if you keep claiming that you admire me and wanted to see me, which is why you did all this, I will still only think that it is your business and has nothing to do with me."
"Compared to that, what my troublesome brother-in-law feels is what I care about."
Each of those words told them that Shien had been absolutely right.
"Shafna does not want to see you at all. She has never even paid attention to you."
That was reality.
The cruelest reality.
A reality everyone understood perfectly well but did not wish to acknowledge.
The proof was that, from the moment she appeared