Sometime soon, Mai and Ru were now at the luminous rocky caverns. They were sitting at the ground comfortably. The floor beneath them was glittered in gem-like particles scattered along the vast place. The rocky walls were tinged with fragments of prismatic sapphire crystals. Stalacites and stalagmites of frozen glass below and above. Pristine radiant butterflies of gold and violet were flutterring around in moderate numbers. The two dazzling maidens turned to look at the shallow underwater lake reflecting its pure crystalline water nearby. Moreover, Zeran was unconciously floating at the great center of the subterranean spring. There were glowing lavander chains shackled upon his whole body. Not only that, it seemed there was an icy mist that was surrounding around him with its mystical touch although, it's color was blending with the violet energy from the chains, turning it to look-like some kind of occultist ritual that was being held. Mai noticed that Ru's expression was deepened with great concern and a very heartwarming smile was at Ru's face, revering of immense happiness, while Ru was looking at the waters. Mai was subtly shocked since, this is the first time she had seen Ru filled with great happiness, so Mai tries to open up a conversation in order to break-off her sudden tensions that was coursing throughout her skin,
"So how's he feeling?".
Ru replies, while she was still looking at the floating Zeran at the serene waters,
"He's recovering now...".
A little while later, Ru masked her evangelistic smile and swapped it with her usual teasing sinister smile. She shifted her face to Mai and Ru said with great emphasis with added sarcasm in her tone,
"Also Mai...I'm sure you still LOVE him don't you?"
"Besides he's the ONE who saved you from them..."
"If I remember that GODDESS SCANDAL correctly...".
The air became still afterwards. Mai felt irritated as she heard that from her sort-of close friend, turning Mai's face to be filled with intense frustration. Not only that, her eyes revealed an intense rage too. Soon, Mai got up and said with utter defiance in her tone, as she looked at Ru with a cold stare,
"Tch..."
"I'll be leaving now..."
"And tell Zen or Zera or Zeran, whatever you cal him...that when we'll meet again..."
"We're enemies..."
"Since I'm the queen's protector now..."
"And no longer a Goddess...nor your friend...Ru..."
"Since I want to become a hero that'll save this world...better than he or they was..."
"I'm determined to crush anyone who gets in my way...".
Though, in her thoughts it seemed it was anchored in much more of her hidden ambitions,
("This is the only way for me to become strong...").
Ru responds,
"I see..."
"I'll tell him that...".
Mai left the luminous place, leaving Ru with the slumbering and regenerating Zeran at the lake later on. The frozen feeling in the air had ceased and Ru's heavy burdened feeling was gone. She revealed her fox features in an enchanting magical sparkle. Her foxy tail was so fluffy and riddened in starlight brilliance. Her ears were twitching along with her slithering tail. Soon enough, she sighed and said, puzzling down Mai's defiance in her words, as Ru was looking the sleeping Zeran,
"You still deny your true feelings for him huh...Mai..."
"How about you Zera...how do you feel about Mai?".
Though, Zeran wasn't able to hear Ru's statement due to his unconscious state although, he was in a deep trance yet again, isolating him from the outside world. His trance set him back to Ru's fragment of her own memory. Thereupon, he was witnessing Ru in her own pretty bedroom laddened in entrancing lavander and abyss black. More than that, he noticed that Ru was lying down on her bed and she was holding her phone talking to someone. Sooner or later, he overhears the voice of a serious mid-pitched woman from her smartphone,
"The next chosen hero is up..."
"You already know what to do Ru...".
As Ru heard that, her face looked irritated and disturbed. She changed her position and sat on her bed immediately. Then, she said with an annoyed tone to her phone,
"Alright alright...geez..."
"You don't have to tell me that over and over again...ANGE...".
She called-off her phone and rolled back to her own bed afterwards. Her face had suddenly changed to a depressed look. Her expression wasn't very Goddessly nor oozing of a sinister woman yet instead, such as a pitiful maiden that was feeling the thorns wrapped around her body throughout her whole life. A little while later, she pondered through her sorrowful self and expresses,
"So this is my life huh..."
"Testing heroes and our world endlessly..."
"While she gets them...and have FUN with them instead..."
"While I get just these measly points...and feel this endless pain in my heart getting killed by them...".
She threw-off her phone a few distances on her bed. She let her slim arm cover her eyes but, crystal tears were leaking and falling upon her pale cheeks. The chilling dense air was wrapping around her. Her frown of grave sadness binded with great throns of sufferring was shown upon her near covered face, depicting such as a Goddess of darkness could also be saddened and become so human-like. Thereupon, she tries to utter her words with intense expressiveness and doubts, as her tears were still falling,
"Why did I even choose to be a Dark Goddess..."
"Why...".
While, Zeran had been witnessing the depressed and suffering Ru through her past experiences that she had mustered and brought up, he felt some kind of pity for the dark Goddess, since he was seeing another side of her that was hidden in plain hindsight. He felt that he wanted to hug and embrace the crying Ru but, he already knew that this vision he had been seeing was nothing but, a sychronized trance of his unconscious self and Ru's memory fragment, turning him to express his concerned feelings for her in his thoughts instead,
("Ru...")
("So this is what she had been feeling all throughout her life...")
("I kinda pity her now honestly...").
A little while later, he arose from his deep slumber and snapped out of his trance and the next thing he noticed was, his head was on her comfy lap. As Ru felt that Zeran's warmth and consciousness came back, her smile oozed of great happiness and gratitude for his utter revival from his abyssal sleep, that was somehow so unique to see from an evil Goddess. Fleeting hearts coursed inside of her, making her to feel a sense of sensual calmness. Soon, she spoke with her soothing voice to Zeran while her tail was whiffing of joy,
"How are you feeling now Zera?".
He noticed that her tail looked unussually happy for some reason, making him to express a weirded-out look again and leaned his body upwards. In his inner-self he was feeling quite cozy and warm being comforted by the dark Goddess Ru although, in order for her to not notice his creeped-out look, He replies in a very complacent way with added humor after,
"I feel better now..."
"I thought I was a goner hahaha...".
That sudden moment, Ru hugged him very tightly, making his shackles to chime upon hitting each other. Zeran felt more and more warm sensations coursing throughout his body, while he was wearing a shocked expression. Then, Ru slipped her mouth, that sounded very serious,
"Please don't joke about that...".
A long silence had encroched through air afterwards. Zeran tried to utter a word at Ru yet, he just responded by embracing her with all his care. The two didn't speak with their mouths for a while nor did any action, instead they took their time of being in each other arms and expressing out their unexplainable feelings for each other. Sometime has passed, the tensed up feeling of the two were gone and they were no longer feeling each others warmths. Zeran witnessed the two identical plush dolls of themselves were near each other sitting blatantly at the distance away from the subterrenean spring. His face was riddened by a dumbstrucked look and said to Ru,
"Ru...is that doll really one of your artifacts?".
She replies,
"Yes...".
He noticed that the Zeran plush doll fell down with its head on the ground as it doesn't have any control to itself, unlike the Ru plush doll that looked like it was in a panic and pushed the Zeran plush doll's head upwards again, retaining its stable position. The real Zeran turned his away since he shouldn't have seen the two plush dolls cutesy incident. Though, in his thoughts were suspecting much deeper in sense,
("But why my image though...").
He sighed later on. He turned his face towards Ru beside him. Soon, he opens up a sensitive conversation that would delve upon her personal life, while he was showing a complacent face,
"So...err...instead of a reward...I wanna know what's your relationship with...Mai...".
As Ru heard that from him, her look that was filled with happiness was gone and it was replaced by a sorrowful frown. She held down Zeran's hands on his lap. The atmosphere became still and cold. Then, she looked at him with a serious look on her face and said,
"So you're interested in that huh...okay..."
"Mai is not just a friend of mine...but my only close friend I ever had..."
"Recently...the other dark Goddesses find me weird now since... ".
She paused for a second and wore a forced smile, depicting a sad woman from within. Though, sometime soon, she continues to tell Zeran her own experiences,
"I'm well...acting and feeling quite differently now than what a Dark Goddess supposed to..."
"So they were are all stranged about me and left me on my own..."
"The holy/light Goddesses and other Goddesses...doesn't like dark Goddesses so they didn't accept me too..."
"But Mai didn't care about that and accepted me as who I really am...".
He nodded and proved an interested look upon hearing more of her personal life as a dark Goddess. More than that, he replies with added humor yet again, trying to push her buttons, and held her hands,
"I see...so that's why you two have those pictures..."
"Hmmm you said the Goddesses don't like you...how about the Gods then?"
"I'm sure alot of them admire you, especially your beautiful face and amazing body...".
As Ru heard his sensual flattery, she cracked out a thankful smile yet, it was filled with a hint of sadness seeping from her crystal eyes, that was swelling of pure water and any minute it'll leak out prismatic tears. She responded to him with her normal tone, while she wasn't looking at him directly,
"I appreciate your compliment Zera but..."
"Sadly you're wrong...they don't like me either..."
"If you were thinking I'm fawning my body to them...you are truly wrong about that..."
"I choose who I expose myself to...Zera...".
Afterwards, she lifted her arm and let him feel the carress of a Goddess on his left cheek. Not only that, she had depicted her signature sinister smile with her intensified eyes looking at him directly yet again. Though, Zeran had already gotten used to her seductive actions but, it might just be he was just delving on his inner thoughts instead, failing to let him observe Ru's attempt,
("Yeah...no wonder she's still a virgin...")
("So she's a decent woman on the outside...").
Thereon, Ru adds upon,
"And I could say you're lucky to see me exposing myself to you...".
("Luck...more like tricking me to become your GOLDEN RETRIEVER...you teasing demonness!")
,while Zeran commented expressively in his thoughts to Ru's added statement. Later on, Zeran and Ru weren't communicating with each other anymore, as they were feeling an awkward hidden barrier between them, since they opened up a sensitive topic before. In addition, both of them weren't looking at each other and they were busy with their own simple matters somehow. Ru was swaying her right maiden hand and fixated upon the waters of the clear shallow spring. As for Zeran, he was engaged by the Ru plush doll struggling and trying to pull out the small blue crystal stuck from the ground at the distance yet to no avail, it wasn't near its goal. Even though, there was a barrier between them, it seemed like they understood more about each other, especially for him. Not only that, even with the winding silence between the two, the two of them were feeling secured and soothed being near each others presence. After sometime, Ru asks Zeran, while she was still focussed on flowing her hand soaked in the water,
"Say Zera...do you find it weird...for someone to be too different?".
He responds,
"Hmmmm...not really...in fact I find it awesome...".
While she heard that unique compliment from him, she cracked out a heartwarming smile in a glimpse, although it was soon replaced by a seductive grin on her face, leaking out her intense obsession instead. She lifted her left arm up high and snapped her fingers forcefully that echoed throughout the place. Suddenly, the relaxed Zeran sitting on the shallow waters was made to lie down forcefully and hang above the waters with the ethereal chains of purple shackled tightly upon his limbs and arms, as those chains were struck at the caverns corners. She went to the panicking Zeran and proved a lewd eager smile to him and humming of grave interest filled with passionate hearts was heard from her mouth. Then, she said,
"With this...time for you to eat...my dear Zera♥".
In turn, he wore a shocked expression on his face, proving he was being held captive again by the dark Goddess herself once again, although this time he was filled with some kind of excitement too and he blurts out,
"Don't tell me..."
"I'M CHAINED AGAIN?!".
Ru replies with passionate hearts on her eyes. A smile that speaks of great engagement and said,
"The less body movement...the more you'll recover hmmmm♪".
As he noticed her unique actions of great passion and deep interest, he was filled with great disturbance in his very emotions. Moreover, he noticed that the chains were tighter than ever before, making him to resist any means of freedom and turning him to take on the offer of his predator. A little while later, Ru brought out a great amount of food from her picnic basket that had emerged in an instant. She let him fill Zeran's appetite and energy by feeding him lots of roasted baby back ribs seeped in tasty and mouthwatering worcestershire sauce, amplifying its amazing meaty flavors. Next, he was offered by some scoops of steamin' mashed potatoes although, since his stomach was already full from the baby back ribs he had eaten before he wasn't able to finish all of his second meal. So Ru, took them down and ate all of his leftovers. For some reason, she was feeling an intense sensation while she was eating Zeran's unfinished food that Zeran had touched, while she wasn't letting him see her eating it behind his back. Her ears were tingling with excitement. Her eyes were looking with hearts of deep engagement as she was gulping it down. Though, it seemed he was feeling a bit uncomfortable, while he was seeing Ru's ears twitching and her tail wagging like an excited dog but, he didn't mind it that much, since he was also feeling a sense of happiness of seeing her feeling joyful upon her hearty meal. Lastly, she tried to offer Zeran an immense number of cookies yet, she noticed that his tummy might explode from being overfed, so she suggested to him that to keep it in his own convenient personal inventory for the time being, in which he did as he was told and transferred all of them in his dimension inventory. The two were having a sweet time looking at each others eyes. Suddenly a huge rich velvety armored shell came crashing down upon the vacant side of the spring, that made the water to wave and gush out intensely. Zeran looked surprised and his entanglement was gone. As for Ru, she wasn't shocked, instead her face turned stone cold and her eyes looked deadly. Thereupon, she said in dark monotone with great emphasis,
"So it entered here...even if..."
"This is a SACRED GROUND...".