" Are you crazy!!!???" Theo shouted
Selene's whole hand was inside the skeletal pup.
Theo could only reach out, sadly he was too slow to prevent the undead from chomping on Selene's left hand.
"Selene! What is wron-"
Before Theo further complained, he noticed that there wasn't any blood dripping down from the wolf's mouth.
"I forgot, my summons can't harm me.." Selene said, dismayed.
Theo, now realizing what she meant and remembering the mechanics in the game, sighed in relief.
"You almost gave me a heart attack-"
Before Theo could even finish his sentence, Selene had her scythe in hand and was about to take a full swing on her left hand.
"Selene!"
Whoosh!
Ting!
Luckily this time, Theo was faster than Selene and deflected her scythe from cutting her own hand off.
"Calm down, Selene! do you really hate it that much!" Theo shouting
"Yes! Don't stop me, Theo! I can easily grow it back with the High tier potion!"
"We need that for later!"
"This is a matter of dignity!"
"Dignity my foot. Cutting your hand off just because you're branded with a tattoo like that is far worse, Than your petty excuse for dignity!"
"Kuh.... I know, but like. I don't want people to misunderstand..."
Theo sighed in exasperation and a little bit hurt.
"Selene, did you forget? We're betrothed. A tattoo like this would only show affirmation of our engagement and nothing less."
"True... But like, this is too embarrassing and like.... a variable like this could only mean that its cause of other selves and like this might be tying a knot to our destinies and stuff and im not ready so-"
Selene kept talking and talking till her voice was barely audible.
Selene knew that she was being overly dramatic about the heart sigil.
She might be all high and mighty on the outside like she always was in front of Theo.
Talking and insulting Theo was easy, because their past selves were a great factor on her confidence with communicating with Theo.
Her past self also greatly contributed to her confidence on communication
But no matter what life she had, everytime the topic of romance was brought up to the table, her head would just spiral out of control and short circuit.
She would then whip out her defensive mechanism and start blabbering random stuff, insulting Theo and obviously making rash decisions like she did early.
The reason?
I've never had a relationship before!!!!
Yes, both Lena, the name of her previous self from Earth, and Selene from Alethea are both ladies of high class families in both lives. The only exposure they had to male interaction was either from family, formal interaction for business, or online which she did in her past life.
Lena studied in a prestigious all girls school all her life. All of the staff in the school were women.
She was also the student council president twice during her time in highschool.
She was confident in everything but romance.
She was never exposed to romance, with the exception of the gigantic piles of romance books both selves have read in both of their lives, which serves as Lena's other hobby than gaming.
Who could blame her for having an astronomical amount of thoughts and ideas at the same time?
She currently hated how good her imagination and brain functions were for the first time.
What troubled her mainly, was a part of her was kind of not adverse with the fact that they've been paired with heart shaped sigils. He had his ups now and again
However, Selene had deep malice towards Theo, because of their past, even a genius like her couldn't arrive at the conclusion, opting herself to cut off her hand.
These combined with the fact that she was also embarrassed with being in a relationship with a man she hasn't known for a long time gave her bad heart palpitations.
Gaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!! think!!!!!
Theo was looking at Selene, worried, but was at the same time distraught from what she said.
Was I too pushy? or maybe she finds me creepy, cause I'm not showing as big of an adverse reaction as she does?
Theo did get that the reason for her behavior layed solely because of the variable that just occurred.
Usually the ritual would happen and star-shaped sigil would appear on top of their hand. This sigil would give the characters their character window, shared boost in growth, and usually reinforces everyone's friendship/ affection.
This secret room is usually used in mid-game when the player finalizes the party they decided on until the end game. But veterans opted to attain these perks as soon as possible as the shared boost in growth function is one of the most important perks and strongest to have in the game.
This reason also explains why most players, regardless which character to play, try to get Theo to be a member of their party as soon as possible, only if Theo had it in the playthrough, which half of the time he didn't, which made many players restart the game for the item and ended multiple speedruns that were at world record pace.
This again shows why Theo is one of the easiest characters to use, because you didn't need to go through the hassle of befriending him and getting the perk.
Theo, feeling that he might've fumbled talking to Selene, started to comfort her.
"Hey, Selene, I understand that this sudden variable just appeared out of nowhere, but we gotta move forward and try to go through this together. I understand that you can't stand having a pair of heart sigils with me, but we got to find out the changes this brought first"
Selene who was muttering to herself till now halted from Theo's words.
".... Right. Sorry for overreacting"
Selene turned to the side with a red tint on her pale cheeks.
She felt a little bad and feared that she might've given the impression that she's repulsed being with him.
"Good, first, let's confirm if the character window works"
Theo on the other hand was a little disappointed but focused on the unknown variable.
""Window"" Theo and Selene said in unison
__________________________
Name: Theodore Ignatius
Class: Paladin
Age: 14
Race: (LOCKED)/ (LOCKED) Human???
Tier: Adept
Condition: Slightly Fatigued
Bloodline: (LOCKED)
Life Partner: Selene Aventus
Shared Skills:
Telepathy
Shared Growth
___________________________
___________________________
Name: Selene Aventus
Class: Necromancer
Age: 13
Race: Human/(LOCKED)
Tier: Intermediate
Condition: Fatigued
Bloodline: (Locked)
Life Partner: Theodore Ignatius
Shared Skills:
Telepathy
Shared Growth
?????
?????
?????
__________________________
""....""
A minute of silence passed
"How about we agree to ignore that section?" Theo who broke the silence asked
Theo pointed at the "Life partner section".
"..... Agreed" Selene who short circuited, again, was barely able to audibly reply and nod.
"Other than that, this new sigil added Race, Condition, Bloodline and Shared Skill sections that weren't there in the game" Theo quipped
"I guess the new sigil is a small upgrade from the last"
"True and especially for the Shared Skill section"
And what puzzled both Selene and Theo was the skill Telepathy, which they already had even before they received the sigil.
"This must be the work of the person who sent us here..." Selene contemplating
"Ugh, we can only wait for answers..." Theo groaned clutching his head
"Yeah.... sigh" Selene sighed
"There's also a bunch of locked skills as well" Theo mentioned
"I wonder how we'll unlock those?" Selene wondered
"I guess, we gotta wait and see" Theo said tiringly
At this point, Theo and Selene didn't have the energy to further think anymore.
Both of them just had their first life threatening battle in their entire two lives and to add burden to that, an unexpected variable that didn't appear in the game suddenly popped up out of nowhere.
They wanted to go to clean up and rest, ASAP.
"Ugh, my head suddenly hurts and my body is starting to ache..... we better go" Selene said as she leaned her hands and head on the white orb.
"Yeah, we can continue discussing our plans forward tomorrow" Theo nodded in agreement
"Mmh" Selene nodded, while also showing that even talking was starting to tire her.
"Oh before that"
Theo reached out to Selene and casted Heal on the injury she had on her shoulder.
"Thanks.." Selene with her eyes half closed
"You gotta pay extra next time" Theo jokingly quipped.
"..." Selene on the other hand wasn't listening and was focused on not fainting on the spot
"Uh sorry, Let's leave. The rain of kobolds stopped pouring down from the sky"
After Theo chanted, both of them were transported back to the garden where it was still nighttime.
Both of them said their goodbyes and rested for the night.
...
Selene promptly passed out as soon as she dove in her bed.
Theo, on the other hand, was sitting on the top of his balcony, gazing and admiring at the two moons positioned beautifully in the sky and soft gentle breeze.
He went back into his room after a wave of fatigue hit him, his body signaling for him to go rest.
Tomorrow's definitely going to be busy
Theo's eyes looked at the two moons in the sky once more before falling into deep comfortable sleep.