Jade didn't move her head and only looked around as she still had a splitting headache
"What happened..... what's going on" Jade thought as she closed her eyes and tried to remember but her mind was hazy and it took a while but she could eventually remember everything up to the point she was knocked out
★Gasp★
"Zen"
She quickly opened her eyes and ignoring the pain in her head, tried to look at the face of whoever was carrying her, coincidentally locking eyes,or rather an eye with Zen who had turned around when he heard her
"Z-Zen? Is that you?"
"..."
"Yeah it's definitely you ★sigh★ i was worried for a second there"
"..."
"You look different, what happened? My head feels fuzzy. How long was i out? Are we still in the dungeon?"
"... I accidentally knocked you out,you don't need to worry about anything. You haven't been out for too long, should be almost an hour.....as for my appearance, it's a bloodline skill, don't worry about it "
Zen had considered lying to her about his hair but he realized that knowledge about bloodline skills was widespread. The system clearly said it was a bloodline skill so Zen didn't care about someone seeing him like this.
"You.... knocked me... out?"
"It wasn't on purpose. My sincerest apologies, be assured that I'll find a way to compensate"
Zen answered calmly, his eyes still on the road as they had never stopped moving.
"No, i didn't mean it like that"
Jade chuckled before continuing
"I'm just glad you went back for me. I know you didn't have to, you could have left me there if you wanted " Jade said with a genuine smile on her face
"..... it was a choice based on logic. Without you i have no team"
Jade shook her head with a smile on her face
"Let's forget about that. I remember seeing something that looked like a person, except they were super shiny and sparkly. They made me feel....safe"
"... That was silver and it wouldn't be wise to get too safe around her, although...i guess we did too"
"Silver. They're a she?"
"No one knows whether Silver's a male or female but she acts so much like she's everybody's mother or nanny that we we all ended up calling her a she"
"She sounds nice.... but who's we?'
Zen glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, but thinking about it, he didn't really care so he just replied honestly
"Me, that person we saw earlier, and a few others. You don't have to worry about him by the way"
"You two were.... friends?"
Jade asked, picking her words carefully
"Something like that"
Jade wanted to stop asking questions at this point,when she realized something. If they were still in the dungeon,why was she so warm
She could already guess why her legs and chest were warm and the thought of it made her face go red, but what about the rest of her body?
It was then she noticed the black hoodie and gloves that she had on and realized that only Zen could have done this
"How did you-"
Zen cut her short by raising his hand and showing her the ring. He had already noticed her looking at herself so he could guess her question
"A storage ring? That's amazing, but where did you -"
Once again Zen cut her short, this time with a word
"Silver"
"...Thank you"
Jade said shyly as she tightened her arms that were around Zen, hugging him, although it was unknown whether or not it was intentional or out of embarrassment
"One day I'll repay you and Silver. Who knows? Maybe one day I'll be the one to save you two"
Zen didn't say anything to this but Freya was refreshed by Jade's cheery character. If she had a mouth she'd be smiling brightly by now.
"Can you walk?" Zen asked
"Yeah I think so. I'm still a bit dizzy but i think you can put me down"
Zen stopped by and started setting her down slowly. Little did he know it wouldn't be so simple.
The moment Jade's feet touched the floor, she suddenly realized she had no feeling in any of them. She suddenly went limp as she started to fall. Zen quickly crouched down to catch her as she fell, luckily, on his back
Without another word, Zen stood up with Jade on his back and started walking forward.
"....thank you"
Zen simply grunted in acknowledgement
"Zen?"
"What"
"It's about your hair"
"...."
"I don't know what this skill is..... but it makes you look super pretty and awesome"
Zen raised a brow. He felt the word pretty sounded quite childish to him but he didn't speak up. He'd already noticed that although she was physically matured, mentally she still acted much like a child.
"Huh? Hey Zen i can move my hands a little bit"
Jade started to wiggle her fingers and wrists but it seemed everything from there down was still numb so she couldn't move those.
Time passed and at a point, Jade couldn't resist as she looked at Zen's 3/4 black and 1/4 snow white hair and started running her fingers through it as she gently twisted and played with it like it was something very fascinating. Noticing Zen didn't seem to mind much she kept it up and even braided and unbraided a few small strands of his hair.
After this some more time passed and confusingly enough, they hadn't seen any beasts. Jade had expressed worry at this as it meant it was possible that someone had already come this way and had killed all the beasts. Dungeon creatures would disappear after a while once their cores had been taken so the chance of this being true wasn't low
They had once again come to a crossroad. Jade,who had regained movement in her entire upper body, was currently playing with Zen's hair,unbothered.
This had already happened a few times and Zen would simply use the tunnel's echo to choose the tunnel that wasn't a dead end so she was use to it by now and didn't even bother looking up. Surprisingly though, this time Zen had stopped
"Hmm? What's up Z"
"Z" was what Jade had started calling him after a while, and as he didn't voice any complaints, she had kept calling him that.
"Both paths sound the same"
Jade understood. Zen didn't know which one to go through as there was no way to know which path was a dead end, either that or they were either both dead ends or both plausible paths.
"What do we do now?"
Jade asked, revealing how trusting and reliant she was on Zen.
"Pick one" Zen asked for her opinion for the first time
"Huh? Me?" Jade asked,pointing to herself
"There's no way to choose so might as well pick randomly"
"Oh, okay then. How about the left one?"
Without saying anything, Zen stared walking towards the left tunnel
"Z! Wait ,i just had a thought " Jade said as she looked at the frozen cave filled with icicles that shone and sparkled like diamonds.
Halting, Zen asked plainly
"What is it"
"Turn around"
Although confused, Zen complied, turning his back to the two tunnels
Jade suddenly stretched out her arm with her government issued cyber watch on it, such that it was in front of Zen and her, while the screen was facing both of them. She brought her face closer to Zen's, practically mushing their faces together as she snuggled him with a bright smile.
"Say cheese Z!"
Following this was a snapping sound, indicating she had just taken a picture.
Jade hurriedly fiddled with the watch's screen interface and the next second, a holographic 2D image appeared, hovering a few centimeters above the watch.
An excited and happily smiling adorable green haired girl with bright green doe eyes. A passionless white and black haired stoic with one eye covered by his hair. Both snuggling close together surrounded by an incredibly beautiful winter paradise.
It looked so perfect that it seemed like to edit or alter it in any way would be a crime against good taste .
"Awesome!" Jade exclaimed, looking at it
"Hmmm? Z.... you forgot to smile ya big goof"
Zen didn't reply and was about to turn around when
[Bloodline burst effect has ended]
The small patch of his hair that was white, suddenly began to darken and in a few seconds it had returned to normal. His sclerae which had a strange blue hue to them, returned to normal as well.
[Skill side effect activated]
[You have awakened a sliver of your bloodline]
[HP +50]
[SP +5]
[Vitality: +30]
[All stats +3]
Zen suddenly felt a strange warmth rising from his chest revitalizing him.
Zen suddenly stopped moving and looked at himself.
He felt.... stronger
This was different from the strength he had with the bloodline burst skill. That power couldn't be accessed no matter how hard he tried, he could feel it but was unable to harness it. It was similar to looking at something at the bottom of a deep well, you could see it but never reach it. Meanwhile this strength felt different, like it was truly his, there were no pesky restrictions.
He was surprised he could even grow so much without doing anything.
Perhaps the system was more useful than it had been letting on so far.
"Z! your hair's normal again"
"..."
"Wait a minute, if your hair became like that because of a skill, the skill's duration is probably over, right?"
Zen nodded to answer her question, telling her to just ignore it before he started walking into the tunnel Jade had picked