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Fire, like greed, is a consuming torrent.
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Haibo, Ayanda, don’t look at me like that. We can barely save ourselves, and you want us to carry more baggage? She’s a red player!”
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Thank you, Master,'' SynnForessa thought as she finally fell unconscious.
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not an old woman, she was not 532 years old, no matter what the system said. She could barely remember her previous life. She’d been reborn, so as far as she was concerned, she was 32 years old, and not an old woman. “You saved my life, and for that I am grateful. Thank you,” she said, bowing her head.
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You can sleep too, I’ll keep watch.”
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life in his eyes. The closest would have been back when he started running.”
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“Is this about you?” SynnForessa asked, frowning.
Khaya laughed. “No. My brother sent his goons to threaten any boy that I ever tried dating...so I don''t have much experience there. Anyway, the girl in our story, unexpectedly got pregnant and reality came crashing in. She didn’t actually want to spend the rest of her life as the poor wife of a cursed man. She wanted to go to university, be a nurse and leave the village for a better place. What do you think she did?” she asked.
SynnForessa had no idea where the story was going but she answered anyway. “She ended things with the outcast and chose not to have the baby?”
“No. The outcast loved her dearly, but he had nothing, so he begged her to have the baby and give it to him. He’d take him away and raise him elsewhere. Her fiance didn’t even have to find out. And so for the next few months, the village was astounded when the village outcast kept going in and out of the spiritual leader’s house. The spiritual leader and her daughter didn’t leave the house for months. Rumours swirled until the village outcast was seen one day, leaving the village with a baby.”
That wasn''t how SynnForessa had expected the story to go, but she supposed if the girl felt guilty for using the village outcast, she would have done as he asked.
“The old woman told the people a tall tale to protect her daughter’s reputation and so as not to jeopardise her upcoming marriage. She claimed that she had disregarded her ancestors’ warnings and fallen for the cursed outcast, that she had his child, but she had done a cleansing ceremony to wash away their bad luck so it wouldn’t befall her daughter. She garnered sympathy and the villagers begged the ancestors to forgive her and cleanse her spirit. Her daughter got away with it, married, went to university and even had two more children of her own.”
For some reason, SynnForessa found herself invested in the story. “What happened to the first child?”
“He was raised by his father, and they moved back to the village two years after he left. Unfortunately, there was an accident and his father died. His grandmother…who everyone believed to be his mother, refused to care for a cursed child and dumped him at her daughter’s place where he grew up.”
Khaya stared into the fire as if she feared it would swallow her.
“Synn, it''s been almost thirty years and he still doesn’t know,” Khaya whispered, tears in her eyes. “I wish I never found out. How do you tell the person you love the most in the world something like that? How do you tell someone who already has abandonment issues that he was abandoned by not one, but two mothers? How do you tell a man who worships the ground his father walked on that he lied to him his entire life? I can’t do it, Synn," she gasped. "If he knew that I knew that truth, and didn''t tell him all this time, even after how much he''s loved and protected me—how much he''s done for me, it would break him, and he''d never forgive me,” she said, looking down.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
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sisi.”
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It was the scent of a strong flame.
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Avatar of The Nine-Tailed Demon Fox God title, her casting speed for fire spells was quite fast.
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[Warning! You are under the curse: Venomous MistBlood. -15HP/s while the curse is active.]
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[Player Kijira Masako Pandora has cast Neutralise Toxin on you. All poisonous debuffs reduced by 30%]
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Greed. It was in the shape of a greedy mouth that consumed all types of fire.
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80%,’ she decided.
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Jahreela Saamp''s offer,” she said.
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“But still. I''m sure he''s with Pranav. He got Neo arrested, is it really safe to go to him?” she asked hesitantly.
“Neo got himself arrested. It was his choice to join the gang,” she said with a sigh. “Besides, let’s be practical here. Malume is thousands of kilometres away at Risa’s Plateau while Neo’s at Kirtisn Valley. We don''t have enough gold for a teleportation wheel. If we hired a lucent carriage, who''d help us through the level 10 red aerial zones?”
“I get it,” Ayanda said through gritted teeth. “Can’t you respond to his videos, though, tell him where we are? Maybe he will come to us.”
"Yeah, sure, let’s just post our location publicly on his profile and have weirdos come after us,” Khaya shook her head. “Look, Neo reached out to me, offering me protection. He feels bad for not being there for me when my… never mind…His place is only 30 kilometres away. We’ll go there, and if Neo isn''t able to protect us, then he can get us transport to malume. He has many flaws, but my brother always protects his own. Of that, I''m sure.”
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