The Over-Break System

| “Either way, it is time for you all to leave now; remember, moving forward, you are all banned from the Second Obelisk; the next time I see you, I hope you have all obtained Tier-3.” |

With that said, Yennifer waved her right hand and scattered the four remaining members of MyrkLys into particles, causing their vision to fade to black.

The next thing everyone knew, they were standing outside the First Obelisk entrance with the sunlight from all three of Vinestra’s suns beaming down on their bodies.

The sudden bright light made everyone but Brance wince in pain as their pupils adjusted to the light. Previously the group had been in a dark room, and now that they were thrown into the bright afternoon sun, everyone’s eyes needed a second to recover.

“Tsk, it’s about time y’all showed up. I’ve been waiting out here for over two hours now. Things are worse than I predicted.” Noticing his party members standing in a daze shielding their eyes from the sunlight, Cynrik clicked his tongue and walked over to them.

“Two hours? Wait…how long were we in the Obelisk?” Because Brance was the only one unaffected by the change in light moving from inside the dark Obelisk to the outside, he was the first to respond to Cynrik’s comment.

“Three weeks, we were in there for three fucking weeks. Because of that stupid time differential, we have wasted half of our training time. I assume that because the Headmaster was present, we are off the hook for classes, but still, this has screwed up my timeline so badly.” Scratching his left cheek, Cynrik walked behind Selene and gave her a soft shove to get her moving.

“No time to sit around; we have to get back to the dorm and start prepping right now. The more time we waste standing around talking, the less we will have to continue grinding.”

SMACK

But to his surprise, Selene didn’t budge and turned around before slapping him across the face full force, whipping his head to the side violently..

“Oh shit, Gabby Benny, we better go…things are about to get….” Brance didn’t finish his statement as he quickly grabbed Gabby’s hand and ran off.

As the saying goes, Hell hath no fury like an angry Waifu, and right now, Selene was DEFINITELY Angry.

Rolling his shoulders back and slowly turning to face Selene, Cynrik didn’t even flinch as his expressionless face and eyes met hers.

-You have received 1200 damage from Selene Nilsson.-

‘Fuck off with that Notification, Tobs.’ Cynrik spat mentally while examining his teary-eyed girlfriend.

He was about to open his mouth to say something when….

SMACK

She hit him again, this time hard enough to force him to taste blood.

“Are you done?” Unlike the first time, Cynrik tensed his body at just the right moment, so he stood rooted in place and accepted the smack without budging.

“You insufferable bastard, you took it too far. Do you even realize how it fucking feels to watch someone you love die? Do you understand what it was like for ME to watch YOU die?” Selene icily spoke, with her body shivering as each word left her lips.

“How would you fucking feel if it was ME in your place? Would you even care? Do you care so little for me that you can’t even see what consequences your belligerent actions cause?”

Seeing no reaction and no immediate response from Cynrik, Selene raised her hand and slapped him a third time, only this time, he caught her hand centimeters away from his cheek.

“Let me go; I’m not done. LET ME GO SO I CAN SMACK YOU AGAIN!” Selene’s voice shrilled up by an octave as she screamed and tried extricating her hand from Cynrik’s grasp to no avail.

The longer she looked at her boyfriend’s expressionless face and chilling violet eyes, the madder Selene became.

“Stop talking and making a scene, Selene.” Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Cynrik spoke in a low voice and tone without breaking eye contact with the girl.

After holding tightly onto her wrist, Cynrik pulled her into his chest and activated [Shadow Leap], dragging them both into the Shadow Realm, away from the prying eyes of any students or staff members passing nearby.

Once they were in the familiar negative-colored world of Dark Mana, Cynrik let go of Selene’s wrist, caught her chin with the same hand, tilted her face up, and passionately kissed her.

The simple touch of his lips on hers sent a chill down Selene’s spine as she went from furious to a melting puddle in an instant.

A few seconds later, Cynrik broke off the kiss and spoke calmly.

“Listen to me, Sel; I have tried explaining to you repeatedly that I do not feel or understand emotions like the rest of you do. I understand you are upset about what happened, and I know you want to beat the brakes off of me, but it is unwarranted.” Using his right thumb, Cynrik caressed the girl’s cheek tenderly after wiping the tears from her eyes.

“We were in virtual bodies, similar to a video game. Although I understand it may have been tough to watch, I can’t have you losing control of yourself and doing something that could drastically affect everyone. Everything I do is calculated, and I accept the risks brought about by my actions long before I even speak.”

“I allowed you to strike me twice in anger, an opportunity that even Brance or my Parents haven’t received. That alone says volumes about my opinion of our relationship. To say I don’t care about you is blatantly false, even if I don’t actively show it regularly, but you need to understand that this is all new to me.”

“Back on Earth, relationships never worked for me, I would either grow bored of purely physical ones quickly, or my actions and words would break the wholesome ones down equally as fast.” Sighing as the memories of his two failed marriage engagements flashed through his mind, Cynrik closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and continued.

“If we were our old selves, odds are we would already have broken up and wouldn’t even be on speaking terms. Not to mention that once a relationship ends for me, that’s it, it’s over, and I move on without looking back.”

“Sigh, but what we have is different. Be it because of the annoying intervention of the Deities or because of this strange soul connection we have between us; it is just plain different.”

“While I can’t vocalize my feelings or put what little emotion I am capable of understanding to words, if something happened to you, I would raze everything to the ground, no matter WHAT would happen to me.” Smirking at the thought of burning all of VSFA to the ground was slightly humorous to Cynrik. Still, he said what he said.

“Cyn…I…” Selene sniffled and didn’t know how to respond. Although it was true that Cynrik wasn’t necessarily the best at showing he cared, he still did little things, like serving meals, opening doors, or playing along with her lewd comments.

At the end of the day, it wasn’t that he was a bad boyfriend, but instead, he was muted; the world in his eyes seemed to only be in grey, that was how he lived his life, and she had long since accepted that about him.

However, the image of him being crushed to the ground and killed was still fresh in her mind.

“I know it may have hurt to see me like that, Sel, but things will only worsen in the future. There will come a time when we have to put our lives on the line and fight for everything we want to protect, and at that time, we may have to make decisions that would hurt more than cutting our souls out.

“Nonetheless, those are decisions that will NEED to be made. I won’t always be the strongest or most intelligent person. There will eventually be a point where we face opponents just as strong and intelligent as we are, and at that moment, it will boil down to combat experience and grit.” Cupping her cheek with his hand, Cynrik made Selene look in his eyes.

“But never again doubt that somewhere in this decrepit and black heart of mine, there is a place that solely belongs to you, and you alone.”

Feeling the tears threatening to spill over again, Selene could only nod and bury her head in Cynrik’s shoulder.

“Anyway, we need to go; we have lost half the time we had to train and need to make up for it. I spent significant earnings on the highest classification of XP crystals in preparation for something like this.” Smirking and patting Selene’s back, he tossed a small joke in to make her chuckle.

“Oh yeah, sure, I totally believe that you predicted a whole three weeks would fly by without us noticing.” Pulling back and thumping his chest with her small fists, Selene retorted.

“I mean, I swear I did, the moment I realized I couldn’t reach you in the mind link, but I could talk to Brance; I knew something wonky was going on. Either we were moving in different time streams, or you were so far away that the connection couldn’t be made.” Shrugging his shoulders and looping both his arms around Selene’s plump hips to pinch her ass, Cynrik quipped before kissing her once again.

Feeling his touch, Selene squirmed in his arms, and when he pinched her butt, she let out a squeal.

“Time to go. Let’s catch our cowardly asshole party members so we can beat them up.”

—

It didn’t take long for the two Dark Affinity users to make their way back to the dorm, and when Cynrik unlocked the front door and walked in, he was greeted by the delicious aroma of freshly cooked fried chicken and mac and cheese.

“OI FUCKSQUAD, WE ARE HOME!” Cynrik shouted as he kicked off his shoes by the front door and pulled Selene into the dorm by the hand.

“COUGH, COUGH! Is it really necessary to freaking yell the second you come home? Damn it, Gabby, water, I need water, COUGH!” Brance’s voice came from the kitchen as he choked on his food.

When Cynrik and Selene rounded the corner, Gabby patted him on the back and carefully brought a glass of water to his lips as Brance fought through the coughs and glared angrily at Cynrik.

Taking a second to point and laugh at his little brother’s expense, Cynrik pulled Selene’s chair out from the table and pushed it in when she sat down.

Next, he moved to get food for both of them and joined the table for dinner.

Even though the suns were still out, it was already after six in the evening, the allotted time the brothers had chosen for family dinner, where everyone in the group had to be present.

Taking a large bite out of the crispy chicken drumstick, Cynrik savored the taste before looking around the table.

“We have three and a half weeks to get to Tier-3; I hope everyone didn’t blow their cash on stupid shit because if we are going to pull this off, we will have to be clever and disciplined.” Taking another bite, Cynrik quickly finished off his chicken and explained his new plan.