Chapter 116: Echoes of Wedding Bells

I had a strange dream.

When Jay opened his eyes, he couldn’t help but think that.

His last memory was leaning his back against the soft sofa placed under the window where sunlight entered and placing a sketchbook on the cushion. But now he was lying straight on the bed under low illumination. A soft but not heavy duvet was conveying pleasant warmth.

Thick but loose socks were also contributing to that warmth, but Jay remembered he was barefoot in slippers before falling asleep.

He probably didn’t sleep that long. Past experience suggested that at most, an hour or two had passed.

In the late afternoon, the red sunlight before sunset used to induce sleep. Before he knew it, his eyes closed on their own. It was a routine to fall asleep for an hour or two like that and wake up only after darkness completely settled in.

Although still not used to it, this was also clearly the influence of pregnancy.

After falling asleep, he used to dream of the forest, the lake, and the lilac colony. It felt not like he dreamed of that place because he fell asleep, but rather fell asleep to go there.

But today was different from usual.

At that sense of heterogeneity, Jay blinked slowly.

“Is something uncomfortable?”

Ah, I see.

Only when Philius’s voice was heard could Jay figure out the cause of the heterogeneity he felt.

Philius was next to him lying on the bed. Leaning his back against the bed holding documents in his hand, that was exactly like usual.

“I had a strange dream…”

The unclear ending of his sentence meant Jay hadn’t completely escaped from the dream yet. Philius put down the documents he was holding and stroked Jay’s forehead. A slightly high body temperature was felt as sleepiness still remained.

“What dream?”

The eyes blinking slowly closed completely. A hand, warm like his forehead, grabbed Philius’s hand and pulled it down, burying his face in it. He felt Jay inhaling deeply. As expected, he seemed not fully awake yet. It was pleasing to see him seeking his scent unconsciously.

Jay’s breath formed on his palm. It was when a smile was drawn on Philius’s lips.

“A world without you…”

“…Hmm?”

It was an incomprehensible answer.

“I dreamed of a world without you.”

The smile disappeared without a trace soon.

It didn’t mean he didn’t see him in the dream. Jay was talking about a world where Philius didn’t exist, where only Jay existed alone.

It was a very long time ago. The day he taught Jay magic for the first time.

Back then, Jay said he had dreamed of another world after waking up from mana exhaustion. He told him a story of a world unlike this one, without pheromones and magic, where a person with enough wealth to plant illusions in many people gains strong power.

A world completely different from here.

Philius thought Jay was telling him a goal he should aim for rather than such a world really existing.

To be precise, he hadn’t even considered the possibility itself that a world completely different from here existed.

But now Jay seemed to speak on the premise that such a world exists. No, he seemed more certain than that.

As if he had lived in such a world.

Philius realized his guess was correct.

The movement of eyelashes tickling his fingers like the slow flapping of a butterfly stopped. The breath gathering in his palm scattered.

Jay stiffened his body like a reaction after inadvertently leaking a hidden truth.

He really had experienced a life in a world completely different from this one, without Philius.

“How was it, that world?”

Most people would laugh it off asking what nonsense he was imagining. Some might clap saying it’s an interesting story. Either way, few would accept words spilled in sleep as truth.

But for Philius, it was rather harder to find a reason not to believe. Because Jay’s stiff shoulders relaxed at his question. Because the stopped eyelashes resumed the movement tickling his fingers again.

He felt Jay’s tension released upon showing he accepted those words as they were. Even without other reasons, it was sufficient ground to believe Jay’s words.

“…It was lonely.”

The words touching his palm with a sigh evoked conflicting emotions in Philius simultaneously. While feeling pity as the emptiness Jay must have felt touched him directly, he also felt relief at the fact that Jay didn’t feel fulfillment in a world without him.

And Philius couldn’t hide his emotions. That he was relieved by the fact that Jay is beside him now.

Suddenly, laughter began to mix in the breath forming on his palm. Jay’s eyes visible between fingers also seemed curved.

“I’m not a good person after all.”

He couldn’t say it would have been good if Jay wasn’t lonely there too. His greed prevented him from harboring such a generous heart.

Even without confession, the emotions Philius felt were transferred to Jay too. Although he didn’t feel the sense of unity enough to convey each other’s words just by thought like on the day of the victory ceremony again, strong emotional changes were still conveyed. In other words, it meant Philius’s emotions moved intensely enough for Jay to feel.

At that fact, Jay could be relieved.

The dream has now completely disappeared.

Instead, what touched him was the sensation of reality conveyed by Philius’s slightly cool body temperature.

The reason the boundary between dream and reality wasn’t divided for quite a long time was because that dream was once reality. The life of Han Jay who clung only to work without a moment of leisure after losing all his family, the world without Philius.

“Isn’t not being a good person your type?”

At Philius’s words squinting one eye, Jay let out a laugh again.

“It is my type.”

Giving the already decided answer, Jay kissed the hand still cupping his face. As he lifted his eyes which were lowered for a moment, Philius’s hand moved slowly. Cool fingers touched the lips which became hotter than usual as if feverish. He couldn’t not know what the fingers rubbing his lips wanted.

Jay raised his arms and hung them around Philius’s neck.

“That’s a relief.”

At the answer even brazen, just as a smile was about to hang on his lips again, Philius’s lips touched his.

Chuu, chuu. Every time Philius’s lips touched and separated, a sound not light rang out. Languid breaths flowed out matching the beat.

The relief of belonging to the world deepened further with the kiss.

He woke up at a rustling sound. It was a slow movement unlike when he opened his eyes at once to escape from the dream of being alone.

Even if he napped, there was no case of not being able to sleep at night. Sleep visiting the lakeside in the dream was rather more satisfying than ever.

“Did you wake up because of me?”

Philius’s voice contained an emotion of being troubled, but it wasn’t a reason for Jay to hesitate nodding. Because it was true that he opened his eyes as the space next to him was empty.

It seems he was just about to get up from the bed. Philius was looking back down at Jay in a posture with one leg lowered off the bed. Unlike usual when he obtained necessary items with spatial movement magic leaning back against the bed, it seemed there was something he had to move for himself.

“What is the matter?”

As he spoke scratchily with a locked throat, a water glass appeared in the air above the bed. Jay slowly raised his body. Even after a not-short time passed until he took a posture to drink water, the water glass was still floating in the air.

Only after Jay grabbed the water glass with his hand did Philius withdraw his magical power. It was too late to call it a waste of talent or magical power as Jay was now used to Philius operating magic in this way.

“I have to instruct the garden construction.”

Jay realized a little late that Philius’s words were the answer to his question.

“…Are you doing it yourself, Phil?”

The garden construction plan had already been set. That construction would start soon was a fact Jay also knew.

Although it became a room Jay rarely uses now, Philius’s words that he would plant lilac trees in the garden visible from the balcony of the room made for the lady of this mansion were still valid.

But Jay didn’t know that the start of construction was today, and that Philius would supervise the construction himself.

“Um, because there are magic circles I installed in that garden.”

It was a fact Jay only guessed.

“What magic circles are they?”

“Quite various. Barrier and noise prevention. There is also a temperature control magic circle.”

It was like a greenhouse. Actually, Philius’s intention in decorating that garden wouldn’t be much different. Because he always wanted to protect him.

“When spring comes, you will be able to see lilac flowers.”

Even if planted in this season when the cold hasn’t fully gone yet, it’s difficult for flowers to bloom immediately this spring.

He might have to wait a few years for the trees to adapt to the soil.

Even knowing that fact, Jay nodded.

Because Philius looked quite excited unlike him.