Descending Into A Novel-Chapter 41:Nothing Happened

"...leave me alone...William..."

She froze, afraid she might disturb him and cause him to wake up.

He mumbled in his sleep again, "...i don’t wanna...she always treats you so...badly..."

Her mind was in a frenzy, she already knew that Raymond was hiding a lot about his past.

How could someone like him not have a complicated backstory?

Each time she had inquired before, he had simply brushed it off. Acting as if it were nothing.

This was her first time hearing about his past.

And her first time hearing this name.

’William?’

Quietly opening the door to his apartment, she slowly took off her shoes. Which was a burden to do when she carrying Raymond in her arms.

Setting him down onto his bed, she sighed. Now she was all dirty as well from carrying him around, she would have to take a shower later.

"...William...I’m sorry..."

She froze again, the dilemma eating away at her heart. This was maybe her only chance to learn more about Raymond and his past but she didn’t want to learn it without his consent.

The curiosity ate away at her heart as she debated furiously with herself.

’This is your only chance to know about him? Aren’t you curious to know more about him?’

’It’s rude to just intrude upon him like this, there’s a reason he wont say anything about his past after all!’

In the middle of her debate with herself, Raymond stirred slightly—she had tried to be gentle when setting him down but it had probably woken him up again.

"Ellen...?", he mumbled.

"Yes?"

He weakly reached out towards her, letting him grasp her hand. She quietly moved herself closer to him—until she was standing over him.

All of a sudden, she felt herself get pulled onto the bed abruptly. While in an awkward, half sitting half laying down position—she felt an arm wrap around her.

What Ellen was unaware of, was the fact Raymond was the type of individual who slept while hugging something—usually a large pillow.

In the absence of a pillow to hug, he had naturally settled for the next best thing.

Ellen.

With Raymond quickly falling asleep again. It left Ellen in quite the predicament.

’Raymond! Wake up! Raymond!’

She desperately pleaded in her mind for Raymond to wake up again. Squirming slightly in his grasp before she eventually gave up.

Resigned, she slowly maneuvered her body until she was fully laying down. With Raymond’s arm wrapped around her and his face almost buried in her neck.

She felt his warm breath hit her skin. Each time, causing a tingling feeling to run throughout her body.

Quietly draping the blanket over the two of them, she closed her eyes as well. Trying to fall into a deep sleep, with Raymond’s quiet snoring—similar to the gentle purring of a cat as her background noise.

She had been alone her entire life, denying any advances from men. Thus, Marking this her first time ever sleeping in the same bed with another person that wasn’t her parents.

But strangely, it didn’t feel that bad.

...

Raymond awoke to find his vision filled with a sea of golden blonde.

’Am I dead?’

His nose was filled with a pleasant scent, reminiscent of a field of flowers. His body tightly hugging something soft.

He quickly realized what exactly it was that he was looking at however.

’Ellen?!’

He racked his brain, searching through his memories of yesterday in an attempt to find out what exactly happened.

Try as he might, he couldn’t remember anything. The latest memory he had was him thinking the stars looked beautiful and that was it!

How did something like this happen! Past Raymond what did you do!

Based on her breathing. It seemed like Ellen was already awake—today was a Monday so her natural circadian rhythm had likely woken her up for class.

Thankfully, she was lying on her side. Her back towards Raymond and...

’Why is my arm wrapped around her!’

His left arm was wrapped around her, going under and over again. Trapped under her body weight and unable to escape.

His mind was in overdrive right now, working at full power to try and escape this situation without alarming her.

Pretending to still be asleep, he shifted his body so that he was no longer almost directly hugging her. With his left arm still trapped under her, it was a struggle to make it look natural.

Thankfully, with only his left arm trapped under her. She quickly got up, rolling out of bed and landing on the floor with a small thump.

Quietly standing up, she immediately sprinted out—nearly tripping over his furniture. The whole time, she didn’t make a single sound. Careful not to wake up Raymond.

Seeing her slowly close the door, Raymond also got up once the coast was clear.

He breathed a sigh of relief, he didn’t know what past Raymond had done. But he would definitely kill that bastard if he ever met him!

Luckily it seemed they hadn’t done anything bad yet. Just sleeping together in the same bed was still fine.

He shuddered at the thought of what might happen to him if he had done anything bad. Although given Ellen’s authority over him, couldn’t she have easily escaped?

Quickly getting ready, he suited up in his uniform and left his dorm.

Making his way onto Ellen’s floor, he knocked on the door. Waiting patiently for her to respond.

Seeing Raymond already awake without needing her to wake him, she remarked. "I thought you would skip today with you reactivating your cores and whatnot."

"I was tempted to, but I don’t want to miss another lesson with instructor Sienna."

She nodded, "That’s fair."

Thomas had already texted him yesterday, he was in the training hall at the time so he had naturally put his phone on do not disturb.

The message was something like: Your instructor seems to be very excited to meet you again Raymond, I asked her and she said that quote ’She would rather ******** and **** you ****,******* and that if you made her show up ******** to waste her ******** time again she would ********* **** until ******** black and blue *******.’

The app they used to communicate had a built in filter to block out swear words. So you’ll have to use your imagination for this one.

When Thomas had even asked his instructor this was unknown, wasn’t it a weekend? How did he even get the chance to ask her?

Stepping out from her apartment, Raymond summoned his staff and held out his hand for her to hold.

He had also finally decided to ask the academy for permission to use magic in the academy grounds and—naturally they had accepted.

So now Raymond could sleep until just before class started and then teleport directly into class. He also wouldn’t need to waste time styling his hair or doing other things.

Seeing him in only his uniform holding his staff, she raised an eyebrow. "Where’s your books and stationary?"

"I’m a dimension mage, now that I’ve reactivated my core. I can cast some of the basic spells—such as a mini storage dimension."

She held out her own bag towards him, the message clear as day.

"Level 1 storage dimension"

A small purple rift opened, his dimension-attuned core seeing action again for the first time (second time actually) in five years.

"Just toss it in, it’ll be perfectly fine when you need it."

"Level 1? Are there other levels?", she asked while throwing her stuff inside. She had ran back into her apartment to grab a few other things for him to store inside.

"Each new level just increases the storage size, past level 3 lets me store plants and past level 5 lets me store animals. But I usually just use the different levels for organizing my things."

Unfortunately, his storages were completely empty. Travelling between dimensions was something he could do reliably but the more items he carried, the harder it got.

Especially items with lots of mana or just any hazardous things in particular. Which was why he emptied out his storages in reliable safehouses in every dimension he visited.

Luckily his staff was a soulbound item. Which meant it was considered as a part of him, and while it had caused him some trouble when trying to calculate dimension travel. It was more then worth it.

Grabbing his outstretched hand, he clasped it tightly before casting his teleport spell.

With the familiar feeling of teleporting, Raymond opened his eyes and found himself in standing outside the entrance to class.

Letting go of Ellen, the two of them entered and swiftly took their seats near the back of the class again. With Raymond pulling out their needed books and stationary discreetly.

It felt as if the classroom was louder then usual. The class, which resembled a lecture hall seemed unusually empty today as well.

Both of them avoided eye contact with the other, Raymond fidgeting with his fingers while Ellen casually looked out the windows at the sky.

He tapped his fingers on the table, closing his eyes hard. But doing that only reminded him of this morning—causing his tapping to speed up.

’What happened yesterday!!’

The silence between them felt unbelievably tense. He wasn’t sure whether she knew, and he definitely didn’t want to know whether she did or didn’t.

She had acted as normal when talking to him just now so maybe she didn’t know?

Meanwhile, Ellen was trying her absolute best to remain indifferent. The earlier conversation with Raymond had exhausted all of her mental brain power.

’Get a grip Ellen! You aren’t some kid anymore!!’

Raymond didn’t seem to act any different so he likely was still asleep when she managed to escape.

Still looking out the window, her brain spun. Raymond hadn’t said anything about last night so maybe he just didn’t remember what happened?

If he didn’t then that was good, but if he did...

She would have to dig a hole to hide in it. Preferably on a different continent then Raymond.