It hit her while explaining the artwork—this wasn't just admiration; it was fixation. The painters she felt drawn to hadn't merely worked on one theme; they'd vanished into it, whether a person, a tale, or some inner sight. Then silence came fast, because seeing herself in that pattern felt too close.
Of course, Jin Yeager saw it. Nothing escaped him. A slight lift at the corners of his mouth—just enough to hint at amusement, something she'd learned meant he was pleased—and his gaze stayed on her face, lingering past politeness. He understood what she implied, clearly did, yet gave no sign he would speak of it, simply letting the moment pass like smoke through fingers.
Listening closely, he caught every word when she described how brief and bright life feels—how people rush through tasks and dreams, always aware their moments are numbered, scrambling to squeeze everything in before the end. Then came her thoughts on autumn, winter, and summer days off—the odd stretch of minutes in class compared to how quickly trips vanish—time bending strangely, shifting without warning, somehow both too long and gone too soon.
When she talked, his face showed nothing—just that distant calm she knew well but never understood. Nothing slipped through. Her words sank into him like rain into stone—quietly, fully, with no sign on the surface—but small changes in his eyes, tiny lifts of his thick eyebrows, hinted otherwise. What she said reached him, though not with feeling, not really, at least not where it could be seen, but rather with thought, with taste, much as a thinker admires a sharp argument or a player adrift in layered sound.
What caught his attention was how alive she appeared. Not just energy, but something deeper—heat pulsing under skin, time slipping fast, a rhythm so short it almost hurt to watch. A moment stood out: a brief brightness where most things lingered forever. Like fire streaking overhead, sudden and sharp, vanishing before you can name it. Afterward, only an afterimage remained, faint, impossible to hold.
Her gaze caught the spark in his eyes. That look chilled her bones—fascination always crawled before ownership slithered in. Ownership, she knew, only paved the road toward being swallowed whole. To vanish like that? Not an option.
He did not talk about being on stage himself—not outright. Still, whenever she described bright lights, hushed crowds, and the moment sound leaps from player to listener, a shift passed over his face. A trace of old pain, perhaps, or memory, slipped up through stillness like air caught under ice—there just long enough to shimmer before vanishing again.
It puzzled her, at first. Stored it somewhere deep, alongside other quiet realizations piling up like unsorted notes—her private collection, messier than his, yet just as carefully kept. A stage shaped him, maybe. She nearly believed that now. Noticing how he stood—the sense of motion even when still, movements carrying weight without effort, sound moving through air like water spreading—all signs of rehearsal, repetition, and muscle memory built for being seen and heard.
Yet when exactly? Which time, which setting, which version of events? To speak up felt risky. Asking might expose how closely she'd been watching—just as intent as his own gaze on her—and she had no way to guess if that truth would help or harm. Probably harm. That hunch sat heavy.
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Frequently, talk drifted toward heavier topics.
One step led to another, slow like dawn light creeping across stone until shadows vanish. Music came up first, maybe a painting, books—he'd tilt his head at these things, puzzled yet drawn in, while she watched him watch the world. After that, the talk slipped sideways into deeper water without either meaning for it to happen. Thoughts tangled around death, not sharply but softly, like thread pulled through fabric. Wanting someone stayed quiet at first, then louder, showing its shape against silence. Love wore different clothes depending on who held the strings. Forever asked questions he neither knew how to answer, just as the present pressed close with its fragile weight.
Somehow he steered each exchange like someone who knew exactly where to go but refused to show the map—no force, no obvious nudges, yet every quiet pause, every carefully timed question, bent the talk just enough that Historia began voicing what she'd meant to keep hidden. Truths slipped out one by one because he listened like it mattered, sat still like silence helped, and acted as if nothing said there would ever reach the outside world.
She saw right through the act, yet still stayed. One thing was clear—seeing truth did not always stop her from falling into the lie.
There was no open threat. Polite phrases shaped each reply, voice steady, and behavior flawlessly proper. Yet inside those careful words and calm gestures ran something sharp—like tension hidden under smooth fabric—an unspoken note that he held control because he wanted to, not because he had to, and could just as easily let go. The silence between lines carried weight.
That night, he thought out loud about how people run after things that don't last.
Maybe it was the eighth day. Or maybe the ninth. She could not tell—the The library once more—the same as before, the same—the same as always. This room became their spot without deciding on it. deciding on it. Books filled the space between them. Old stories helped bridge years. One lived for two decades. The other counted life in the hundreds. Still, they spoke here. Odd how paper and ink made that possible.
Light seeped into the room through tall arched windows carved into the round wall of the library, empty frames made of stone holding nothing but slices of open air. Those gaps sat high up, narrow and sharp like spears pointing toward the ceiling, letting in a flow of color that shifted without warning. Gold melted into warm yellow, then bled sideways into dark orange before sinking into a heavy violet—the kind seen only when day refuses to let go. Historia stood still, eyes fixed on how the sky changed, each shade arriving slower than expected. It felt less like time passing and more like the world pausing just beyond glassless holes. Nightfall here didn't arrive—it waited, hovered, and stretched itself thin across every surface until even shadows seemed uncertain.
There he was, near the window. Back turned—unusual, unusual, unusual, unusual—nose behind since he always watched what happened behind him, even around someone harmless like her. Yet here he stayed, still, his hands resting low on his spine. The fading glow painted everything except him; sunlight slipped into his hair and disappeared, leaving only a shape carved out of brightness, wide across the upper body, tight through the middle, and gone before you could name it.
From nowhere, a dim glow soaked the walls in colors like dusk after a storm—purple, purple, purple, and purple fading into blood red. Warmth from earlier pooled around corners, turning heavy. Books hunched slightly on their shelves, quiet, as if guarding whispers. Stillness settled. Heat lingered, mixed now with dust, paper, and the nearness of Jin Yeager.
Love, cash, glory—they want these things. He stopped. Inside that silence, Historia felt the pressure of watching eyes—no—no—no—no blame there, really, just quiet amusement tinged with something like sorrow, the look of someone who'd seen human wants spin round the same track since before cities rose. Then come death
Truth carried its own weight. Not sharp in tone—just—just—just—just clear, like noting how flames need air or leaves fall when dry. He spoke without an edge. An edge. And the hundreds. If pain came, it rose from what was real, not from how he said it.
A shadow took shape by the glass, edges carved by light behind the nose, behind the turned—unusual, unusual, unusual—nose behind the unusual nose behind the edge. An edge, the nuanced nose behind the cheekbone rising smooth, lashes pooling ink beneath—then—then shifting fully into view, gaze locking onto hers without delay or guesswork.
"What if you could have something that lasted?" he asked. "Something eternal?"
This wasn't some idle thought. You could hear it in how his voice changed—suddenly lower, sharp, aimed right at her, steady as a flashlight, cold as steel. He wasn't just talking about ideas. What he meant was an offer.
That book in Historia's grip wasn't really being read—just held, chosen not for its words but because it gave her something to hide behind. A thick cover of old Scottish poems, picked at random, is now serving as a barrier, awkward and thin, yet pressed tight like armor. His gaze felt heavy, even from across the room, pulling at her without touching. The way her fingers gripped the spine showed strain, bones pressing hard under skin, turning pale. Lines on the back of each hand stretched taut, tense as wires wound too far on some forgotten tool.
Stillness followed her question—then came the softest hush of words, like breath caught mid-air: "What price does 'forever' demand, Jin?" She did not expect it to reach him. Yet it did. Thin as smoke and fragile as old paper tearing at the edges, yet clear enough for him to catch every subtle nuance behind each syllable. His ears missed nothing, even when silence should have swallowed it whole.