Chapter 1196 - 546: The Softhearted God

Chapter 1196: Chapter 546: The Softhearted God

She lowered her voice, but the surprise and accusation in it were impossible to hide: "You hesitated too? So you really are just like me!"

"Tsk!"

Yunier quietly bit down on her teeth, extremely displeased with that moment of instinctive panic and giving herself away just now.

But she wasn’t the type to admit defeat so easily. She rallied at once, trying to drag the spotlight back onto Teresa and keep attacking: "Wait, saying you’re the same as me means... you admit you’re greedy for him?"

"I..."

Teresa was momentarily tongue-tied, realizing she’d somehow fallen into another pit.

The two girls kept bickering in whispers, voices so low they were almost inaudible, accusing each other while also covering for each other.

Gradually, the initial embarrassment and panic that had almost choked Teresa slowly faded away amidst this familiar kind of affectionate back-and-forth, half like messing around.

Her taut nerves loosened, replaced by a subtle sense of intimacy, like sharing a secret together.

Teresa no longer tried to pull her hand back; instead, without realizing it, she gently returned Yunier’s grip.

Because of her Snake-man blood, her body temperature was very low. Yunier’s hand was a bit warmer than hers; the firmness of that grip and the real feel of the palm against hers was like a solid anchor, letting her drifting heart slowly settle.

In the midst of Silence, Teresa suddenly spoke softly, her tone sincere and gentle: "Yunier, thank you."

"Hm?"

Yunier raised a brow in surprise, looking at Teresa in puzzlement.

The topic had turned a bit abruptly. She thought Teresa was about to pull some little trick again, so she slanted her a teasing glance.

What are you up to now?

At this point, surrendering is useless anyway!

"Are you begging for mercy?"

Even if you take the initiative to beg for mercy now, I’m not going to let you off that easily!

Mm... though if your attitude is devout enough, it’s not like I couldn’t consider it.

But Teresa shook her head and didn’t take the joke. She lowered her gaze, looking at their interlaced hands. Her voice was very soft, but carried unmistakable emotion:

"Thank you for being willing to be my friend."

"Without you, my life in Elda would probably be a lot lonelier."

She meant every word of it.

When she first came to Elda, she had just escaped a nightmare, with no one she could call her own. Her heart was full of unease and confusion about the future.

It was Yunier, this slightly odd but overflowing-with-enthusiasm Divine Favored Girl, who took the initiative to approach her, showed her around the territory, introduced her to others, and used every kind of way to drive away her loneliness.

If Yunier hadn’t taken the initiative to come knocking on her door, she might have eventually managed to talk to other people in Elda—but it would definitely have taken much more time.

It was Lord Herbert who brought her here, but it was Yunier who helped her truly blend into Elda.

Precisely because of that, Teresa’s gratitude toward Yunier was completely genuine, deeply felt.

She moved her lips, wanting to say more, to express that gratitude. Yet just as she was searching for the right words—she heard a small, uncontained chuckle.

Pu-chi.

"Hm?"

Teresa lifted her eyes in confusion, looking at Yunier, who had suddenly laughed out loud, her gaze full of puzzlement.

I’m saying something really serious and touching here, why are you laughing?

"Why are you looking at me like that? Teresa, you really are such a silly child! What are you even talking about?"

Yunier shook her head. The smile on her face remained, but her eyes lowered slightly, cleverly hiding the flash of complex emotion within—relief, being moved, and a faint, hard-to-notice loneliness.

Her voice grew quiet too: "It’s me who should be thanking you, thanking you for being willing to be my friend."

She was a Divine Favorer, a vessel carrying the will of the Divine, equivalent to Their fleshly body in the Mortal Realm.

In the Church, almost all the believers treated her as a lofty Divine, revered above all, and no one had ever cared about the feelings of this vessel herself.

The identity it gave her, aside from power and honor, was more often an invisible barrier.

The Church’s believers revered her greatly, saw her as a symbol of the sacred, yet very few truly regarded her as "Yunier," just an ordinary girl.

That omnipresent respect was, at the same time, a series of cold walls.

Everyone treated her with immense respect, but at the same time, with immense distance.

The believers chased after the Divine, yet were in awe of Their greatness—unable to look it straight in the face, let alone stand as equals.

Yunier had a cheerful personality; she could be friends with everyone, and yet she had always been very lonely.

Teresa was different.

Her initial distance from Yunier had only been because she was shy by nature, not because of Yunier’s identity as a Divine Favorer.

In Teresa’s eyes, she was "Yunier" first, and everything else came second.

Why should the two of them need to thank each other?

For two people like this to become close friends in the end—isn’t that a kind of Destiny?

Better to thank Destiny’s arrangement?

No, rather than thanking that vague and ethereal Destiny...

The two of them, hearts in silent accord, snuck a glance up. Yunier’s eyes, just like Teresa’s, unconsciously, quietly fell once more on the sleeping man between them.

It was better to thank the man who had truly guided them to the same place.

His brows had finally relaxed, his face carrying a faint weariness—clearly, his dreams weren’t all that peaceful.

"Lord Herbert seems really tired." Teresa said in a low voice, with a hint of heartache in her tone.