For Me,There Is Only You |18+|

47. Rising Tension

The excavation mission at Grimwood was taking much longer than expected—it had already been fifteen days.

Every crystal was being extracted with extreme care to avoid triggering anything unpredictable or disturbing the natural balance.

This meticulous pace was essential, which is why only Ansel and Ezra were directly supervising the excavation. If anything went wrong, only they had the power to handle the potential impact.

Secrecy was also crucial.

No one outside of our group and the Noctivor Legion could know that a Nexus had been discovered; any word getting out could lead to chaos and competition for control over such powerful resources.

And now that the others in the group had realized only a non-magical being could actually detect the Nexus, and I fit the description of only human entangled with their world, they wanted me to head to the Howling Pines to search for another one.

Ansel, of course, was firmly against it—so was Zev.

He pointed out that Howling Pines had a strange, disorienting effect on anyone who dared to enter that place. It even affected Zev, if only briefly, which made it a place of even greater risk for me, someone without magical abilities to shield myself.

Ansel also argued that our primary goal was to gather enough nullithium to forge weapons for the upcoming fight, not to locate every Nexus on Earth.

If Grimwood had a large enough supply, there would be no reason to venture into the Howling Pines at all.

Now, everyone was busy with their assigned tasks, while I found myself mostly confined to the house.

Ansel hadn't said this directly, of course, but it was obvious. He was more watchful than ever, checking in on me at least twice a day despite being busier than anyone else.

He seemed determined to make sure I was eating, sleeping, even breathing—and, honestly, it was starting to get on my nerves.

We still hadn't had a chance to talk about Genesis or the wolfsbane he'd been secretly taking.

I noticed, though, that he and Genesis were avoiding each other entirely; she only took instructions from Ezra now, which made the tension between them even more obvious.

In a way, I was kind of relieved to be confined to the house. I'd been feeling unusually exhausted lately, with little energy to go out, so I spent most of my time in my room.

I'd brought a few books from Ansel's study to keep me occupied, but even reading felt like a struggle some days.

This morning, I was still wrapped in my comforter, lacking the energy to get out of bed—until Ansel knocked on my door, telling me to be in the meeting room within the hour.

With a sigh, I got up, smoothing out the creases on my maroon, ankle-length floral dress before leaving my room. I ran my fingers through my long dark brown hair, which had become wavier and messier from neglect, and made my way down the hallway to the ground floor.

The sound of chatter and laughter from the meeting room grew louder with each step.

I paused at the door, hesitating as an introverted part of me surfaced, feeling like I was about to intrude on a world that I wasn't part of.

The room was alive with an easy camaraderie that only made my nerves flare up, but I took a steadying breath and stepped inside.

The moment I entered, Kyler's red head popped up first, his hazel eyes immediately lighting with mischief. "Well, look who's finally out of hiding," he said with a smirk. "I was starting to think Ansel's obsession has reached all in our heads and we were all imagining you."