The Cursed Fanalis

Chapter 25

The silence but Astarah's chuckling made everyone uncomfortable. Aladdin was sobbing with the girls and the guys were just there, silently staring at Astarah.

"Astarah, what are you laughing about? Stop it! You can't do this to me after saying all those words earlier! You just can't!", Judar lifts Astarah's body and pulls her close to him. He embraces her and rests his head on her shoulder. "Please don't do this to me...", he sobbed.

The fanalis reaches for his face and caresses his cheek. "You fool. Those were parting words remember? And I didn't really expect that Andras was sealed within me and this shit to happen."

"And because the seal is broken, Astarah is no longer an immortal. Or rather, she doesn't have the curse of eternal rebirth anymore...", Titus added with a sad tone. "Which means, in this situation, she could die and never come back again."

They all became frantic after hearing Titus' words. Kouen suddenly takes out Phenex's sword and began to heal Astarah. Which wasn't working. "You idiot woman. Live! How can you just do all of that to us? To the people who care about you!", no one expected Kouen to yell like that. He himself was the verge of tears but they weren't coming out.

"One life in exchange for thousands. A good trade right?", Astarah bluntly retorts and shuts Kouen up. A smile formed on her lips as she reaches for Phenex's sword and pushes it down, refusing Kouen's healing service. "Thanks for worrying your highness."

"Astarah!", Judar embraces her again, tightly. "Don't smile like that in front of other men. Only to me! I'm sorry for leaving you... I promise that I won't leave your side ever again so please stay! I'll do anything!"

"Judar—", Astarah winces and tears began to fall. "Judar...", she takes a deep breath and pats his head lovingly. "Judar..."

I don't want to go either.

Everyone watches the couple desperately holding on to the thread of life. All they wanted was to be together.

Astarah pushes Judar's chest and turns to Aladdin. "Aladdin. Can you do me a favor?", she pauses.

"Anything...", Aladdin didn't raise his head up and continued to sob.

She reaches for her cheek. "Andras. See you soon.", and removes the rusty vessel pierced below her eye and hands it to Aladdin. "Take care of him for me."

Andras seeps his head out of the studded ring and had an aloof expression on his face. "I'm not taking anyone as my master. Just you.", he said then goes back to the vessel.

"Aha.", Astarah chuckles. "Everyone, thanks for everything.", she trembled in Judar's arms and eyes every each of her friends. "I can't wait to... Do more fun stuff with you guys. Morgiana and Myron, I actually do want to hang out again as girls. Muu, I still have to do your paperwork. So I can just get rid of my debt."

Muu furrows his brows and smiles sadly at her. "You're still worried about that?"

The black-haired fanalis chuckles and nods. "Yeah.", her eyes widened as everyone's did too. She pulls her hand above her and watches her hand slowly turning into red rukh. "Oh. I guess I'm running out of time."

"Just stop saying it Astarah.", Judar tightens his embrace. "Astarah. Please don't leave me."

"Judar, I want to do and talk about more things with you. You kept feeding me with something I hate so we're gonna have to work on that later. So before that, can you kiss me?", she hiccuped and closes her eyes.

Judar gently cups her cheek while sobbing and kisses her deeply, closing his eyes. Tears ran down on both of their cheeks and the others'. Kougyoku's cry became louder as the couple parted their lips. She points at Astarah and half of her body was already turning into red rukh, fluttering their wings.