Promise Ceremony

Su Ran closed her eyes.

Everything disappeared from her sight.

The magic essence within her body moved with a thought.

She absorbed the magic essence, arranging it tightly, and following the key points for constructing a magic essence circuit from the meditation technique, she sketched out the winding, spiraling lines, little by little.

However, just as the magic essence circuit was about to take shape, the circuit Su Ran had built within her body collapsed directly.

All the lines vanished without a trace.

All the lines reverted back to magic essence, remaining quietly within Su Ran’s body.

‘What’s going on?’

Faced with the sudden collapse of the magic essence circuit, something that had no mention in either of the two meditation techniques, Su Ran realized she had encountered an unprecedented situation.

If the magic essence circuit could not be constructed, it would also mean she could not enter Sequence One.

‘What should I do now?’

Su Ran only had this one experience of a failed magic essence circuit construction, which was clearly not enough.

Thus, holding to the idea of “ask when you don’t know,” Su Ran opened the Witch Game, preparing to ask Isa and the others.

‘Coincidentally, because of Eve’s matter, I’ve closed myself off and haven’t contacted Isa and the others for a few days. I wonder how their flying magic lessons are going?’

In the forest cabin within Noda Forest.

To put it bluntly, she had completely exhausted her separated spiritual power before she could fully integrate her spirit into the magic essence.

Isa, sitting on the bed, opened her eyes, a hint of annoyance flashing within them.

Ever since receiving Her Highness Su Ran’s guidance, she had been striving towards the goal of completely integrating her spirit into the magic essence within her body.

Apart from her normal meditation to absorb magic essence and learning Elven Wings, Isa spent all her other time researching methods to integrate her spirit into magic essence.

During this period, she had tried many different methods.

But without exception, all had ended in failure. Only this time had her efforts made a little progress.

‘If only Her Highness Su Ran were here.’

‘It’s been two or three days since I’ve seen Her Highness.’

Her small hand supported her pink, fragrant cheek as Isa’s bright eyes looked out the window, full of longing.

For the past few days, Her Highness Su Ran had not appeared, and her calls had received no response.

If not for the fact that she could still send food over normally, Isa would have almost thought she had lost contact with Her Highness Su Ran.

“If only I could hear Her Highness Su Ran’s voice.”

Looking at the night sky outside the window, Isa murmured to herself in a low voice.

“Isa.”

“Su… Her Highness Su Ran? Could it be that I haven’t heard Su Ran’s voice for so long that I’m having auditory hallucinations?”

When Su Ran’s voice appeared, Isa, who was still in a daze, didn’t react, thinking she was hearing things.

“You’re not dreaming. It’s really my voice.”

Hearing Su Ran’s confirming reply, Isa bounced right off the bed.

“Your Highness, did something happen to you? Why haven’t you been responding? I was so worried about you!”

Isa’s concerned words warmed Su Ran’s heart. Her actions after falling into grief had been improper and had indeed made Isa worry for a long time.

“Don’t worry, it’s alright now. I promise I will never make you worry again.”

In order not to let Isa continue to worry, Su Ran chose to enter the game and appear before her.

When the purple light appeared, Su Ran, dressed in her little dress, materialized in front of Isa. She reached out and gently pulled her into an embrace, speaking while softly stroking Isa’s back.

Su Ran felt a tightening on her back; it was Isa holding her tightly with her arms.

“The days you didn’t answer me, Your Highness, I was so scared… scared that I would be all alone again.”

Hearing Isa’s heartfelt confession, Su Ran no longer had the mind to care about the dampness spreading on her marshmallows.

“You won’t be. I will never leave Isa.”

Perhaps feeling that her verbal promise was too simple, Su Ran gently pushed away the gradually calming Isa, bringing their gazes to the same level.

In front of Isa, Su Ran raised her pinky finger. “Let’s make a pinky promise, shall we?”

“A pinky promise?”

Looking at Her Highness Su Ran’s strange gesture of a raised pinky, Isa asked with a look of confusion.

“It’s a ritual we use in my world to make a promise.”

‘A ritual from Her Highness Su Ran’s world for making promises?’

After hearing the explanation, Isa mimicked Su Ran by raising her own pinky, and then waited for the next step of the ritual.

“I’m going to recite the incantation now. The ritual will only take effect after it’s recited.”

Hooking Isa’s pinky, Su Ran began, “Pinky swear, hang ’em high, stick a needle in your eye, if you ever tell a lie.”

“Come on, Isa, repeat what I just said.”

“Pinky… swear, hang ’em high… stick a needle… in your eye?”

Repeating Her Highness Su Ran’s incantation in a low voice, Isa seemed to have even more questions. “Your Highness, this incantation is so strange. What does a pinky swear have to do with hanging? And why a hundred years? What about after a hundred years?”

Faced with Isa’s questions, Su Ran didn’t know how to answer for a moment. Should she tell her that before people in her world became superhumans, human lifespans rarely exceeded a hundred years?

Therefore…

‘If the ritual isn’t performed quickly, it won’t be effective.’

Hearing that the ritual had a time limit, Isa didn’t overthink it.

For her, the most important thing right now was to complete the promise ritual with Her Highness Su Ran.

“Pinky swear, hang ’em high, a hundred years, no goodbyes!”

With the words of both Isa and Su Ran, the promise ritual was successfully completed.

In a place Su Ran couldn’t see, Isa secretly looked at her pinky, which was still linked with Her Highness Su Ran’s, a trace of Her Highness’s body heat still remaining on it.

“The promise ritual…”

As she spoke, the satisfaction in Isa’s expression was palpable.

Although she knew Her Highness Su Ran had already helped her a great deal, Isa couldn’t help but want to ask for even more of Her Highness’s favor.

After making the pinky promise with Her Highness Su Ran, Isa seemed to feel that the connection between them had become clearer and more concrete. Perhaps this was the effect of the ritual.

Just as Isa was wondering if there were other rituals that could further deepen her connection with Her Highness Su Ran, Su Ran suddenly spoke.

“By the way, Isa.”

“Is there anything, Your Highness?” Isa immediately stopped her thoughts and responded.

“It’s like this. Could you please help me call Philly and Maimai over? There’s something I need to ask you all first.”

Since she was already here, asking just Isa was the same as asking anyone. Su Ran decided she might as well just ask everyone at once.

This way, when constructing the magic essence circuit, they could use each other’s experiences to cross-reference and thus reduce the probability of failure.

Just as Isa went out to find Philly and Maimai, a fluctuation of magic essence appeared outside the forest cabin.