Vero groaned as she slowly opened her eyes. An excruciating pain radiated from her head throughout her body. She raised a hand to touch her temple and was stunned to see that her hand was covered in bandages.Her other hand felt heavy, and when she lifted it, there was a cast wrapped around it.After dropping her hands back on the bed, Vero blinked and stared at the ceiling. She was lying in a bed, but not in her dorm room. The ceiling of this room was so high and wide, decorated with carved gypsum with a luxurious crystal chandelier that hangs in the middle of the room. Even so, the light was not on and there was only a silvery-gray light glimmering from the large windows beside the bed.Vero looked there and found the moon glowing in the distance, illuminating the room and the forest that stretched across it. The leaves on the trees glisten because of the wetness after the rain.“You’re awake?”Vero flinched at the sound of someone’s voice. She looked to the other side of the bed an

When Vero opened her eyes the next day, Lev was no longer by her side. Darkness enveloped the room. It seemed Lev had turned off the sitting lamp and there was only a streak of light coming through the gap between the curtains. Vero pushed aside the blanket with her bandaged hand, then stepped out of bed. She walked over to the window and opened the curtains to see the scenery outside. The forest stretches as far as the eye could see and in the distance are mountain ranges whose peaks are covered with snow. Vero was trying to open the window, she wanted to breathe the morning air outside when the bedroom door opened and an old man stepped in pushing a trolley. “You are awake,” he said. His voice sounded firm and clear. He pushed the trolley onto the coffee table by the verandah door, then placed a plate, a cup, and a glass teapot onto the table. Vero gave him a confused look, and the man bowed politely to her. “Raphael, at your service,” he said. As he straightened up, he smiled k

Lev sat next to Vero during morning class and she could barely pay attention to what the lecturer was saying because her eyes kept glancing back at him and her mind couldn’t escape the change in his attitude toward her.When the lecturer gave students several questions to work on, Vero didn’t know what to write on the answer sheet. She just stared blankly at the paper lying on her desk.“Give me that,” Lev whispered while pulling Vero’s answer sheet, then he handed his answer sheet to her.Lev has done it all. And judging from the answers he wrote, it seems like he did everything correctly.The morning class ended half an hour later. The answer sheets were collected and Vero didn’t even know what Lev did to her answer sheet.“What are you doing with my answer sheet?” asked Vero when the lecturer had left the class.Lev clamped one hand against the back of his chair while the other was busy tapp

A week had passed in the blink of an eye. The day that all Duradel students and residents had been waiting for had arrived. It was the festival of the summer’s first day. Although it was named the first-day festival, the event lasted three consecutive days over the weekend. Lev had officially become Vero’s seatmate and since then, nobody had bothered her anymore. She started to enjoy her life in Duradel and this place became beautiful in her eyes once again. However, there was still a worry that enveloped her heart. Who else but her new friends who were not from the human realm. Besides the Duradel residents, it seemed that only Vero knew their identities. And a secret as big as that could not be borne without consequences. The threat that Lev gave her still haunted her until the day of the summer festival. “You’re thinking about something,” Jia guessed when she came to her room on the night before the summer festival. She brought Vero’s gothic lolita dress they had chosen togethe

“What are you wearing?” “What?” Vero looked down to inspect her outfit. Nothing was wrong. Her bikini straps were in place and the outer lace flowed beautifully around her body. It was a bit chilly, considering that the summer in Duradel wasn’t as scorching as in her hometown. “Bikini,” she said, looking at Lev. “Have you never seen a bikini before?” Instead of answering Vero’s seemingly mocking question, Lev looked away briefly while grumbling in annoyance. The veins on his jaw clenched as he tightened it. “Change your clothes,” Lev said then, his golden-brown eyes darkening with emotion. At first, Vero didn’t understand why Lev asked her to change her clothes. She stared back at him in confusion before darting her eyes around to make sure she wasn’t in the wrong costume. She wasn’t the only college girl wearing a bikini, and nobody else was looking at her intensely except Lev. “Why?” Vero folded her arms under her breasts and puffed them out. She felt satisfied seeing him looki