The Ice Age Came And I Just Got Married - Chapter 38

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 38
“The shiny one is me.”
The child who’d introduced herself as Annie looked at me with wary eyes.
As if afraid I’d take the Winterstone from her.
I stared at the girl with an awkward expression.
Then the boy beside her, who looked to be around ten, spoke up.
“Annie likes shiny things.”
Well then, I should just give her something else that sparkles.
I promptly unclasped the Brooch I was wearing from the inside vest of my Jumper and handed it to the child.
It was a Brooch carved in the shape of a snowflake, with a diamond set in the center that gleamed brilliantly as sunlight poured down on it.
Annie’s eyes widened into perfect circles.
“Wow.”
“Want to trade with me, auntie? This is prettier, isn’t it?”
The finely crafted Brooch was indeed far more beautiful than the roughly hewn Winterstone.
Annie looked up at me in surprise.
“Really? That’s okay?”
“Of course. It’s called Barter. When we trade like this, auntie can keep you safer.”
“Um, um…”
Annie pulled out a small portable pouch with hands like autumn leaves and rummaged around inside it, fishing something out.
It was a Winterstone larger than the child’s own hand.
Its color glowed with a silvery radiance—it was truly a Silverstone.
The child clutched the Silverstone but continued to hesitate.
Boom—!
And in that very moment, a massive chunk of ice fell into the distant Harbor.
“Oh my!”
A startled woman rushed over, scooped up the children, and loaded them onto a cart.
Only then did Annie reach out her hand toward me.
“Wait, wait! Auntie! Annie’s eye!”
As I stretched my hand toward the child, the woman blocked me.
“What are you doing right now?”
Instead of answering the woman, I looked at Annie.
“Annie, what do we do? It looks like your mother doesn’t like our Barter.”
Then the child burst into tears.
“Annie wants to keep eye! Boohoo! I hate you, mommy! Why won’t you let me? With pretty auntie? Boo-hoo!”
The woman spun around to face the crying child in alarm.
“Hannah, what are you doing? We need to move, now!”
Joseph shouted at the woman—Hannah. She glanced back and forth between me and the child in visible confusion.
“Annie won’t go! Annie promised to do the—the trade with auntie!”
It seemed the child had understood Barter to mean something else entirely.
Hannah grew visibly flustered and tried to calm the girl, but Annie jumped down from the cart and clung directly to me.
“Hannah, what are you doing! Just give her what she wants and let’s go!”
Joseph shouted at Hannah.
Marcus, Charlotte, and Brian, who’d been watching, looked up at the sky and urged me forward anxiously.
“Senior, I think we should evacuate right away?”
“Eve, let’s just go.”
I calmly extended my hand toward Annie.
“Here, snowflake.”
Annie’s eyes shone as she received the snowflake Brooch and eagerly handed me the Silverstone in exchange.
“Thank you. I’ll protect you, I promise.”
I took the Silverstone and moved immediately.
Toward the Tsunami. To where people couldn’t see me.
Upon arriving there, I clenched the Silverstone firmly in my palm.
It was cold—as if I held a solid snowball in my hand.
But that coldness didn’t last long. The Silverstone began to vibrate faintly.
Hum—
A silvery radiance bloomed from within the Stone.
The light, at first no brighter than a candle flame, grew steadily stronger, until it seeped between my fingers.
It was like liquid moonlight.
Silver particles flowed down the back of my hand, and slowly, like living things, began to seep into my skin.
It seemed each Stone was absorbed differently—varying by the Stone’s size and the power it contained.
Crack—
A blinding light burst forth in that instant.
The Silverstone crumbled into brilliance and scattered into my body like light itself.
My heart lurched violently.
Like parched earth drinking in rain after endless drought, my hollow body greedily absorbed the power.
A shudder that stole my breath climbed up my spine. My eyes closed of their own accord.
And when I opened them again, the Silverstone was already gone.
Only a few particles of silver dust glimmered in the hollow of my palm.
I turned back. Logan, Marcus, and Charlotte were following behind me.
Brian came last, his expression bewildered—he hadn’t seen me absorb the Silverstone just moments before.
“Marcus, Charlotte. I’m going to move that Tsunami somewhere else from now on. If I end up being displaced along with it… don’t wait for me. Just head to Dotori Village.”
Marcus and Charlotte nodded at a beat’s delay, taking a moment to process my words.
Before they could fully grasp what I’d said, I stepped toward the ice wall.
Thud—
Bang!
Crack-crack-crack—
The ice blocks began crumbling in earnest.
In an instant, the surroundings descended into chaos.
Someone approached me as I stood unmoved before the ice wall.
It was Logan, just as I’d expected.
He took my hand.
“Hold my hand. You can use your power with just one hand anyway.”
That was true, but…
Why my hand?
“If you get displaced to another place with that Tsunami, I’m going with you.”
“I might be displaced alone.”
“Or we might both be displaced together.”
That was fair. Since we didn’t know what would happen anyway, there was no harm in holding hands.
And like Logan said, one hand was enough to channel my power.
The world is an endless series of choices, and no one knows the outcome. So I had to always be true to the feelings of the moment.
In this damned world where death could come at any time, I couldn’t afford to have regrets.
My true desire right now was to hold Logan’s hand.
“I won’t let you regret holding my hand.”
I had my own conviction, though to others I might look reckless.
Yet Logan took my hand without a moment’s hesitation.
For his sake, I would protect him no matter what.
We would survive. We had to.
“I don’t regret it,” Logan answered.
In my peripheral vision, I could see him smiling faintly.
“Right now, I have this certainty that you’re going to pull something off.”
I had so much I wanted to say—
Crash!
But when ice shards fell from behind me, I had to snap back to focus.
I placed my hand on the cold ice.
I think I can do this.
That’s exactly what I felt. I think I can do this.
The target location for displacement: the middle of the Sea, far from land.
I kept visualizing the target point while concentrating power into my palm. An intense feeling washed over me—a sense that this was exactly what I needed to do.
Whee-whee—
Peepee, who had been circling around us, suddenly dived into my Jumper’s pocket.
“Eve! Logan!”
At that moment, Charlotte, Marcus, and Brian called out to us.
But even before I could respond, the ice beneath my palm began to glow with a soft silver radiance.
Hum—
The Silverstone’s power was responding.
Silver ripples spread across the ice surface in all directions, as though a single drop had fallen on the surface of a vast lake.
“Eve.”
Logan called my name carefully.
His voice sounded like a gentle comfort, as if to say don’t worry. And that was likely what he meant—because it was Logan.
My heart thundered in my chest.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
The Silverstone absorbed into my body vibrated intensely. Or rather, it felt as though this power itself was showing me how to wield the Silverstone’s strength.
Picture your target point.
It was almost as if someone inside my mind were speaking to me.
I fixed my target point in my mind at once.
Dozens of kilometers from shore, in the middle of the sea where no one dwelt.
And I poured all my strength into my palm.
Shrieeeeek!
In that instant, a blinding Silver Radiance erupted. It was a light that seemed to swallow the entire coastline.
Rumble-rumble-boom.
The earth shook. The colossal ice tsunami began to vibrate.
Towering ice cliffs dozens of meters high, and within them countless ships and wreckage, all of it swallowed up in a brilliant shower of silver radiance.
“Junior!?”
“Eve!”
“Wait, hold on. Marcus, Charlotte—fall back!”
With Brian’s final shout, all sound grew distant.
In that moment, Logan’s grip on my hand tightened. His fingers interlaced with mine, and our hands wove together naturally.
‘I won’t let go. Not ever.’
No words were spoken, but his fingertips said it all.
The sensation of space tearing open.
My body was hurled into the void and the world turned upside down.
The landscape before my eyes warped.
Splash.
What came next was the sound of waves.
I slowly opened my eyes.
What lay before me was an endless horizon. On all sides stretched the sea, with no sign of land.
Only the dark blue water and gray sky.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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