The Bookkeeper-Chapter 68: The Final Battle 2

The morning was subtle. Raiden lay relaxed on the living room sofa, tossing a Persian coin as Ash roamed over his chest, seeking a better spot to sleep.

He focused entirely on the coin, studying the force of his finger as it pushed the metal into the air, wondering if he could increase its speed by infusing his finger with mana.

He repeated this motion again and again, oblivious to Ash’s voice echoing repeatedly in his mind until she grew tired and drifted off to sleep.

After what felt like an eternity, he finally succeeded. The coin shot into the air with boosted speed and pierced straight into the ceiling. But pain bloomed in his fingers, slowly spreading through his entire hands. It was unusual, though he didn’t dwell on it.

The achievement made him smile, and that’s when he suddenly recalled Ash calling his name. He turned to her instinctively, but she had already fallen fast asleep.

Raiden leaned back into the sofa. Rather than stress himself with endless thoughts about everything happening around him, he decided to dedicate every free moment to training.

His recent achievement left him wondering. All he’d done was channel more mana into his thumb than his other fingers.

He had already learned to distribute mana evenly across his body, as Freya had taught him, but this time he redirected small amounts from his other fingers to concentrate in his thumb—amplifying the attack.

Could he apply the same technique across his entire body to boost his strike speed and movement? he wondered. The sharp pains shooting through his fingers were concerning, but it might be worth the risk.

But just as his thoughts began to drift, June’s voice cut through his concentration.

"What are you thinking about, bookkeeper?" she asked, settling into the adjacent sofa, her dark hair spilling across the fabric.

Raiden turned slightly in her direction but offered no response, letting his head fall back against the cushions.

"I don’t mind if you respond or not..." She stood up. "You didn’t take our fight seriously, so I want a rematch."

"I nearly killed you once, so I get it if you’re scared, but you’ve gotten too cocky, and I want to bring you down a peg," June continued. Raiden still didn’t dignify her with a response.

"Well, think about it," she said, then left the room.

The moment she left, Raiden exhaled in relief. Levi had departed the night before for Persia City on his orders—to rescue Leo and bring him home.

Freya was reveling in her new position as knight commander, having spent the day tormenting her troops since Raiden’s appointment.

Soul and Speed did nothing but train together in the fields. Now he was stuck in the house with Alora and June, two troublesome girls who he suspected wanted him dead.

As if summoned by his thoughts, Alora entered the living room before he could even finish worrying about the pair. Her white hair swayed behind her as her star-contracted eyes fixed on Raiden.

"So is this all you do as a bookkeeper?" she asked, leaning toward Raiden to lock eyes with him. For reasons he couldn’t explain, Raiden found it amusing and smiled.

"I never knew you still had something genuine in you..." she giggled and settled beside Raiden, turning to face him directly. "Especially not a genuine smile."

What Raiden wanted was solitude, but Alora’s deliberate positioning made it clear she wouldn’t be following June’s footsteps out the door.

He’d have to engage with her, though maybe he could extract some valuable information about the palace in the process.

Raiden carefully moved Ash from his chest to the sofa cushions, then turned to face Alora with a manufactured smile.

"I can do more than smile..." he said with obvious sarcasm.

"How charming," she responded with an equally false smile. "I want you to be gentle with me, if you don’t mind."

Raiden’s eyebrow shot up in surprise.

"Just like how gently you cared for your white dragon?" he said, his tone sharp.

Raiden shifted in his seat and faced her directly. If he was going to play this game, he’d better do it right.

"Why so?"

Alora giggled. "Don’t tell me you don’t remember."

Raiden’s eyes narrowed in confusion. There was nothing to remember—what game was she playing?

"You promised to marry me..." she said, her eyes taking on a lustful gleam. ’How could you forget?

It was a lie. They had never spoken during their childhood, not once—at least nothing Raiden could remember. Yet something about it felt familiar. Could it have actually happened, and he’d simply forgotten?

"My father and yours were walking by the throne room while we followed alongside them, until you suddenly took my hand and ran up those stairs next to the throne room, into the library."

Raiden’s eyes narrowed as he studied her face. Something that had been completely absent from his memory moments ago now felt startlingly vivid. He could remember it all with perfect detail.

"I was scared," she said, her voice trembling.

"But you took both my hands, looked straight into my eyes, and said, ’I know this is our first time speaking, but I want to marry you someday.’"

A wide smile spread across her face as she spoke, and she gestured to it. "This smile—this was exactly how you smiled that day."

Raiden found himself imagining that very smile on his face as she described the scene. But he quickly dismissed the thought—as Jack, he wasn’t bound by Raiden’s childhood promises.

"We were such innocent children," he said with a faint smile. ƒгeeweɓn૦vel.com

But Alora smiled back at him. "No, this happened two years ago."

The scene came to Raiden with perfect clarity, as if the childhood memory had been false and this was the true one. His expression darkened.

Something was very wrong. His father had died two years ago, making this memory impossible. Was she going to convince him next that his father wasn’t actually dead?

That’s when it dawned on him. Something else was happening here—he found himself believing everything Alora said, and the memories felt completely authentic. If he were truly Raiden, he would have been completely fooled, but being Jack allowed him to think through it logically.

"This won’t work, Alora," he said, leveling a lazy stare at her. "Is this your power or something?"

She smiled proudly, but before she could answer, a memory surfaced in Raiden’s mind. Since childhood, she’d been known as the Dreamwalker, and the servants had always kept their distance from her. That was one reason they had never been friends.

"You’re the Dreamwalker... you can implant false memories into people’s heads and enter their dreams."

Alora’s face took on a sarcastic expression. "When you say it like that, I sound like a manipulative bastard."

She stood up, smiling as she started to leave. "I am the Dreamwalker—I make dreams come to life."

Raiden watched her walk away with obvious pride. What had he gotten himself into? He could recall his father telling him how powerful the princess was—that she might one day surpass even the deceased queen.

And her ability was mind manipulation?

Raiden sank back into the sofa. Alora required careful handling, but her mention of dreams stirred thoughts of his own bizarre dreams—the ones that always slipped away upon waking. Was she perhaps behind that strange familiarity he’d felt when embracing King Hannes?

Each thought led to a dead end. To clear his mind, he removed another coin from his pocket and began repeating his previous mana procedure. Each push on the coin repeated the same pain he had felt earlier, but he didn’t mind.

There was a war at hand. He couldn’t dwell on superstitions.

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