City of Witches Chapter 121

Why do happy moments pass by so fleetingly?

Time slipped away like sand through fingers, leaving no chance to grasp it.

Every day we woke up and had breakfast together.

Amelia's cooking wasn't exactly superb.

She knew it too, so instead of trying fancy techniques, she mostly made dishes that highlighted the natural flavors of the ingredients.

Fried eggs with bacon, sausages, bread, and such.

After breakfast, before lunchtime, we'd pack a lunchbox and go out somewhere.

We had decided to do one special thing each day.

Some days, we took an easel, canvas, and pencils, sat on a hillside of untamed, crooked barley fields, and painted together.

Some days, she played the violin, holding a concert just for Siwoo.

Other days, we went fishing or swimming together in a nearby lake.

We climbed onto the roof, lay side by side, and watched the stars,

or stomped on bedsheets in a tub full of soap bubbles while doing laundry,

and sometimes bought ingredients to bake apple pie together in the cottage oven.

Amelia shared with Siwoo all the warm days she had received from her Master.

Each day was an incredibly precious and radiant moment.

"Amelia."

"Yes?"

"You seem a bit distracted today."

"I was just lost in thought for a moment."

Amelia shook her head and looked at Siwoo.

He was sitting at the table, organizing formulas that had become much more difficult than before.

Now, without his explanations, Amelia couldn't properly understand them anymore.

If it were another Witch's Magnetic Magic, it might be different, but the Magic he was researching had a uniquely strong character of its own.

Moreover, since he once lost his emotions, that character felt even more pronounced.

"You don't have to stay by my side. I can manage on my own now."

"No. But sometimes you still get stuck, don't you?"

Siwoo's voice had deepened.

With more than half the medicine bottle emptied, he now looked like a young man past his adolescence.

There was still a hint of boyishness, but with each passing day, he grew more similar to the Siwoo Amelia remembered.

"If you're tired, you can go to sleep first."

"No, I'm a Witch. I'm not that tired."

"But lately, you've been sleeping regularly every night."

"I must have gotten into the habit. But it's still true that I don't need to sleep."

Amelia, who used to go without sleep for as short as a week or as long as several months, had somehow become a Witch with a regular sleep pattern.

"Are you feeling lonely because I'm not there?"

It had been quite some time since Amelia and Siwoo stopped sharing a bed.

Siwoo, growing rapidly day by day, had felt awkward first and declined to sleep together.

Siwoo asks, pretending to be nonchalant but clearly embarrassed, trailing off his words.

He seemed to slightly regret bringing it up at all.

"Maybe?"

"Ah."

Amelia's one-liner, making the already flustered Siwoo even more flustered.

It was a remark that slipped out without passing through the brain's filter.

Siwoo stared blankly with his mouth agape, and Amelia gazed intently at his face.

His features no longer suited the descriptor "childlike."

That small boy had grown up so much already.

Though they had actually spent only a little over a month together, having watched him grow from his childhood self to now made it feel like they had shared a very long time.

With such happy times, it wouldn't be strange if each year felt like a single day.

"Sorry. It was a joke."

"Were you joking too? I was also joking."

Amelia leaned her head on the desk and smiled brightly, while Siwoo unnecessarily covered his chin with his hand and turned his head away.

A fake cough escaped him.

Perhaps because so many memories were being reconstructed with intense density, each day truly felt like a year to Siwoo.

After merely closing his eyes and waking up, his body, mind, and memories had all changed.

Therefore, the intimacy and affection Siwoo felt for Amelia, who stayed by his side all day, wasn't just for a month's worth of time.

As if Amelia had raised the young Siwoo herself, sometimes she felt like a mother, sometimes an older sister, sometimes a teacher, and sometimes...

"Siwoo."

Interrupting Siwoo's thoughts, Amelia suddenly lifted her head.

In Amelia's hand, now smaller than Siwoo's, was the medicine bottle, less than half full.

Every night, Amelia gave Siwoo his medicine.

She wished these days could continue.

Of course, she also wanted to run away and hide.

But this was Amelia's duty and responsibility.

Watching Siwoo recover safely brought relief, but simultaneously, a sadness like being consumed by embers also coexisted.

Unaware of Amelia's inner turmoil, Siwoo calmly took the spoonful of potion and drank it.

"I could drink this much on my own."

"I want to do it for you."

Siwoo obediently took the spoon from Amelia, put it in his mouth, and swallowed the medicine.

Amelia watched him, for some reason, with sad eyes.

"Don't push yourself too late. I'm going in."

"Yes, Amelia."

Amelia, about to leave the spot fearing tears would burst forth if she looked at his face any longer, stopped in her tracks.

Seeing Siwoo growing up strong and healthy revived a lingering attachment she thought she had long since abandoned.

She knew in her head.

She mustn't say it.

She mustn't utter these words.

It would be cowardly, petty, and despicable.

But the anxiety and desperation accumulated while watching the happy time end right beside her unknowingly forced its way through her lips.

"Siwoo, I have something to say."

"Yes?"

Amelia stood leaning slightly against the desk where Siwoo was studying.

Had he noticed her voice was different from usual?

Siwoo turned to look at Amelia, pretending to be tense.

Her sorrowful gaze felt like it pierced his heart.

She was sad.

Seeing Amelia's gloomy face made Siwoo's heart ache too.

He thought such an expression didn't suit her, that a smiling face suited her better.

"I'm listening."

Siwoo carefully offered consideration for Amelia, who remained silent for a long time.

Amelia's beautiful eyes were now brimming with glistening tears.

"Later on..."

Amelia swallowed a sob and spoke to Siwoo.A selfish utterance for a fleeting comfort,

one I had resolved never to let pass my lips.

“Even if you regain your memories later… could you… ever forgive me?”

“........”

Seeing Amelia, who looked so wretched and fragile, so unlike her usual self, Siwoo reached out and gently wiped her tears with the sleeve of his shirt.

“Amelia…”

Amelia felt an impulse to rush into his broad embrace and cling to him.

To confess everything—what she had done wrong, how deeply sorry she was—and to beg.

To plead, to cry out how sorry she was, how full of regret, to beg him never to abandon her.

To implore, to pray, to seek forgiveness.

But Amelia barely managed to suppress that irreverent urge.

She felt Siwo’s thickened hand patting her back.

“I don’t know what wrong you’ve done to me, Amelia. So I can’t make any promises.”

Even in her vulnerable, selfish state, his tender voice rang so close to her ear that tears began to spill out as if by some lie.

“Hic… ugh… sniff…”

As Amelia’s shoulders shook, soaking his shoulder, Siwo gently stroked her head.

“But… I’ll try to forgive you. Even if I can’t right away, I’ll try. Because to me right now, Amelia, you are more precious than anyone.”

Siwo waited until Amelia calmed down.

He held her shoulders and gently created some distance to look at her face.

Amelia’s usually neat face was now a tear-streaked mess right before Siwo’s eyes.

Though their upbringings, their ways of thinking, and their positions were different, at this moment, both of them thought the same thing.

I want to kiss you.

Without anyone taking the lead, their lips met.

As their soft, pliant lips overlapped, Siwo wrapped his arms around Amelia’s waist and the nape of her neck, pulling her close.

Amelia’s hands, which had been fumbling awkwardly for a place to hold, clung to Siwo as if desperate, gripping his shirt.

As if she didn’t want to let go.

As if she wanted to stay like this forever.

When his rough tongue slipped between her lips and entered her mouth, Amelia’s body trembled as if electrified.

Sensing her attempt to pull away, Siwo gripped her slender waist tightly, not letting her escape.

Amelia felt the sensation of the kiss as if walking through a dream—dazed and hazy.

Rough yet soft, pliant yet sticky at the same time.

She had learned from her Master.

You taught that a kiss is a signal between two people.

A signal of “I trust you.”

A signal of “I allow you more than before.”

Shin Siwoo trusted Amelia.

Amelia wanted to allow Siwoo even more than this.

She might not know anything else, but she could understand and feel that much.

Exchanging saliva and breath, Amelia clung to Siwoo.

The gradually heating breaths filled the small room.

Even the hands clinging to his collar held a silent, desperate longing.

The hand supporting her waist moved to grip Amelia’s buttocks.

The other hand, which had been at the nape of her neck, lifted her Nightgown like a curtain and grasped her soft, bare breast.

Siwo didn’t know how to treat a woman.

He was merely following his instincts as he handled Amelia.

Amelia, too, offered no resistance to Siwo’s exploration of her body.

As if truly surrendering herself, she only gasped for breath, sucking on his tongue with even more devotion.

Without breaking the kiss, the two walked naturally toward the bed as if dancing a waltz.

Amelia’s legs, stepping backward, caught on the bed, and she fell backward with a soft thud.

“Haa… haa…”

“Haa…”

In that brief moment, their lips parted, and Siwo looked down at Amelia, trying to calm his trembling heart.

Her hair, scattered across the bed, shimmered like gold dust; her cheeks were flushed bright red.

The Nightgown, lifted by Siwo’s hand, exposed her white, smooth stomach and one side of her chest.

Amelia made no move to cover herself.

She didn’t adjust her dress.

As if awaiting judgment, she only gasped for breath, heavy from the kiss, and looked up at Siwo…

Siwo swallowed hard.

To Siwo, Amelia was a benefactor who had cared for him and showered him with affection for nearly a decade.

Even knowing he shouldn’t, he couldn’t claim he had never thought of the beautiful Amelia in a romantic way.

Quite the opposite.

He had often—very often—wished to grow closer to her, to share a deeper relationship than this ambiguous one.

And this atmosphere, even to the oblivious Siwo, felt like a natural progression.

A flow that could make them one, that could deepen their bond.

“.........”

“.........”

He had always thought that even if they formally dated, intimacy would come three years later.

That was the proper, cultured demeanor of a lady.

But when his tongue pushed between her lips…

When his strong hands grasped her breast and lifted her hips…

When she lay like this on his bed, under his scorching gaze…

She wanted to allow it.

She wanted him to open the Gate to a world she had never experienced before.

Siwo swallowed hard, leaned down, and covered her body as if crawling over her.

Amelia tightly shut her eyes and turned her head away.

Then, as if resolved, she gently pushed Siwo’s cheek away with her palm as he tried to bite her neck.

“No… Siwo, we can’t do this…”

“Ah…”

Siwo, who had been intoxicated by the atmosphere and ready to take her, snapped back to reality as if waking from a dream.

As if cold water had been poured over the heated mood, it rapidly cooled. Amelia sat up and straightened her disheveled dress.

She spoke in a choked voice.

“I want what you want too, Siwo…”

Amelia brushed past Siwo as if fleeing, grabbing the doorknob.

Her back, turned to him, looked terribly small and pitiful.

“But… I don’t have the right… I don’t have the right to do this…”

“What right—”

“I’m sorry.”

With those final words of apology, as if trying to erase everything that had happened, Amelia returned to her room.

Author’s Note:

As expected, it’s delicious no matter when you eat it hehe.Honestly, I like stir-frying just the heads in butter more than the salted grill itself.

By the way, it really is as strong as they say.

I only meant to drink one bottle of soju, but I ended up drinking more and almost couldn't update ㅎㅎ

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