Chapter 55: Tom and Jerry

After reading two more notebooks, Blanche felt her vision blur. She wanted to keep going, to learn more, but she knew it was time to return.

What she had discovered... she could hardly believe it. She finally understood Kiyan. She now knew what he had done—and why he would never make the first move. And yet, despite everything, she still loved him. Discovering that the one you adored was a real bastard didn't erase love. Not really.

Now, she even knew why she owned a forge. And that also explained Aaron's and Kiyan's rings, which were anything but ordinary...

Blanche knew what she was. Who she was. Why she mattered so much. But she still didn't know the identity of her father, nor the one who had run him down. As if her other self had held back from writing it, so she would discover it on her own.

She set the notebook down on her bed and went downstairs, ready to face the entire world to find her familiar.

The bedroom she left behind almost seemed to regret her departure. The deep shades of red and black still wrapped the space in a muted warmth, the heavy fabrics catching the light like slumbering embers.

The bed, still faintly marked by her presence, stood at the center with sovereign elegance.

The wall library kept silent watch, its rows of notebooks perfectly aligned like fragments of her own life. Through the bay window, light poured in, flooding the desk and sliding gently across the floor, as if trying to hold her there just a moment longer.

But she had no mind for that anymore.

She crossed the hallway, went down the monumental staircase without really seeing it. The reflections of the marble, the columns, the grand volumes—all of it faded behind a single thought, clear and urgent.

Find Phénix.

She found him outside, by the pool, completely naked, sunbathing on a lounge chair.

The pool stretched out before him in its full length, extending the one she had discovered indoors. The water, a clear blue, seemed even purer under the light of the sky, almost unreal in its transparency.

It flowed gently from the greenhouse to the outdoors without interruption, like a liquid ribbon connecting two worlds. The surface barely rippled, disturbed only by a light breeze that made the water shimmer in scattered reflections.

Around it, the garden breathed in perfect harmony. The intense green of the grass contrasted with the white of the manor in the background, and bright flowers dotted the space like splashes of color too vivid to be entirely natural. The light, still dense, wrapped everything in a soft, almost caressing warmth.

And in the middle of this flawless setting, Phénix.

Lying there without the slightest hint of self-consciousness, completely at ease, as if the place belonged to him as much as to her. His body caught the light, every line defined with almost insolent clarity.

Nothing in his attitude suggested modesty or restraint—only absolute ease, disarming confidence. One arm bent behind his head, the other resting casually, he simply enjoyed the warmth, motionless, like a solar creature at its peak.

The contrast was almost absurd. She, still filled with questions, revelations, tension close to the surface. Him, stretched out there, as if nothing mattered.

And yet, he was exactly who she had come to find.

" Damn it!" she exclaimed, startled and horribly uncomfortable, turning her eyes away.

Phénix burst out laughing.

Two seconds later, he was dressed again.

" You'll have to get used to it," he said." Demons affiliated with Lilith don't do modesty."

Blanche grumbled, still unsettled.

"So, you done reading? Can we go back? " Phénix asked.

She looked at him more closely. His aura, magnificent, imposed itself on her: a soft red blended with a deep midnight blue, never tipping into purple.

It wasn't just a color, but a living, shifting presence that seemed to breathe around him. The red pulsed with a warm, almost soothing softness, while the blue, dense and deep, carried a silent gravity, like an echo from another time.

The two blended without ever merging, forming an impossible, mesmerizing harmony that held the gaze as much as it unsettled the mind. At times, the aura rippled slightly, like a controlled flame, revealing fleeting shades, elusive reflections.

He was now wearing his white three-piece suit, without jacket or shirt.

The pale fabric caught the light with an almost unreal intensity, tracing every line of his body with sharp precision. Without the jacket or shirt, the ensemble felt both incomplete and perfectly deliberate, as if he himself redefined the rules of elegance.

The trousers fell flawlessly, fitted without constraint, while the waistcoat hugged his torso with almost unsettling precision. The contrast between the purity of the white and the warmth of his skin reinforced that impression of a solar presence, impossible to ignore.

His hair moved in the breeze.

It caught the light like living threads, shifting with natural lightness, indifferent to any constraint. Every movement seemed slow, almost deliberate, as if even the wind bent to his rhythm. A few strands fell across his forehead before drifting aside again, revealing his features in turn, enhancing that sense of constant fluidity.

She realized that the sun itself had not moved since her arrival.

The light remained fixed in the sky, unchanging, as if suspended outside of time. Shadows did not shift, reflections on the water remained identical, and the glow bathing the garden neither faded nor changed. Everything seemed held in a perfect balance—artificial, perhaps, but disturbingly stable—as if this entire place refused to obey the laws of the outside world.

" It never gets dark here," the demon added, taking her hand and leading her toward the exit.

" Have you read them, my notebooks? " she suddenly asked, something on her mind.

" Never. No thanks. I've already died, ended up in hell, and I'm still living my best life. If I'd known I was going to die, I would've tried to change everything and lost it all. Knowing the future? Not for me, little mouse."

" Then... how do you know about my... memory?"

She chewed on the word, almost afraid Odin might strike her down on the spot. She wasn't supposed to talk about her ability. To anyone.

" Oh, well... you brought me here and told me everything," he replied simply. " Who I was, and who I would be to you. You haven't read that part yet?"

Blanche shook her head. Had he seen the size of that library? It would take her a decade to read everything.

" Here, time is suspended. Even the gods can't change that. Not seen, not caught. So yes, you can tell me you remember who you are, even outside of Epsilon. You've already brought Saphir and Alacazar here. You can rely on them."

Blanche stopped. Waiting. Nothing. Phénix simply gave her a teasing smile before continuing to walk.

"Why "little mouse"?"

"Because I'm Tom and you're Jerry—way smarter and craftier than me."