Kang Hyun-woo hadn't noticed, but ever since meeting him, Iris had been unable to bear her constant anxiety.
She tried her best to act cheerful while looking at the phone, but the unease growing in a corner of her heart was not something she could control.
Two hundred long years.
Even for a High Elf who lived for eternity, spending such a long time locked away in a dark prison without a single ray of light, utterly alone and without any interaction, was bound to be a daily existence of loneliness and agony that surpassed all imagination.
Living for a long time did not mean one became numb to emotion.
On the contrary, they were pitiful beings who grieved more than anyone at the death of an acquaintance and yearned for the traces of time that passed in the blink of an eye.
Suffering in a seemingly endless expanse of time, they often ended up either castrating their own emotions or forcing their way into a state of transcendence to achieve enlightenment.
Even elves, praised as descendants of the gods, were, in the grand scheme of things, a part of humanity. And humanity was nothing more than a collection of social animals, incapable of living alone, who had gathered in groups.
Why else would a High Elf, personally crafted by the World Tree, live alongside other elves, building villages and running cities?
Why do people live among other people, marry, and have children?
No matter how hard life gets, holing up in the mountains is not an easy thing to do.
Dying alone and forgotten in one's room, without contact or connection to anyone, is considered one of the worst ways to die in the modern age.
For Iris, who had grown up surrounded by the love and attention of countless people, the last 200 years had been far too cruel.
And then, just as she was cornered to the point of contemplating the extreme choice of suicide, Kang Hyun-woo appeared before her.
He was the first warmth, the first conversation, the first meeting in 200 years.
Being alone with a man she didn't know was a first for her, so she had been wary initially, but that didn't last long. Once she realized he was incredibly weak, she felt at ease.
All that remained after was curiosity and a slight sense of favorability.
She had been so happy to see him that she had committed the shameless act of grabbing his hand first, but thankfully, he didn't seem to mind much.
A man's hand, which she held for the first time, was hard, but it also felt warm and reassuring.
'Was it because I let my guard down without realizing it...?'
She had even told him about her past, something she should never have revealed to a stranger, rambling on and on.
Even as she spoke, she knew she should stop, but the more she confessed her past, the more she let go of her emotions, the more the knot in her chest seemed to loosen. She couldn't bring herself to stop talking.
Moreover, though it must have been bothersome, he listened to her story until the very end—the tale of a foolish, old-fashioned woman's downfall.
After confessing her past to him, she felt truly refreshed.
—Don't you want revenge?
She couldn't answer easily.
There had certainly been moments when she wanted revenge on Resilia and those who had been behind her.
But perhaps it was because 200 years had passed, dulling her emotions. Fiery feelings like vengeance had long since burned out, leaving only ashes.
With the dregs that remained, she could no longer muster the will to do anything, nor could she hold onto the hope that she even could.
In the first place, she doubted she could ever leave this place.
She looked at the stone door that would never open, even if she took her own life.
And even if she could get out, would there be a place left for her in the kingdom?
—Who can I blame now? Seeing through to the essence of others is a virtue of a monarch... I was just a poor judge of character.
Even if Resilia had committed an injustice, her ascension to the throne had been carried out under the explicit approval of the World Tree.
How could a mere creature like herself be permitted to go against the will of the World Tree?
—Still, you don't want to stay here forever, do you?
For 200 years, her days had been unchanging.
—Hey, things are different now.
—You have me now.
He, who had appeared without any warning in this place no one ever visited, was strangely kind to her.
Her wariness of this strange man, a human no less, had been brief. The more they talked, the more questions she had about him.
'Why is he so kind to me? I have nothing. Why, when I have nothing to give you?'
In her long life spanning hundreds of years, Iris had learned that there was no such thing as kindness without a price in this world.
Just as the people, the court ladies, and the officials had respected and loved the queen chosen by the World Tree, not the sinner who was abandoned and dethroned by it.
Without the premise of being chosen by the World Tree, she had no value.
Realizing this, Iris found Kang Hyun-woo's unconditional kindness both incomprehensible and incredibly joyful.
At some point, her heart began to pound fiercely whenever she looked at him.
Though she was called an archmage for her brilliant intellect, Iris was confused by this unfamiliar feeling, the first she had ever experienced.
But of one thing, she was certain.
It wasn't a bad feeling.
—I came from another world, a place called Earth.
It was a hard story to believe.
But the evidence he showed her was convincing enough to instantly quell her slight disbelief.
'I've never seen a magic tool of this level, not even in Magnolia.'
The more she examined the magic tool called a "cell phone," the more she was met with a series of astonishments.
It was amazing that this single small device could be used for communication, maps, location tracking, entertainment, photography, and recording. But the fact that one could access a vast library called the "internet" and that anyone could view its knowledge was unbelievably astounding.
It was a shame she couldn't use it now, but how many long years would it take for this world's magic engineering to develop to such a level?
Elves were a race that wasn't particularly close to magic engineering, but Iris was different.
She was more convinced than any other elf that magic engineering was the discipline that would lead the world of the future, so she had been researching it with great interest for a very long time.
Of course, due to the opposition of some high-ranking noble elders, she couldn't get national research support, but if you counted only the time she spent studying alone, there were few on the continent as well-versed in magic engineering as she was.
Because of this, Iris knew.
The advancement of civilization doesn't just happen over hundreds of years. Only when the birth of a genius who can change the era aligns with the flow of the world can civilization make radical progress.
In that sense, this cell phone was truly revolutionary.
'He really is from another world...'
Besides the phone, the combination of his dark black hair and black eyes was a rare sight on the Aquilon Continent.
It was just like a fairy tale she had read as a child.
In a certain kingdom, there was a princess beloved by all. She was kind-hearted and gentle, always grieving for the hard lives of her people and never hesitating to help them.
One day, during those peaceful times, a witch who was jealous of the beautiful, universally loved princess cast a wicked curse upon her.
—You will be loved by no one.
Under the curse's influence, the princess came to be hated by everyone and was eventually exiled from the kingdom.
The attention and love she had received her entire life turned to hatred and contempt. Even in her final moments leaving the kingdom, what flew at her were not tears and sympathy, but rotten eggs and tomatoes.
Falling into deep despair, the princess with empty eyes wandered aimlessly until she reached a deserted forest.
In the dark woods, so dense that not even sunlight could penetrate, only the fierce cries of beasts could be heard.
The princess knew instinctively.
—This place... will be my grave.
Despite her calm words, her whole body trembled faintly.
As fear took over, pearl-like tears flowed endlessly from her jewel-like eyes.
Sensing prey that would clearly be unable to resist, beasts gathered one by one. Surrounded in an instant, the princess turned pale, unable to even flee.
Finally, the beasts charged toward the princess.
—Kyaaah!!
A sorrowful scream echoed through the forest.
Trembling at her impending death, the princess was puzzled when, after some time had passed, she felt no pain. She cautiously opened her tightly shut eyes.
And there stood a man.
A man with dark black hair and eyes like obsidian.
With a single sword in hand, he had struck down all the beasts.
As the princess stared blankly at the scene, he knelt before her and said:
—Are you hurt?
The princess, hated by all due to the curse, was saved by a black-haired hero from another world whom she met by chance in the forest.
Was it because he was from another world? The hero was unaffected by the witch's curse, and he soon fell in love with the princess.
With the sole determination to help the princess, the hero engaged in a life-or-death battle with the witch. After a grueling fight that left him covered in blood and his vision blurry, the hero finally succeeded in defeating the witch, and thanks to him, the princess was freed from the terrible curse.
The princess was able to return to her kingdom and reclaim her place, but ironically, the fairy tale ended with the hero watching the now-beloved princess from afar before returning to his own world.
The story concluded with the princess, missing the hero who had disappeared without a word, soaking her pillow with tears every night.
The princess looked up at the darkened night sky, agonizing and grieving.
Why did you leave me and go back?
Did you not like me?
Was the love you whispered in my ear all a lie?
The torment of having no one to answer her questions continued forever, becoming another curse.
It wasn't a very popular fairy tale, as the ending was too sad and unsettling for innocent children to enjoy with a smile, but Iris couldn't help but feel that her current situation overlapped with the fairy tale's conclusion.
Mr. Kang Hyun-woo, like the hero in the storybook, had come from another world, and saying that no one knew when he would return was not much different.
What if he, like the hero, returned to his own world without a word?
What about me?
Would I have to be trapped here alone forever again?
The end of the past 200 years, which had been unbearably painful, was an attempt at suicide.
It was such a painful and terrifying moment.
Would her hand, trembling more than ever before, have succeeded in plunging the stone into her own neck?
The answer was, she didn't know.
She couldn't be sure, but she couldn't deny it either.
That's how much the last 200 years were days she never wanted to experience again.
That was why she truly wished he wouldn't return to his world.
She wished he would stay by her side forever.
But how?
She had nothing.
To hope that he would abandon even his own world and remain by her side, there was nothing she could do for him.
On the outside, Iris pretended to be looking at the phone, but in reality, she was so cornered that her entire body was drenched in a cold sweat.
Just imagining herself left alone here again after he disappeared made her throat tighten and tears well up.
Iris made a vow. She would give anything, use any means necessary, if only he would stay.
And then, it felt as if a light of impossible hope shone down on her. She had entered an app called "Gallery," and inside were several pictures.
As she expected, they were photographs. Even in this world, there were quite a few magic tools that functioned as cameras.
When he had explained the phone to her, he had mentioned a photography function, so she figured this was a kind of storage for taken pictures. Indeed, even for a photograph, the quality was exceptional. She was marveling at the high-definition images when...
'Th-This is...??'
As she was swiping through the pictures, what appeared before her was a photo of a naked woman. And not just any woman, but women in extremely suggestive poses.
The sight of them wearing something like underwear that barely functioned as clothing, with their chests exposed and legs spread wide open, was a shock beyond comprehension.
Moreover, among them were even photos where women shamelessly exposed their private parts, which should be cherished and were too indecent to even speak of.
The moment she first saw the pictures, Iris's brain briefly overloaded.
Born as the daughter of a high noble, she had learned not only various etiquettes but also the chastity and dignity a woman should possess as if by instinct. Purity was a woman's treasure to be kept for the one she loved most, and exposing one's skin more than necessary was no different from a sin.
The clothes she was wearing now were also attire that adhered to such customs.
Thanks to mending and cleaning them with magic every single day for the past 200 years, the clothes Iris wore were always as neat, elegant, and proper as if they were new.
Of course, it was because Iris possessed a voluptuous figure that could pierce through even the characteristics of such clothing that Kang Hyun-woo had decided to help her without a moment's hesitation.
'H-How shameless...!'
A woman simply should not act this way.
Regardless of status or position, if you were a woman, there was a line you must never cross!
Iris doubted her own eyes and swiped past the photo as if she didn't want to see it anymore.
But what awaited her were even more dizzyingly explicit lewd pics. At the sight, Iris felt her mind going blank.
'Wh-Why on earth... does Mr. Hyun-woo have these...!'
She couldn't believe it.
She had thought he was a good person, and she still did. But the more she looked at the pictures collected in this place called the Gallery, the more she had to doubt her own judgment.
The budding suspicion was beginning to blossom, but at the same time, a strange sense of joy was also sprouting within her at the fact that his phone contained such pictures.
'They're all... women with enormous breasts...'
There were short women and tall women.
Some were rather plain-looking, while others were stunning.
But not a single one of them had small breasts.
And she, too, had very large breasts. She had seen her own chest for hundreds of years, but it was so large that she often thought it was unnecessarily big.
It was difficult and uncomfortable to tighten her corset on more than one occasion, and the moment she took it off, whatever she wore made her look bulky and fat overall.
Her shoulders frequently ached, and she had thought of it as a body part that was just heavy, wishing she could make it smaller with magic.
'...Mr. Hyun-woo must like large breasts, right?'
But now, she would do anything to keep him from leaving. She wanted him to stay here and not return to his world.
It was a thought her past self would never have had, a choice she wouldn't have even considered a mere year ago.
"I-If it's okay with you... would you like to touch my breasts...?"
As long as she could keep him here, she would do anything.