Chapter 496 496-To Never Fall Into True Heartlessness.

'Sigh...let's deal with this first...'

Austin thought as he lightly patted Marlene's head, a sleep spell covering her. With her current mental situation, she quickly succ.u.mbed to it. After all, she hasn't slept for some 'years'. Austin could soon feel the chaotic aura around Marlene calming down, her hug that was getting too tight slowing down as her head fell blissfully to his shoulder.

Within a few seconds, she was fully out, and seeing so, Austin slowly took her body away from him. He moved her around such that her head lay peacefully on his lap. Just from looking at Marlene's face, Austin could tell through the suffering that she went through, and he could sigh himself at it.

He's already tired of punis.h.i.+ng himself and feeling guilty for the things he does. In retrospect, there were easier and less forceful methods to get Marlene to fall in love with him, but none of it would have led toward the path of Marlene following her feelings to be with him, not when Catherine is in love with him and the duty of Marlene's rule lay over her.

Unlike the rest of the younger girls, Marlene is more mature in certain ways. She knows how to let go of some things and to move on with her life. She is a warrior, one of code and conduct, the very conduct she followed throughout all her life. And in that conduct, she would never betray a friend nor would she follow some feelings of hers and risk her Empire for it.

She is like that, and in the game, Austin had to grovel and try again and again, almost sacrificing the rest of the girls to get his hand on Marlene, and truly, he has no interest in doing it here. Heck, his character had to almost die within the Water arc of the game to finally even get any response from her, and in Austin's eyes, all of it is a waste.

He has already learned the lesson that trying to be nice and playing it right won't get him anywhere, and any such guilt that comes with it should be locked up or thrown away. All he could do is to make sure that all the girls he goes after would be the happiest women in the world, well, at least after he breaks their hearts again.

'Sigh...the things I do to live...'

Shaking off his thoughts, Austin focused on Marlene. His hands slowly patted her, and he could see that it was affecting her. A small smile broke off her mouth while she started to giggle like a little child, which could only once again bring a wry smile to Austin's face. If there is one thing that Austin has learned from the T, it is the fact that he can never completely expect how the situation would go with any girls in this world.

If he puts on an expectation, these girls seem to break through the roof of that expectation, and he has long since given up hope of using common sense or trying to mark the correct reactions. In fact, Austin knew something like this would happen when he did this to Marlene, and while she looks to be crazier than all his women, she isn't. She is on the same level of craziness as the rest of them.

The simple reason for such extreme reactions from Marlene is due to the constant illusion she went through, the feelings increased, and the sudden mind break she experienced. In fact, the reason for such an extreme level of affection that appeared in front of him is because these affections were things that grew over her within the illusions.

It is the culmination of the feelings she gathered within the illusions, and it all just released at once when she came out of the illusion, which still doesn't change the fact that the current Marlene is completely out of control. In fact, Austin is sure that if he doesn't do something about it, Marlene will definitely lose a part of herself to madness.

And he, in no way, wants it. Austin has come to like the Marlene that he came to know, one of stubbornness, code, loyalty, and a little bit of innocence that keeps popping up at unexpected times. She is a warrior and a proud one, and Austin would be too black-hearted to destroy that part of her, which he came to adore in the game and in real life.

With a smile, he took out a small seal in his hand. Just as it did, several symbols started to appear around Marlene's body, all converging into one that met at the top of Marlene's head, forming the shape of a seal. Seeing it, Austin didn't hesitate to place the seal in his hand matching the one on Marlene's head.

A small click sound spread out within the small room as the symbols in Marlene's body lit up and soon started to fade away, along with the seal in Austin's hand. He smiled at it as he now looked at Marlene again. The chuckling from her mouth faded away, the edges of her eyes that seemed to be tearing getting repaired, while the aura of madness from Marlene faded away.

You see, tying down the power within Marlene wasn't easy. She has a powerful bloodline, a great lineage, a physique, and mental strength. Something special is needed to tie her down, and in fact, Austin spent a fortune of his affections to buy the seal he used, which, in the fact, can only be used once.

Though in the end, it was worth it. The thing was that the seal didn't just heighten her emotions, but at the end of unsealing the seal, the marker has the choice of making a change in the mental power of the one sealed, only if at the time of unsealing the mental situation of the sealed one is messed up.

And Austin needed that. While he took away the seal, he also made sure to erase the madness and instability of the illusions she went through. After all, going through so much emotion, so many years at once has its side effects, and Austin removed it, while at the same time retaining all the feelings she has, just not the dark side.

This means that she removed even the memories of the time Marlene had to take dark actions against the people she cares about, all the things that she did which broke her code of a warrior and rule will no longer reign in Marlene's mind. Of course, the memories won't be there, but Austin made sure to keep some feelings and lessons she learned to remain.

It was easy to manipulate that last bit of her value. While he took those memories, he made sure to retain other conduct Marlene learned, one of never giving up on him.

"I hope this can make it up a little bit..."

Austin muttered. While bad things did happen, Austin still made sure that Marlene still earned some great things from the experience. Right now, there would be no greater ruler than Marlene in the world. Within the illusion, she lived many lifetimes, and each lesson she learned there would be an integral part of how Marlene would grow as a person.

Then again, having too much memory would destroy Marlene, so Austin sealed some of them, and they would return back to her as Marlene grows stronger. In fact, Austin is sure that Marlene would grow up to be a great ruler and a very powerful one at that. Overall, after this, she would definitely stand at the top of her generation.

Overall, this might not make up for the pain he inflicted and the ones he might do in the future, but it still brings some sort of solace in Austin's mind, caused by the end of it all, he doesn't want to be someone that would use people's feelings as he likes for no reason at all. If he did reach that, then there would be no difference between him and a heartless monster.

Sighing himself once again at the things he has to do, Austin kept patting Marlene's back, with his spell and the current situation of Marlene, she might even be out for a day. She should be out for months, but thanks to his last-minute actions, once Marlene wakes up, she would be someone different, someone for the better.

'Though, I guess this might only increase the feeling she has for me...'

In fact, Austin isn't even done, he has one round after this to just make things more concrete. Thinking till here, Austin turned towards Marlene as an image pa.s.sed in his mind.

[

Name Marlene Kia Leviathan

Affection: 175%

]

'Well, you gotta be crazy and have that sort of love to survive among my girls'

[You think?]

The system asked once again.