The System Sent Me to Breed an All-Female Amazon Tribe

Chapter 436: Do Not Underestimate Me, Boy

Marina’s eyes blazed with fury, her hands clenched into fists at her sides, and her voice rose to a pitch that she rarely allowed herself to reach.

"You have done a lot of things that are worthy of death and suffering in the deepest portion of the underworld! You have no idea the damage you have caused, the chaos you have brought into my life, the peace you have shattered with your mere presence!"

[Eh?! Seriously?! Did I burn her family to ashes by mistake in a past life?!] Benjamin panicked a bit internally, his thoughts spiraling as he tried to remember anything he could have done to warrant such intense hatred.

But fortunately, he only flinched a little to betray his emotions, a tiny twitch of his brow that would have been invisible to anyone who was not watching closely.

"Like...?" He raised a brow, his voice calm and measured despite the storm inside him. "Mention one... no, mention three things I did specifically. If you’re reasonable, and I’m really meant to be hated, I will leave and never try to be close to you again. But if you are just projecting something on me, if your hatred is not really about me at all... there will be consequences, mark my words."

"Oh? Let us see then," Marina put a finger on her chin as she dramatically remembered, her eyes narrowing with contempt as she ticked off each point on her fingers. "One: the woman I love with all my heart and body suddenly enters a state of infantilism when she is alone with you, and is currently pregnant with your child. Do you have any idea what that does to me? How that makes me feel?"

[Yabaiiiiiiii!] Benjamin was sweating mentally as Marina began, his thoughts racing with alarm. [She is already dropping huge points from the get go...! But wait, is "infantilism" not an overexaggeration? And the pregnancy was not exactly planned... But I can see how she would be upset.]

"Number two: one of the reasons I came to Verdant Spire was because there were NO men," Marina continued speaking, her voice growing louder and more passionate with each word. "I came here to escape them, to find peace and solitude away from the politics, schemes, and manipulations of the male-dominated world. So your presence here is by default a source of spite for me.

"Number three: you literally almost killed Elara last week! And that feeling... That dreadful feeling that there was nothing I could do to stop it, that I was powerless to save her from you; it keeps me up at night! It haunts my dreams and poisons my waking hours."

[Uwah, she is making it sound like I tried to stab Elara!] Benjamin trembled internally before speaking out, his voice ringing with a defensive edge that he struggled to keep in check.

"I only nearly messed up an experiment and jeopardized the world for literal minutes," he rolled his eyes, trying to downplay the severity of what had happened. "I’m not so incompetent as to actually destroy the world: there are people I love in it. I would never intentionally hurt Elara or anyone else you care about. Whatever happened, it was an accident, and a miscalculation: not malice."

"If you had failed to seize your power at the last second..." Marina bit her lips a little, her teeth pressing into the soft flesh as she struggled to contain the flood of emotions that threatened to overwhelm her.

Her voice was quieter now, more vulnerable, as if she were reliving the terror of that moment all over again.

She paused, her breath catching in her throat, before she forced herself to continue. "I... I would not have even realized that my love was already dead... that the world was no more. Because I would have also died immediately! I would have been erased from existence without even knowing what had happened to me or to anyone I cared about."

"..." Benjamin was silent.

[I have no refutation for that one, of course! I would like to say "I did not know power stone + elemental stones were equal to a nuclear beam capable of ending the world in one shot!" but from an objective view, what I did was NOT cool!

[It was reckless and straight-up dangerous. If I had failed, if my control had slipped even slightly, everything would have been gone.]

"Fine, Marina," Benjamin walked some steps forward, closing the distance between them by a few feet.

His blue eyes met her dark ones, there was no defiance in his gaze; only remorse. "I apologize. I shouldn’t have done that. I should not have worried you so much. Please, forgive me. I know that words cannot undo what happened."

"IT IS NOT SO EASY!!" Marina lost her temper and yelled, her voice rising to a pitch that echoed through the room.

Her aura slowly rose in dark waves around her, a visible manifestation of her rage that made the air feel heavy and thick.

"I watched the beam flash! I felt my blood dry up, you airheaded brat! One second more and Elara would have been history! Deva and the others would have vanished so quickly, it would have been like they never existed!! Do you understand what that felt like? To watch the world almost end and know that there was nothing I could do to stop it? To feel completely and utterly powerless?"

"..." Benjamin only looked away, a pained flash in his eyes.

Marina watched him for a few seconds, her chest heaving with ragged breaths, then she wiped the tears falling off her eyes with the back of her hand.

The gesture was quick and angry, as if she were annoyed at herself for showing such weakness.

Her composure slowly returned, settling over her like a mask, though the redness in her eyes still betrayed her.

"Well, as for the fourth reason I despise you..." She began, her voice steadier now but still flaring an edge of bitterness.

"Eh? I get it already," Benjamin glanced at her, raising one hand in a placating gesture to calm her down before she could launch into another tirade. "And we agreed on three, remember?"

"In truth, I have thousands of reasons I hate your existence!" Marina huffed and got ready to flood Benjamin with verbal violence, her lips parting to unleash a torrent of grievances that had been building up.

"Of all the reasons you gave," Benjamin immediately spoke up, cutting her off before she could begin. His voice was firm but not aggressive. "Only the last one was reasonable. I am a newcomer in Elyndor. I do not know fully how common sense and magic works here. Everything is strange and new to me, and I am still learning the rules. But I also should not have tried something so obviously dangerous too. That was my fault, and I accept full responsibility for it. But..."

He walked even closer, his boots silent on the floor, until only a few feet distanced them.

He could see the flecks of gold in her deep green eyes, the subtle trembling of her lips, the way her chest rose and fell with each steadying breath.

"But as for the other reasons you hate me, the thousands of reasons, I do not count them as reason enough. They are not about me. They are about someone else — someone who hurt you, someone you are still angry at."

"What?" Marina squinted, her dark emotions crawling up again like shadows inching across the walls.

Her voice dropped, low and dangerous, carrying a warning that would have made lesser men flee.

"You heard me." Benjamin did not falter under her dark and angered eyes. His gaze was steady meeting hers without a trace of fear. "I was wrong in that experiment. But it is not reason enough for you to hate me the way you do. So... you fail. You are just projecting hatred onto me."

"So...? As you said, you will show me some consequences?" Marina looked him dead in his eyes, they were the same height, her deep green flashing with challenge and barely contained fury.

"I must let you know; I have seen many god-touched before you, and believe it or not, I have bested a good number. I have fought creatures that would make your blood run cold, and I have walked away victorious. Do not underestimate me, boy... I can easil—"

"..."

SMOOCH!

Marina was interrupted.

Benjamin had moved to her in the blink of an eye, so fast she could swear he did not move at all.

One moment he was standing a few feet away, the next his lips were pressed against hers, warm and insistent.

His hand wandered behind her and grabbed a fistful of her ass, squeezing it and pressing her into himself with a firmness that left no room for escape.

His other hand cupped the back of her head, tilting her face up to meet his.

He used his tongue to slither into her mouth, exploring her with a boldness that made her gasp against his lips.

The kiss was hot and wet, deep and consuming, carrying all the passion and frustration, the confusion that had been building between them.

And that hot kiss lasted for about two minutes...

Before—