Free Web NovelChapter 79: Chapter 79: Begging
Chapter 79: Begging
—REN—
Something inside me ached.
Because she had no idea.
No idea how desperately I wished that were true.
No idea how much I hated the fact that I wasn’t simply Ren.
"I know I complain a lot," she continued. "And I drag you into nonsense. And sometimes I make your life harder than it needs to be."
"Sometimes?" I asked before I could stop myself.
She gasped.
"Wow."
I chuckled.
"Wow, Ren."
"My apologies, my lady."
"No, no. Continue. Apparently this is the honesty hour."
Despite myself, I felt the corner of my mouth twitch.
She pointed accusingly at me.
"See? This is exactly what I mean."
"What is?"
"That."
I raised an eyebrow.
"That what?"
"You do that thing."
I waited.
"You know."
I did not.
She groaned dramatically.
"That thing where you act all serious and responsible and then randomly say something sarcastic." freёwebnoѵel.com
"My lady, I do not—"
"You literally just did it."
I closed my mouth.
Unfortunately, she was correct.
Lady Aria looked absurdly pleased with herself.
Then her expression softened again.
"I just don’t want things to become weird between us."
The words struck far harder than they should have.
"After everything that happened tonight..." she continued quietly. "I realized something."
I waited.
She hesitated.
Then smiled weakly.
"I don’t actually have many people."
"My family situation is complicated, you already know that. The nobles make my head hurt. Half the people around me want something from me."
Her smile became self-deprecating.
"The other half are apparently princes in disguise."
I nearly choked.
Thankfully, she did not notice.
"So when I think about losing a friend..." she continued quietly, lowering her gaze to her hands.
A weak laugh escaped her lips, but it carried no real amusement. "It honestly scares me more than I expected. Maybe it sounds silly, but after what happened tonight, I realized how little time I actually spend letting people get close to me. Every time I think I’ve finally found someone I can trust completely, something changes. Something happens. And suddenly the relationship isn’t what I thought it was anymore."
The room fell into silence.
The weight behind her words settled heavily between us, and for a moment neither of us seemed willing to break it.
Aria slowly lifted her head and offered me a small smile, but it looked fragile.
"I don’t want to spend our last days together with you hating me," she said softly. "I know you aren’t the type to talk about what’s bothering you. You’re always patient. Always calm. You just quietly carry everything by yourself. But if I’ve done something wrong, I’d rather know. I’d rather fix it than pretend nothing happened until it’s too late."
Suddenly, my mind went completely blank.
My mouth parted before I could stop myself.
What...
What did she just say?
"Aria!" The name escaped me far more sharply than I intended.
Before I realized what I was doing, I had already crossed the distance between us. My hands found her shoulders, gripping them firmly as panic surged through me with frightening speed.
"Are you throwing me away?"
The question sounded desperate even to my own ears.
Aria’s eyes widened immediately. She looked genuinely startled by my reaction, as though the possibility had never crossed her mind.
"What?" she asked.
"You said our last days together."
My voice felt strained.
"You said it like you’ve already decided it."
Aria seemed completely shaken at the realization.
"I-I mean..." She laughed nervously and looked away. "You’re going to the academy soon, remember? We already talked about it. That’s why I said that."
The smile she forced onto her face only made my chest hurt more.
Because I could see right through it.
I had spent enough time beside her.
I knew the difference between her genuine smiles and the ones she used when she was trying to reassure other people.
This was the latter.
"Are you planning to leave me after I enter the academy?"
The question escaped before I could stop it.
The moment it did, the room became unbearably quiet.
Aria froze but she didn’t answer immediately.
And that silence hurt more than any answer could have.
Because suddenly I realized something I had never allowed myself to think about before.
I had always assumed I would remain by her side, because somewhere along the way, being with her had become the center of my life.
Every plan I made somehow involved her.
Every future I imagined included her.
Every dream I allowed myself to have started with the assumption that she would still be there.
Yet perhaps that had only been my assumption.
Perhaps I was never part of her future at all.
Perhaps I was merely someone she intended to help before moving on with her own life.
The realization struck harder than it should have.
Slowly, I released her shoulders and stepped back.
A bitter laugh nearly escaped me.
How foolish.
How utterly foolish.
I had spent years fearing the day someone would drag me back to the palace.
Yet somehow I had never prepared myself for the possibility of losing her instead.
My vision blurred.
I lowered my head, but it was already too late.
The tears came anyway.
No matter how much I tried to stop them.
No matter how much dignity I tried to preserve.
They came.
Aria’s eyes widened in horror.
"Ren..."
Her voice sounded distant.
I couldn’t even look at her.
Because the truth was painfully simple.
I could survive being Crown Prince Damien Ashford.
I could survive returning to the imperial palace.
I could survive becoming everything I never wanted to be.
But I could not imagine surviving a life where Aria was no longer part of it.
She had pulled me from the streets.
Given me a home.
Given me purpose.
Given me laughter.
Given me a place where I belonged.
Without realizing it, she had become the most important person in my world.
And now, for the first time, I was being forced to consider the possibility that our paths might someday separate.
The thought alone was enough to shatter me.
"Ren..." she whispered again, sounding more distressed than before.
But I couldn’t answer.
Because if I opened my mouth, I was afraid everything I had spent years hiding would finally come pouring out.
Yet my restraint broke anyway.
The pressure inside my chest had built for too many years. Too many fears. Too many things left unsaid. Before I realized what was happening, my knees gave out beneath me and I collapsed to the floor.
A broken sound escaped my throat, then another.
And suddenly I was crying.
I cried like someone standing at the edge of losing everything.
My vision blurred until I could barely see her. I lowered my head instinctively, ashamed of how desperate I must have looked. The tears refused to stop no matter how hard I fought them. They spilled endlessly, carrying years of fear with them.
"P-please..." My voice cracked so badly I barely recognized it. "D-don’t leave me, Aria..."
The words sounded pathetic.
Yet once they began, I could no longer stop them.
"I’ll die without you."
Aria flinched and fell silent.
For a moment, I heard nothing except my own uneven breathing.
I expected her rejection.
Instead, warm arms wrapped around me which made my entire body froze.
Aria had knelt in front me without hesitation.
Before I could react, she pulled me against her.
The gesture was unusual because of our size difference. Her arms couldn’t fully encircle my shoulders. Yet somehow that only made it feel more genuine.
One of her hands settled on the back of my head.
The other gently rubbed my back.
I buried my face against her shoulder before I could stop myself.
The scent of flowers and parchment surrounded me.
It was the warmest embrace I had ever known.
She is my Aria...
...my Aria...
My breathing gradually steadied beneath her touch.
The panic that had consumed me moments ago slowly loosened its grip beneath the warmth of her embrace, yet the fear remained lodged painfully inside my chest.
I had spent years surviving on my own. And somewhere along the way, when I met her, I had grown accustomed to her.
To the certainty that when morning arrived, Aria Valen would still be there causing trouble, dragging me into impossible situations, and somehow making the world feel less empty than it truly was.
And now the mere possibility of losing that had reduced me to this.
A pathetic, trembling mess kneeling on the floor.
I hated it.
And yet I could not stop.
"Please..." I sobbed against her shoulder, my voice breaking apart between uneven breaths. "Tell me what you want... just so I could stay with you..."
The words escaped before I could stop them.
I had never begged anyone for anything in my life.
Yet here I was.
Begging her.
Because the thought of being abandoned by her felt far worse than anything I had ever endured.
