Alice turned around and reacted with shock. In front of her was Nier whose face was covered in tears. She was desperately biting down on her lips to prevent herself from crying. In fact, her lips were bleeding. Her blood and tears were mixed in together as they ran down her face together.
Alice walked up to Nier’s side, and pressed on Nier’s lips. She asked: “What’s wrong, Nier? What happened?”
“I don’t feel too well… My heart aches. It hurts so much. I can’t control it either. I just keep having an urge to cry.” Nier cried as she looked at Alice. Big drops of tears dropped down. Alice helped her wipe away her tears and patted her back. Nier’s shaky legs almost gave in. Nier did her absolute best to resist crying. Alice looked at the young girl in front of her sympathetically but she didn’t know the reason.
“Let’s go. I’ll take you back to the outer court.”
Alice supported Nier. Nier leaned on Alice as she sobbed. Alice didn’t know why Nier was like this. Nier bleeds and she’ll die, but she’s never seen Nier cry. Nier never cried even when she got hurt in training.
But Nier was crying like a kid right now. She had never thought Nier could cry like this. What exactly happened with Nier?
“Ah, Miss Nier!”
When they arrived back at the outer court, they saw Luna who was holding a candle as she stood at the entrance waiting for his majesty’s return. Alice frowned and passed Nier to Luna. Nier hugged Luna tightly and cried loudly in her arms. Luna smiled helplessly as she comforted Nier. Alice made a small bow and said: “I’ll leave Nier in your care for now. I need to return to guard her majesty.”
“Oh, alright. Thank you.”
Luna held Nier and struggled to help her upstairs. Nier had seemingly already lost the energy to move. She rested her entire body in Luna’s arms. Luna struggled to get Nier to the bed. She then sighed as she looked at Nier and asked: “What’s wrong, Nier? Could it be that his majesty rejected you?”
“He… he has a fiancée… he’s going to get married… why… why…? I should be indifferent to it… didn’t… didn’t you say that I would be able to let go after he rejects me? Didn’t you say I could let it go once I’d expressed my feelings to him? So why? Why am I in so much pain…? My heart hurts. It aches. It hurts. I want to die so badly.”
Nier curled up like a prawn and grabbed her chest tightly. Her expression of pain and her tears wet her pillow. Luna sighed. She looked at her and held her hand tightly. As she looked at Nier, she softly said: “So do you understand love now? Being rejected by the one you love hurts like that. It’s the same for me, Nier. I love his majesty too, but I know that I won’t have the chance.”
“What do I do…? What do I do……?”
“Do you still love him? Or otherwise, are you able to completely forget everything? Can you look at his majesty calmly the way you did in the past? Will your heart not be set aflutter by him? If you can, you just need to silently wait. Or do you still love his majesty?”
Luna looked at her. She hugged her and continued, “Nier, you might not have any way of answering this question right now, but you should understand your feelings tomorrow. If you still love his majesty, it’s not bad to be a bodyguard by his side. You can be happy to just see him and stay by his side. That’s how it is with me. I don’t have the right to love him, but I cherish the time I get to spend at his side. Him having someone he loves doesn’t stop us from protecting him.”
“Luna… I… I……”
“Have a good rest, Nier. You must be braver than me. At least you have a chance and the courage to express your love.” Luna hugged Nier and looked at the moon in the sky. In her soft voice, she continued, “I really don’t know how beautiful and lucky that girl his majesty loves is. Is she also missing his majesty right now?”
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The Northern winds across the border were freezing. The extreme cold and heavy snow in the North was the one thing the elves hated most. The north of the large canyon had never been so desolate. But the winter this year seemed even more merciless. It was only autumn and yet it was freezing there. No living organism was to be found, and not a single strand of grass could be found.
The elves serving in the army in the North were preparing their stuff to head south. It wasn’t that they were abandoning their post, but because elves just couldn’t withstand the freezing weather and snow. Their senses were dulled in the snow even if they wore thicker clothing, and thereby would die soon. That was the elves innate weakness, which was why they had no means of crossing the large canyon.
The young girl pulled her dagger out of a big corpse and red blood spurt fourth in a split second as well as the warmth of life. The young girl looked at the corpse underneath here while huffing and puffing as she walked up to a tree and sat down, completely drained. A few huge green corpses were lying facing every direction on the ground, allowing the cold wind to blow against them.
The young girl sat under the tree and shut her eyes for a moment. A while later, she took out a pendant from her shirt and spaced out as she looked at it. She then stood up, stretched out her limbs and headed towards the next camp……
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I raised my head up to look at the moon in the sky that was soon to be full and let out a big sigh.
Nier’s straight pitch caught me off guard. I never thought Nier would like me, and confess at this time.
Do I not love Nier? I’m not sure, but she was the first and the one who was always by my side. We went through life and death together. We went to many places together. We laughed together, suffered together and fought. Nier was a compulsory part of my time here with the humans.
It’s the same as when I’m with the elves. Lucia is the person I care about most over there, but I only have Nier here. Maybe getting married here and getting married in the elven lands won’t conflict with each other. But I’ve been influenced by monogamy. And I refuse to betray Lucia.
I swore that I would not betray Lucia all my life at the deer hunting festival. I can’t betray a woman who didn’t abandon me when I was critically wounded, put her life on the line to protect me and looked after me.
But why can’t I forget Nier? My head was filled with Nier. I can’t betray Lucia, but I keep thinking about Nier, and worse, I don’t even feel guilty about it. Am I born a scumbag?
I don’t think so.
I don’t want to betray Lucia but I do have feelings for Nier. What do I do now? And it’s going to be a full moon soon, so what can I do? I don’t even have two days left with Nier. How do I face Nier?
I rejected Nier, but now my heart is unsettled.
“So you were here, onii-sama.”
Freya suddenly appeared by my side and looked at me. She then looked at the bottle of wine by my foot silently before saying: “Why did you drink so much? That is not good for you.”
I looked at the moon and spoke at a slow pace: “I’m alright. I’m still sober. It’s just that I feel very unsettled.”
Freya nodded as if she understood something. She stood next to me and looked at the moon in the sky together with me. She said: “I do not know what you are fretting about, onii-sama. I do not think that you would ask me for advice either. However, if you are facing a selection problem, there are always two choices, are there not?” The first one or the second one? But… there is a third one.”
Freya made an eye gesture and continued with a smile, “Multiple choice, am I right?”
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