EIITAB - Chapter 123 < Becoming A Dog Myself >
Even if it is Trampled and Broken
Aslan wanted to be the most prosperous man in the world to Hestia. But he clung to her, begged her, and hurt her.
'That day was your coming-of-age ceremony.'
He couldn't do anything about what had happened on his own, and it brought deep despair to what was the most beautiful and hopeful day. Ugly, unsightly. All of that added to the resentment towards Hestia.
His hesitant hand finally cupped Hestia's face. However, he was afraid that this sand castle-like state might break, and that he might ruin it with his own hands, so he couldn't give it any strength.
"Hestia."
There was no strength in his voice as if his throat had been constricted. Aslan repeated as if he had become a person whose name could only be spoken. Then he lowered his head as if he didn't dare to look at Hestia.
He had been tormenting this small and delicate woman for a long time with his petty and base heart. Unfortunately, Hestia was only swayed by his emotions. Aslan hid his expression as he impatiently rubbed his tired face. He wanted to swallow his emotions, but it wasn't easy.
His neck rose and fell greatly. Aslan managed to take a deep sigh and looked at Hestia. His golden eyes were shaking dangerously like a dying candle. Aslan stretched out his arm again and barely managed to place his hand on Hestia's face. The cooled temperature was evident on the tips of his fingers.
"Why is it so cold? Huh?"
As soon as he finished speaking, his teeth clenched and his jaw protruded tightly. He continued to caress Hestia's cold cheek with his weak hand, then straightened up as if he had decided on something.
Aslan immediately climbed into bed, cleaned up the hot pot that had already cooled down, and hugged Hestia's body directly. Unlike a moment ago when he couldn't even properly caress her cheek, his desperate hand kept pulling Hestia towards now him.
Aslan deeply inhaled her scent and he also closed his eyes. It wasn't an expression suitable for the strong man, but his trembling eyelids looked very pitiful. He wanted to forget everything else about her and feel only her. Then, Hestia's image immediately appeared inside Aslan's closed eyes. It was what he wanted to see the most right now. Hestia was smiling at him. No, it seemed like that. What he couldn't be sure about was that the distance from her, which apparently wasn't that far away, felt distant.
'A little more, please.'
Out of a desire to see the blurry image more clearly, his arms and hands that hugged the woman's body became even stronger. Her silvery, thread-like hair blew as the gentle wind enveloped her. Aslan held his breath. Before he knew it, his eyelashes were wet.
'Hestia.'
The morning star in the dawn sky, the shadow of summer, the budding buds, the waltz of spring. A gentle stream that flows through his hands. Friendliness. Recording, spring, summer. Soft. The excitement of a first date. Chest tightness 10 minutes before the meeting. Things he can never see in Kalathi. Things Aslan never really had. Or things that have been lost, or have become aspirational.
But strangely enough, it all came down to explaining just one person to Aslan. Hestia.
Aslan, like a child who had just learned to speak, gave Hestia's name to every word and sentence.
In that way, she had already become everything and formed Aslan's world.
"I love you."
As if all his desperate heart had boiled over and volatilized, a harsh voice bit his dry lips and crawled out into the world. A confession without anyone to hear was so shabby.
Aslan chuckled. He felt like the way he was right now was quite funny, even to himself.
"Hestia, I love you."
The more he put it into his mouth, the thirstier he became. If he could, he wanted to take out his whole heart and show it to Hestia. His heart is boiling like this, so why did he never face it honestly?
Why did he never tell Hestia?
He, who had ignored Hestia as a mere idiot, felt like a fool even though he was great.
"I-I'm sorry. However...."
A sharp, dry, self-mocking laugh escaped his lips. There was just one story he wanted to tell.
"I love you."
I love you.
He repeated to himself the words he had just said once more. His eyes grew hot. It was okay to say that now it seemed like he wasn't holding Hestia close to him, but just snuggling into her. His spring goddess. His spring Saintess.
He won't be stubborn anymore.
He knew it. That's not what she asked him to do. He just shook it himself. He just like looking at Hestia, and he really doesn't know what to do... So it was like that. He became a dog himself. In any narrative built up between the two, Hestia was not at fault. He swears, not a single one.
Despite not being able to lift his head from such a guess, Aslan dared to want it again.
'Please let me look into those soft, fragrant eyes of yours just one more time...... May you contain me.'
".....I love you."
The lips that had been digging into the thin white neck touched Hestia's ear this time. Aslan parted his dry lips and whispered incessantly. Even if he can't be forgiven in the end, he hopes this ugly and poor voice reaches her. He desperately hoped, hoped, and hoped again. And...
"...Hestia?"
Aslan, who hugged her, noticed her strange behavior. It was a feeble movement, like that of a newborn creature.
Aslan held his breath without realizing it. He couldn't open her eyes and look at Hestia right away. The movement was so subtle that for a moment he thought he was mistaken.
In a moment silence fell, like the eve of a storm. All his muscles stiffened as if the moment of decisive battle was right in front of him. In this way, Aslan was quietly but sensitively concentrating on all his senses. Should he open his eyes?
Then, on the other hand, he became anxious.
'What if this is all really an illusion?'
What if even his own senses were deceived by his earnest hope that Hestia would come to her senses?
The hope that was rising would disappear into the abyss of despair in an instant. Will he be able to support his broken heart again?
He was too tired to come up with a positive answer. At that time.
"......!"
He felt Hestia's body move once more. Aslan unconsciously lifted his eyelids, holding his breath. Pale skin. Round forehead. A sharp nose. And the purple eyes that always made him intoxicated appeared for the first time in a very long time.
***
"Huh, huh,"
Breathing heavily, Anette was climbing the snowy mountain. She didn't have to worry at all because the falling snow covered and erased all traces of the path she had taken. The higher Anette climbed the snowy mountain, the lower the temperature around her became.
The snowy field that her feet were covered in was so soft that it turned into ice when she touched it. Anette encountered the demon beasts from time to time, but they never attacked her as much as she wanted.
Instead, they just ran away as if to avoid the distance.
"Shall we rest for a moment?"
Anette stopped for a moment, caught her breath, and straightened her back. She looked down the mountain as if to look back on her way up. She could see the back of Duke Kalathi's castle. This was a rough terrain to begin with, and the slope was steep, so the horsemen did not walk well. So, of course, it was a place where there was no path for people to climb.
"That's why it's easy to climb without being seen by others."
Kalathi Castle, seen from the mountain, seemed quiet so far. It seemed like no one had noticed that she had left there yet.
"If it stays like this, I think I'll be able to reach our destination quietly."
For Anette, sneaking out of Kalathi Castle was easy. This was because she was already used to it, having been secretly going in and out of the hole for a long time.
"How much is left?"
She turned away from the castle as if she had no regrets about that place. When she tilted her head a little more and lifted her gaze, she saw the roof of the abandoned house falling down beyond the thick snow.
This is a place that was used as a hunting groundskeeper's house a long time ago, long before the rampaging demonic beasts posed a threat to the Duchy of Kalathi as they do now.
Now that access to the snowy mountain is controlled, no one uses it anymore. And that was Dulcinea and Anette's secret place.
'It was originally the place where I met Count Penlot, Dulcinea's father....'
Anette swallowed her bitter smile and let out a long breath. If she were like a normal person, her breath would have been frozen white with every breath she took. But Anette's breath was not like that. There was no trace of warmth in her as if she had been cold from the beginning and had been spit out.
Anette started to play with her foot again. His teeth suddenly clenched.
"It will be soon. Soon... Everything will end. I don't have to be alone anymore."
Anette muttered something to herself that she didn't know what to say and strengthened her legs.
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