Chapter 7 : Love

Flora froze as if holding her breath at the cold rejection.

Her red cheeks turned pale in an instant, and her purple eyes were filled with deep sadness and despair.

Big tears fell down her cheeks, leaving a small sound in the room.

Her sobs were low, but they echoed throughout the room.

It was a pitiful sob, as if she had lost everything in the world.

A whisper that seemed to break between her sobs as she sat down and sobbed.

“Why… why can’t you convey my feelings to Peridot…?”

Her purple eyes shook as she looked at me.

The emotions contained within were pain and deep despair.

She cried out in a voice full of despair.

“No one understands me after all… I’m alone… I’m all alone…!”

I hugged her shoulders that were constantly sobbing and trembling, and screamed as if my heart was going to burst.

Now, all that remained was the image of a frail girl whose whole being had collapsed.

I looked down at Flora, who was sobbing, covered in tears.

The suffocating sobs and screaming cries showed the depth of her pain.

Her loneliness, darkness, and despair perhaps resembled mine.

A strange and intense whirlwind of emotions was rising inside me.

It was an intensity that was unpleasant yet incomprehensible.

Where would this emotion end?

I didn’t know, but my body moved as my emotions led me.

“Flora.”

I called her name in a low voice.

But Flora bowed her head deeply and didn’t move an inch.

I slowly raised my body.

A cold metallic sound rang out every time the shackles around her ankles brushed the floor.

I looked at Flora, who still didn’t move an inch.

In the silence, her shoulders looked thin, It looked dangerously fragile.

I saw my past self in that appearance.

Without hesitation, step by step, I approached her.

I knelt in front of Flora and held her close.

The shoulder that touched my arms was trembling like a small tree branch.

I felt hot tears soaking my collar.

I slowly opened my mouth.

As if I was soothing an old wound that I wanted to forget, I began to bring out the memories that I had kept hidden.

“Flora,”

The soft voice was calm, but there was a deep, dark darkness within it.

“I am a half-elf.”

When the words that explained my own existence flowed out of my mouth,
an old pain swept through my heart.

“I am an illegitimate child born for the duke’s experiments. I don’t even know what kind of person my mother was. The cold stone floor was my bed, and the experiments that continued every day were my day.”

I paused for a moment to catch my breath and carefully wrapped my trembling shoulders.

Even at that moment, my voice continued without a hint of hesitation.

“Even though I cried out in pain and begged them to stop, they wouldn’t listen. I prayed earnestly to God, but He didn’t answer. I think that was when I stopped believing in God.”

Flora was still sobbing softly in my arms.

I felt my trembling breath and continued speaking calmly.

“They cut out my heart.”

The pain hidden somewhere in my chest seemed to faintly come back to life.

The scar stung.

“And they forced the Dragon Heart into that spot.”

I briefly took a breath and placed my hand on my chest.

“Sometimes, my chest burns hot with uncontrollable pain. It’s because my heart, which isn’t mine, is beating against its own will.”

The tips of my fingers that were wrapping around Flora’s shoulder stiffened slightly.

I closed my eyes and continued speaking in a calm tone.

“They ate medicine made from my heart and tried to avoid aging and death with it. But in the end, they died because of the medicine. Isn’t that ridiculous? That’s how I became a duke.”

A smile crossed my lips.

But it wasn’t a superficial smile meant to comfort the other person.

It was a twisted cynicism that mocked the cruelty of life.

“Even after that, people despised me. As if they couldn’t erase the stigma of being an ‘illegitimate duke.”

I quietly looked into her purple eyes.

In her eyes, there was a loneliness like mine.

“Most of the people I’ve met in my life were like trash.”

My tone was indifferent, but deep distrust and disgust were embedded within.

“Incurable filth. And I breathe the same air as them.”

Flora trembled in my arms without saying a word.

From the tips of my fingers that wrapped around her, warmth gradually spread to me.

“I have no regrets about dying right now.”

My voice was so calm.

As if it were a spell I had repeated countless times over the years, it was a confession I made to myself.

“Because I can’t figure out what value my life has.”

I was staring into a dark, cold abyss.

But strangely, at the end of it, a very small ray of light seemed to be gleaming, different from before.

It was something small but intense, something I had never caught.

“Flora,”

I called her name softly.

There was definitely some emotion in my voice.

“I don’t know your past.”

The sound of her crying subsided for a moment at my words.

For a moment, her trembling stopped in my arms.

“But I do know this.”

I sighed and continued slowly.

“You are… just like me.”

Those words rang heavy inside me.

The feeling of being understood for the days filled with loneliness, despair, and darkness.

It was an unfamiliar but strangely comforting feeling that I had never felt before.

Flora’s purple eyes widened at my words.

She looked up at me as if she couldn’t believe it.

The tears in her eyes shone like flickering candles.

Carefully, her trembling hands reached out to my chest.

Her warm fingertips traced my fabric and stopped at the place where the dragon heart was embedded.

I could feel a dull, alien throbbing beneath it.

“Does it hurt…?”

Her lips trembled.

It was as if the pain was being transmitted to her, Full of worry and regret.

“…It doesn’t hurt.”

I answered quietly and placed my hand over hers.

The back of her hand was as cold as ice, but it seemed as if a subtle warmth was being transmitted to my fingertips.

“More than the pain I’ve suffered since I was born into this world.”

I thought I had become numb to physical pain for a long time, but what really weighed me down was always despair and loneliness.

What is this feeling that is stirring inside me now?

I slowly raised my hand and cupped Flora’s cheek.

Her smooth, soft skin trembled slightly under my palm.

Tearful purple eyes were looking at me.

In those eyes, there was earnestness and affection.

The moment I met those eyes, I felt something boiling up in my chest.

“It’s okay if you don’t release the chains.”

A soft but clear voice flowed out between my lips.

The cold, heavy feeling of iron no longer bothered me.

“Anyway… I’m not leaving.”

I continued speaking carefully.

Swallowing the confusion and unfamiliarity inside me, I spoke clumsily but sincerely.

“I understand now. The… love you talked about.”

I wrapped my arms around Flora.

I felt her slender shoulders tremble slightly in my arms.

What should I call this overwhelming feeling?

Is it the romantic love that people in the world commonly talk about, or something completely different?

I couldn’t tell exactly what it was.

But I decided to define this confusing and intense feeling boiling inside me as ‘love.’

‘Yes, it’s love. Let’s call it that…’

I slowly grabbed her shoulders and slightly pulled her away to face her.

The smile reflected in her purple eyes was unfamiliar.

It resembled the strange smile that Flora had shown me, a mixture of affection and obsession.

I thought it wasn’t bad.

I thought that this somewhat distorted smile was a true expression of me.

“Peridot…”

Flora called my name with a trembling voice.

Her body temperature was transmitted to me.

The subtle trembling sensation was a trembling that seemed to be a mixture of joy and emotion, a trembling that seemed to be desperately wanting something.

“I… really… do you love me…?”

Her voice was full of earnestness.

It was as if she was a child who was cautiously asking for confirmation, as if she could not believe it herself.

Her cheeks were flushed red, stained with tears, and her large eyes were trembling with a mixture of joy and anxiety.

Her emotions were trembling precariously, like a fragile flame that seemed impossible to grasp.

“Yes.”

It was a short and concise answer.

There was no need for any long-winded words or flowery words.

At this moment, all I could do was tell the truth.

“I love you.”

A tear flowed from Flora’s eyes again.

It was not from sadness or anxiety.

What was on her face were tears of pure joy and relief.

She said nothing, but hugged me tighter with both arms.

It was a breathtakingly intense hug.

“I love you too, Peridot… Really, really… Only you…!”

Flora’s voice was trembling with emotion.

She buried her face in my shoulder and whispered breathlessly.

Her voice traveled through my collar, and it felt hot like a flame.

I carefully patted her back and quietly accepted her emotions.

Even if it was a slightly imperfect and dangerous love entangled with madness and obsession,
I felt that it was enough for this moment.