HCGS 130

CHAPTER 130………………………………………………………………..

Adele lay down on the bed without even taking off her dress, resting her head against the pillow.

She hadn’t removed her jewelry or tiara, and her skin throbbed uncomfortably, but even that pain paled compared to the ache in her chest.

“……”

No—it wasn’t just pain. It was a hollow numbness.

A despair she had never once felt in this world, in all her years of living here, tore her heart to shreds.

Was it helplessness?

She had never realized the weight of emotions she’d always felt in that other world could be this heavy. Nor had she understood just how peacefully she herself had lived until now.

“……Adele.”

Even when Killian called her name, Adele didn’t stir. She only clutched the pulled-up blanket tighter and set her jaw.

“I know you’re not asleep.”

“……I want to be alone.”

Step. Step.

An unusual impatience was evident in the sound of his shoes.

Killian, who always put her wishes first, did not yield today and ultimately came to stand before her.

As he slowly bent down and looked at her trembling eyelashes, he swallowed a pained sigh.

“……”

His knuckles tightened again and again, but unable to bring himself to touch her, his hand moved upward instead, toward the tiara pressing down on her head.

“Leave it.”

“Adele, don’t do this—”

“Why not? Doesn’t it suit me well?”
“…Captain—no, Your Highness?”

Unable to hold it in any longer, resentment overflowed in Adele’s open eyes.

Killian barely restrained the urge to touch her cheek.

“……Isn’t this what you truly wanted from me?”

Tears that never reached her eyes soaked her voice instead, painfully so.

After removing the tiara herself, Adele shook her head, unable to suppress the surge of emotion.

“What were you thinking all this time?”

“My lady.”

“Am I truly your wife?”

…Don’t cry. I absolutely don’t want to cry.

Adele tightened her eyes and grounded herself in reality.

If she let the tears fall now, she’d end up giving in and clinging to him, and she didn’t want things to fade away like that.

If it were something that could simply pass, she might feel at ease—but both she and this man knew better.

That the reality before them was no longer something they could turn back from.

“Adele, how can you say that?”

“If you hated hearing it, you should have told me.”

“……”

“Did you think I’d never find out?”

Adele smiled faintly, and Killian looked at her as if he’d been cut.

The man once so composed now seemed clumsy in everything, as though he didn’t know how to voice his heart.

“……When did you realize?”

“Does that matter?”

“……”

“No, let’s be honest. From when did you start forcing yourself to look away from me?”

She brushed her hair back and met his gaze directly.

Who did he think she was? There was no way she wouldn’t notice something he knew so well.

Just as she was sensitive to him, he would have been the same.

“Why do you think I avoided you so much?”

“Adele.”

“Because I was tired? Because I felt awkward around my husband after so long?”

“……”

“If that were the case, then we truly married strangers.”

Her smile made her words all the sadder.

Taking a deep breath, Adele kept her eyes on him and smiled calmly.

Growing desperate, Killian took her hand and looked up at her.

“That can’t be true.”

“Or did you want to believe at least that much—that I knew everything, yet pretended not to? That I would keep playing ignorant?”

Just like you.

Shaking her head, Adele pushed him away. He caught her hand again immediately, but she felt nothing.

Even with the fireplace blazing, her fingertips ached as if frozen.

“If you couldn’t hide it forever… you should at least not have let me learn it from someone else.”

“……”

“Then maybe I wouldn’t have felt quite so miserable.”

“Adele.”

As if he couldn’t endure it any longer, Killian lowered his forehead onto the hand he was holding.

Adele tried to push him away again, but he stubbornly held on, his voice sinking low.

“……Then get angry. Yell at me.”

“Angry?”

As if she’d heard something absurd, Adele pulled her lips into a sorrowful smile.

“What would change if I got angry?”

“……”

“If I shout, will you stop being my husband?”

“How could you say that!”

“Crown Prince.”

Killian’s eyes, as he sprang to his feet, shook violently.

His face looked like that of someone dying of thirst.

“I like the South. This is my home, my land. I have no intention of leaving.”

“……I know.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

There was much contained in her words. This time, she didn’t add that she liked him.

At the clear difference, tension creased Killian’s brow, while Adele grew ever calmer.

“……Is that all I need to know about Your Highness?”

“I only wish for my wife—”

“Just as I do, Your Highness must have your own duties and responsibilities.”

“……”

“I won’t blame you for that. Though it’s unfortunate that I can’t follow that path with you.”

To the man faltering over every word because he saw only her, Adele was gentle—and merciless.

“Adele……”

“Let’s talk about the rest slowly.”

She didn’t set a time, but it clearly didn’t mean now.

So please leave—that was all she asked, and even that felt painfully simple.

Killian lowered himself, placing one knee on the floor and raising the other.

This couldn’t end like this.

He couldn’t be pushed away like this.

“Please listen to me. I have always intended to—”

“You’ve been speaking all this time.”

“……”

“I was always ready to listen—to how you felt, why you made those choices.”

Right here. In this very place.

Adele tightened her eyes, now growing thin with strain, and lifted her trembling lips.

“I waited for you. I was awake before you returned here each morning to wake me. I never fell asleep first, afraid I might miss even a single word. Every moment we shared, every encounter—I was always trying to listen.”

“Adele.”

“Even tonight. Even when your noble younger sibling was there with us.”

She smiled while grinding her teeth, cold and fragile like a glass doll that would shatter at a touch.

Carefully but firmly pushing Killian away, Adele clutched the blanket tighter and finally turned her reddened eyes from him.

“I think… I’ve done enough.”