Chapter 222 – The Heartache of Kinue and Chloe

  Kinue:

  “Was it my fault?” my friend urmured to herself.

  “What did I d? What’s wrong with me?” she asked, her voice breaking as tears streamed down her face.

  Chloe was drowning in guilt and self-doubt, her words cutting through me like a knife. I had never seen her so devastated. She had always been s, yet now she was shattered by the pain of reje. It wasn’t just her heart that was broken; it was also the bond she cherished most in the world—her friendship with Nathan.

  Everythi wrong. It’s over… the friendship we had is over. We’ll never go back to hoere… I lost my family again.

  As her words came out in choked sobs, my heart ached with her. I carried my own burdens too, my own hidden pains. I had given up on my feelings for Nathan to prevent something like this, to avoid hurting my friend. But seeing her like this, I realized that both of us had lost something irretrievable. In a way, I had also lost part of my family.

  “I shouldn’t have rushed things. I was so stupid. I should have… I should have…” she said before burying her fa the b again.

  I y down beside Chloe, ing her in a firm hug, hoping my touch could somehow ease her pain. Her words felt so final, so filled with despair, that I struggled to find a response.

  “I was so happy, thinking I could do it. I like him, Kinue. I really like him. I’ve liked him ever since we were little. He’s my best friend… my partner in crime… he’s always been with me, even when I dragged him into trouble. He was the one who taught me not to be afraid to leave the house… he was always there. I’ve lost a love and a friend. Now, I don’t even know how I’ll face him… what does he see me as?”

  She told me they were engaged… I never even had a ce.

  How do you fort someone when you’re just as broken?

  “We’ve both lost someone we care about, Chloe…” I whispered.

  Chloe, in a brief moment of vulnerability, peeked out from uhe b and looked at me, her eyes swollen and red fr.

  I gave up on Nathan because I wao avoid a situation like this, but now… I’m hurting too. I want to cry like her. I’ve lost my family…

  “It was my fault… I rushed things. Maybe if I’d waited… tried harder…” She swallowed hard. “Am I not good enough as a woman? Why doesn’t he see me that way?”

  I didn’t know how to answer. I could feel her pain and my own, taogether. The sileween us was heavy.

  “I’m sorry, Kinue, for liking the boy you like too.” She hugged me back, and her words felt like a dagger in my chest.

  “I should be the one apologizing, Chloe. I’m just a oner. I shouldn’t even have thought about it… and I’m not even human. To most, I’m just an animal.” The pain in my voice was evident, but I held back my tears. I didn’t want Chloe to feel like she had to e as well.

  She looked at me, her tear-streaked face filled with determination.

  “You’re not an animal, Kinue. You’re our friend, our family.”

  I let out a bitter ugh. “I guess we’re both feeling like trash today…”

  She ughed softly through her tears, but then turo hide uhe b again.

  “You’re the duchess,” I tried to joke, “just and him to love you.”

  Chloe chuckled again but quickly grew quiet.

  “It’s all my fault. Nate wouldn’t even have this life. I dragged him and my aunt into this… I stole his future. He’s going to hate me when he finds out the truth.”

  Her words lingered in the silence, weighing heavily in the room. There were no easy answers for the pain she carried.

  Chloe looked at me with a deep, sorrowful gaze.

  "I fix this. I know how to break off an e between high nobles... I just o have a child with someone else. I ’t bear staying by Nathan's side if he hates me after finding out he’s being forced into marrying me. My heart wouldn’t survive that. I’ll end it all, Kinue. And you’ll be free to have something with him."

  She seemed resolute, but her expression was shattered.

  "It’s over for me. I never want to see him again—not because I’m angry, but because I couldn’t handle him hating me. I o end this e." Her voice was steady, yet it carried the weight of finality.

  She stood up, sitting on the edge of the bed, lost ihoughts.

  "I’ve lost my cousin, my friend, and the love of my life. I hate myself so much for this. I didn’t even know pain like this could exist. I just... I just wanted my friend back. But if I see him again, I know I won’t be able to take it. He’s the one who used to be there for me in moments like this."

  Chloe buried her fa her hands, her voice muffled by her tears.

  "I want Nate. I don’t want anyone else. Why ’t he see me that way? I... I love that idiot. I love teasing him, I adore his cute reas, the way he gets embarrassed. I love annoying him. I think about him all the time. I wao make him happy. I wao be by his side every night and wake up to his face every m. I wao gh life’s ups and downs with him, knowing I could always t on him. I wao hug him as much as I wao have him y his head in my p while I stroked his hair. I wanted... I wanted a family with him."

  She looked at me, tears brimming in her eyes.

  "I’m sorry... I’m selfish. I shouldn’t be unloading all of this onto you."

  Her words hit me like a punch to the chest, and before I could stop myself, I let out the feelings I’d buried deep inside.

  "I wahat too!" I fessed. "I wanted all of that with him. I wanted him to be my parto sleep in his arms, to breathe in his st. I wao take care of him when he was hurt, to be there for him when he was sad. I wanted... to bee oh him. I wanted him to be my love."

  The weight of my fession crushed me. I couldn’t hold it in anymore.

  I sat down, burying my fa my hands, trying to hide the tears that streamed down my cheeks.

  "Don’t you see, Chloe? You’re a high noble, a duchess. You have everything... status, wealth, beauty. And if he still rejected you... what must he think of me? To him, I’m probably just trash... or worse, an animal." I sobbed, uo tain the sadness suffog me.

  My friend tried to reach out, but I raised a hand, signalio stop.

  "I’m sorry," I said, my voice choked with emotion. "I ’t look at you anymore. Every time I see you, I think of him. You were rejected, but I never even tried because I knew I didn’t stand a ce. You lost a cousin, a friend, and a love... but I lost the person I wao build a family with. You have your mother, but I have no ohe professor is my mentor, my guardian, but one day, she’ll have her own family. In the end, I’ll be abandoned by everyone."

  Tears streamed down my face as I spoke.

  Knock, knock.

  "I’ll get it," I murmured.

  Chloe didn’t look at me; she probably felt guilty. But at that moment, I o let it out.

  When I opehe door, I found a man standing in the hallway.

  "Sorry..." I quickly wiped my tears. "We’re not accepting room service right now." My voice was weak, still heavy with sorrow.

  The man offered a small smile.

  "You’re Kinue, right? And that over there is Chloe Evenhart?"

  "Yes..." I answered, fused, as I tinued wiping away my tears.

  "Great, I’ve been trying to talk to you for a while now."

  "I don’t uand…" I murmured, trying to process the situation.

  That’s when he reached for his ste bracelet.

  "My name is Quinn," he said, his smile twisted and unnerving.

  "KINUE!" Chloe screamed desperately. "Get out of there!"

  Before I could react, a sharp pain pierced my stomach. I looked down and saw the bloody bde.

  I was stabbed!

  Shock overwhelmed me, and before my body could even respond, I was shoved backward, colpsing onto the floor. Blood poured out rapidly, staining my hands red as I tried to stop the bleeding. My mind scrambled to make sense of what was happening, but fusion and agony ed me.

  "Kinue!" Chloe's voice tore through the air, filled with panic, yet everything around me felt distorted and distant. Pain was the only thing that felt real in that moment.

  The man before us tinued, his voice ced with venom. "This is all Nathan Evenhart's fault! Remember that as you die!"

  He reparing something, and soon I saw the fireball f in his hands, encased in swirling wind.

  "This is my fire bomb!" he shouted, ung the bzing sphere into the room as though it were a death sentence, impossible to escape.

  The orb’s light filled the space for a brief moment, pulsating with an intense glow that seemed to drain the warmth from the room before releasing it in a devastating explosion. The fireball felt alive, throbbing like a heart on the brink of rupture. Chloe tried to move toward me, her eyes wide with terror, but before either of us could react, the spell detonated.

  The explosion began with a low rumble, esg in a single instant to an overwhelming roar. The sound was almost tangible, tearing through the air around us. The light was blinding, burning e against my tightly shut eyelids.

  Then came the heat—oppressive and suffog, as if we were trapped inside a giant furhe fmes spread with terrifying speed, dev everything in their path with a ferocity that seemed almost se. The fire g to the walls, ing furniture in mere seds.

  The shockwave hit , a brutal force that ripped me off the ground as if I were a ragdoll. The sheer power smmed me against the ship’s wooden pnks. The walls buckled and splintered like paper, shards flying in every dire like deadly knives.

  The pressure of the bst forced the air from my lungs, leaving me gasping for breath in ay of suffocation. The seari only intensified the agony, scorg my skin even from a distance.

  As my body was hurled through the air, everything around me moved in slow motion. Pieces of the ceiling and walls spun through the air, some still abze, tumbling like deadly projectiles. The deafening roar of the explosion drowned out all other sounds, a stant, relentless cacophony.

  I felt my body crash through one of the ship’s walls, the wood shattering like brittle gss. Then, the sensation of falling overtook me, weightlessness pulling me downward befravity seized me.

  When I hit the subterranean river, the water felt like a solid wall, the impact so fierce that paied through every iny body. The freezing chill of the river was a new form of tormeinguishing the residual heat of the explosion while sapping away the st remnants of my strength.

  Debris from the ship tio rain down arouriking the water and sinking beside me. Bubbles streamed desperately from my lips, rising toward the surface. I tried to move, but every muscle felt paralyzed, my body too heavy to respond.

  The river's current dragged me relentlessly, spinning me in its unfiving force. My body was tossed from side to side, like a mere object at the mercy of the water. As my strength faded, only ohought remained in my mind—a single name.

  Nathan...

  His name was the st thing I g to, a fleeting spark of light in the overwhelming darkness. The icy grip of the subterranean river seemed to envelop me, sm any trace of warmth or willpower I had left. The sensation of sinking deeper into the abyss felt iable, as if the river itself was determio cim me.

  The bottom felt unreachable, an endless void pulling me further and further from life and light. I was no more than a lost soul in its depths, drowning in a sea rets and words left unsaid.