The Regressed Princess - Chapter 76

Chapter 76: Running Toward the Sea — “Let’s Go, I’ll Take You to See the Sea.”

The play came to an end, and the actors stepped to the front of the stage to bow.

“They performed quite well. In the future, I… Eleanor?!”

Andra turned to her lover with a smile, but her heart suddenly jolted: the usually spirited girl was now blinking slowly, tear after tear tracing her cheeks and splashing onto the floor.

This was not the normal Eleanor. Could it be… poison?!

She shuddered with horror and grabbed her lover’s hand to support her body.

“Belaians, what have you done?!” Andra settled Eleanor firmly and slammed her hand on the table, rising abruptly.

The instruments and singing ceased instantly. The nobles dove into the shadows, not daring to make a sound. The Nolannan nobles who had followed Eleanor stood up one by one, some even resting their hands on their weapons.

Sitting in the front row, the King of Belai was breaking out in a cold sweat, yet her voice remained steady.

“What has happened? I can swear, we have absolutely made no impolite arrangements.”

She stood up in the darkness, though this time no oil lamp illuminated the King’s silhouette. Charlotte pondered in silence for a moment, then a sudden realization struck her.

She spoke helplessly: “The incense we use has a certain… recreational effect. Perhaps the Princess of Nolanna is sensitive to this spice. Please rest assured, this incense has no harmful effects on the body; at most, it only helps one sleep better at night.”

Andra furrowed her brows. She had Coral lead Eleanor aside to be watched carefully. The scholar acting as a doctor in the diplomatic team nodded to them, implying that the Princess seemed fine it truly appeared she had just fallen asleep.

Eleanor seemed to be dreaming of something sad; her eyelashes trembled as they shed tears. But her breathing was steady and her complexion remained healthy; it truly did not look like poisoning.

During the half-minute of their standoff, the guards had already seized the time to cluster around the King of Belai, even raising their shields. Charlotte breathed a sigh of relief. Restoring her previous demeanor, she spread her arms and said warmly, “I usually enjoy falling asleep to its scent myself. Perhaps our esteemed guests from afar would care to return to their rooms and rest for a while?”

With that, the King of Belai arranged for courtiers to lead the Nolannan nobles away, lodging them tonight in the largest and most comfortable side palace chambers.

Andra initially wanted to turn and leave, taking Eleanor away from here immediately. But she reconsidered: if Eleanor was unwell because of this incense, the Belaian physicians would likely be the most experienced and the treatment more convenient.

Furthermore… she cast an icy gaze over the crowd, searing Charlotte’s face into her memory. If anything truly happened to Eleanor, an assassination inside the palace would be the fastest course of action.

Six years had passed, and Andra had gained a deeper understanding of her own strength. Years ago, she would have had to fight a desperate battle if surrounded by strong foes, but now she only had to worry about one thing: where to run fastest after the killing was done.

Andra suppressed the violence in her eyes and nodded: “Then I shall trouble you to arrange it as quickly as possible.”

Eleanor drifted in a thick, viscous dreamscape. A faint fragrance floated at the tip of her nose, and in her haze, she envisioned a crimson river. As the image of the blood river appeared in her mind, all hallucinations were swept away.

Mmh…

She bit her lip and struggled to open her eyes. Immediately, a pair of hands reached out to gently hold her fingertips.

“Eleanor, how are you feeling?”

Andra’s voice was somewhat raspy as she slowly brushed her cheek against Eleanor’s forehead. Eleanor did not speak; in the darkness, there was only their quiet, shared breathing. It took her a long while to tear herself away from the romantic drama and mottled memories, whispering softly: “It’s okay… luckily those were all fake.”

If only they were fake.

She seemed to hear that cowardly version of herself whispering in her ear.

“A person only truly experiences the life they are currently living; Andra has done nothing yet. If you kill her now, it is but the slaughter of the innocent.”

Yes… I suppose.

Eleanor twitched her fingers, replying to that voice in her heart.

I have already prepared to pay the price.

Even if she spent every future night so filled with regret that she couldn’t sleep only able to pass out from exhaustion she would absolutely not let Andra go.

“Yes, they’re all fake.”

Her lover lit a lamp to check Eleanor’s complexion. Determining she was fine, she blew out the candle with a soft whoosh. It was likely quite late, yet the youth was still wearing her formal gown from earlier, not even having removed her decorative leather armor.

Andra leaned in and kissed her forehead, her lips brushing her ear as she softened her voice.

“You are more precious than Lilia or Evelyn.”

Eleanor froze, then bumped her head against Andra’s with a faint smile. “You…”

Andra wasn’t talking about the two actresses, but the Love Goddess of legend and the peerless beauty who could attract a memory-wiped God of War. How could she compare to them?

But Andra’s expression was serious. She said solemnly, “I am far luckier than the God of War. You are simply lovelier than them. Sigh, if only my darling relied on me a bit more, she’d be even cuter.”

Her strong arms wrapped around, circling Eleanor firmly in her embrace. Andra rocked her like a child, whispering warmly, “You’ve worked too hard these past few years. Rest more; don’t be in such a hurry.”

She attributed her lover’s fainting partly to the King of Belai, who used powders and incense like a madman, and partly to Eleanor’s own constant, high-strung nerves.

Tension. Urgency. She saw the exact same emotions in her lover as she felt in herself. She could endure pressure infinitely and enjoy it, but she did not want Eleanor to awaken the same “interest.” Eleanor was too prone to internal strife.

Andra pressed against Eleanor’s neck, gently rubbing her earlobe.

“Is there any discomfort?”

“No.”

“Did you dislike the play today?”

“…It was alright.”

Hearing the loneliness in her lover’s voice, Andra seemed to catch a loose thread from the middle of a ball of yarn. She sat up and said earnestly, “Don’t be afraid. The tragedies in plays are deliberately fabricated to attract the audience; the two of us won’t be like that!”

Seeing her lover’s dazed, cute expression, Andra couldn’t help but hug her tight, whispering against her ear: “Rest assured, whether it’s ten years or twenty, I will always love you. My sword is meant to protect you; it will never harm you… not even as a scare.”

Eleanor was speechless. Seeing her remain silent, Andra thought the second play had wounded her lover’s fragile spirit. She thought for a moment and said easily, “We won’t be like the God of War and Evelyn one chasing while the other loathes. We were always like-minded.”

“Andra.”

Eleanor reached out in the darkness, gently clutching her shoulders. Her lover’s long hair fell over her in strands, making her throat feel tight.

“What do you want to do most? And what do you think… I want to do most?”

Eleanor sat on Andra’s lap like a water sprite, looking at her quietly with those eyes.

You are the leader charging on the battlefield, the monarch weighing down the four directions, the black-hearted politician. You are also the terrifying, one-hundred-percent selfish mother to our children. And you are my lover who could not remain faithful.

Tell me, when exactly were we like-minded, and where are we supposed to go?

Gulp.

Andra could hear the sound of her own swallowing. Eleanor’s legs were pressed against hers, her body leaning softly into her chest. A rapid heartbeat, warm body temperature, and… that sigh-like questioning.

What do you want most? What do you think I want most?

The two questions pulled back Andra’s drifting mind. She instinctively sensed this required a serious response and thought rapidly. Every moment of Eleanor’s life over the past six years played in her mind like a slideshow.

She quickly extracted the key point: Care.

Eleanor cared far too much for those commoners; sometimes it even made Andra feel jealous—jealous that her lover would broadcast her precious love so freely to irrelevant people. She keenly realized that what her lover loved was not just “commoners” in a broad sense, but humanity itself. Eleanor did not maintain her foundation from the perspective of a ruler; rather, she held an extraordinary tolerance for nobles, commoners, slaves… everyone she deemed “human.”

Why? What is the point of doing that?

The eighteen-year-old Andra did not yet understand the question, but that didn’t stop her from giving what she considered a better answer. Her heart wanted to bury her head in her lover’s soft embrace, but her arms tightened, pulling Eleanor closer as if afraid of a cat about to slip away.

“I… want most to realize our dream.”

Andra wanted to give an ambiguous answer. But sensing the obscure emotions of her lover in the dark, she followed up: “We can continue to build Enlin, then expand outward, bringing advancement and civilization to more people.”

Unification.

Her answer was identical to that of her previous life.

A light flickered in Eleanor’s eyes that Andra couldn’t decipher.

Is it because Enlin developed faster in this life that you “realized” this so quickly, or have you held this purpose from the very beginning?

Andra’s voice was low, and so was Eleanor’s. She asked in a whisper that only the two could hear: “Then, the King of such a nation would be…”

“Naturally, it would be the best.”

Andra spoke with enthusiasm: “You love them, and I can protect them. There will always be people who do not understand your foresight; I can help them understand it well.”

Eleanor blinked, nearly laughing aloud.

Look at that, how similar you are to the first life.

The Andra of this life had stepped onto the old path prematurely. Likely, the various “divinely aided” decisions of the past six years had allowed Andra to build her confidence faster, entrusting her faith in “her Angel” even earlier.

Andra’s answer to the open-ended question “The King would be…” wasn’t even a name. Because she defaulted to the belief that there was only one answer to “who would be King,” she only answered “how the King would be.”

I will, I can, I am able the subtext was: I am the one who chooses.

Eleanor had once possessed one hundred percent of Andra’s trust. She could say clearly that if her first-life self had resolved to kill Andra, the only difficulty would have been that Andra herself was hard to kill, not finding the opportunity. Opportunities were everywhere, flaws were everywhere; all that was missing was a bottle of lethal poison or an assassin capable of a surprise strike.

But this one-hundred-percent trust sufficient to kill Andra was not enough to make Andra retreat backstage, let alone make her give up the dream of pointing her sword at the world.

Despairingly, she traced the youth’s handsome features with her hand, feeling the surging vitality beneath the skin. The voice in her head no longer echoed, because Andra had already given an answer identical to the one in her previous life, without any change.

She hadn’t changed. That was her nature, harder than diamond.

Tears fell drop by drop. Andra could see her lover’s trembling eyelashes in the darkness. She quickly pulled the retreating Eleanor back into her embrace, patting her lover’s back gently as if coaxing a sobbing child.

“Are you in a bad mood?” the youth’s voice trembled slightly.

“Yes,” the girl’s muffled answer came.

And so, Andra’s heart also drifted in a slight ache. She could feel Eleanor’s sadness, but it seemed unrelated to the play or the incense. Was it because of her answer just now? But why?

Andra couldn’t understand the logic no matter how she tried, but she quickly steeled her resolve. She couldn’t let Eleanor stay sad; crying like this would harm her health.

Eleanor heard a sharp intake of breath in the dark.

Andra suddenly grabbed the cloak from the chair and draped it over her lover. With a series of metallic clinks, she hung her sword back at her waist. Then, she reached out her right hand to grip Eleanor’s waist, using her other hand to support the girl’s legs as she stood up abruptly.

“Wait, where are you going?”

Eleanor’s sobbing stopped with a hic. She clutched the cloak, her eyes wide like a startled kitten. Andra wanted to laugh but bit her lip. She strode to the window and pushed it open with a click. A cool sea breeze scraped into the room, swirling with the scent of summer.

Whoosh.

The sound of wind, water, and swaying tree shadows… looking up, there was an entire, brilliant river of stars. Today’s moon gently pulled at a white veil, and star after star blinked, lighting up various constellations.

Andra sat sideways on the windowsill. She lifted the lover in her arms toward the sky, letting the clear light of the stars and moon wash away her sadness. Eleanor’s breathing indeed grew soft. Under Andra’s gentle gaze, she stared at the firmament, her lips trembling slightly.

Rustle… after a moment, Andra moved, and the girl in her arms tilted with her.

“Ah!” Eleanor was startled, but soon found herself firmly secured in the crook of an arm, with only her feet thrown weightlessly into the air.

Whoosh.

Andra leaped, grabbing a thick branch with her left hand and jumping onto the high treetops in a single bound. The move shocked Eleanor into a low scolding: “Be careful not to break a leg! We’ll be discovered by the guards like this…”

“Hahaha, it’s fine!”

Andra laughed heartily. She hugged the Princess in her arms and leaped, throwing all trivial troubles to the back of her mind. The hazy light poured over them, outlining a beautiful silhouette.

“Remember to hold on tight~”

Andra carried Eleanor through the trees, occasionally letting go with one hand, scaring the girl into clutching her shoulders tightly. She moved up and down like a swallow, then landed on the beach with the agility of a leopard.

Scritch-scratch, splash.

The sound of soft sand under her feet mixed with the waves. The youth quickened her pace, laughing brightly under the moonlight.

“Let’s go, I’ll take you to see the sea.”

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