Since I’m a Time-Limited Princess Who Has No Tomorrow - Chapter 9
“Your Highness, you are having a hard time because you can’t control that darkness yourself, right? You said that you end up hurting other people even if you don’t want to.”
“…Yes, I am.”
“But just now, you managed to control it. The darkness disappeared, and the lights here were lit again.”
“That’s…”
“So, if you practice, you’ll be able to control it continuously in the future.”
The Crown Prince’s eyes widened.
“Practice, you say?”
“Yes!”
I quickly nodded and grabbed the Crown Prince’s hand without hesitation.
“I’m fine being in Your Highness’s darkness, so let’s practice together.”
“…!”
“I’ll help you. Until Your Highness no longer fears your own darkness!”
The hand I was holding trembled slightly.
I looked up at the trembling, night-sky-black eyes of the Crown Prince and thought.
‘You can do it.’
The eodukseoni don’t need to be banished; if left alone, they will eventually disappear on their own.
Because the ones who fear the darkness of the eodukseoni the most are the eodukseoni themselves.
The eodukseoni, upon witnessing the creatures around them either die or go mad, naturally come to fear their own unnatural darkness. This fear causes them to grow into even larger eodukseoni over time.
As the eodukseoni grow larger, the fear their darkness evokes intensifies, and their own fear of that darkness increases as well.
At that moment, when the eodukseoni’s fear becomes greater than the eodukseoni itself…
‘You’ll be eaten by your own darkness.’
It’s similar to me.
It is caught in a vicious cycle where its body weakens under the pressure of its own power, and as its body weakens, it becomes less able to withstand that power.
So, the fate of an eodukseoni would be similar to my own fate.
‘But you can escape that vicious cycle.’
You’ve already succeeded once in overcoming your fear.
I heard that small eodukseoni are unable to overcome their fear, so they all end up being consumed by their own darkness and die.
But this child is not a small creature; he’s a human who can control their emotions with reason and willpower.
‘Besides, I, as the Heavenly Princess, will help you, so you’ll be able to do it for sure.’
I can definitely help you not be afraid and practice controlling your power as much as needed.
I gave a bright smile toward the Crown Prince.
“You’ll definitely overcome it, Your Highness!”
“…!”
The Crown Prince looked down at me as if he were possessed. The boy’s delicate eyelashes fluttered.
At that moment, a loud rumbling sound came out.
From my stomach.
“….”
“….”
“…Are you hungry, Wife?”
“…I haven’t had a single meal today…”
Thinking about it, I feel a little sad.
I got up to prepare for the wedding, went straight to the ceremony, and was led into the bridal chamber right after it ended.
That means I starved all day today.
‘I don’t like eating much, but this is a bit too much.’
This body doesn’t have to fast every time it’s not in good condition like mine.
‘I need to eat a lot and grow up quickly so I can get healthy!’
After realizing this, I feel hungry. The Crown Prince asked me in a panic.
“There must have been a table set in the bridal chamber. Didn’t you eat anything while you were waiting?”
What? Where? I didn’t see it?
Seeing my expression, the Crown Prince quickly jumped to his feet.
“It’s definitely…Oh, it’s here.”
The Crown Prince looked around the bridal chamber and then pulled out a hidden meal from behind the folding screen.
It was a dinner table covered with beautifully embroidered paper.
Why is it hidden like that?
“I heard that a separate meal was prepared in the bridal chamber so that the bride could dine comfortably on her own. Didn’t you hear this from the maids?”
“…Yes, I didn’t hear it.”
Since they all disappeared after receiving divine punishment, there were no maids.
‘Why didn’t they give me even one meal…’
I thought they wouldn’t even give a meal to someone who’s about to die soon.
“You must be hungry. Please go ahead and eat.”
The Crown Prince quickly set the table in front of me and personally removed the cloth covering the food.
White steamed rice, clear beef soup, kimchi, grilled beef, sliced pork, braised fish, sweet and sour fish, boiled vegetables, raw vegetables, pickled vegetables, raw beef, fermented seafood.
‘It’s simple… or is this considered a well-prepared meal by human standards?’
My meals usually consist of 120 dishes, but I’ve heard that a royal meal in the summer season is about 12 dishes, so a meal with about 9 dishes should be fine, right?
‘I’m not sure because of the situation.’
As I tilted my head in confusion, a delicious aroma suddenly wafted up. It was so tempting that I found myself salivating without even realizing it.
It was the first time I felt the smell of food this good.
I used to hate meal times.
‘Is it because I starved all day?’
Or is this the difference between a healthy body and a sick body?
‘Everything smells good. What should I eat first?’
While I was thinking, the Crown Prince clicked his tongue when he saw me hesitate.
“It looks like the food has gotten cold. I’ll have it brought out again.”
“N, no, it’s okay.”
I stopped the Crown Prince and quickly picked up my spoon to take a bite of the rice first.
“…!”
As soon as I took a bite, I was completely awake.
‘It’s delicious!’
Rice… was it always this delicious?
Even though the rice was cold, I could still feel its sticky texture and subtle sweetness.
I chewed the plain rice, lost in its flavor. The shock made my head feel numb.
‘Can rice taste like this? Is rice really this delicious?’
I knew that the painkillers made my tongue a bit numb, but I didn’t expect such a difference.
It’s so incredible that even the cold plain rice tastes so delicious it gives me goosebumps.
As I hurriedly scooped up my spoon, the Crown Prince placed a side dish on top of my rice.
“You should eat the side dish too.”
It was a fragrant savory dish.
‘Is this different from the taste I knew?’
I carefully looked at the well-cooked meat on top of the white rice and carefully put it in my mouth.
“….!”
It’s so delicious…!
It’s really so delicious…!
Even though I was prepared for it, the taste was so surprising I couldn’t help but be amazed.
It wasn’t because I was hungry that it tasted more delicious.
The taste of the meat I was familiar with was like a piece of paper soaked in soy sauce compared to this.
‘Compared to this, it wasn’t even delicious.’
The rice and the beef strips blended into a fantastic harmony in my mouth. The different flavors combined to create a new, extraordinary taste.
‘This is the real thing.’
Now I understand why people are so interested in food and why they love delicious things so much.
‘I’ve never known anything like this before?’
A shiver ran through my body.
‘Will other things be like this?’
I tasted each one, moving my chopsticks absentmindedly.
They all taste different. When I ate them together, they tasted different.
‘They’re all familiar foods, but everything feels new and amazing…’
If this is how good it tastes cold, I can’t even imagine how it would be when it’s hot.
‘It was good that I came down. Good job.’
If I had stayed in my original state, I wouldn’t have known how delicious food could be and might have ended up dying.
As I struggled to hold back tears of gratitude, gripping my cheeks with both hands and trembling, I noticed the Crown Prince sitting across from me.
“….”
“….”
I hurriedly lowered the hand that had been covering my cheeks and offered it to him elegantly.
“Please have some too.”
“I have already eaten. You may have it all, Wife.”
The Crown Prince smiled softly and placed the fish he had deboned on my rice.
The plump white fish meat looked so delicious. I stared blankly and put it in my mouth.
‘This is really, really delicious! What do you call this flavor? Is this savory?’
Honestly, it makes me want to try every single dish I had dismissed indifferently before!
I was caught off guard by how moved I was, and then I flinched when I saw the Crown Prince looking at me.
That expression… I think I had the same look when I fed snacks to Ruhwa.
‘So I look exactly the same as a nine-year-old even at 209 years old.’
Even though it’s natural to look like a child in Ruhwa’s body, I still have the dignity of the Heavenly Princess to maintain!
‘After confidently offering to help just a moment ago, acting like this would make me lose your trust!’
I tried to eat as gracefully and maturely as possible.
I was definitely doing that, but my chopstick speed kept increasing.
Everything I put in my mouth was so amazing that I felt dizzy.
‘I finally understand what it feels like to say something is delicious…’
I ate so frantically that I quickly became full. There’s still a lot left, and I want to eat more…
‘I’m a little tired…’
* * *
The Crown Prince, Cheon Gyeolwoo, carefully laid the young lady, who was dozing off with a spoon in hand, onto a silk cushion.
‘You should brush your teeth and get some rest. You must be tired in many ways…’
The boy covered the girl with a blanket and sat next to her, looking around the bridal chamber filled with the light of the wedding candles.
He couldn’t sleep.
It had been two years since he had seen a night with light.
For the past two years, the boy had been in the pitch-black night without a single light.
‘I was planning to die today.’
Cheon Gyeolwoo fiddled with the small dagger hidden in his sleeve.
Before entering the bridal chamber, he had been practicing placing it at his vital point.
When the wedding ceremony was confirmed as suggested by the ministers, Cheon Gyeolwoo realized that his father had permitted his son’s death.
The boy understood his father’s decision.
He was a sinner, an unfilial son who had harmed his parents, and a cursed monster.
But the method wasn’t acceptable to him.
If he were to die, let him die alone. What crime did the bride who was to marry him commit? He heard that she was only nine years old.
So he prepared a dagger.
If he didn’t enter the bridal chamber at all, it was clear that the ministers would send assassins to kill the young bride.
The bride had to die somehow to blame him.
So he had to go into the bridal chamber to stop the assassin.
Instead, he intended to take his own life before the bride died due to his darkness.
Since he was doomed to die anyway, he wanted to save the innocent child if he could.
Fearing that his bride might be blamed for his death, he even wrote a will in advance.
What he said before entering, not to be afraid, was simply out of concern that the bride might be devoured by the darkness if he hesitated before taking his own life.
‘I thought I had to die here.’
He truly couldn’t imagine that the child who had become his bride would be unaffected by the darkness.
‘…I no longer need to commit suicide.’
He can’t believe it.
Storyteller Rolipoly's Words
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