He tried not to think of Eris. Thatâs why he went to see Helena often on purpose. He was relieved to face that fair smile. Helena nodded, listening to his story without any signs of displeasure.
As expected, Helena was good. With Helena, he didnât think he would have nightmares anymore.
Soon, there was a ceremony to appoint a knight. Jason decided to keep the promise he made to himself that day. He will make an oath that he can only do once for
her.
âI want to make a knightly oath to you.â
On the day of the inauguration ceremony, despite knowing that Eris was listening in the garden, he purposely did not stop.
Even when she was young, Eris used to secretly bully Helena. He had condoned it in the past, but now that he has decided to protect Helena, he couldnât give her any more slack.
âJason, you can only take the knightâs oath once! Why would you do that for meâŠâ
âItâs only once, so I want to do it for you, Helena.â
Maybe it would be okay to get married. Life in the imperial palace was hard. It would be much less difficult to live as a duchess than to live as a maid. While thinking of children resembling Helena running in the garden, a smile was drawn on the side of his mouth.
Helena needed him.
Jason knelt on one knee. He pulled out the sword from his waist and handed it to Helena and whispered.
ââŠ., Jason Kazar, pledge allegiance and obedience to Helena Antebellum in front of God. Even if the path is a series of hardships and adversity, I am willing to follow it, and no temptation will subside me.â
âJasonâŠâ
âHelena, even if I canât walk the same path as you, I want to protect you to the end. Please allow me to do that.â
Her thin hands were hesitant. They slowly came up to his head. The number of spectators increased by one more, but he didnât care. Alecto was always one step behind because he had a lot of fears. He will run away as always.
Everything went just as Jason expected.
Except for one person.
âThen stab me now.â
âWhat?â
âArenât you holding a sword? You can stab me with that.â
Swordmaster Jason was able to hear the gossip about Eris more than anyone else.
Even the smallest things that Jason had never thought about were criticized.
Only then could Jason understand why the Eris from his childhood was so hung up on perfection. There were many who said she was at fault even when it wasnât her fault.
Nevertheless, Eris did not complain.
No, actually, she had never complained before.
She always raised her head upright and expressed contempt rather than sadness. Now he knew that being mean to someone was her defense mechanism,
And that even the last defense mechanism was an exception to Alecto. Even if it made her sick, Eris valued her âexception.â
Finally, when Eris fell off the cliff, Jason realized that his curiosity should not end with âcuriosity.â
The thin body fell helplessly. Jason fell along with Eris without time to think.
However, let alone being grateful even though he saved her, Eris was busy pushing him away somehow.
Eris who had never cared about herself, Eris who said it didnât matter if there were many enemies, and Eris who said it was okay to die because she didnât feel sorry for her life.
What happened to her while he wasnât there? Even if she hurt others, a girl who didnât destroy herself doesnât have any regrets about anything anymore. She speaks precariously, acts precariously, and lives as if to die.
Jason couldnât understand Eris because he had always longed for life. He didnât even know how to deal with it because he couldnât understand it.
His mistakes have come to an irreversible point. It seemed to get worse the more he tried to deal with it, so Jason ran away from someone for the first time,
After letting an angry Eris go, Jason turned to something easier. Something that did not need to be treated preciously or require a single conversation. If you kill, thatâs allâŠ.
Among the corpses, Jason stood alone and finally decided to try. He was always confident in his efforts and perseverance.
Letâs keep knocking on Eris. If he nudged her, she might think it would be a pity to die someday.
There was a time when he dared to think like that.
However, human relationships are different from any equation or machine, kindness doesnât produce unconditional favors. Furthermore, some relationships are never restored by individual efforts alone. Jason, unfortunately, realised this too late.
Eris, who came to the mansion for his sisterâs debutante ball, was dressed differently from usual. She looked exactly her age. Only after seeing that did, Jason realise that Eris was younger than him.
The Eris he remembered was always more mature, than his age or him. She was cold-hearted, quickwitted, viciousâŠ.. he assumed it was true because everyone said so. Usually facts are made that way.
Jason didnât make her that way. Because she was talking about Alecto, the only person who could break her down.
âI realized that kindness cannot be called love..â
Jason tried to be kind.
âOnce upon a time, I thought that if I continued to love him, His Highness would look at me. That was the reason why I was so hung up on the Crown Princess seat. I needed a position from where I could be seen when His Highness looked back at me. It was a place
where I could be rest assured and wait for His Highness with confidence.â
Jason needed a place to rest.
ââŠI have grown up. Since I realized that His Highness will never love me in my life, wouldnât it be okay to rest a little now?â
Jason did not grow up.
âIt was my lifelong goal to become the Crown Princess and to be loved. It may sound funny to others, but it was as important to me as Lord Kazarâs prophecy, After giving up on things like that, what regrets would I have?â
Eris had acted as if loving someone was the value of her existence.
She loved Alecto and would have liked to marry him and she believed that becoming the empress was the only ending to her life. Why did she like Alecto so much? Jason wanted to ask.
It was only after Jason watched Eris that he was able to look back on himself from the past, who believed that killing the dragon was all he had to do. The way he had been living so far was not living.
It was only a certain amount of time when he reluctantly held his breath because of responsibility,
Did Eris not know how to do that? If she knew how, she would think she didnât want to die.
Both Eris and him were drifting apart because they couldnât find their purpose. If each makes up for the otherâs shortcomingsâŠ..
Maybe we need each other. The idea was almost confirmed when Alecto said he was taking Helena as a partner to his sisterâs debutante prom.
ââŠSo, Iâm going to take Helena to your sisterâs debutante ball.â
After saying those words, Alecto seemed to pay attention to Jason for a moment. But Jason was obsessed with other thoughts.
There was no way Eris would give up in the Kazar familyâs debutante ball. If she couldnât become a princess, her next best choice would be him. Even at her coming-of-age ceremony, she held out her hand, to him.
Are you okay? Jason did not realize why Alecto had asked him such a question.