Rapunzel, DON’T Let Down Your Hair!

Did he really have to go this far? Hearing that he had been imprisoned in a tower, she had imagined someone fragile and kind, but the Rapunzel before her was completely different from what she had expected. He was mistrustful, irritable, and in any case, not the sort of person who made her want to risk her life to rescue him.

“How you found out about me. And why a princess came here to rescue me.”

“Fine. I’ll tell you. I’ll talk, so lower that first.”

Whether her first impression of him was good or bad, Erin didn’t want to die. She pleaded with him in the brightest, most obedient voice she could manage.

Rapunzel silently aimed the sword at her eyes this time.

Ugh, what an impossibly stubborn man!

Cursing Rapunzel inwardly for refusing to compromise on even a single thing, Erin began by explaining how she had learned about him. Starting with William running away from home because he intended to take Rapunzel as his wife.

* * *

After that, Erin told him a great many things. William running away, the mission she had been given. How the prince everyone thought was dead had actually been captured by bandits and dragged somewhere. How she had wandered through the mountains while pursuing them, and so on and so forth.

Roughly a hundred days had passed before she reached the tower today, so naturally, a great many things had happened in that time. Explaining everything one by one would take far too long, so Erin tried to skip over the unimportant parts.

“Don’t gloss over it. How did you defeat the troll the bandits kept?”

He wanted to know every tiny detail. What weapons they had used, who had attacked where, how many times, and which attacks had succeeded. Naturally, the story dragged on, and even though everything outside had grown pitch-black, they still hadn’t gotten past Kalis.

She had assumed that because of the clouds, it would be impossible to tell whether it was morning or night from here, but that wasn’t the case. A few hours ago it had merely been dim. Now, it was truly dark.

Was it because she thought it was nighttime? Or because she was exhausted from talking so much? An irresistible wave of sleepiness descended over Erin.

“And that’s how we finally managed to defeat the troll… the troll.”

“What happened next?”

“After that, the bandits suddenly scattered and started running away, haaahm…”

Erin couldn’t finish her sentence and let out a huge yawn. Rapunzel asked once more what had happened to the bandits, but she couldn’t answer.

She was far too sleepy. Her mind had already fallen halfway asleep and couldn’t even remember what she had just been talking about.

How long am I supposed to keep telling this story?

Erin thought as she blinked eyes dampened by her yawn. Even though she was practically dying of sleepiness, Rapunzel was still staring fixedly at her.

Erin decided she hadn’t seen it and closed her eyes. The moment she stopped resisting the encroaching drowsiness, her body felt wonderfully comfortable.

“Talk. If you don’t, I’ll throw you out of the tower.”

Her body had already entered sleep mode, and even his threats couldn’t reverse it.

“I’ll tell you after I wake up…”

After mumbling like she was talking in her sleep, she finally drifted off.

How long had she slept like that? It felt like barely ten minutes had passed when Rapunzel roughly shook her awake. Erin frowned deeply and slowly opened her eyes.

Contrary to what she had expected, the surroundings were quite bright, as though she had gotten a full night’s sleep.

“Wake up. You slept a lot.”

“…How many hours did I sleep?”

“I don’t know. There’s no clock here.”

Rapunzel spat the words out almost like a complaint, then nudged her torso with his foot. He didn’t even have to say what he wanted. It was written plainly across his face.

He truly seemed intent on hearing every detail of her hundred-day journey. On the second day, he made her talk from morning until night again.

Without even giving her food or water!

Erin thought he truly was an awful man, but she also found it strange. Even though she hadn’t consumed anything, her body didn’t feel weak. She wasn’t hungry or thirsty, which was strange enough to be bizarre. She didn’t even feel the need to use the bathroom. Whenever her energy ran low, she simply became overwhelmingly sleepy.

About seven nights passed like that. Rapunzel’s treatment of Erin gradually improved, little by little.

At first, he had simply left her to sleep on the floor as though abandoning her there, but before she knew it, she would wake to find a blanket draped over her body. Then, the following day, he put her on the bed entirely.

“Wake up, Princess.”

Even when waking her, he used a gentle voice and barely touched her shoulder. She could clearly feel that he was trying to approach her more carefully.

Thanks to that, Erin’s reactions toward him had also changed considerably from the beginning.

“Mmm. Ten more minutes.”