Chapter 134
IX.
Yoo Jaha woke up in an unfamiliar world.
There were no special signs – no accidents, no magical circles appearing beneath her feet, nor desperate voices asking her to come. She had simply lost consciousness on the living room couch and woken up in another world.
She wasn’t summoned to a temple as ‘the saint who would save the world’, nor to a royal palace as ‘the hero who would defeat the demon king’. When she first regained consciousness, Jaha found herself abandoned in the forest, protected by no one.
Before she could even grasp what had happened, she might have been captured by slave traders, but fortunately, she was discovered by patrolling soldiers who took her under their protection. Though she couldn’t understand their language, she could tell they meant to help.
These people provided her with food and shelter without demanding anything in return, treating her with strangely excessive respect. Occasionally, they would bring some kind of document, looking back and forth between it and Jaha while whispering among themselves, but they didn’t seem to have any harmful intentions. Still, being thrown into a strange world where she knew no one and couldn’t communicate left her feeling uneasy.
There’s no such thing as a free lunch.
What do they want from me? And can I really handle whatever it is?
After much internal conflict, Jaha attempted to escape. But when she cautiously stepped outside late at night, she found soldiers stationed everywhere.
Realizing she was being watched to prevent her escape, Jaha spent each subsequent day paralyzed with fear.
Why are they keeping me imprisoned like this?
What exactly is their purpose?
Having lived nearly 30 years in the flood of media, she’d seen enough for all sorts of thoughts to cross her mind.
Am I… a sacrifice?
Are they planning to kill me for some ritual?
She wasn’t entirely sure about this world’s cultural level, but it seemed roughly equivalent to Earth’s medieval or early modern period. In that case, things like human sacrifice or even cannibalism wouldn’t be out of the question.
Jaha grew gaunt, unable to eat properly.
Just as she began to think, Am I really going to die like this in another world?—a man arrived.
On a day when the surroundings seemed unusually restless, the man appeared, trailing a long cloak like a prince from a fairy tale.
His extraordinary status was obvious at a glance. Even without his attire or the people’s deferential postures, his appearance alone would have made it clear.
If you gathered all the most radiant and noble things in the world and molded them together, they might take this form.
Jaha was stunned that a person like this could exist.
At this level, he’d qualify as a UNESCO World Heritage site—no, a universal cultural heritage. The very ideal of beauty.
Whether it was Stendhal syndrome or not, her vision blurred for a moment, her mind growing hazy.
Her heart pounded so violently that, had this not been their first meeting, she might have mistaken this reaction for fear rather than awe.
So this is how the heart reacts when seeing someone too handsome.
It was her first time experiencing such an emotion, leaving her utterly dazed.
The man stood perfectly still in place.
Golden hair and blue eyes so dazzling it reminded her of the sun god.
Now she understood why princes in fairy tales were so often blond with sapphire eyes. Everyone must have imagined a handsome man with looks like that and set the standard accordingly.
As she stared, entranced, the man approached her. Even his gait was elegant—how was that possible?
‘Why is a national treasure coming toward me?’
Confused, Jaha watched as the man stopped before her and knelt on one knee. His long cloak spread like a curtain over the ground around them. The surroundings fell dead silent.
The man pulled something from his embrace and gently took her right hand. Jaha eyed him warily—why was he taking her hand?—but then she froze in quiet shock as his lips brushed against her skin.
His mouth lingered on the back of her hand before pulling away. It had been a light touch, yet for some reason, Jaha felt a strange, lingering intensity, as if it had left a brand.
But that wasn’t the end. Before she knew it, the man was holding a ring, and her bewilderment peaked when he tried to slide it onto her ring finger.
What the—?
Why is he putting a ring on me the first time we meet?
And why the ring finger of all fingers?
While Jaha hesitated over whether to pull her hand away, the ring slipped onto her right ring finger.
Had he forced it on, she would’ve resisted—but his touch was so careful and reverent that she couldn’t bring herself to refuse.
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Hilale
Hilale