Time Healer Ceres - Chapter 94

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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“What are you thinking about so hard? Come on, let’s get lunch.”
“…All right.”
At her belated answer, a smile bloomed across Aria’s face—the kind of picture-perfect beauty that seemed almost painted on.
Behind her, however, the expression on Princess Nailia’s face shifted visibly from open displeasure to something more carefully masked.
Apparently she’d been planning to join them for the meal as well.
“I’m so happy we’re eating together again after so long! Don’t you think?”
Aria linked her arm through Seres’s with easy familiarity.
Seres regarded her quietly for a moment, then turned without comment and headed toward the restaurant.
“Huh?”
But shortly after, Aria’s chattering voice beside her trailed off.
Curious, Seres glanced ahead and spotted a familiar figure approaching slowly.
Third Prince Alrex was coming toward them, a slight smile on his face.
She’d assumed he was coming to greet his younger sister, Princess Nailia.
Instead—
He passed silently by without so much as looking at Princess Nailia.
His identity as a prince had become common knowledge after the welcome party, as far as Seres understood.
He wasn’t still trying to hide it, surely.
Seres’s puzzlement deepened when she glanced at the princess beside her.
‘Chilling. Absolutely chilling.’
The look in Nailia’s eyes as she watched Alrex pass was no joke.
Her gaze burned with resentment, as though she’d just laid eyes on the murderer of her parents.
‘Well, not all family members need to get along.’
Seres dismissed the matter from her mind.
“Miss Seres.”
But just as she was about to move on, Alrex’s distinctly smooth voice stopped her in her tracks, and she had to turn around.
He closed the distance with quick steps, offering a bright smile as he extended his hand.
‘Should I break it, or shouldn’t I?’
While she hesitated—
“You’ve got some dust on you.”
Smiling gently, Alrex brushed a strand of her hair back with his fingertips and took a step back.
‘There’s truth in that old saying, I suppose.’
You really can’t judge a person by appearances. Looking at that face, who would imagine he could be so brutally violent?
“It looks like you’re heading to lunch. What a shame—I would have enjoyed joining you.”
…What? Again?
‘Why is he suddenly acting friendly?’
Weren’t they supposed to keep their distance from each other?
“You should eat with people you’re close to, or it’ll upset your stomach. Besides, I’d think you’re closer to those people than you are to me.”
Seres raised her hand and pointed in one direction—at the group visible at the end of the corridor, the very ones who’d suffered Alrex’s brutality before.
Following the direction of her gaze, Alrex’s expression hardened slightly.
And indeed, as soon as those people spotted the Third Prince, they gave a sharp cry of alarm and bolted.
“Ha…….”
‘So that’s what that was—a warning not to bother pretending to be friendly now that I’ve already seen what he’s capable of?’
Alrex let out a short laugh.
‘This really isn’t going to be easy.’
Rejected again, Alrex watched intently as Seres turned on her heel and walked away.
‘All that glaring won’t hurt me.’
Only her own eyes would feel the strain.
Though her back tingled with an uncomfortable prickling sensation, Seres didn’t acknowledge it.
‘I can feel it—this instinct.’
Getting tangled up with that man would be annoyingly exhausting.
And instincts like this had never steered her wrong before.
When you had an instinct this strong, the best answer was to avoid the entanglement altogether.
“Seres.”
Aria hurried after her, falling into step beside her and speaking hesitantly.
“Do you know Alrex well?”
“No.”
“But you two seemed really close.”
“Get yourself some glasses.”
“What? Glasses?”
“Your eyesight must be worse than I thought.”
Seres turned away from Aria, whose eyes had gone wide, and stepped briskly into the restaurant.
“…….”
Princess Nailia watched her with a faintly surprised expression.
Certainly, Seres had changed markedly from how she used to be.
On the first day, she’d been quite shocked to see her single-handedly subdue a male student who’d been tormenting her with nothing but a pen.
Until now, the Seres that Princess Nailia had observed was always gauging others’ moods, unable to speak properly in front of those with even a modicum of power or authority.
The only person she’d treated as small and beneath her, deliberately belittling, was Aria.
Which made her dislike Seres all the more.
‘Yet…….’
In how she’d just addressed Prince Alrex, not a trace of that old demeanor remained.
Rather, watching the prince’s mask-like smile vanish with just a few words from her, Princess Nailia found herself doubting her own eyes.
Others might not see it, but she knew well enough.
Prince Alrex, who always wore a smile, was far less harmless than he appeared.
Behind that beautiful smile, he was hiding something incomprehensible, locked away very carefully.
“Nailia?”
Unable to tear her gaze from Seres, Princess Nailia nodded at Aria’s call and entered the restaurant.
* * *
“Oh! There’s a table over there!”
Though it was near the end of lunch hour, the restaurant was still fairly crowded.
Aria moved ahead to claim a spot, then gestured repeatedly to summon the other two.
“Seres, sit down! I’ll bring you your favorite.”
Aria flashed her bright smile as usual and rushed off toward the food area before Seres could protest.
Swish.
“……?”
At that moment, someone quietly took the seat beside her—Princess Nailia.
There were seats in front and plenty of other places, yet she’d deliberately sat right next to someone she disliked. What was the intent?
“I don’t like you at all.”
Seres understood the reason immediately from the low murmur of her voice.
Perhaps she’d wanted to say this quietly, up close?
“That’s fortunate. The feeling is mutual.”
Princess Nailia’s delicate brow twitched.
The old Seres would have hung her head and wept over such a remark.
Now, seeing her smile with apparent amusement instead, Princess Nailia found herself at a loss for words.
“Why don’t you stop exploiting Aria? You know how Sense Byrol feels about her—constantly interfering like this isn’t what a friend does, is it?”
Sense Byrol.
She’d heard that name before. Who exactly was he?
“Aria didn’t say much, but she suffered so much because of that……!”
Whoosh!
Princess Nailia’s eyes widened in shock.
In an instant, Seres had kicked the chair she was sitting on, sweeping it out from under her with a light flick.
Before Nailia could protest, she was sent sliding backward in her seated position.
“What on……!”
Crash!
As she was about to express her shock at this sudden retaliation for her unpleasant words, Princess Nailia lost her ability to speak once more.
As plates and food came cascading down onto the spot where she’d been sitting.
“Oh no! Oh no!”
It was Aria.
She’d dropped the dishes while carrying the food, and now she stood there with a bandage around her wrist, whimpering.
“My old wound suddenly started throbbing… sniff.”
Tears streamed down her face as she clutched at the burn scar, a sight of such pitiful helplessness.
“I’m sorry… sob… I’m sorry. I should have carried it more carefully…….”
“Well, you didn’t.”
“…What?”
“You made a mistake.”
Aria’s eyes wavered slightly.
“I’ll go get more!”
“Sit down.”
“No, I should…….”
“Sit down.”
Aria, who had started to rise hastily to fetch more food, flinched at the soft murmur of Seres’s voice.
Instead, Seres stood from her seat, gave Aria’s rigidly tense shoulders a gentle pat, and went to bring the food herself.
Aria could only watch her with a somewhat dazed expression, sensing anew how very different Seres’s presence had become from what it once was.
“…….”
Princess Nailia, too, found herself lost in deep thought, her gaze flickering between the cascade of food piled before her and Seres.
Chapter 26. Friends?
‘Well, well.’
Seres recalled what had happened in the restaurant earlier that day, and a faint smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.
She had seen it clearly then—the way Aria had deliberately twisted her wrist and let the plate slip from her hands.
Precisely where Princess Nailia was sitting.
‘My old wound suddenly started throbbing… oh, dear…….’
And the words that followed.
If Princess Nailia had taken the full brunt of that shower of food and heard those words, Seres could easily imagine how everyone around would have reacted.
‘Princess Nailia, are you all right? This is all your fault!’
‘Good heavens! You made an injured person fetch food?’
‘Because of you, Aria got hurt! And you call yourself conscientious!’
‘What are we going to do about this!’
Wouldn’t all that blame have poured down upon Nailia instead?
‘No, no, don’t say that. I wanted to do it. I’m sorry, Princess Nailia.’
‘Aria, why are you apologizing? She’s the one who did wrong!’
‘That’s right!’
‘You’re too kind—that’s your problem! Ugh, it drives me crazy!’
And so Aria would have appealed once more to everyone around about her own good-hearted nature.
‘This feels like she’s playing with a person.’
All while clinging to her side and calling her a friend.
Was it merely fancy that the original owner of this body seemed to have been used by Aria in every conceivable way?
‘How amusing.’
Seres’s smile deepened.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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