Chapter 160 - An Intermission (Part 2)

After helping Prince Faestien, he read the letter again. He had soon discerned the identity of such person being referred to by the sender of the letter.

It seems to be a writer as well..... And his beloved.

[He is a fellow author. I met him because he sent a friend request to many people in the author server, not knowing that's against the rules, haha! I was the first one to approach him first and get to know him.

He is a very shy and reserved person. He does not want to talk in the server, and prefers private personal conversation. The more I get to know him, the more I felt close to him. So did he.

The more I think about it, it sounds like one of my shitty BL stories. But it's true.

He and I felt like we've known each other our whole lives, no matter how cliche that sounds. Just in a matter of few days, we have known so much, even things we never share with anyone else. I do not believe in fate, but he is starting to convince me of it.

It was a very complicated relationship. We hesitated for a long while, because he is inexperienced in dating men. I was the first one who made him feel this way.

Though he acts shy, he is actually very sly. He is very good at hinting things. Unluckily for him, I was very good at acting dumb too. He asked me advice about a guy once. He says this certain guy seems to like him, and he likes him too, but he wants that guy to confess to him first.

I didn't take the bait. Long-distance relationships, especially ones that began online, rarely work out in real life. I already have much experience to know that. I answered vaguely that maybe that guy will confess someday. He did not like that.

Then one night...

I got drunk and confessed. I forgot everything I said that night, and woke up surprised that I said all those things. Tsk, this is why alcohol is the enemy of man.

But my bunny was very patient with me. (I know it coincides that I have a character that I refer to as 'bunny', but he is not inspired by the real-life one.)

Just like how the Crimson Wolf is patient with the Great Purple Eye. Always waiting for him. It thawed the icy coverings I placed in my heart after so much pain and struggle in something so bizarre as love. He understands my trust issues after everything I have been through.

I love him more than anything. I don't care anymore how foolish that sounds. I don't care if people would think it will never last, or if it never truly lasts. Even with just chatting and having a screen separate us, I know what I feel for him is genuine.

Even if it doesn't work out well in the end, I'm still grateful I met my bunny. He made me care for myself a little, to see the good in me that I will never see. He always ask me if I have eaten already and tell me to not be so stressed over work and everything blah blah blah. I would not elaborate, plus, I want our memories to be only mine.

The point is that.... he made me feel needed and important, especially after so many people in my life leaving me behind and making me feel that I can never be enough unless I give them all my efforts and all my money.

If not for him, I would not just be taking a break from writing. He believes in me as an author more than anyone. My family even doubts it, despite the money my writing brings to them. Saying it will never last, isn't that ironic?

Both dream and lover are regarded as something that will never last. I don't fucking care anymore.

And so... During this break, I want to take a moment to be a good boyfriend first. A good Hubby, as he calls me. I want to support his dream as a writer too, for us to support each other. Fuck everyone who calls it childish.

Goodbye in April, see you again in May.]

Xendros folded back the paper once again, deep in thought.

Though he does not know what is 'BL' and 'server' and 'Hubby' and other very confusing terminology the author had used, he had managed to understand the main gist of it. It all boils down to the story of a desperate man who had locked himself to a dreadful fate, but has managed to attain solace from a fellow man and author.

Crescentian people are a different kind indeed. He had overheard stories, but witnessing it for himself for the first time is another matter on its own.

Men here can freely love fellow men as a lover. In Ilvedia, it is not so.

Such a thing is not only unadvisable, but also terribly taboo. He was aware of the existence of people that do not only love the opposite sex, and some of them not even identifying as the sex they were born of. Such people are always presented as villains in the Ilvedian myths, or regarded as foreigners that came to invade and take over the regal kingdom of Ilvedia into debauchery.

Take for example the myth of Shai Du, the shapeshifting demon that hailed from Zhauli to seduce the King Bonmarte the Third. Zhauli and Ilvedia had always been at war, and this is not the only myth with a Zhaulian antagonist. There are thousands of them, only that this one is famous due to the presence of 'abnormal' love as well.

Shai Du was born in a physically masculine body, but because he is a demon, he can shapeshift into many forms. He is a trickster that likes to engage in extramarital affairs with men and women alike. One day, he had reached as far as the Ilvedian borders in his travels, and saw the king bathing in a lake.

Scheming internally, he first changed form as a deer. The deer drank from the water where the King Bonmarte was bathing. The king merely greeted the deer, and patted its head. 

The guards wanted to kill the deer and cook him for dinner, but the King waved his hand away and told them to let the deer be free. Shai Du was intrigued, and ran off to hide and observe behind the trees again.

This time, he transformed into a scantily clothed woman, with her clothes torn and her body filled with bruises. He waited for the king to finish bathing and see him. He called out for help, to which King Bonmarte and his men have heard, and made haste to aide the 'poor woman'.

As a woman, he claimed to have been taken advantage of by several thieves, and thrown haplessly into this forest. The king took pity to her and brought her to the palace.

Shai Du had learned that King Bonmarte is a young widower. Only after three months of being married, the queen had become terribly ill, and died right before his eyes. He vowed to never love again or marry, and such devotion was famous in Ilvedia. No one from the Draconian religion is allowed to remarry after the death of a spouse.

But with his expertise, Shai Du managed to make the King fall in love with him as a woman named Wysteria.

King Bonmarte wanted to marry Wysteria and make her queen. This caused turmoil among the people, specifically the nobles and the Church, and there are actually many widowers that want to remarry. It caused a large divide in the once peaceful kingdom.

This is exactly the kind of mischief that Shai Du would enjoy.... before.

Now, it is not so. He felt guilt for the first time, despite being a demon.

He had fallen in love.

And so, one night, he revealed his true form in front of King Bonmarte while standing in a balcony, bathed in the pale moonlight that is as cruel as his appearance.

He conjured a dagger made of his own essence, and handed it to the king of Ilvedia. In Zhauli, people who commit treachery are not executed against their will. They are coerced until they commit suicide themselves, or make their most beloved person kill them.

King Bonmarte knows what this means. Shai Du, the trickster known all around the Thirteen Kingdoms, had fooled him but was asking to be executed for treachery. And because he handed out that dagger to him.....

This trickster must love him the most.

It was said that though King Bonmarte did kill the demon, he had planted several wisteria trees on the palace grounds, and did not allow the consumption of venison or hunting of deers throughout his whole reign as king. The throne was passed to the eldest son of his younger brother. He died alone in the bed where Wysteria slept.

When Xendros first read the tale as a child, he felt very confused. Because...

This shows that they love each other very much, so why must they suffer such a fate? Why does all tales of lovers that are men and women end happily and manage to defeat all obstacles, while this doesn't?

Now, he understands.

Men and men are not meant to be. Women and women are not meant to be. They are the most foolish of all lovers, those who love abnormally.

"Xendros, I am going to sleep now. Good night." 

He broke away from his reverie when he heard Prince Faestien's voice. He had long laid down in that cot he made for himself.

He stammered a little, also heading for his bed. "O-Oh. Good night, Your Highness."

That night, he dreamt that he was a king who stabbed a blue-eyed deer after it confessed its feelings for him.