The Dragon King's Substitute Bride

Chapter 117

CH117 Morgan

She sounded so unsure but I smiled.

""I'm sure."

She nodded. "Then... if you think it best." She chuckled. "I lean on your judgement, though I have to say that the heavens really have brought an amazing young woman into my son's life."

She smiled, her eyes misty. "I can not think of a bride who would forgo her own honeymoon for

another."

I scoffed. "Given the circumstances, I'm not sure why it's such a surprise."

Haruka blinked and then she burst into laughter..

"I really shouldn't laugh!" She cried. "It's been so long since I remembered the fact of how I got to be here..." She shook her head. "And I imagine that your circumstances are not quite the same.

I frowned at that. "What do you mean by that?"

I thought the Trial was pretty much the same throughout time.

She sighed and looked off into the distant, as if she were looking back through the years. She looked utterly blissful and in love. Anya sat beside me, looking just as curious as I felt.

Her fingers traced the edge of her teacup absentmindedly, a small smile playing at the corners of her lips before she finally began.

Celestial Range, where the mountains met the sky. My parents... well, I barely remember them. They died when I was young, leaving me an orphan. The village wasn't kind to children without families, and for the most part, I raised myself. It didn't help that I was a foreign orphan in

her head. "We'll get into how I came to be there

a moment, if Adele had a similar story. She never spoke about her past much. Any time I'd asked her, she glossed over it stating that it didn't matter. Haruka's eyes flickered with old memories-some painful, some bittersweet. For a moment, I saw the girl

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CH117

me," she continued, leaning back in her chair, "marry a lord or spend the rest of your life scraping by as a servant. Marriage was considered a way to better your position, but it wasn't what I wanted. Not to the men that were in the village or anyone who might have wanted me.

their plans for me, and I had been very forward in how much I had no plans to participate in their plans... That's

up

and just chance my luck in the forests. He just... appeared seemingly." She smiled softly, her eyes brightening for a moment. "He wasn't the king you know today. He was younger, quieter, still learning what it meant to be a crown prince under his father, but he was just as kind then as he is now." Her eyes glossed over. "He saw me-this

a flicker of something deeper passing over

he'd come through was the Trial Gates," she said quietly. My jaw dropped. She shrugged. "I was injured. He wanted to bring me to the doctor. At the time, the veil was

"He did. Scooped me right up and-hurried through it, calling

crazy, and suddenly, I'd gone from an injured orphan to a completely

"Just

with irony. "Yep. The way I understand it... your entry into the realm was

wasn't envy-not exactly-but it was hard not to compare her story to mine. There had been no fear for her. Her and Hayato's relationship had

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more dramatic, traumatic, and complicated. I was still dealing with the effects of how I'd ended up here due to Goro and Adele's machinations. It

why she was Hayato's

that it hadn't always been the way it had been with me. I don't know how I would have felt to know for sure that Haruka had

"And... you adjusted?"

he court me. He was my greatest defender and apologetic while I got through all the classes, the endless education, and nonsense that I was certain was just made to make

how to keep the palace afloat and the