Chapter 37: Sleeping Beauty
The hillside beyond the capital was quieter than most places within noble territory.
There were no servants rushing through endless hallways, no nobles exchanging veiled insults beneath polished smiles, and no suffocating expectations disguised as etiquette.
Only the wind, the warm sunlight, and the endless green fields stretching peacefully beneath the afternoon sky.
Aria lay asleep beneath the shade of a large tree, completely sprawled across the soft grass without the slightest concern for dignity. One arm rested beneath her head while the other still loosely held the crumpled paper bag that had once contained pastries.
Several crumbs remained scattered near her sleeve like evidence from a very serious cri scene.
Ren stood nearby with his arms crossed, keeping watch quietly while the breeze moved gently through the hillside.
A few strands of dark hair drifted across Aria’s sleeping face as she shifted faintly in her sleep, though she never fully woke.
She had fallen asleep almost imdiately after finishing her pastries.
Which honestly no longer surprised him.
After the emotional state she had been in since morning, combined with the fact that she apparently cried hard enough to leave her eyes swollen for half the day, sleep had probably beco unavoidable.
Still...
Ren lowered his gaze toward her again.
Lady Aria truly looked different while asleep.
Softer sohow.
Younger.
Without the endless dramatic reactions, exaggerated expressions, and strange phrases she constantly used, she almost resembled the proper noble lady everyone originally expected her to beco.
Almost.
A faint smile tugged briefly at the corner of Ren’s lips before disappearing again.
Because truthfully...
He preferred the current Lady Aria far more.
The old rumors surrounding her the mont he walked into the estate did not match the woman he knew.
The Lady Aria he served was loud, reckless, overly expressive, and entirely incapable of behaving like a normal aristocrat for longer than five minutes.
But she was also warm.
And unbearably kind.
Ren still rembered clearly the day she found him that day.
At the ti, he had been starving.
Filthy.
Half-collapsed near the marketplace while people walked past him without sparing him even a second glance.
He had long since stopped expecting help from anyone.
n like him rarely received kindness.
Forr slaves abandoned by previous masters or the ones who escaped often beca invisible to society afterward. Most people avoided them entirely, either out of disgust or simple indifference.
Ren himself had already accepted that reality.
And then she appeared.
He still rembered the confusion he felt when a noblewoman suddenly crouched directly in front of him without hesitation despite the dirt, the sll, and the horrified stares from nearby rchants.
Then she asked him the strangest questions imaginable.
At the ti, Ren genuinely thought she might have mistaken him for soone else.
Because nobody asked things like his well-being.
Before he could even answer properly, she had already dragged him toward a nearby bakery while ranting angrily about "basic human rights" and "society failing dramatically."
Ren still did not fully understand half the things she said.
Afterward, everything happened too quickly for him to properly process.
She gave him money and trusted to return to her with food she wanted to share with him.
Later she complained that he looked "one strong breeze away from dying."
After that, she dragged him into expensive clothing shops while loudly arguing with rchants over prices despite clearly having enough money to purchase the entire store if she wanted.
At one point, she even pointed directly at him and declared that he requires pants imdiately.
Ren had never been so publicly humiliated in his life.
And sohow...
It had still been the kindest day he could rember.
The servants at House Valen nearly looked ready to collapse when Lady Aria personally brought him into the estate afterward.
Ren still rembered the horrified silence inside the entrance hall while she loudly demanded hot water, dical treatnt, clean clothes, and "human decency" as usual.
At the ti, most of the estate genuinely believed their young lady had finally lost her mind completely.
Honestly...
Ren almost believed it too.
But despite her strange behavior, she remained sincere in every action afterward.
She made certain he ate properly.
Ensured his wounds were treated.
Forced him to rest despite his repeated refusals.
And perhaps most unsettling of all...
She gave him a choice.
A real one.
Once he recovered enough to stand properly again, Lady Aria simply looked at him and told him that he can leave whenever he wants.
Ren still rembered the confusion he felt hearing those words.
Because slaves were rarely given choices.
Freedom itself was sothing distant and almost unreal to people like him.
Yet she offered it so naturally, as though it should have been obvious from the beginning.
And when Ren chose to remain beside her instead...
Lady Aria rely grinned brightly before declaring that he had officially joined the "overworked victim association."
To this day, Ren still had absolutely no idea what that ant.
At first, he assud it might have been so noble organization.
Later, he realized Lady Aria simply enjoyed saying strange things with complete confidence and expected everyone else to accept them without explanation.
A quiet laugh escaped him at the mory.
It had only been less than two weeks since she dragged him away from the marketplace.
Yet sohow...
His entire life had already beco unrecognizable.
Before eting her, every day had felt identical.
Then Lady Aria appeared like complete chaos wrapped in noble clothing.
She never once looked at him with pity.
That was the part Ren still could not fully understand.
Most nobles who perford acts of charity always carried a certain expression afterward. Superiority. Sympathy. Condescension disguised as kindness.
Lady Aria looked at him differently.
As though his suffering genuinely angered her.
As though the idea of soone starving in front of her offended her personally.
Ren lowered his gaze toward the sleeping woman once more.
The afternoon sunlight filtered softly through the tree branches above her, scattering warm patches of gold across her face while the wind moved quietly around the hillside.
She looked peaceful.
Completely defenseless beneath the open sky.
And strangely enough...
That sight alone made sothing inside his chest ache faintly.
A soft breath escaped him.
If only Lady Aria had been an ordinary woman...
If she had not belonged to nobility...
If he had t her under different circumstances...
Then perhaps he would have been shaless enough to ask for her hand himself.
The thought alone felt dangerous.
Because reality remained reality.
Ren knew exactly who he was.
A forr beggar.
A slave she rescued out of kindness.
Soone standing far beneath her station in every possible way.
anwhile, Lady Aria belonged to a world far beyond his reach no matter how casually she rejected its rules.
She was too bright, too alive, and too impossible for soone like him.
And Ren understood his place well enough not to mistake gratitude for entitlent.
Lady Aria was his benefactor.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.
So instead of allowing those thoughts to linger further, Ren quietly removed his coat when the afternoon wind began growing colder.
Carefully, he draped it over her sleeping figure without waking her.
Then he returned to his place beneath the tree and continued keeping watch beside her in silence.
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