Becoming a Monster-Chapter 87: Open your Eyes

As Ailetta approached, she smiled warily at his response, or rather lack thereof, but she remembered he would always have moments like that.

Despite the tension surrounding her, she wanted to jump into his arms and hug him tightly after the many life and death experiences she’s had in the past day. She couldn’t feel safe and comforted while with her friends, and that’s what she craved the most right now.

Her eyes began to water as she still tried her best to maintain her smile while addressing Noah.

"No-Noah? Will you be staying here tonight?"

Her smile, which she was trying so desperately to maintain, faltered as she asked the question that troubled her the most.

Despite their inability to talk at school, she had always managed to catch glimpses of him at his favorite spots. Unbeknownst to her, she had become somewhat of a stalker, driven by her need to be near him. Now, the thought of him leaving filled her with a sense of dread. If he left, she feared she might never see him again, or worse, she might perish because she wasn’t strong enough to face the dangers alone.

As tears streamed down her cheeks at the thought of dying with so many regrets or never seeing Noah again, despite patiently waiting for so long for him to acknowledge her existence again, Ailetta’s heart felt heavy with despair.

"....." Noah narrowed his eyes as he observed the way Ailetta looked at him. Initially, he had almost answered yes instinctively, knowing he had to wait for Arachne to finish changing and not wanting to risk going out at night. But as Ailetta began to cry, he realized that her question held far greater significance than he had naively believed.

The sound of his heart seemed to pulsate loudly in his chest as he felt the urge to clutch at it. Seeing her in such pain pained him deeply, yet he couldn’t fully understand why. He knew how she felt about him, but he remained uncertain about his own feelings towards her.

The brief lapse of silence following Noah’s pensive gaze caused Ailetta to become worried, and inwardly she panicked. She couldn’t gauge what Noah was thinking as she once could, especially now that his entire aura and physical appearance seemed to have changed. His childish features had vanished, replaced by a more masculine structure, and his devilish eyes had become more oppressive. Even if he didn’t mean to, the way he stared caused her to lose focus due to the pressure he naturally emitted.

"I-I’m sorry!" she cried out, her tearful voice resonating with such pain that even the deaf could hear it. She turned to run away before Noah could reject her once again.

"Wait!" Noah called after her, causing her to stop in her tracks. Though too afraid to turn around, she focused intently on every word he said, the world around her fading away as she hung on his response.

"Why did you bother asking me a question if you weren’t going to let me answer? Are you an idiot?" Noah’s blunt question made her want to crawl into a hole, but then she heard footsteps and realized he was approaching her.

"Now, if I were to answer yes, then what would your response be?" At this point he was seriously observing and analyzing every twitch, every eye movement, looking for anything to help him understand her better and respond appropriately.

He didn’t know why seeing her fighting for her life hadn’t phased him, but seeing her in tears did.

Everything about her made him feel like a contradiction, which was a significant reason why he had found it so easy to avoid her during school. Being the cause of her bullying was just an excuse to avoid dealing with the complex emotions he had regarding her.

He liked to be alone, but he had always allowed her to keep him company. He wasn’t going to trust anyone again, yet he had shared his most prized stories with her. Even now, after everything that had happened, he kept reminding himself, or rather, convincing himself, that the best way to grow was to lose all of his humanity. Yet here he was now.

Ailetta didn’t realize that Noah was also struggling with conflicting emotions. She was already surprised enough by his question. ’Was my question not direct enough? Wait, would trying to sleep with him make me seem slutty? I didn’t want to do anything else... Oh no! My question does suggest that! What do I do??’ She tried to stay composed as she formulated her feelings into words, but she couldn’t hold in her shock as her thoughts spiraled out of control.

However, she didn’t know that her reaction and hesitation to respond only fueled Noah’s confusion and his own imagination. ’Why did she suddenly become shocked? I don’t understand...I just wanted to know what she wanted before I answered so I wouldn’t misunderstand what she wanted. Ugh, why is talking so complicated?’

The two sat in silence, both in deep thought, the noisy spectators were not only getting impatient, but they were mostly confused as to why the two hadn’t said anything for so long.

But Noah was more at a loss than any of them. The more he reflected on the complicated emotions swirling within him, the more out of control he felt. These were emotions he wasn’t ready to deal with yet.

"Yes! Coughs* I mean yes...I’m staying the night here. Now will you tell me why you wanted to know?" He said, his voice sounding helpless but relieved to finally express what he had been wrestling with internally. The words lifted a weight off his chest, freeing him from the spiraling "what ifs" that had been tormenting him.

The sudden burst from Noah caught Ailetta off guard, but when she saw the look on his face and heard the tone of his voice that not only sounded desperate to hear her answer, but also curious. She struggled to hold in a giggle, she couldn’t resist smiling. However, noticing the frown forming on Noah’s face, she was quick to realize that smiling wasn’t the right reaction. She knew that this conversation was also hard on him too.

Now that she received another chance to redeem herself, she took a deep breath to voice out what she wanted from him without implying what her earlier thoughts suggested she did before.

"Th-this may be the last time we ever see each other again if, if....." She hesitated, feeling her emotions welling up again. She thought she was ready to talk about it, but the words caught in her throat. Noah noticed her struggle and misunderstood, thinking she was implying concern for his safety and the possibility of him dying while traveling "alone".

"You don’t have to worry about me dying out there, I’ve been doing just fine, In fact I’ve never felt better." Noah boasted proudly. However, he quickly realized that Ailetta didn’t seem happy or relieved by his declaration.

"I’M NOT WORRIED ABOUT YOU DYING!" She screamed before catching herself and lowering her voice. At the same time, she clenched her fists so tightly that she drew blood.

"It’s me...I...I don’t think I’ll last long enough to see you again..." Ailetta admitted, her voice trembling. She looked up and saw the shock written on Noah’s face. Either his shock lowered the pressure she felt from looking into his eyes, or she was too influenced by her own emotions to care, as she boldly stared into his purple irises.

"I’m not like you Noah, you know that, right? You’ve seen how we all struggled to survive till now. Do you honestly think we can survive the way we are going now if we had had to fight something like that ant by ourselves, or that huge thing outside the dorms? I just....I just want to spend one last time with you..."

As she spoke, she noticed an expression on his face that she had never seen before—fear. Alarmed, she turned around, scanning the area for any sign of danger. She didn’t understand what could possibly make him wear such an expression when he seemed to have become the sort of person who thrives in the face of death.

"Noah, what’s wrong?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper.

She didn’t know that her words struck a chord within him. The moment she mentioned the possibility of her dying, countless scenarios and images flashed through Noah’s highly active imagination. He envisioned different scenes of her being killed by every kind of creature he had encountered, each one more horrifying than the last.

With each imagined death, each time the light in her eyes faded and her body went limp, Noah felt as if his heart was being stabbed. He couldn’t explain why, but the thought of her dying filled him with an indescribable horror.

He tried to look her in the eye, but his heart couldn’t bear it. The haunting visions of her lifeless face were too much to endure. Instead, he looked down at the ground, his body slumping in defeat, feeling as though a heavy weight had settled on his shoulders.

Ailetta’s tears fell silently as she waited for his response, the emotional distance between them seeming to widen with each passing second.

"Why...?" he muttered, just barely loud enough for her to hear, confusing Ailetta.

"Why are you telling me this now?" he asked, peering into her eyes with an intensity that terrified her. Ailetta didn’t understand how she could have angered him. Her first instinct was to apologize, but then she noticed something odd about him, his entire body was shivering.

Ailetta had to think fast before things went from bad to worse. ’What does he mean, telling him about this n—!’ She realized what had gone wrong. Knowing Noah’s serious trust issues, she understood that when he said, "Why bring it up now?" he must’ve thought she had a hidden agenda. But that only made her furious.

"You doofus!" She blurted out, causing the rising conflicting emotions Noah was going through to slightly falter.

"Why do you think I could only say it now? Who was the one that told me not to follow him? Who was the one that repeatedly left me even when death was always around the corner? Who was the one who just leaves and never says where he’s going?? You never gave me the chance to talk to you!" She heaved, trying to stabilize her breath after her much-needed venting.

At this point, any hint of mistrust was gone from Noah’s point of view, and he could only look down in guilt. He remembered all of those moments Ailetta had talked about clearly. During those times, he had felt justified in his actions, believing that he was doing what was best for both of them.

If it wasn’t for the sudden wave of fear he had experienced from imagining her dying, he might have tried to argue that what he did was for their own good. But now, deep down, he didn’t know what to think, what to feel, or even what to say.

Ailetta, on the other hand, didn’t like the fact that she had to yell at him or that she had made him out to be selfish. She understood that all he ever thought about was escaping into the worlds of the books he essentially lived his life through. She couldn’t exactly blame him for tunneling everything else out, but why did it have to include her too? The thought left her feeling conflicted and hurt.

"!"

Noah was so deep in his thoughts that he didn’t respond to Ailetta approaching him before she grabbed his hand, startling him out of his daze.

"I don’t want you to feel guilty about all of this... I just want you to understand why I want to spend this night with you. Just one night, and then you can enjoy your adventures just like you always wanted," she said, her voice tinged with sadness. Even as she spoke those words, all Noah could see was a painful smile on her face, with tears running down her cheeks.

He hesitated for a moment, conflicted by his guilt, before finally motioning to wipe away her tears. But as his hand hovered in the air, he hesitated. The guilt that had been preventing him from showing that he cared seemed to weigh him down. However, despite his internal struggle, he found himself subconsciously squeezing her hand in his.

The look on her face, that painful smile, reminded him of a time from long ago. It was the time he had been emotionally betrayed by Regina, and during that dark period, he had worn the same smile that Ailetta was wearing now. He shook his head at the memory, feeling a pang of self-awareness.

"I guess I can be an asshole too,"

The source of this c𝓸ntent is fr(e)𝒆novelkiss