Rebirth: The unfavored Princess is the Tyrant King's favorite-Chapter 151: howls and growls

Nicholas’s heart raced as he observed Luciana’s fragile form, her skin ghostly pale and eerily still, as she plunged into the water. She sunk deep into the water like a lifeless doll, her hair swirling around her head in a dark halo.

A deep, primal growl erupted from his throat, echoing the ferocity of a wild beast ready to protect what was precious.

Without a moment’s hesitation, he plunged into the cold, dark depths, his powerful strokes propelling him toward her to retrieve her limp body from the grasp of the water.

His howls and growls were heart-wrenching as he carried her stiff, bluish body ashore in his dragon form. He held her against his chest and belly, which looked like the smooth underside of a snake.

He stood on his hind legs with his gigantic tail wagging along on the ground after him, creating a large dent in the mud. He carefully laid her on the grass and transformed back into his human form, kneeling beside her.

~~~

As James and Amirion ventured deeper into the dense, shadowy forest, they both kept at the usual pace not paying attention to each other, both lost in their own thoughts.

James could tell they were nearly at the shimmering lake when suddenly, an unsettling noise disrupted their inward musings—deep, guttural growls reverberated through the trees, echoing like the roar of a fearsome creature. The sound was reminiscent of distant thunder, rumbling ominously, and sending a shiver down their spines.

The trees around them seemed to lean in closer as if listening intently to the eerie symphony, amplifying the tension in the air and leaving both men momentarily frozen in place.

Both men stared at each other, their eyes wide with a mix of fear, uncertainty, and curiosity. Amirion could have sworn it resembled the roar of a dragon, but he knew there was no way a dragon would be out here in Gloryland.

"What was that?" Amirion asked James even though he had planned not to speak to the man.

"How would I know? But I know it doesn’t sound like a wolf or a bear," James said.

His sentence had just ended when they locked eyes, and a look of mutual understanding passed between them, causing them to shout at the same time.

James: "My prince!"

Amirion: "My Princess!"

They both turned to stare at each other at their outbursts. Each of them had their own thoughts running through their minds, but they both decided this wasn’t the time to confront each other as they pulled the reins on their horses and galloped away at full speed toward the lake.

~~~

"Luciana, Love, wildflower, please open your eyes," Nicholas said and pressed her chest in a steady rhythm, trying to expel all the water she might have swallowed underwater, hoping it would come out.

He kept pressing her chest up and down, using just the right amount of strength, hoping she would cough any moment from now, but nothing happened.

She just continued to spill water out of her mouth, nose, and ears without any sound.

Luciana wasn’t moving; her body lay limp on the grass like a corpse. Nicholas had never felt fear grip him like it did at that moment.

"Luciana, love, please don’t do this to me," he begged and stretched his hand towards the side of her neck, trying to find her pulse, his hands trembling as he did so.

He released a shaky breath when he felt a faint pulse.

He urgently picked up her clothes and his heavy robes to wrap her cold body, hoping to provide her some warmth. He only wore his inner shirt and trousers and carried her, positioning her against his chest.

He didn’t know if it would be best to find shelter and attend to her first or return to the palace. The distance from the palace was quite far.

He pressed his lips against her forehead and realized she was as cold as ice. He realized she had been underwater for too long, and the best thing to do wouldn’t be to take her back to the palace for the imperial physicians to check on her.

Finding shelter and starting a fire in the middle of nowhere to keep her warm might not do her good under such circumstances.

He kept his lips on her forehead for a while to calm his emotions and muttered against her skin, "You are going to be fine, my love."

He said them with such conviction in his tone even though he was more than afraid of seeing her unresponsive in his arms like that.

He carefully carried her and made his way to his horse only to see James and Amirion on their horses approaching him.

One look at the pale woman in the prince’s arms and both of their hearts skipped a beat.

The princess consort looked like a corpse, blue and limp. Her wet hair was stuck to her forehead, and James couldn’t even look into his prince’s eyes, afraid of the emotions he might see in those usually cold eyes.

The princess looked like she was on the verge of death—as if it was too late to save her.

But James knew he couldn’t say such words out loud, and Amirion too.

They saw the huge dents in the soil and the beast-like footprints in the mud, but the prince was looking okay without any blood or scars on his body, so they didn’t know how to ask him what happened.

James immediately took the cloak around his shoulder and gave it to the prince.

"This would give her more warmth," he said, and Amirion followed suit, taking off his thick fur jacket and handing it to the prince.

Nicholas quietly nodded, took everything they gave to him, and wrapped it around Luciana’s body. Without speaking a word, he brushed past them and approached his horse.

Nicholas climbed onto his horse with a little difficulty since he held Luciana in his arms, but with his strength, it wasn’t that difficult. With her like this, there was nothing he couldn’t do.

After he climbed onto the horse, he positioned her well so that she would lean comfortably against him even though she was unconscious.

With his woman comfortably nestled in his embrace, he urged his horse into a comfortable pace at first before he pulled hard on the reins, and they broke out into a much faster pace, bolting through the forest route with the speed of lightning.

James and Amirion saw the blurry figure of the prince as he whizzed through the trees, and they followed suit, their minds buzzing with unanswered questions they could only keep at the backs of their minds at this point.