The Abandoned Prince Heals an Enemy Soldier on the Frontlines, Only to Discover She’s the Seventh Imperial Princess - Chapter 24: The Abandoned Prince Has a Dream

Chapter 24: The Abandoned Prince Has a Dream

“Mh… huh? Where… am I…?”

Rubbing my sleepy eyes, I slowly opened them.

What I saw was a vast grassland under a sky full of stars, with a gentle breeze blowing through the air.

“Alright, this is definitely a dream. Goodnight.”

I shut my eyes again and went straight back to sleep.

Just a moment ago, I’d been sleeping in Clyne’s room.

Now I was lying in the middle of a wide, open field.

Yeah, no doubt about it—this had to be a dream.

“…mmh… correct…”

“Hm? Clyne? Wait, Miss Clyne!?”

I heard her voice from behind me and quickly turned around—

Only to freeze in shock.

“T-That form…?”

“…mmh… explaining this… is a little hard…”

The Clyne standing behind me wasn’t the little girl I knew.

She had curves in all the right places—an incredibly well-developed body.

She still wore the same nightgown, and her eyes were still half-lidded and sleepy-looking.

But now, her appearance was so mature it made it hard to know where to look.

She looked like a beautiful, drowsy older sister from a dream.

“…this is… my dream world… I’ve always lived here… so the version of me in this world… has grown up more…”

“R-Right… I think?”

I didn’t totally get it, but from the sound of things, this wasn’t just some ordinary dream.

“…this world… even my mother… can’t sense it… it’s mine alone…”

“Not even Alcarion? That’s impressive.”

“…yes… no one else knows about it… it’s a world just for me… and you… so—”

“Huh? Whoa!?”

Suddenly, Clyne leaned in and wrapped her arms tightly around me.

Her large breasts pressed right up against me.

“W-What are you—”

“…forever… just the two of us… together… always…”

“!?”

The way Clyne looked at me sent a chill down my spine.

Something about her felt… dangerous.

Every instinct in me was screaming to run—

But at the same time, something told me I shouldn’t turn away right now.

So I stayed still, waiting for her next words.

“…you’ve actually been here before… in this world…”

“W-Wait, really?”

“…yes… and back then… we were in love…”

“Whoa!?”

“…we had lots of children… and we were totally head over heels…”

I blinked in shock, completely frozen by what I just heard.

“S-Sorry, but I… I have no memory of any of that…”

“…memories from this world… can’t leave it… only I can remember… everything resets when you wake up…”

“You’re serious…?”

So I really had spent time with Clyne in this dream world before…?

That’s insane.

I couldn’t remember a single thing.

“…the you from before… said you wanted to stop my mother after seeing what was happening in the outside world… so I let you go… just that once…”

“R-Really?”

“…but now… I won’t let you go again… you’re important to me… just mine… so please… don’t leave me anymore… don’t leave me alone…”

“I…”

Her words caught me off guard.

I couldn’t say anything.

Clyne truly meant it—

Right now, she really wanted to stay with me, just the two of us.

Even if I wanted to turn her down, my chest tightened so much I couldn’t speak.

I didn’t know what the “me” who lived in this dream world had been thinking when he chose to stay with Clyne.

Because I had no memory of it.

But… since it was me, I could at least guess what I might’ve felt.

“Clyne… do you hate the outside world?”

“…yeah…”

“Why?”

At my question, Clyne looked me straight in the eyes and said—

“…my father… was human… but… he died… before I even grew up… of old age…”

“I see…”

“…losing someone you love… hurts… I don’t want to watch someone I care about grow old and die…”

“…”

It really was a hard problem.

When someone lives much longer than the people around them—

That time gap turns into a quiet kind of pain.

“…but in my world… there’s no such thing as lifespan… no one dies… everyone can live forever… the people I love… can stay with me… always…”

…That’s heavy. Really heavy.

Maybe Clyne was still just a little girl… who happened to have lived for a long time.

The world she saw was completely different from mine.

I had already died once. I’d been reincarnated, which made my way of thinking a bit different from most people.

But Clyne—

She was on a whole different level.

To be someone who can only watch the people they love grow old and die…

That must be terrifying.

“But Clyne, you still have family who can live as long as you, right?”

“…I don’t like my mother… she fell in love with someone who wasn’t my father…”

Yeah… I couldn’t really argue with her on that.

“…I don’t like my sisters either…”

“Why not?”

“…they’ve also felt it before… the pain of losing someone important… the sadness of watching someone die before you… but when I asked them… to stay with me in this dream world… they said no…”

…I see.

Now that I thought about it—

Someone like Ailynn really did live in the moment.

People like her didn’t care much for things like eternity or permanence.

“…I don’t hate my little sisters… but… they still don’t understand how I feel…”

“I see.”

“…but you were different… you understood my pain… and stayed by my side… so this time too… will you stay with me…?”

“U-Um…”

I scratched my head, thinking.

No—I wasn’t trying to figure out how to turn her down.

What I was really thinking about… was what the previous me must have been thinking.

Would I really just leave behind a girl this beautiful, who cared about me that much, and go back to the real world?

I could say this with total confidence—

No way. Not a chance.

I didn’t want to hurt someone who loved me.

I didn’t want to make a girl cry. Especially not one like Clyne.

So if that was me, I probably wouldn’t have left until I’d come up with a way to stay with her—

A way to live as long as she did.

But the fact that I hadn’t told Clyne anything about that solution meant…

I either couldn’t come up with one, or I wasn’t sure it would work and didn’t want to say anything yet.

…Come on, think. This is me we’re talking about…

“…Ah.”

I did have something.

Something no one else had.

A special ability granted by a goddess. A cheat skill.

“Clyne.”

“…yes?”

“I probably… won’t die of old age.”

“…why…?”

Clyne tilted her head.

To be honest, this had been on my mind for a while.

My body just wasn’t growing—at all.

At first, I thought maybe it was due to malnutrition or something.

But ever since coming to the empire, I’d been eating three meals a day and sleeping properly.

And yet, not even a single centimeter of growth.

That wasn’t normal.

One possible explanation…

Perfect Regeneration might be canceling out aging itself—treating it like a status condition and wiping it out.

The reason I never told Clyne about this before was probably because I hadn’t been sure about it myself.

I didn’t know for certain that I was ageless.

…From here on, this is just my guess.

Maybe the me from before took a really long time to realize this possibility.

And by the time I finally figured it out, so much time had passed that I couldn’t bring myself to tell her anymore.

Maybe I’d gotten older… lost that recklessness, that boldness.

So I kept it to myself.

But now—

Because I can guess exactly how the old me would’ve thought, I realized it in seconds.

Still, that probably came after years… maybe even decades of thought.

So now, I’ll say it in his place.

“Clyne. Thanks to the cheat skill I got from the goddess, I don’t age. So you don’t have to worry.”

“…you won’t… die from old age? …really?”

“Have I ever been a liar, Clyne?”

“…no…”

I gently patted her head.

Clyne closed her eyes and leaned into it, looking completely at peace.

“Clyne. Yeah… I’m sure losing someone important before your time really hurts. I’ve never gone through that myself, so I probably can’t say anything too comforting.”

“…”

“But I can promise you this—I’ll live longer than you.”

“…really…?”

“…Okay, maybe I overpromised a little. Let’s say I’ll live as long as you. Because honestly, I wouldn’t want to lose someone I care about first, either.”

When I said that, Clyne gave me a small nod.

“…alright… I believe you… but…”

“But?”

“…if you ever break that promise… I’ll never… let you leave this dream again… I’ll keep you here with me… forever… okay?”

“O-Okay. Sounds fair.”

It was a bit intense, but honestly…

I was the kind of guy who felt safer when love was on the heavier side.

And just like that—

I returned from the dream world.

“—Thank you, Reyshel.”

Right before I fully left the dream, I heard a voice I didn’t recognize and turned around.

And there—

Stood a gentle-looking man with emerald green hair, smiling warmly at me and Clyne.

…Ah. So that’s who it was.

Realizing his identity, I gave him a polite bow.

And with that—my consciousness faded, and both Clyne and I returned to the real world.

―――――――――――――――――――

[Afterword]

A Random Tidbit

Author: “When a seemingly normal beautiful girl turns out to have super intense feelings—it gets me kinda excited.”

R: “O-Oh… okay.”

If you found yourself thinking, “Wait, she’s stacked in the dream world?” “I love Clyne,” or “The author’s just exposing himself at this point lol”—Then please consider leaving a comment, bookmark, ★ rating, or a review!