Ark - Volume 16 Chapter 8

[COMPLETE] Can a royal Romeo and Juliet find their happy ending?

Ayleth, Princess of Zenithra, is secretly trained in hand-to-hand combat, and collects swear words she doesn't know how to use. During the Festival of Peace, in which every royal son on the continent will be at the castle for a month, she is instructed by her parents to find a husband. Yet, Ayleth has never even been kissed—until the very first ball, when she meets the man in the Lion mask.

Etan is a seasoned warrior, and the Prince of Summitras. He attends the Festival hoping to find a powerful wife who will help him conquer the dark sorcery of their bloodsworn enemies, the Kingdom of Zenithra. But at the very first ball, he discovers the masked woman who captures his heart is the Heir to the evil empire.

Ayleth and Etan face an impossible battle. Will their love survive? Or will their parents' dark dealings keep them apart forever?

[Mature content. No sexual violence.]

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“You…” She stepped back. Then back again, her mouth dropped open. “You… You cannot be…”

“I am,” Etan said, and his hair raked back as he pushed his mask off his handsome face. So handsome her heart raced.

His hair was ebony black, his skin a warm brown that threatened to fade in in the winter months. He stared at her with glittering green eyes, over high cheekbones and a noble nose, his jaw tight and shadowed this late in the day. His chin was high over the pillar of his neck that she’d just touched with its hard lines and steel strength, so different to her own. And his chest... She gasped and covered her eyes. She’d humiliated herself revealing her stupid, childish curiosity.

“No, Ayleth. This changes nothing.”

“How can you say that? It changes everything!” She was horrified to realize she was crying.

“Ayleth, please.” His voice cracked on the plea and she stared at him, shoving her mask up and off, despite how it would pull her hair out of the beautiful twist the maid had managed for her.

His eyes locked on hers and she couldn’t think. She couldn’t breathe.

She had met her One. And he was the son of her bloodsworn enemy.

She stared at him as he stepped forward again, offering both hands, palm up. “Touch me,” he whispered. “Hold my hands. This is real, Ayleth. I don’t know how it happened, but this is real. Please don’t deny it.”

She couldn’t resist. She raised a trembling hand to his cheek, letting her palm catch on the scruff of his jaw. He blew out a breath and put his hand over hers, and that jolt that happened whenever they touched shivered through her again.

“Please, Ayleth.”

“I cannot deny it,” she whispered.

In a land where ancient families are as common as the stars, the weight of millennia-old legacies brings not only honor but also the chains of rigid traditions. Here, bloodlines are the cornerstone of power, the unyielding foundation for climbing the ladder of authority.But what hope does the descendant of a mere hunter have in such a world? How can they claim a seat at the table in this grand feast of ambition and betrayal? Is it through the fragmented remnants of a cheat ability from the game For Honor, now warped and unrecognizable? A fleeting glimpse into an uncertain future? Or perhaps a stroke of intangible, invisible luck?The stage is set, the pieces are moving—will this unlikely contender rise, or will they become just another casualty of the Game of Thrones?

“Had that night been quiet and windless… If she had never appeared in front of me…”

Whenever he recalled the past, Clyde felt endless regret. If he had known that being a Suzerain would be so troublesome, he would have never picked up that troublesome Bloodkin. In fact, he would never have even left that secluded Death Canyon.

“Big Brother Clyde, don’t be so dejected. You are now a well-known Suzerain, a hero of the entire continent, the Human Race’s Savior!”

“Lucifer, enough. I just want to return to my quiet life.” Clyde, an Evil God, had yearned for a quiet life, but by chance— or fate— he had met a young a mysterious Bloodkin Lolita named “Lucifer.” Under her guidance, Clyde embarked on his destiny, rising from the unknown as a nameless wanderer to become a Suzerain of a fief before taking the throne of the entire Ximengsi Continent.

There was just one problem: he who would be the torch of the human race wasn’t even from this dimension.

“You called me lazy, good. Watch me turn sloth into gold.”—Rino.***Rino used to be a boy who was betrayed by someone he trusted to be his intern, and left to die all because he believed in digital money. At just 18, his entire world laid into shambles when his intern retrieved the loan he borrowed, the bank seized all he had left with him, and worse, his father disowned him.That was when he died out.But fate had other plans.He wakes up in the body of Rino Carter, the “useless” son of a global billionaire who also believes in online wealth, but is termed lazy by everyone around him. Except this time, Rino has something powerful by his side...He awakened “The Throne of Gold System”.Not only did he awaken this system, Rino returned as another being of the same identity in a different timeline, and this time, he’s building an empire no one can take from him.He’ll conquer the world of money, crush his enemies and win hearts, with the system by his side.***“You see, money is power. And I? I have money.”—Rino Carter.