Lewd System: Every Scream and Moan is EXP-Chapter 268: A Weakened Jax

The slap echoed through the café walls. It left her mark on his cheek, a red handprint that told exactly how hard it was.

Tears started falling down her already ruined face again. She said with pain and rage crashing together behind her voice. "I was a fool."

She stood up. Clenched her fists so tight that her nails drew crescents into her palms.

"I should have known. I should have understood why every woman of influence in this world seemed to gravitate toward you. It wasn’t coincidence. It wasn’t charm."

Her voice cracked.

"It was your plan all along."

She continued before he could speak. "You plotted it from the very beginning, didn’t you? You needed people with power. With armies. With thrones. Because that’s what a champion with a genius mind would do in order to win. Collect weapons."

Her eyes were burning. "And we were your weapons. We were just pawns sitting in your palms. You never looked at me or even Nerith as persons with a heart."

She pulled at her own hair. "I was a fool for not thinking about what Queen Sylvie said. That you are after people who hold significant power. I was a fool when in just a few days you bound yourself to Nerith. Maybe you were after the powerful army behind her."

Her voice dropped to something that hurt more than shouting. "And I was a fool to fall for your words. To fall for you. To fall right into the hands of a mastermind who I was thinking of giving everything to. My pride. My heart. My entire world."

She let out a painful laugh and murmured to herself. "How foolish of you, Astrid."

Jax said. "You are getting it all wrong."

She looked at him. "Am I? Because from where I’m standing, everything finally makes perfect sense."

She turned and walked toward the exit. Her voice carried across the empty café without her looking back. "I wanted a reason to erase you from my life if things didn’t go well. But I never imagined the reason would be that you were never real to begin with." 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Seeing her going, Jax said. "Wait. I want to—"

She stopped at the door. Turned. Wiped her tears with the back of her hand. And spoke with a composure that was being held together by nothing but spite.

"Oh, I almost forgot. You must be terrified right now. That I’ll leak your identity. That I’ll undo whatever grand strategy you’ve been building."

She sniffed.

"But don’t worry, Professor. I will carry one more secret of yours. And trust me on that. I didn’t even tell anyone about your demon realm tactical move."

Her voice steadied.

"I won’t mean any harm to you. Or to your plans. Because everything I said, everything I did, none of it was fake. Even if yours was."

She turned to leave. But stopped.

Because she heard glass breaking.

She looked from the corner of her eyes and saw Jax had crushed the glass in his hand. The shards were buried in his palm and fingers.

Blood was dripping from between his knuckles onto the white tablecloth. And he was refusing to let go. Squeezing harder. As if the pain in his hand was easier to deal with than whatever was happening inside his chest.

Then she saw tears on his face.

’Was it another act? Or did he actually regret it?’

’No. Think about it, Astrid. If he wanted to hide his identity, he wouldn’t have brought it up in the first place’. He would have taken her confession, put on a fake mask, and built a brand new wall of lies to hide behind. ’Then why now? Why reveal the one thing that could destroy everything he had built?’

His eyes. His tears. They reminded her of what she already knew about Jax. He was the strong type. He never broke when the world threw threats at him. Even when the entire world was against him, he always stood tall. Or at least held himself together enough to look like he was standing tall.

There was only one time she had seen him cry. When he found Aunt Adelina in that prison in a horrible state. But even that, maybe it was his ultimate move to gain allies and push himself ahead in his game.

Every thought she had was contradicting the one before it. She didn’t know what to believe. What was real. What was calculated. What was genuine.

She thought. ’Why does this man always have to be the reason I end up like this.’

Then she walked back. Sat beside him. Grabbed his hand. Pried his fingers open one by one and removed the glass pieces from his bleeding palm. Wrapped her handkerchief around the wounds.

All in silence.

Jax broke it. "What would you have done?"

She didn’t look up.

"Tell me, Astrid. What would you have done if you were in my place? If you were thrown into another world and the only purpose of being there was to win and earn a blessing of your choosing."

His voice wasn’t pleading. It was asking. Genuinely asking.

"What would you have done if that other world taught you things you never felt before? If it took a hollow, detached person who saw emotions as liabilities rather than needs and turned them into someone who finally understood their weight? Not as burdens to throw away but as reasons to stay. To fight. And for the first time in their life, to actually feel alive."

He looked at the blood seeping through the handkerchief.

"What if the world shows you exactly what you had been craving your whole life and then the world shows you the reality? That it’s all just a dream. And the next day you wake up and everything is gone."

His jaw tightened.

"I did nothing wrong to you or anyone else. Except hiding who I was. Because I had no other choice."

He looked at her.

"You said I faked things only to win this game? Then ask yourself. Do you really think any of the words I said today, yesterday, or even before were fake too?"

His voice hardened. Not with anger. With something that refused to be dismissed.

"I swear, Astrid. In your name. I never intended to hurt you. And if I wanted a huge army behind me then tell me why would I have made enemies of most of the kingdoms recently? Why would I get on the bad side of the academy and Lysandra?"

He shook his head.

"I never had any interest in this god’s game. Or for your understanding, the demon’s game. But as time passed, as I felt something foreign, something you people call love, everything changed."

His voice dropped.

"This world isn’t a game for me anymore. Being brought here will soon be either my biggest regret or the greatest blessing ever given to me."

He looked at the ceiling.

"Because if I lose, I get thrown back to where I came from. Leaving behind the people I gave my heart to. The people I made promises to. But if I win, then no such misery would touch me. Because winning gives me a wish. And that wish can be anything."

He paused.

"Even choosing to never leave this world. Even getting to stay in the place that turned me from a strong person with a clear mind who feared nothing into someone who thinks twice before every choice. Because now his life isn’t just his own anymore."

Astrid’s eyes gleamed hearing about the wish. But then realization took over as she said. "But wasn’t it all a lie? A trap set up by the demon?"

Jax replied. "The demon and its story is all a lie. But yes, trust me on this. The wish is real. My words are real."

He knew everything depended on the game. If he loses, a penalty from the system would strip all his power. The reward he was truly fighting for was the interdimensional teleport. The goddess wish had nothing to do with any of it. In fact he was forced to demand something very specific from the goddess on winning--fucking her. But that was a truth he couldn’t share with anyone.

He looked at the baffled girl sitting beside him wrapping his bleeding hand and said. "Now do you understand what I meant when I said my greed would swallow me?"

She looked up at him.

"Because each person I put my heart out for is another responsibility on my shoulders. This game that was just a timepass for me became my life or death in no time. Because if I lose, I don’t know what I will do to myself. I won’t be able to live knowing that somewhere, in some place, a girl would be waiting for me. For someone who wasn’t able to keep his promise."

His bleeding hand clenched beneath the handkerchief.

"You know, Astrid, back in my world I was someone who always won. No matter what game it was. No matter how rigged. There was only ever one person standing on the podium. No matter how big the tournament was, no matter how much fortune was at stake, I walked in like I owned the place. Because I knew who I was. Because I knew I had nothing to lose."

He looked at her.

"But this game, which should have been just another walk through, turned me into someone so weak that every day I question myself whether I will make it. I lost my fearless self. And the reason is because now I have everything on the line. Everything to lose."

His eyes met hers.

"And one such thing I stand to lose is you."

-x-X-x-

[A/N: Thanks for the gift F3AR_GINO, and thanks as well to Black_Iron, Anthony_Frazier_Sr, Ordici_T, Milk_Man_4767, and tony_adams_4787 for dropping the golden tickets.]