[BL] Accidentally Becoming the Healer of the Deranged Archduke novel Chapter 156

Chapter 156: "Thank you for being so kind to me, Your Grace"

Xion could not exactly recall when, but these nightmares started years ago.

Perhaps even before he fully understood what the word nightmare actually meant.

Even now, after more than two decades of life, they still plagued him.

Sometimes, they came like whispers. Faint, fleeting murmurs that would brush against his mind and vanish before he could thoroughly grasp them.

However, there were also times when they struck with brutal force. They would drag him into a suffocating loop of fear and helplessness.

No matter how much he tried to forget, the memories always found a way back in. Even the ones that didn’t belong to him.

The fractured recollections of the previous Xion Vaelis were now tangled with his own.

And worst of all... they felt real.

Too real.

It was not a pleasant experience or feeling. Over the past month, Xion’s life had come to him in blips and drifts.

Those flashes had gagged him, tormented him.

They seemed to take pleasure in striking when he least expected them, like when Xion was finally calm, or simply trying to find rest after an exhausting day.

That was when the shadows would lunge at him with barely concealed fury.

More than once, Xion had persuaded himself it was because he didn’t belong to this world, that his body was still trying to adjust.

Like the very existence of Xion Vaelis was furious with him as it screamed at him to leave, to disappear.

But he knew it was not true. He was sure. After all, it was little Xion himself who had asked him to come here. _{freewebnσvel.cѳm}

He had tried to cope. Tried to drown himself in work, in researching mana, in anything that could exhaust his mind enough to force a dreamless sleep.

But it never worked.

Each time, the nightmares seized him with a suffocating clutch until he was left gasping for air to fill his frantic lungs.

His fingers would claw desperately at his surroundings... at bedsheets, pillows, or whatever was within reach as though digging his way out might somehow break the nightmare’s hold.

When the panic reached its peak, his body would be the first to refuse to obey. Then his mind would spiral further into the abyss.

And then it would come... that raw, broken scream tearing from his throat without his permission.

No matter how hard he tried to suppress it... no matter how fiercely he fought to keep it locked inside... in the end, it always ended the same way.

With his tears.

And oh, good lord, how he loathed them.

Xion hated his tears more than anything in the world.

He bit his lip harshly until the physical pain brought his senses back. He was still clinging to Darius, hiding in his arms as if he were a rabbit burrowing into its warren.

His fingers twisted tightly in the archduke’s robe, knuckles pale from the force of his grip. And yet he did not loosen it.

At least not until his breathing was under his control.

With a shaky breath, Xion slowly unfurled his fingers. His joints ached from how tightly he’d been holding on, and yet, part of him hesitated to let go entirely.

Because it felt ... safe.

The silver hair. Pale green eyes, Archduke... The silver hair. Pale green eyes. Archduke... The silver hair. Pale green eyes...

He was no longer back on earth. There was an archduke who was worrying about him, there was also his baby Noxian who would call him brother so sweetly.

What if he insisted on asking? What am I supposed to say? That I cried because I dreamt of people chasing me? That, like a stupid child I could not get rid of my fear?