I suddenly remembered that a long, long time ago—before I ever returned to the Locke family—I had once smiled like this, shone like this.
So it turns out I could be this beautiful, this vivid, this full of youth.
“Tsk, as expected of me,”
Maxwell crossed his arms and sighed narcissistically. “Turning decay into magic—effortlessly.”
Me: “……”
Fine. I was already used to his sharp tongue.
Jackson, standing to the side, looked at me without concealing his amazement. “Aria, you’re truly beautiful today.”
I could hear the sincerity in his voice. It wasn’t politeness—it was genuine admiration.
And suddenly, I realized something.
It wasn’t that I was never pretty.
It was just that over those years, I’d been denied again and again, trampled on, ignored—until, without realizing it, I had e
