The Ugly Duckling Of The Tiger Tribe-Chapter 269: More truth forced out

I no longer had anything to fear after saying the truth. Only, I didn’t say everything.

I didn’t tell them who I was before my transmigration, because I felt it wasn’t necessary but it was secretly a secret I wished to keep.

I didn’t want them to know I was such an outcast, and neither did I want them to know that I wrote a novel that was similar to this world.

Maybe it was because I didn’t consider it as important as the secret of my identity that I overlooked it like that.

And thus, all of that was exposed as we walked through the shimmering yellow fields of the yellow valley.

I blinked my eyes, confused as I stood in one place. They all stared at me, and I held my head, trembling. What did I just say? I couldn’t remember.

All I remember before now was feeling dizzy and swaying a little, and then I said something. Did I say something I shouldn’t have? I probably didn’t because why else would they be looking at me like that?

I watched their shocked expression, trying to remember what I had said. What was it? Try to remember, dammit!

"Arinya, what’s a novel?" Fenric asked and I paused.

I froze in place. The world was still swaying, the golden pollen dancing in front of my eyes like tiny, mocking stars.

The sweet, heavy scent of the valley was vibrating in my lungs, and my tongue felt loose, like it was made of water.

"A novel?" I repeated the word, sounding alien even to me. "It’s... It’s a book. A story. A long, long story written on paper."

"What is paper?" Fenric asked.

"It’s a material made out of trees. It’s very very light. Lighter than a parchment."

What was happening to me? Why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut? Was this what Noah meant when he said it would suck the truth out of me?

"And you said you wrote one?" Noah asked, his dark eyes narrowing, though not with anger—just sheer confusion. "You said you wrote a story... about us?"

"Did I say that?"

I wanted to clamp my hands over my mouth and keep myself from talking any further, but I knew that it wasn’t going to work out as I imagined. The valley wouldn’t let me stop. The truth was leaking out of me like a sieve.

"Not exactly us," I blurted out, my voice high and frantic. "But a world just like this. With beastmen like this one and... and hearts that break and heal over the female lead. It was filled with mating too. A lot of it." My eyes were twirling as the truth spilled out of me.

Please, just stop talking.

"I wrote about loneliness because I was lonely. I dreamed up a world like this before I even knew you existed!"

My heart was panting and I clamped my hands together.

"In my world, we had plastic, cars, machines," Stop talking. "Life was so comfortable there and everything was different! I’m a fraud who accidentally dreamed herself into a nightmare!"

It happened.

That last part... It definitely wasn’t what they thought it was, but how could I explain when my own words were being overshadowed by whatever truth the valley pushed out?

If they don’t ask, they will misunderstand forever.

Fenric walked over to me, his brow furrowed. He looked at me as if I were a confusing piece of a puzzle.

"A nightmare?" He asked, his voice dipping low. "Is that what this is to you? Being with us? Are we a nightmare to you, Arinya?"

"No! No, never." I cried out, the pollen once again dragging the truth from my lungs before I could filter it. "Being with you is definitely not a nightmare. It was my dream. I spent years imagining a world like this—one with adventure, with wild forests, with... with people who would actually stay with me. How could it be a nightmare? It’s a wish and a dream come true."

I slumped against a tree trunk, my eyes wide and shimmering as the golden dust swirled.

"I’m a dreamer, a girl who wanted to become an actress, but even the spotlight hated me, so all I could do was get lost in my own fantasy! In my old world, I was nobody."

The words came out so fast I didn’t know how to rein them in. Nothing remained hidden and I knew for a fact that the whispering valley was dragging them all out against my will. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

"I was an outcast, a wallflower, someone who nobody saw even when standing on the brightest stage. It wasn’t fair. It was hard and it was painful. But I couldn’t do anything about it. I screamed, I yelled, I banged on a drum but they still never heard me or listened. It was as if I were invisible. Like I was born to be a background character.

My heart felt pained while making these confessions as I recalled all the things I went through back in the modern world.

"I wrote a beastman story for a long time. It was about this world, about mating, about adventures, because I didn’t have anyone to talk to, and I definitely had no one to love me. I hated my world because of the controversies that moved the world, and I wanted to be here instead. And then one day, I fell off a cliff and landed in Arinya’s body, but I feel like I cheated. I feel like I’m living a life I didn’t earn because you’re all so good to me!" I clenched my fists. "You all make me think that the world I lived before now was nothing but a dog’s life, and this is what living feels like. That’s why I... I never want to go back. I want to stay here. I want to be your wife, and the mother of our cubs. I..."

Tears rushed down my cheeks, falling on the shimmering yellow meadow that suspiciously reminded me of the yellow field I woke up in.

My heart was pounding and it felt like more welds were going to pour out soon.

I looked at them, my heart exposed and my body trembling.

"I’m not a beast. I’m just a lonely and sad girl who knew exactly what kind of men you were before I even met you because... you’re everything I ever wanted and more!"

The silence that followed wasn’t cold; it was heavy with the weight of my confession.

Fenric was the first to move. He stepped into my space, his ruby eyes searching mine with a strange, intense heat.

"So you’re saying... You wrote about someone like me? Someone who would protect you and stay by your side through a blizzard?" He swiped his finger through his hair, smiling like a jack of all trades.

It looked like an attempt to make me smile but I couldn’t force my lips to curl up even though I wanted to.

"Yes," I whispered, a tear sliding down my cheek. "And no. I wrote someone like you, but I didn’t write about you because you were not one of the main characters. None of you were. And that’s why I don’t feel guilty having you to myself. This world isn’t even the world I wrote to begin with. It’s just similar."