Novel Full Chapter 449: I Love You
***
{Outside The Projection}
Two things stood out to them.
Aladdin was good; rather, he was perfect for Malik.
And Sinbad really knew his Elder Brother well, preparing and waiting for the day he’d finally mention the need for a successor, ready for all possible picks.
The second, and the most important thing, was that they knew what direction their Sultan was taking with those questions; it became too obvious at the end.
He wanted someone to keep the unity after he was gone.
Someone who was ready to strategically lead them and prepare them to fight against a common enemy, making them ignore all their little squabbles.
Malik had truly grown up.
The image of that beggar was long gone.
Now he was a Sultan through and through.
Even the way he spoke was completely different.
Seeing his past self must’ve brought back memories.
Of course, this supposed ‘past self’ before him was much more educated, but that wasn’t his focus; it was the mentality.
Neither ever wanted to sacrifice for this world.
But look at Malik now…
He had sacrificed everything.
Soon, even his very life would go…
The one man who never held any obligation to save the world had saved it without being asked, only doing so because he felt that it was his purpose, and only feeling so because of his beyond extreme level of kindness.
So seeing another like him, walking the same Path…
It appeared to stir something in Malik.
As it did in the hall, making them smile bitterly.
After that, many hummed with small reactions, all the same shape:
Surprise mixed with relieved approval, yeah… they found themselves liking that boy.
Aladdin looked cute enough to be trusted and sharp enough to be dangerous in the right way. His practical answers only had them like him more—terrain beats numbers, punishments that heal, and a successor shaped by need rather than blood.
It made sense in their weary brains.
He was going to be reliable.
Sinbad had also earned their praise.
His claws were all over this setup.
What he did made them less terrified of the future.
Whether they saved Malik or not, succession was going to happen.
And thankfully for them all, it wasn’t going to be a fluke or some whim.
It was planned, with contingencies that made future chaos feel a lot more avoidable.
His being a beggar wasn’t something that affected them; it couldn’t, not when Malik, who was once a beggar too, had reached a height none even thought possible.
Mostly, though, the hall held a bitter, strange feeling.
People who’d once scoffed at street children suddenly found themselves promising, aloud or inwardly, to be kinder to beggars.
Yes, never would they mistreat a beggar ever again!
***
{Inside The Projection}
The room felt too quiet after the two left.
Malik stayed on the throne, making small movements only, as if the gold was the only thing keeping him upright.
Tip tap… tip tap…
Yet, before silence could make itself a home, footsteps echoed in the hall.
They were soft, belonging to a woman who smelled faintly of flowers and… rain.
Her hair was silver, her eyes almond, and her smile was bright enough to fold people up and keep them in her pocket.
It was Scheherazade.
“Hey, cutie~.”
She sang, flinging her hair.
“How are you today?”
“…”
Malik didn’t bother to reply.
He didn’t even make eye contact.
As always, stillness was his language.
“I see you’ve met your shiny successor. Aladdin, right? Cute kid. He’s got grit and a proper scrappy past. You did well in choosing him.”
“…”
He, of course, said nothing.
“Do you…”
Scheherezade’s smile died down a little.
“Do you finally accept yourself as Sultan?”
Malik’s head lifted a little, eyes finally meeting hers.
“…Yes.”
He simply repeated the line he’d said to Sinbad earlier:
“I’ve accepted that I might be their guardian, their Sultan, but I am nothing more than a miserable génocidaire who barely stands against his own madness and Corruption.”
She gave him a small, understanding chuckle.
“We’ve got some progress, at least.”
Her hands sat on her back as she leaned in.
“Say… now that you’re nearing the endgame, would you like the warmth of a woman? I’m sure you and Layla haven’t been doing it at all since that day. I like you. I’ll be honest—I’m a bit old for you, but age teaches things. So I’m sure I’d treat you better than—”
She grinned.
“That little Night.”
***
{Outside The Projection}
“Sorry…”
Scheherezade, under Sinbad’s piercing eyes, materialized before Layla.
“Little night.”
She raised both her hands for a moment, silently telling Sinbad not to worry.
“I didn’t mean for you to find out like this, but…”
Her face revealed a bright smile.
“I slept with him~.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“WHAT?”
Nearly everyone in the hall reacted the same.
Surprised had rocked them straight, their jaws nearly hitting the floor.
And, of course, they weren’t the only ones, as Azeem, Huda, Sinbad, and most especially Dunya couldn’t believe it.
No way Malik would betray Layla like that, even if they were barely husband and wife.
But surprisingly, the one those words were directed at, Layla, wasn’t at all jealous or mad; rather, she…
“Really? I don’t think he’d do that, even then… but I wish he had accepted instead. If he did… then I’d be happy he at least got to enjoy himself before… this.”
She was encouraging it.
“Lady Scheherezade… you’d make a way better wife to the Sultan.”
Scheherezade looked at her for a while and then sighed.
“…You’re no fun.”
She disappeared, returning to the corner.
“Just don’t kill yourself after this.”
***
{Inside The Projection}
Malik looked at Scheherezade for a long minute.
His eyes somehow held both indifference and anger.
Enough to make anyone on Fam Iblis tremble and even entirely flatten the smile out of her face.
Sure, she liked danger; she’d courted it for sport, but she knew when to close a book, too, and this book wasn’t to be touched, not right now.
“If…”
He finally spoke.
“If your words are true… you like what I am.”
His words came softly, despite his threatening eyes.
“You like the thing I became—not who I am.”
Scheherazade blinked a few times.
She couldn’t believe what he just said.
Eventually, a half-chuckle slipped out of her.
“Don’t you start speaking for me, Sultan~.”
She was as playful as a cat.
“I know exactly what I want.”
A cat that knew how to hunt.
“But since we’re being honest…”
Her words left her with a seriousness he’d never expected.
“You are kind. Too selfless, yet also selfish when it comes to those you love. You’re smart; cunning like a fox. Brave, of course. Brave in the way saints are brave and in the way monsters are brave. Sacrificial—oh, the way you give things up, it’s almost… artful. Handsome, yes. Very handsome. A carved gold statue that’s been through a thousand wars. Incredibly handsome. A hunk, actually. A glorious, terrifying hunk of a man who could topple kingdoms by frowning. I mean—look at you! Look at you! The world is a worse place for not bending its knee properly to you.”
The compliments multiplied, tumbling faster, prettier each time:
“Generous, terrible, poetic, necessary, and doomed—a walking contradiction that is lovable for his selflessness yet hated for his selflessness.”
She laughed brightly in between lines.
“You’re a poem I keep reading… every time it stabs me in the same place, but I can’t stop. I could write songs about how you scorch fields and then plant gardens with the same hand. I could—”
Her praise ran wild, a glittering, dizzying cascade.
The cadence was almost… manic.
Yet Malik, throughout all of that…
His expression never changed.
Even as he heard the end.
“I… I love you.”
A confession.