Chapter 448: Unraveling Secrets II

He looked at Aria, waiting for her to freak out. But she didn’t really show a bad reaction. This calmed him down slightly, and he continued.

"Well, in my past life, I was just a regular, boring guy sitting inside a small room, reading fantasy books and playing games. I will explain more about my world later if things remain the same between us, or at least similar."

He rubbed his face.

"And there... well, I read a specific book about a dumb Hero who got magically sent to a different world. He basically helped an empire called Crestwall defeat the Demon King. After that, he was basically manipulated and used as a political weapon to achieve various goals for multiple corrupt people."

He looked into Aria’s eyes.

"In the last few Chapters of that novel, there was this terrifying ninth-circle mage named Aria Sterling. She had gone through so much pain. And even though she basically didn’t do much other than defend herself when people went to attack her, she was painted in a bad light by the world. She was called a villainess... A witch worse than the demon king and much much more. And in the very end... the Hero basically killed her. Well... the novel ended with the hero entering some weird room and since this place was known to stop all teleportation magic, I assumed that she had no way of escaping..."

Adrian’s voice cracked.

"I felt sorry. I understood what she had gone through in the story. And after finishing the novel, I basically fell asleep... and I woke up inside Adrian’s body."

He reached out and gently held her small hands.

"When I opened my eyes, I was in that exact court trial. When I realized who I was, and who my daughter was... the fact that my daughter was the Aria Sterling... I couldn’t help but think that maybe, just maybe, I could change the terrible future."

He squeezed her hands softly.

"At the start, I simply wanted to make sure that you did not go through all those bad things. I just wanted to make sure that I could safely defend you from the darkness of this world, considering the fact that in the book, all of the bad stuff seemed to unfairly happen to you."

"I felt pity for you, yes." He smiled sadly. "But as time passed, and as I spent more time with you... I couldn’t help but adore you. I couldn’t help but think of you as my own daughter. I couldn’t help but think of you as my only family in this entire world. At some point, I couldn’t even tell you exactly when, I had in fact genuinely become your father, even though I am not."

He wiped a tear from his own eye.

"To me, you had gone from being a fictional character that I pitied and wanted to save... to my beloved daughter. And this... I don’t care whether you went back in time or not. I don’t care if you used to be a ninth-circle mage. Even now when I look at you, I cannot help but think about you as anything but my daughter."

He let go of her hands and looked down.

"But I don’t really know how you see me anymore. After all... I’m a completely different soul while you’re still the same one who just went back in time."

Aria just sat there. She didn’t say anything, but her small lips quivered all throughout the time when Adrian was speaking. She also watched as Adrian’s hands shook slightly in his lap.

The moment he finished, she looked up at him and opened her mouth.

"Papa," she said, her voice cracking.

Adrian looked at her, bracing himself for the worst-case scenario.

But Aria just jumped at him. She threw her arms around his neck, hugged him really, really tight, and started to cry into his shoulder.

Unlike the multiple times this had happened in the past, where Aria cried and Adrian simply comforted her... this time was different.

Tears just rolled down Adrian’s own cheeks as he hugged her back just as tightly.

The two of them just sat there on the floor of the mud hut, holding each other and sobbing.

After a few minutes, Aria finally managed to speak through her tears.

"I... I don’t care whether you are from a different world. And I don’t care if I am technically older than you or not mentally. Well, I don’t really know whether I am or not, but I just... you are the only person who genuinely cared about me. Apart from, well, Serena. She used to be my strict mentor in my past life."

Adrian nodded against her shoulder. "I know. I guess there wasn’t much written about it in the book, but I do know that she was your mentor. And I..."

He pulled back slightly, bringing his palm to the back of her head and chuckled while he sobbed.

"It’s kind of hard to imagine now that you used to be a big girl. You’re still so small."

Before he could even say anything else, Aria squeezed him tighter.

"Papa, I love you. I still love you, and I will continue to love you. The one who truly accepted me wasn’t Adrian, or well, the terrible man who I knew in my past life. The one who accepted me was you. The one who accepted me was the one who read about my pain. It was you."

She buried her face in his chest.

"So, even though you are not technically my original father, just like you said, as time passed... in fact, it didn’t take me too long at all. In time, I couldn’t help but consider you my real father. And I love you a lot. I still love you a lot. And that is never, ever going to change, Papa."

She sniffled loudly. "I... I still want to be a child. I still want to experience a real childhood. I couldn’t experience it in my past life. Everything was just... everything was just so painful. But now everything seems so nice, and it is only thanks to you. I don’t want to grow up. Well, at least not so soon."

Adrian chuckled softly, wiping her tears with his thumb.

"Well, you will always be my cute baby. And honestly speaking, I cannot see you as anything else but my cute little baby."

"Papa..." Aria whispered as she squeezed him tighter.

And a screen appeared right in front of Adrian a moment later.

[Congratulations. You have accomplished the true hidden requirement.]

[You have been accepted as the father.]

[’Adrian Sterling’ has been rejected.]

[You can now consume ’Adrian Sterling’s Soul that lies dormant within you.]

[Your true ability can now be used fully without restrictions.]

’What do you mean true ability? What’s my true ability?’

[Choice Gamer]

Adrian looked at it and couldn’t help but glare at the system screen.

’Oh? Now even you make fun of the games I play huh? Fuck you! What does it even do? Let me play Visual Novels or something?’

Choice Gamer: When it’s time to make Important choices, the world around you freezes