CHAPTER 230: CHAPTER-230

The red began to creep beyond that single page, crawling across the book. Page after page shifted hue, the pale parchment deepening into shades of crimson. She had only spilled a few drops—yet the entire diary seemed to bleed.

Her hand trembled, thumb still hovering above the parchment. This shouldn’t be possible...

The diary pulsed faintly beneath her palm, alive, as though responding to her blood.

Soon—like a trick of magic—every word on the diary began to fade. One line at a time, one sentence after the other, vanishing as though the parchment itself was swallowing them whole.

Kaya watched in silence. She didn’t gasp. She didn’t move. She simply sat there, eyes fixed, absorbing everything.

And then, in their place, new letters began to bloom.

Not faintly, not weakly, but bold—black so deep it seemed to drink in the dim light of the cave. English words, unfurling in perfect, flowing cursive. Lines upon lines of it, like some master calligrapher had poured their very soul into the ink.

Kaya’s lips parted slightly. She had only seen handwriting this beautiful once or twice in her life. But this... this wasn’t handwriting. This was art. Every curve, every stroke seemed alive, like each letter carried its own breath.

Her fingers twitched with the urge to trace them—but she didn’t dare touch.

Within moments, the transformation was complete. The shifting stopped. The glowing ink settled. The diary looked normal again—aged parchment, bound spine, ordinary cover.

Ordinary, except for one thing.

The script was no longer foreign. The twisting characters that had once looked like Chinese... or Japanese... or something else entirely, were gone. Replaced with English. Clean, flawless, effortless English.

Kaya’s eyes narrowed.

It wasn’t just a translation. No—this was the original text itself. She could feel it in the flow of the words, in the rhythm of the sentences. This is how it was always meant to be read.

Which meant one thing: Veer hadn’t read it wrong. She knew the look in his eyes when he had been reading to her before—slow, careful, word by word. He hadn’t lied.

Either the words had been completely different when he read them...

Or Veer simply could not see the diary as it truly was.

As Kaya opened the first page, her brows furrowed. The moment her eyes landed on the ink, she instantly knew something was wrong. This wasn’t the storybook she had been expecting. The handwriting was too raw, too personal, the kind that spilled straight from someone’s heart rather than a writer’s imagination.

It didn’t take her long to realize—this was a diary.

Not just any diary, but a man’s. She could tell by the tone of the words, by the yearning scribbled into every sentence.

Her hair was so beautiful and dark, so silky. I just want to touch it. How can she look so beautiful and cute at the same time?

Kaya blinked, her face twisting with secondhand embarrassment. "Ugh..." she muttered under her breath, her lips curling as if she had just bitten into something sour.

The more she read, the clearer it became. These weren’t neutral observations. They were drenched in longing. The hesitant, almost worshipful descriptions screamed of unspoken affection—of a man who loved in silence, pouring all of it into the safety of paper.

On the next page, the handwriting seemed even more desperate, as if the pen itself had been dragged through the weight of his soul.

I have fallen into such a darkness that I never thought a firefly could look so beautiful. No... I should not compare her to the sun. The sun belongs to everyone, its rays warm every soul. But I don’t want that. I don’t want everyone to have her warmth. The sun can never reach the deep canals where I dwell. Only fireflies can. And though I never believed in fireflies before—fragile, fleeting sparks in the night—she has become the only light I can see.

Kaya blinked, her lips pressing into a thin line. Fireflies? Darkness? Sunlight? It was almost poetic, and yet heavy with despair. Whoever this man was, he wasn’t simply writing about infatuation. His words dripped with loneliness, as though he had lived too long at the edges of the world.

The next lines only deepened the weight in her chest:

Living has always felt like dying. I did not choose my profession because of respect or ambition. I chose it because I wanted to heal. To make sure people lived better, healthier lives. To give them what I never had. But I know, in their eyes, a person like me does not deserve anything. They will always hate me.

Kaya let the diary rest slightly on her lap, her brows drawn together.

She turned the page, and the next words almost jolted her.

Ha ha ha... I’m so happy. She looked at me. She smiled at me. My goddess... I knew she would.

The handwriting was shaky, uneven—as if his hand had trembled while writing. The next line was smudged, ink blotted in places, as though drops of liquid had fallen onto the paper. Kaya narrowed her eyes. Was it rain? Or tears? Somehow, from the way the words were carved into the page, she knew it was the latter.

But how could something as disgusting as me ever reach out to her? She is a star in the sky, and I... I am nothing but a pest in the gutter. She has so many who long for her, who want her, yet she shines brighter than all of them. Like a flawless jade that glows no matter how much the world covets it...

The tone of the next lines shifted suddenly, growing darker.

The master hit me again today. My legs are bleeding. My toes are torn. The pain is unbearable... but I cannot let her see it. I cannot let her know. I cannot bear the thought of disgust clouding her gaze when it falls on me. I will endure it all, smile, act normal—anything, as long as she does not look at me with hate.