The final, echoing chord of Nova’s opening hit faded into the night air, leaving a brief silence across the vast arena before the crowd erupted once again into a wall of thunderous applause. Even we were clapping inside our skybox and I was sure other skybox were no different.
Down on the central stage, Yerin stepped up to the front edge of the platform, the white-hot spotlights locking onto her glowing figure. She tapped her custom earpiece, taking a slow, deep breath to steady herself as she raised the microphone to her lips.
"Thank you..." Yerin spoke, her voice carrying a soft, crystalline clarity that resonated through every spatial speaker in the stadium. "Thank you all so, so much. Words cannot express it enough."
The stadium gradually quieted, more than two hundred thousand fans hanging onto her every word.
"I know... there have been so many rumors and questions surrounding this farewell performance," Yerin continued, offering a warm, genuine smile toward the main broadcast cameras. "And honestly, wish I could answer every single one of you individually. But the truth is simple... my life is shifting into a new Chapter. For the next two years, there are things, and people, far more important to me that require my absolute, undivided focus."
She paused, letting the weight of her words settle over the ocean of listening fans. "I can’t promise you that I’ll ever return to this exact stage, or that I will ever perform on this scale again. But what I can promise you... is that I will try my best to come back to you all one day. You, my fans, have made my life something truly beautiful. You are, without a doubt, one of the greatest blessings I have ever received. I will never, ever forget you."
A wave of emotional gasps and tearful cheers swept through the stadium. I could understand them.
"Now..." Yerin’s lips curved into a soft, slightly playful smirk, her dark eyes sparkling with a familiar, chaotic glint that sent a spike of alarm straight down my spine. "..I know many of you are wondering why I’m stepping away at the absolute peak of my career. Many of those complex questions... can actually be answered by a single, simple truth."
She looked directly into the lens of the high-definition cinematic camera hovering in front of her face, as if looking at everyone across the globe through it.
A breathtaking, radiant smile broke across her features, a smile full of blinding happiness that left the entire stadium paralyzed in silence for two solid seconds. Even I was affected by it. She was so damned beautiful that I almost jumped out of the skybox to kiss her.
"I..." Yerin declared, her voice echoing across the entire globe, "...have fallen deeply in love with someone."
BOOM!
It felt as if a nuclear warhead of pure shock had been detonated over the Capital.
The initial silence shattered into an absolute, apocalyptic uproar. Two hundred thousand fans in the physical stadium, and millions watching the live broadcast across the world, went completely, utterly insane. Mixed screams of disbelief, heartbroken wails, confused cheers, and frantic shouting created a storm of noise that physically shook the arena structure.
Meanwhile... inside our floating VIP skybox...
An absolute, heavy, crushing silence fell over the room.
The cheerful music-mirroring system faded into the background. The energetic dancing stopped dead in its tracks. Everyone in the lounge was completely frozen in place, staring at the glass window with wide, flabbergasted eyes.
Grandfather Alistair slowly raised a hand, rubbing his eyes with two fingers as he stared out over the stadium in complete, speechless bewilderment. "Am I... am I growing so old that my ears have begun hallucinating corrupted noise?"
Julian took a slow, measured breath, staring at the stage with a rare, thoroughly stunned look on his face. "No, Father. I heard the exact same thing. The lass said she’s in love."
"How in the world is that possible?" Alistair blustered, pointing a trembling finger toward the stage. "Yerin?! Falling in love?! That chaotic, unhinged little goblin who loves nothing more than her own personal freedom and causing endless trouble?! She doesn’t even allow normal people within five feet of her personal space."
Sitting on the sofa, Alice slowly turned her head. Her sharp, perceptive eyes drifted away from the window, locking squarely onto me. I could practically sense the movement.
"Well.." Alice spoke softly, a quiet, knowing smile spreading across her lips. "...Yerin hasn’t really interacted with anyone outside the inner circle recently... except for one specific person."
SWOOSH.
In a single, synchronized motion, every pair of eyes in the skybox—Alistair, Julian, Alice, Val, and even little Dylan who just followed them—snapped straight toward me.
I stood there by the glass, forcing my posture to remain completely steady, staring blankly ahead as tried my absolute best to pretend I hadn’t noticed the mountain of terrifying gazes drilling into the side of my head.
’Oh, man...’ I thought, sweating internally. ’She really went ahead and dropped that bomb on live television, didn’t she?’
[Full of surprises, eh.] Paige giggled. [What are you going to do now, Goblin Slayer? Your goblin just snitched on you.]
’Respect the constitution.’
Mom wasn’t about to let me off the hook that easily. I knew it all too well.
Alice stepped closer, crossing her arms as her eyes sparkled with intense, motherly amusement. "Seth, sweetie... do you happen to have any clue whatsoever who this ’mysterious person’ Yerin fell in love with might be?"
I kept my mouth shut, remaining stubbornly silent. Like hell I was talking. Give me my lawyer, damnit.
[Lawyer kink~]
’Shut up!’
[Yes, Daddy~] Paige giggled even harder.
Beside me, Yoona leaned back against the leather sofa, her dark crimson hair cascading over her shoulders. She looked at my flustered, stoic face, her dark eyes overflowing with pure, wicked amusement. "Go on, Seth... answer Aunt Alice. We’re all waiting~"
As if my mom wasn’t enough, my other fiancee was joining in the fun too.
’Is this marriage?’
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