Lewd System: Every Scream and Moan is EXP

Chapter 360: Chapter 360 : The World’s Worst Job Offer, Seems Nice though

Roxana sat there, stunned into silence by the turn his words had taken.

Somewhere against her will, her heart had started racing. Everything he said kept circling one impossible idea, that she mattered, that she was a piece of his life he refused to keep playing without. And then the last of it finally registered, the words sinking in deeper than any wine had managed all night.

‘The place where you actually belong.’

“Forget the paperwork,” Jax went on, casual as ever. “Forget official procedures. Anyone who tries to oppose it, I’ll handle them personally. All you have to do is bring your luggage back. That’s it. That’s the entire job.”

She stared at that cold, flat face of his.

And that face was exactly the problem. Because she had seen it before. The same calm mask, the same even voice, on the day he had torn into her. The memory surfaced whether she invited it or not.

Her palm slammed the table.

“Give me one reason. One actual reason why I should drag myself back into a life where my value gets erased with a single sentence.”

Her voice trembled now, but the anger underneath it burned slow and steady. “You said your piece that day and walked away. But did it ever once cross your mind to wonder what happened on my side of the door after it closed?”

Her fist clenched hard enough that the handkerchief wrapped around it began turning red. She didn’t seem to notice. Or care.

“Do you have the slightest idea what it does to a person? When the only human being in this entire world who ever looked at the real you, who told you that you’re not weak, not a failure, not a disappointment, suddenly turns around and calls you useless?”

The words kept coming, cracked and unstoppable.

“I was a fool, working like a slave for you. No, wait, that can’t be right. You must have fooled me. Because there’s no logical way an imperial princess willingly feels happy protecting a stupid peasant. Or genuinely caring for a stubborn bastard like you. And I did, you know. I genuinely enjoyed our whole disaster of a journey, never realizing I was just a slave with extra steps. A convenient punching bag for anger you couldn’t aim at the right person. All because I took pride in the pathetic delusion that you actually depended on me.”

She laughed. It was the ugliest, saddest laugh the lounge had heard all night.

“You don’t even know, do you. How hard this lazy imperial princess worked to save your ass. I sacrificed my beloved nightly drinking sessions to sit awake at a desk making detailed lecture notes on which elite students you should never provoke. I aggressively weaponized my privileges as the Queen’s biological sister to fight off the powerful professors and political factions who wanted you expelled so badly. I went to war with arrogant noble brats and their rich, influential parents when they marched in to file formal complaints about the messes you left behind. I shut the mouth of every single person badmouthing your name, just so your already terrible reputation wouldn’t rot any further.”

Her breath hitched. “Dozens of silent wars, Jax. Dozens. You never heard a whisper of a single one, because I personally made sure each of them was buried before it could ever reach your ears.”

She looked down at her bloody, trembling hands. Her eyes were one blink away from flooding the table.

“And after all that. After every sleepless night, after every sacrifice. The grand evaluation I received for my efforts came in one word.”

Her chin trembled. “Useless.”

And then the rain started.

Jax watched her sob for exactly one second before he moved. His hand rose and settled against her tear-soaked cheek, and his thumb gently brushed away the stream running down it.

“You of all people should know my flawed nature better than that, Roxana.” His voice was quiet. “I’m a man with zero communication skills to speak of. Completely atrocious at speaking my mind, and every attempt ends in total catastrophe. My voice always finds a way to brutally hurt people, to shatter their spirits from the inside out, until they’re entirely justified in hating my guts.”

His thumb caught another tear.

“Other people open their mouths and comfort comes out. Warmth comes out. The right words at the right time come out. When I open mine, everything comes out wrong, or backwards, or wrapped in so many layers of sarcasm and cruelty that the actual meaning suffocates under a pile of shit I never intended to say.”