Johanne's POV
The moment Leon and the Princess's lips met in that quiet, suspended second…
Something inside me shattered.
It wasn't just a crack.
But it was a sudden, painful rupture that echoed through my chest like glass breaking under pressure.
The sensation was so raw and so visceral, that no mask or forced composure could hope to hide it.
My entire body tensed, my shoulders stiffening as if trying to hold together the pieces of something that had already fallen apart.
I didn't know what the emotion was. I couldn't name it.
It was ugly.
It twisted my expression into something unrecognizable—even to myself.
My face burned, not from embarrassment, but from the intensity of something far more unsettling.
I couldn't explain it. Couldn't analyze it. Couldn't rationalize it.
And above all—it hurt.
It hurt so much that I found it difficult to breathe, as if someone had reached inside my lungs and squeezed all the air out.
