POV: You Get Isekai'd Into the Final Fantasy XV world

Chapter- 9 The Truth Is Sore

The following morning, I woke up with dry patches on my face from the tear tracks. Scrubbing my eyes with my knuckles, I sat up to see that Iggy and Gladio were gone. Noctis sat across the tent, uncharacteristically awake, staring at me.

The last of my grogginess disappeared as my heart began to pound. I gulped. "Good morning."

"Morning," Noct said before looking away.

I cleared my throat and tried to stretch the awkwardness out of my muscles. "So," I said with my arms above my head. "What's the plan for today? Gonna cash in on those hunts and then make for the sword?"

Noct took a deep breath. "Something like that," he said as he let out the air filling up his chest. "Iggy is out collecting herbs for breakfast and Gladio is off on his morning run, so we have some time before we need to head out."

"Oh, okay. Guess I'll do some practicing then," I said, trying to get away from this situation as fast as possible. As I moved to get up, I was abruptly stopped by a sharp pain throughout every muscle in my body. "Ah!" I hissed as I fell back down.

Noct cringed. "Yeah, I remember how sore I was after my first full day of fighting too. Here, let me help you up," he said as he made his way to me and offered his hand.

I merely stared at his outstretched hand for a moment before realizing I was afraid to touch him. The last time he had touched me, my whole life had flashed before his eyes. I was cut open and laid bare without a scrap of dignity or privacy. But once I managed to get the logical part of my brain up and running again, I realized that that would likely never happen again. Just grab it before he notices you being weird, I scolded myself.

"Thanks," I said as I placed my hand in his. As he pulled me up, I let out a sigh of relief that nothing happened.

"Let's go for a walk, it'll help those sore muscles," Noct suggested.

"Oh, um..." I trailed off searching for a reason not to be alone with him. "Won't Ignis be back soon? I should help him make breakfast."

"Specs? Nah, he just left and he likes to take his time picking the 'best ingredients,'" Noct said as he made air quotes.

"Oh, then I guess there's no reason not to," I laughed nervously. At this point I was deeply considering just hightailing it the hell out of there and never looking back. But that was probably a horrible idea that was based off of my instinctual flight response. I suppose this was inevitable and I'd have to face it at some point if I wanted to stay with them. So I drank in a deep breath to prepare myself for the worst and painted a smile on my face. "Right, let's get going then."

The ramp down from the safe haven led up in the direction of a hill with fluffy green grass. We started the trek upward and away from the line of trees behind us, passing the occasional boulder.

My legs burned a bit with each step, but I could feel the stiffness gradually decreasing. Noctis kept his pace slow to match mine as we soaked in the sunshine and felt the morning breeze.

"Any better?" he asked.

"Yeah, a little," I responded.

"Um so," the prince started.

Scared of what he would say, I cut him off. "So what prompted you to wake up so early?" For a moment, Noct looked baffled, like I'd just made an observation that I didn't have enough evidence yet to be making. Which I shouldn't. So it was justified. "I-I mean, from what I've seen and what the guys keep saying, I assumed you were a late riser..." I trailed off.

"I... am. I just didn't realize it was so obvious."

Yeah right, king of sleepiness.

"Actually, I had a hard time sleeping last night," Noct said. I froze for a millisecond before forcing myself to move forward. Did he overhear Prompto and me? Shiva, strike me down. Before I could get a handle on them, my thoughts ran away from me and my face started to heat up. "And I didn't catch the whole conversation between you and Prompto, but I heard... I heard you crying."