CHAPTER 324

ARIA’S POV

Exhaustion weighs heavy on my limbs, and despite the fear gnawing at the edges of my mind, sleep overtakes me. My body, pushed far beyond its limits, gives in to the desperate need for rest. I collapse onto the sand, the cool earth beneath me, and I fall into a deep slumber, the kind that comes only when the body has nothing left to give.

Every muscle in my body aches, but the relief of lying still is overwhelming. My eyelids, heavy with fatigue, close almost involuntarily, shutting out the disorienting darkness of the night around me.

For the first time in my life, there’s no one around, no familiar faces, no voices to break the silence. It’s just me, stranded in some remote corner of the world, far from everything I’ve ever known. This island, a place that should feel like a refuge, instead feels like a prison.

The solitude is suffocating, the silence oppressive, and despite the stretch of land I now call my own, I feel more isolated than ever before. The waves that had o