After Rebirth, I Became My Ex's Aunt-in-Law-Chapter 56: Fifty Pounds of Regret

The jungle was not a polite host. It grabbed at ankles with gnarled roots, slapped faces with wet ferns, and hummed with the constant threat of things that bit, stung, or ate flesh.

For Lucas Sinclair, it was a green, humid hell.

"Move it, mule," Aria called out from ten yards ahead. She wasn’t even breathing hard. Her boots found purchase on the slick mud with annoying ease, her machete clearing a path for Leo, who was trotting behind her like a happy, mud-splattered spaniel.

"I... can’t..." Lucas wheezed.

The canvas sack on his shoulder felt less like sand and more like a dead body. Fifty pounds didn’t sound like much in an air-conditioned gym with a protein shake waiting. In ninety-percent humidity, on an incline that felt vertical, it was crushing him. His knees shook with every step. The strap dug into his shoulder, cutting off circulation to his arm.

"You can," Bella snapped from behind him. She was limping, one strap of her expensive sandal broken, forcing her to drag her foot. Her face was a mask of misery and entitlement. "Stop slowing us down, Lucas. My feet are blistering."

"Then carry the bag!" Lucas shouted, spinning around. The momentum of the heavy sack nearly threw him off the narrow trail. He flailed, grabbing a vine to steady himself. "You want to go faster? Take the penalty! You were the one who told me to take the tent!"

Bella recoiled as if he had offered her a live grenade. "I am a woman! And I am injured! You are the man. Be a man."

"Being a man doesn’t mean being a pack mule for a princess who didn’t bring hiking boots!" Lucas roared, his voice cracking.

"Trouble in paradise?" Aria’s voice floated down from the ridge above. She was leaning against a tree, drinking water, looking down at them with mild amusement.

"We’re fine!" Lucas yelled, hoisting the bag higher. "Just... waiting for Bella."

"I’m waiting for you!" Bella shrieked.

Aria checked her watch. "Pace is dropping. At this rate, we’ll reach the Cenote by next Tuesday. Damien will get bored again."

As if summoned by his name, a drone buzzed down through the canopy. It hovered directly in front of Lucas’s sweating face.

"Nephew," Damien’s voice crackled from the speaker, crisp and cool. "Heart rate is 160. Pace is 0.5 miles per hour. My grandmother walks faster, and she’s been dead for ten years."

Lucas glared at the camera lens. "It’s heavy, Uncle! It’s wet sand!"

"It’s the weight of your choices," Damien corrected. "Every pound represents a bad decision. Lying to the press? Twenty pounds. Wearing those shorts? Twenty pounds."

Leo giggled from the ridge.

"I hate this show," Lucas sobbed dryly, lurching forward.

Two miles later, the terrain shifted. The dense jungle gave way to jagged limestone rocks. They had reached the edge of the Cenote of Shadows.

It was a massive sinkhole in the jungle floor, a gaping maw of earth leading down into darkness. Far below, a pool of water gleamed like black oil. Vines hung down the sides like nature’s ropes.

"Checkpoint reached," Aria announced, stepping to the edge. She looked down. It was a fifty-foot drop to the water.

"There’s the crate," Leo pointed.

Floating in the center of the cenote was a wooden platform with a glowing yellow box.

"We have to jump?" Bella whispered, horrified. She crept to the edge, looked down, and immediately squeezed her eyes shut. "I have vertigo! I can’t do it!"

"You don’t have vertigo," Aria said.

"The challenge is simple," Damien’s voice announced from the drone, which was now circling the sinkhole. "Retrieve the flag from the crate. Bring it back to the rim. First one up gets a hot shower."

"Shower?" Bella’s eyes snapped open. "Hot water? Soap?"

"Shampoo," Damien promised. "Conditioner. A fluffy towel."

Bella looked at the drop. Then she looked at the water. The promise of cleanliness overrode the fear of death.

"I’ll go!" Bella shouted. "I’ll do it!"

She looked at Lucas. "Hold my shoes."

"I’m holding fifty pounds of sand!" Lucas yelled, dropping the sack on his foot with a groan. "I can’t hold your shoes!"

Bella ignored him. She took a breath, squeezed her eyes shut again, and jumped.

Her form was terrible. She flailed like a dying bird, screaming the entire way down.

SPLASH.

She hit the water hard.

"Ouch," Leo winced. "That was a belly flop."

"She survived," Aria noted, watching Bella surface, sputtering and thrashing.

"Help! It’s cold!" Bella screamed, paddling toward the platform.

"Your turn, Lucas," Aria said, gesturing to the abyss.

Lucas looked at the sack of sand. "I... I can’t jump with this. I’ll drown. It’ll drag me to the bottom."

"The penalty rules state you must carry the burden to the checkpoint," Aria recited. "The checkpoint is the crate. If you leave the bag here, you’re disqualified."

"I will literally die!" Lucas panicked.

"Then swim hard," Aria shrugged.

She turned to Leo. "Ready, Prince?"

"Ready!" Leo grinned. He took a running start and cannonballed into the void. "YOLO!"

SPLASH.

Aria looked at Lucas one last time. He was staring at the bag like it was a bomb.

"You know," she said softly, stepping closer. "If you really want to win... you have to let go of the things that weigh you down."

Lucas looked at her. For a second, he thought she meant the sandbag. Then he saw her eyes—green, cold, and knowing.

She meant Bella. She meant his ego.

"I can’t let go," Lucas whispered, defeated.

"Then sink," Aria said.

She stepped off the ledge.

She didn’t flail. She dove. Her body formed a perfect, streamlined needle as she cut through the air. She hit the water with barely a ripple, slicing into the cold depths of the cenote.

The shock of the cold was instant, waking up every nerve ending. She surfaced, shaking her hair back, treading water effortlessly.

"Show off," Damien’s voice crackled from the drone hovering just above the water’s surface.

"Just good form, Mr. Executive Producer," she called back to the camera lens, swimming toward the platform where Bella was struggling to pull herself up.

Bella was slipping on the wet wood. "Help me! Aria! Pull me up!"

Aria grabbed the edge of the platform and hauled herself up in one fluid motion, water streaming off her tactical gear. She stood over Bella, who was clinging to the edge like a wet cat.

"The shower is for the winner, Bella," Aria said, reaching for the flag in the center of the crate.

"No!" Bella lunged, grabbing Aria’s ankle. "It’s mine! I jumped first!"

Aria looked down at the hand on her boot.

"You really don’t learn, do you?"

She didn’t kick Bella. She simply leaned down and unclipped the carabiner holding the flag.

"Lucas!" Aria shouted up to the rim. "Catch!"

She threw the flag. She threw it into the water, near where Lucas was standing on the ledge above, hesitating.

"Go get it, Lucas!" Bella screamed. "Jump! Get the flag!"

Lucas looked at the flag floating in the water below. He looked at the sandbag on his shoulder.

He made a choice. 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

He dropped the bag.

"Disqualified!" Damien’s voice boomed instantly. "Lucas Sinclair has abandoned the penalty. Forfeit of reward confirmed."

Lucas fell to his knees, sobbing.

Aria looked at Bella.

"He chose himself," Aria said quietly. "He always does."

She grabbed the second flag from the crate—there were four, one for each contestant—and clipped it to her belt.

"I’m going for that shower," Aria said. "Try not to drown."

She dove back into the water, swimming for the ladder carved into the rock wall.

As she climbed, wet and exhausted but triumphant, her phone buzzed in its waterproof pouch.

[The Wallet: Hot water is ready. And I found the strawberry shampoo you like. Hurry up.]

Aria smiled, climbing faster. The jungle was hell, but the rewards were heavenly.