Chương 141: Before I Landed in This World

The ravine vanished. The black moon split apart. The wet earth, the shattered trees, and the blood-covered walls were pulled into a white fracture. Then the real world returned. Zayn and Narek reappeared in the middle of the ruined atrium. They did not come back standing. Zayn hit the tiles on one knee. Narek collapsed in front of him. For a second, nobody moved. Elias kept his sword raised. Jonah stood in front of Lena, his split shield pressed against his chest. Mira and Ivara kept their circles ready.

Soren waited in the shadow of a column, a dagger aimed at the back of Zayn's neck. Garron held a broken chain in his bloodied hands. All of them watched the two figures that had returned from the territory. Narek's transformation was receding. Not cleanly. The overgrown muscles contracted beneath the black fur. His limbs shortened with wet cracking sounds. One horn fell to the floor. The other remained embedded in his skull, broken near the base. His jaw returned to an almost human shape. Almost.

The fangs did not disappear completely. Neither did the claws. The red veins beneath his skin died out one by one, leaving behind dark lines that climbed all the way up his neck. Mira's system appeared. [Identity: Narek.] [Seed of Assimilative Rage: extracted.] [Life-force conversion: interrupted.] [Temporary Soul Strength: 244 → 176 → 103 → 61.] Then the fall slowed. [Current Soul Strength: 49.] Mira exhaled.

"He's back near his natural value." Ivara did not look reassured.

"Near. Not fully." Another line appeared. [Residual demonic alteration.] [Lifespan consumed: undetermined.] [Identity: unstable, but preserved.] Lena rushed forward. This time, Elias did not stop her. She dropped to her knees beside Narek, placed her hands above his torn-open chest, and released a golden light. The magic entered. Then almost immediately came back out in the form of black sparks. Lena winced.

"His body is rejecting healing." Ivara came down from the gallery.

"Not completely. The corruption is no longer active, but his flesh learned how to function with it. If you force too much, his body could start treating the healthy parts as foreign."

"Then what do I do?"

"Keep him alive. Do not try to repair him yet." Lena nodded. She reduced her spell. A weaker light wrapped around Narek, enough to stabilize his breathing without trying to restore what the seed had changed. Zayn, meanwhile, was not looking at the system windows. He was watching Narek breathe. Once. Then a second time. The seed he had swallowed stirred in his own stomach. He doubled over sharply. A black mass rose into his throat. Zayn vomited onto the tiles. Not blood.

A thick substance, threaded with red fragments still trying to pulse. Gluttony contracted beneath his tongue. The corruption wanted to be assimilated. His body wanted to take it. To make it its own. Zayn gritted his teeth.

"No." The black matter tried to return to him. He drove the scythe into it. Ruined Time ran down along the blade. The remains of the seed dried out, cracked apart, and became reddish dust. The fused scythe growled:"You could have gotten something out of that." Zayn wiped his mouth.

"I've already taken too much out of it." Narek opened his eyes. One gray eye. The other still crossed by a thin red fracture. He saw Zayn. His breath caught. Lena placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Don't move." He tried anyway. His claws scraped against the tiles. Zayn made no move to defend himself.

"The seed is gone," he said. Narek looked at his own hand. The black fur had retreated, but his fingers were still too long. The claws trembled. Dark plates still covered part of his forearm.

"What did you... do to me?"

"I ate it." A silence passed. Narek gave a weak laugh.

"Of course you did." No warmth. The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Not yet. Only a weariness far too old for his age. His gaze shifted. Above them, visible through the collapsed wall, the little mirror still rested in the blood of the council chamber. Its surface lit up. Seryth was still there. Her face appeared behind several cracks, but her smile had not changed.

"Touching." Zayn raised his eyes.

"You lost." Seryth laughed.

"Lost what? A seed? An already broken adolescent? A few months of preparation?" She placed a finger against the inside surface of the mirror.

"Look at him. He still doesn't know whether you told the truth." Narek tensed beneath Lena's hands. Seryth went on:"You removed the seed. Not the images. Not the ravine. Not the days when he called your name." Zayn did not answer.

"You cannot devour the fact that you never came back." That sentence hit its mark. Narek looked away from Zayn. This time, no magic forced him to look.

"I don't know anymore," he whispered. Lena lowered her hands.

"Narek..."

"I don't know which of my memories are mine anymore." His voice broke.

"When I close my eyes, I see him killing my people. When I open them, I remember him in front of our fire." He looked at Zayn.

"I remember that we welcomed you. I also remember you covered in blood." Zayn remained still. Narek clenched his claws.

"I don't know what's real."

"Then don't choose today." Narek stared at him. Zayn leaned on his scythe to stay standing.

"Don't forgive me." Silence fell.

"But stay alive long enough to decide for yourself what you blame me for." Something trembled in Narek's face. Seryth sighed from the mirror.

"How disappointing." Narek slowly turned his head toward her.

"How many times did you show me those scenes?" She smiled.

"Enough."

"How many?"

"You were still counting at first. After that, no." Narek's hand closed over the tiles.

"Did Zayn destroy the village?" Seryth tilted her head.

"Zayn is a remarkably destructive creature."

"That isn't what I asked." Her smile thinned. Narek insisted:"Did he kill our family?" Seryth stayed silent. One second too long. Narek understood. Not the whole truth. But enough. He tried to get up. Lena tried to hold him back.

"You're going to reopen your wounds."

"Let me." He dragged himself toward the broken wall. Every movement tore a breath out of him. Zayn did not help him. He understood that this act had to belong to Narek. Narek reached the mirror. Seryth watched him come closer.

"You think breaking a reflection will bring your memories back?" Narek laid a claw against it.

"No."

"Then what's the point?" He stared at his own distorted face in the surface. Then at Seryth's behind it.

"I just want the last thing you show me to be my choice." He struck. The mirror shattered. Seryth's face broke into dozens of smiles. Her laughter continued for one second inside the fragments. Then vanished. Narek slumped back against the wall. Lena rushed to support him. No one spoke. Victory had repaired nothing. But, for the first time since the ravine, Narek had looked at something other than what had been chosen for him. Elias slowly lowered his sword. Not completely.

Enough to show that he was not striking yet. His gaze returned to the council chamber. To the bodies. To the blood. To the old woman's severed head near the door. Then to Maelor's broken staff, visible in the courtyard beyond the atrium.

"You killed him," he said. Zayn turned his head slightly.

"Yes." Lena went pale. Jonah clenched his teeth. Mira stared at the blue dust still caught between the tiles. Ivara closed her book. Soren finally stepped out of the shadows, without putting away his daggers. Garron let the rest of his chain drop.

"How long did he hold you back?" Zayn looked at him.

"Long enough for you to get here." Elias absorbed the answer.

"And after that?" His gaze indicated the dead.

"After that, you did this." Zayn looked around the room as if discovering it through their eyes.

"Yes."

"They were unarmed."

"Yes."

"Maelor died protecting them." Something passed through Zayn's gaze.

"I know." Elias took a step forward.

"Then why?" Zayn gave a weak laugh. His whole body seemed ready to collapse, but his title still weighed down the room.

"You really want me to explain it?"

"Yes."

"Now?" Elias held his gaze.

"Now." The black mark on Zayn's chest pulsed. Center of the World was no longer fully active. But something of it remained. A pull. A need. The group's eyes fixed on him. Zayn felt every one of them. Elias, the recognized sword. Mira, the mind that analyzed. Jonah, the judgment already formed before the summoning. Lena, the only one who had tried to approach his cell. Soren, criminal turned tool of the kingdom. Ivara, heretic turned specialist in forbidden truths.

Garron, mercenary who claimed he was only there for the money. Narek, survivor whose memory had been replaced with a weapon. All of them. They were finally here. Zayn straightened. The scythe remained planted in the floor.

"You all keep talking like we arrived here together." Elias frowned.

"We were summoned together."

"That's not what I said." Zayn looked at Mira.

"I didn't even know you." She didn't answer. He looked back at Elias.

"Not you either. Maybe I knew your name. Maybe you knew I existed. That was all." Then Jonah.

"You knew me by what other people said." Jonah opened his mouth. Zayn cut him off.

"The weird guy. The one to avoid. The one whose bad reputation was enough that no one ever had to talk to him." Jonah did not deny it. Finally, Zayn turned his eyes to Lena. His voice changed. Not softer. More fragile.

"And you..." Lena trembled.

"You had at least looked at me a few times." The silence grew heavier.

"That didn't make us friends." Lena lowered her eyes.

"I know." The mark of Lust burned. Their gazes stayed fixed on Zayn. He inhaled slowly. Then he spoke. Word by word. Without any mask in his voice.

"Before I was summoned into this world… before this circle, before the titles, before I met any of you… do you have any idea what I was doing with my life? Absolutely nothing. I did nothing. I had time, I had the freedom to do whatever I wanted, go wherever I wanted, become anyone… but I didn't even know what to do with any of it. So I never moved. I just watched the days go by, waiting for something to change in my place.

And you've got the result right in front of you: the most pathetic guy that could possibly exist. The helplessness, the incompetence, the way I let everything rot until it was too late… all of that has one single source. Me. It's me. Me and this rotten nature down to the bone. I was never capable of accomplishing anything in our world. Then we came here, and all of you got something. A weapon. A blessing. A place. A reason to move forward. Me, I got a closed door.

And even then, part of me still expected to change overnight. To become strong. To become someone. To have this world finally give me what I never had the courage to go after by myself. You want to talk about arrogance… I was just a lazy bastard who had ruined his own life and thought being summoned would fix everything. But nothing got fixed. All I learned was how to turn everything rotten inside me into something strong enough to survive. And now, look at me. Look carefully.

Because the useless boy you left behind has become strong enough to kill Generals, take the Throne, break Maelor, and come back here. But underneath all of that… underneath the wings, underneath the marks, underneath the title of Demon King… I'm still that same pathetic guy who never knew what to do with his life. The difference is that this time, my uselessness, my laziness, my arrogance, everything I let rot inside me… has become big enough to kill all of us." No one answered immediately.

Those words did not sound like what a Demon King should say. That was exactly why they hit so hard. The being who had killed the greatest Demon Generals of the demon kingdom, defeated Vaelthor before the Throne, crossed the continent, and held out for days against Maelor had just described himself as the most pathetic man in the world. Mira looked at her hands.

"You're wrong about one thing." Zayn turned a hard gaze on her. She continued anyway.

"I didn't know you." Her voice trembled.

"And when your status appeared, I analyzed you like a problem because that was easier than looking at you like a person." Zayn did not answer. Jonah tightened his grip on his shield.

"I knew your reputation." He inhaled.

"And it suited me. It gave me a reason never to look any further." Soren glanced sideways at Jonah. No joke came. Elias stepped forward.

"I didn't know you either." His cracked sword lowered slightly.

"But when they gave me a weapon and took you away, I accepted the idea that our places had to mean something." Zayn gave a faint smile.

"The hero and the mistake." Elias did not try to argue.

"Yes." Ivara spoke from the back.

"Acknowledging that does not resurrect anyone."

"No," Zayn replied. Garron looked at the corpses.

"And it doesn't make this massacre any less real."

"No." Zayn accepted every accusation. Like Narek's. Without trying to make himself innocent. Lena stepped forward. Jonah tried to stop her. She gently pushed his arm aside. She walked until she stood in front of Elias, a few meters from Zayn. She looked at the broken half-mask. The blood. The marks. The eyes that no longer had anything left of the boy in the sealed room, except perhaps the way they still searched for an answer he hated himself for wanting.

"I saw you," she said. Zayn did not move.

"But I didn't choose you." The sentence went deeper than Narek's claws. Deeper than Vaelthor's blade. Deeper than all of Maelor's spells. Zayn remained silent. The mark above his heart pulsed once. Center of the World faltered. For an instant, the others could have looked away. None of them did. Lena continued:"I came to see you. I tried to talk to you. And then I left with them." Her eyes filled with tears.

"I told myself two minutes were better than nothing. That I had done what I could." She shook her head.

"That wasn't true." Zayn looked at the floor. A joyless laugh escaped his throat.

"Finally, an honest sentence." Lena absorbed the blow.

"Yes." Elias raised his sword again. Not to attack immediately. To remind them what still stood between them.

"What we did does not justify what you're doing now." Zayn slowly raised his eyes. The King returned to his expression.

"I never asked for it to justify anything."

"Then stop."

"No." The answer was calm. Final. Elias tightened his grip.

"Zayn."

"You never knew me well enough to use my name like a chain." The fused scythe rose off the floor. Corrupted aura began to flow over the blade. Jonah raised his shield. Mira opened her circles. Ivara tore several pages from her forbidden book. Soren stepped back into the shadows, already searching for the first blind angle. Garron picked up his broken chain and wrapped it around his forearm. Lena remained at the center, healing light ready in her hands. Narek, leaning against the wall, tried to rise.

His legs gave out. Zayn's eyes shifted slightly toward him.

"Stay down." Narek bared his fangs.

"Don't give me orders." For the first time since his return, something like a smile appeared on Zayn's face.

"At least that part is really you." Then he looked back at the others. Seven Downfalls burned inside his body. But his left wing hung nearly all the way off. His regeneration was slowing. His breathing was uneven. He had gone through the demon kingdom, Vaelthor, the Throne, the crossing, Maelor alive, Maelor dead, the massacre, and Narek. Mira could see it. Elias could too. They had a chance. Not a good one. A chance. Zayn opened his ruined wings.

"You wanted the Demon King." The room trembled beneath his soul.

"You found him." Elias set his blade before him. Soren and Garron spread out to the sides. Ivara finished her first seal. Mira linked her circles to each of the fighters. Jonah anchored the center. Lena extended her threads of healing to the whole group. The formation that had defeated Lyséa rebuilt itself. Facing Zayn. He looked at all of them. Not just the heroes. All of those who had chosen to stay. Then he raised the scythe.

"Come." And the final battle began.