Chapter 20
Warm Smile
Impact!
The collision resonated in the air like metallic thunder. The blade intercepted the cryptid's attack head-on, and for an instant, Laios believed he could withstand it.
Clang…
The sound stretched out, rumbling in his ears as if time had slowed down.
Laios's eyes snapped wide open. His breath caught. The sword trembled in his hands as if made of butter, and in a blink… the metal began to bend. It didn't splinter or break; it deformed as if it were a piece of cheap plastic crushed by an implacable force.
"—!"
His expression changed abruptly, from concentration to icy terror. The veins in his arms bulged as he tried to resist, but he knew it was useless. The monster's strength wasn't just brutal, it was ridiculous.
And then, unable to stop it, a laugh escaped through his teeth.
"Ha… ha…" It was brief, nervous, almost a sigh.
Because he understood what was coming. The sword was no longer a shield, barely a bent toy, and the cryptid's shadow advanced beyond the steel, covering him like a wave he couldn't stop.
The bent blade sank toward him, vibrating, and the monster's weight pushed him backward.
THUD!
The dry roar tore through the hall like thunder.
Echoing throughout the entire hall. The cryptid's blow slammed into Laios's chest, directly into his ribcage. Caving it in.
For an instant, he thought his defense would amount to something, he barely saw the reddish flash of his own aura reacting on his chest. That the sword would have absorbed some of the impact.
But no… His whole body shuddered first.
The monster tore through the metal, snapping it in half with a muffled crack.
The monster pierced through the aura as if it offered no resistance. As if tearing through a viscous veil.
An agonizing pain shot through him, a burning that ripped the air from his lungs in a choked scream.
"—Ghhhk—"
Laios's vision instantly tinged red. Blood gushed from his mouth in a violent spray, splattering the air like a dark geyser. His body arched backward, his ribs cracking like dry twigs under the monstrous fist. His ears rang, deafening him.
His hands, unable to hold on any longer, released what little remained of the sword. The fragments fell to the floor, bouncing uselessly.
Everything inside him screamed that he must not give up, that he must move… but the blow held him pinned, lifting him in slow motion with the impact, trapped in a wave of pain that paralyzed him.
THUD!
A second crash shook the great hall. This time it wasn't the blow to the chest, but Laios's body being hurled like a projectile.
His back arched and, without resistance, he was sent flying through the air.
From the perspective of the officer and the burly man, the scene was a horror in slow motion: their companion flying across the hall, blood marking a crimson line suspended behind him, like a macabre trail.
The eyes of both widened to the maximum. The officer could only react with a choked gasp, while the burly man gritted his teeth in rage, powerless as he watched Laios's body describe an arc in the air.
THUD!
The third crash shook the air with violence. The red doors at the end exploded outward, ripped from their frame instantly as Laios's body smashed into them.
Laios tore through both leaves with a brutal impact, his body shattering the wood while the echo resonated like a cannon shot and the leaves flew apart to each side.
The impact hurled him directly outside.
The rain received him immediately, soaking him in seconds. His body hit the ship's deck with a dry thud, bounced once, and continued sliding several meters across the wet wood, leaving behind a trail of blood mixed with the water the storm swirled away. Until his body finally stopped, motionless.
The rain. Cold, incessant, soaked him as he lay on his back, his chest caved in, his vision blurred by water and pain, gasping between red gurgles that mixed with the water.
Every drop hitting his skin felt like a reminder that he was still conscious, though he could barely feel it.
The sky was overcast, streaked with lightning that illuminated the scene with white flashes. The roar of the sea rose, joining the thunder of the storm.
"Hah… ahh…" Laios barely managed to drag air into his lungs. Every attempt was a knife entering and leaving his sunken chest.
The metallic smell filled his mouth, saturated his throat. Blood pooled, making it harder to breathe, as if he were drowning in his own body.
His eyes, red and filled with involuntary tears, could barely focus. The sky above him was just a dark blur pierced by rain. Was it clear? Was it cloudy? He couldn't tell.
Maybe cloudy… yes, that's where the rain comes from.
"Hah… ahh…" he repeated, his chest convulsing.
His thoughts returned to the fraction of a second before the impact, when everything could have been different.
That thing… good thing I blocked with the sword… — He coughed violently, two wet jolts that shook his whole body.
—hack… hack…— "That thing was going to stab me with its claws, but the sword bent… it bent at a low angle, forcing its fingers… turning the attack into an improvised punch. But… how can a sword bend like that?"
"Was it just poor quality…? Or is that thing simply too strong?"
He lay still for a few seconds, with the rain beating against his face, until another thought slipped in, bitter.
"Would dodging have been better?"
The cold sensation of water sliding over his skin tore him from the tangle of thoughts. It was freezing, but comforting.
"The rain feels so good…" he murmured, and a broken smile formed on his bloodied face. A brief, fractured laugh escaped him.
"Ha… ha…"
The storm bathed him, as if everything else—the blood, the pain, the beast behind—were something distant.
Whispers…
-
Whispers…
-
Whispers…
The sound was faint, almost lulling, like a murmur carried by the wind and mixed with the rain.
"Whispers…?" Laios barely moved his lips, his voice more air than sound.
His tired mind searched for an origin. Where are they coming from?… are there more survivors?
"Hah… ahh…"
"Ha… ha…"
A spark of relief ignited in his thoughts, drowned by the blood in his throat.
How… good… that more remained…
His reddened eyes remained fixed on the sky. All they could see were shades of red—the blood clouding his vision, the storm distorted into crimson shadows. The lightning crossing the sky seemed like open wounds on a dark canvas.
And then, the red was interrupted.
A silhouette leaned over him, darkening the sky. A figure outlined by the rain, blurry, without clear features at first.
Laios's barely functional heart beat violently, confused. Frightened by the sudden appearance.
He didn't know if it was an ally who had reached him… or the shadow of the monster itself.
The figure leaned closer and closer toward him.
Lightning.
The sky split with a white flash, illuminating the entire deck for an instant. In that blink of clarity, Laios managed to distinguish the face before him.
"…Jenna?" he whispered. Barely a thread of air, without voice, but his lips formed the name. His chest, sunken and broken, rose and fell in a spasm as he uttered it.
The brunette girl smiled. It was a warm smile, the same one he remembered, and she leaned closer, stretching out a delicate hand to brush his face.
Relief flooded him suddenly. The pain, the cold, the blood: everything seemed to vanish in a second.
But…
Something didn't fit.
Even with clouded, reddened eyes, even with his vision tinged scarlet, he could notice it. The rain continued to fall relentlessly, lashing the deck, soaking his own body and the world around. But she… she wasn't wet. Not a single drop touched her. Her brown hair remained intact, her clothes dry, as if the storm ignored her completely.
A chill different from the cold ran through Laios's body.
But… he didn't care.
If I can see you one last time… I don't care even if you're a Demon King.
Lightning.
Another flash split the sky and there the figure stood now.
With his ragged breath fading little by little, Laios held the gaze of that figure. And with a smile barely sketched on his bloodied lips, he thought:
Well… pretty… last… hallucination.
The figure straightened with imposing calm.
Laios could barely follow it with his gaze. His eyes, glassy and heavy, moved clumsily downward, trying to focus. He wanted to discern what was really in front of him.
The silhouette that once seemed so familiar had transformed. Now it was a woman wrapped in dark fabrics, covering her from head to toe. No face was visible, no discernible age. Just a human outline, feminine, suggested in the minimal curves that escaped between the shadows of the cloth.
She stood beside him, motionless, with her hands clasped one over the other, resting in front of her abdomen. Her posture was rigid but not threatening, and yet, there was something solemn in the way she slightly inclined her torso toward him, as if observing him in his final moments of life.
The distant roar of the cryptid, the rumble of the sea, the storm itself… everything seemed to fade at that moment.
And then, soft but firm words emerged from the figure.
The voice was neither young nor old. It was timeless, resonating more inside Laios's chest than in his ears, as if filtering directly into his bones.
"That is all, marked one of 'the Chariot'."
The voice resonated like an unappealable judgment, soft yet laden with weight.
"Our Emperor expected more from you."
Laios could barely react; his breathing was a ragged gasp, his body trembled under the rain, and yet those words pierced him like another wound.
The woman slowly separated her hands, each movement measured, almost ritualistic. She lifted them with solemn grace until they reached her covered face. For a moment she remained still, as if savoring the moment, and then she pulled the dark veil backward.
"I expected more from you."
The cloth slid away, and the lightning illuminated her true countenance.
A fine-featured face emerged under the storm, pale skin bathed by the flash. Her eyes were a crystalline blue, so intense they seemed to pierce the darkness itself. Between the fabrics fell a few loose strands of grayish, almost white hair, that shone like silver in the rain.
The vision was so clear and vivid it stole his breath.
Laios, half-sunk in his own pool of blood, could barely focus, but that revelation marked him more deeply than the pain in his chest.