Chapter 43: Solaris (Part 2)

After Easton's time in the Academy, he cut ties with his family and found a house and stable job for himself. He lived a very peaceful but boring life and grew old watching birds.

"I'll be seeing Mother soon." Easton smiled to himself.

And then he finally died.

When Easton finally opened his eyes again, expecting to see his Mother's outstretched arms he found himself back in his old home. He was lying on his makeshift bed and he could hear Mother's voice humming in the kitchen.

"It was just a dream." Easton sighed in relief, before getting up to help his mother make breakfast.

But when his mother died again and he was kicked out onto the streets, beaten up by the noble children, moved in with his father, harassed by his stepmother and stepsister and fell in love with Emilia again. But this time, Emilia fell in love with Luke. Then, Easton had a boring life, grew old and died.

He woke up again, as a child and repeated the same process. But this time, Emilia fell in love with Easton. Easton had a beautiful life, never boring as he grew old with Emilia and finally, they both died a peaceful death. But he woke up again, and everything repeated. This time, Emilia fell in love with Rei.

It was exhausting for Easton, to suffer so much. Every time it seemed that he didn't end up with Emilia, his life would become boring like there was no use for him anymore. These cycles continued repeatedly until it became a never-ending circle. Easton wanted it to stop, but when he tried to run away from his father's family, it seemed like some unknown force froze him in place, or when he fell for another lovely lady that wasn't Emilia, something forced him to continue pursuing Emilia. The only thing Easton could do was study to improve his magic. After 700 lives, Easton had finally mastered all the magical elements.

Easton had died one thousand times and memorized all the possible lines people would say in his life. It seemed like Easton was the only one suffering, everyone else looked like their memories had been erased when a new life started. It was only Easton stuck in the painful cycle. The only thing enjoyable when redoing a new life, was seeing his mother, who was so lovely and beautiful.

But then, one life was different. Easton realised that the mysterious force stopping him from doing the things he wanted; was gone. Finally, Easton could do what he wanted! The first thing he did, was try to lengthen his mother's life.

Unfortunately, she still died when Easton was young.

When the boys, beat him up, he beat them up instead. He used his power to give them a small burn scar to remember the consequences. This had caused an uproar, 'A simple beggar had harmed a child of noble child!'. There had been talk to execute him to prove an example but Easton waved his hand and enchanted them to forget it was him who created the 'incident'. The only thing they remembered was that someone hurt the children. They wouldn't remember Easton's face, but they would think twice before letting their children wander by themselves.

When Easton's father took him home, many things were different. Easton's brother, Luke, lived in the same house with them and his stepmother merely ignored him and his sister, Ivory was friendly.

A lot friendlier than usual.

Easton tried to find what made it different, and found the root of it; Ivory.

At first Easton was overjoyed, he had possibly met someone else who had been stuck in the cycle as well! Maybe he could find someone who they could both talk about their struggles and empathize with each other! But his hopes were dashed.

He had done some more research, and it turned out she was simply someone from a different world and had taken over Ivory's body by accident. Easton was disappointed, he had to find a solution to his problem by himself, in this lonely world. Eventually, Easton had discovered a plan.

To destroy the world.

It was the most logical thing he could think of, if he destroyed everyone and everything he had seen in his past lives, maybe he could end the cycle. Although, the only people Easton had killed were bad people who had threatened Emilia, and he felt disgusted of the idea of killing innocents; it must be done. So, Easton put on a façade of a foolish boy to avoid anyone discovering his plan. But there was one problem that kept changing his plan:

***

"You." Easton pointed at me, a black fire dancing in his eyes, "You made it difficult for me to do my plan. So, I had to dispose of some people to distract everyone."

"…You killed Sardonna?" I asked, still in denial.

How could he kill an innocent girl? Someone who was our age and had laughed and smiled a while ago.

"Yes." Easton nodded, "And the headmaster."

DING!

__________________________________________________________________________________

MISSION SUCCESS:

(Discover the murderer)

Congratulations on succeeding! The murderer was Easton, this is the last mission!

__________________________________________________________________________________

"Easton-" I started.

"Don't call me Easton." Easton snapped, "It was our so-called-father who named me that. The name I was born with and my mother names me was Solaris. Ironic. She named me that, hoping that I would bring light to the world as I had given her, but I'll probably be bringing death and pain."

Easton- no, Solaris had a distant look in his eyes, as though he wasn't quite in this world until he blinked a few times and shook himself out of his trance.

"Over here!" I heard a distant shout,

"3…2…1!"

BOOM

The rocks that surrounded East- Solaris and I like a room collapsed and Rei, Luke, Kyle and Emilia stood on the other side.

"Come with me!" Luke grabbed my hand, while Rei, Kyle and Emilia shot magic at Solaris.

We run through the labyrinth of rocks, until finally we stopped to catch our breathe.

"We should be safe; we've put a lot of distance between us." Luke huffed, sweat beaded down his forehead.

We sat down, and I looked up and almost gasped in surprise. The reason why the labyrinth hadn't collapsed on us was because, Rei's wind element was holding the rocks in place.

"Is Rei keeping this whole place stable?" I asked Luke.

Luke nodded, "We needed to make an escape route and keep Easton inside, so students and staff outside had more time to escape."

There were a few more moments of silence as I worried about Kyle, Rei and Emilia before I turned to Luke,

"What did Rei mean earlier when he said, 'I have the knowledge of a thousand men, yet the world will never truly grant me what I want'?" I asked curiously,

"Oh, in class we were meant to write something on paper about ourselves." Luke shrugged.

"What did you and Rei write?" I suddenly got interested.

"Rei wrote, 'Time is my enemy' and I wrote, 'I know something that I shouldn't know.'" Luke answered me.

I felt a little wary as I asked,

"What secret do you know of?" I started unconsciously edging away.

"Ivory." Luke suddenly turned serious, "I know that you aren't from this world."

I froze and debated whether to lie or pretend it was a joke. I mentally slapped myself, this was Luke! Luke who had supported me all my life!

"…Yeah." I mumbled, "How did you figure out?"

"You're my sister." Luke smiled, stand up and putting a hand on my shoulder, "And you'll always be."