A Lifelong Delusion

A/N: Please read the chapter to the end before deciding to drop. Also, a dramatic music is strongly recommended for the best experience possible.

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"Why... are you doing this?" Not caring about the fact he could be pulverised right there and then, Julian gritted his teeth and demanded.

A condescending chuckle echoed as the scenery changed to the ORC room. Where Grayfia and Sirzechs were still seating on the couch. Only difference. They were totally frozen.

Julian found himself back on his own seat as Mikan sat before him and to Grayfia's right. "Why, you ask? Because I feel like it. Because unlike you. I do not need a logical reason to do anything."

Julian's angry eyes barely had a ripple in them as Mikan trailed a finger across Grayfia's cheek. "She's your stepmother, isn't she? She's truly beautiful. Did you also read about her in a book?"

A curious expression appeared on Mikan's face as she lowered her finger from the devil's cheek to her white neck. "I wonder? Would you feel sad if I was to cut her head off?"

She checked on Julian's unwavering expression as she smiled. "No? Fair enough. I guess you did not spend enough time with her to have developped any real attachement yet."

She teleported herself beside Sirzechs as she put a hand on his shoulder. "What about your biological father?"

Both her eyebrows shook as she had a small laugh. "Uwah, so cold! You don't care about him either. Well, he was never present in your life before today. So that's understandable."

There was pause, where no sound could be heard. And Julian had the impression that time was frozen.

Before...

"Well, don't mind if I do then." Mikan shrugged as she spoke uncaringly. Waving her hand.

*THUD... THUD*

Two heads fell and rolled on the floors.

Julian entire body tensed immensely as his heart lurched for an instant. And as fast as it came, his discomfort left and he was back to normal.

No, not normal, as the more time passed. The more distressed he was becoming.

Leaning forward and tugging at his hair, Julian laughed in a low tone as he had enough of this farce.

He decided that it was time for it to end.

So, he lifted his head and gazed confidently into Mikan's own eyes, who were akin to an abyss, taking in him with amusement.

'Kass, take me out of here. All of this is pointless and I cannot do anything against her.'

He became even more confident as he saw no real reaction from Mikan to this thought.

And so he only waited for this nightmare to end.

He waited, he waited, and he waited.

And the more he waited, the more his face gradually morphed into a hateful grimace.

"Well, I don't know what prompted you to be so confident in this situation. But it just make more curious." Mikan smiled as some pleasure flashed in her eyes. Proving to Julian that she certainly knew what she was doing.

Making both body disappear, the scene changed again. As Julian found both of them sitting at a dinner table now.

The environement was very familiar to him.

And for reasons... Because it was his home.

In a mechanical manner, Julian turned his head to see that the Void Dragon God was not the only other person at the table.

No, as two more people sat there, one on each side of Mikan.

His mother, Kassidy. As well as his father, Jacob. Respectively standing on the right and left of what was now easily his second most hated person in the world.

Julian just waited with a furious expression for Mikan's torture of him to resume.

"These are your adoptive parents, right? They look like a lovely bunch. And from what I can see from you memory. They really are." Mikan sincerely praised as she smiled at Julian's intense killing intent.

Without further ado, she asked him. "They are the one who raised you for 17 years. Do you love them?"

She seemed to not do like before and waited for Julian's answers. Who without skipping a beat. Spat out furious. Almost yelling. "OF COURSE I LOVE THEM! I would sacrifice my life for them if I had to!"

Julian breathed out heavily as his body shook faintly.

He had the time to calm down before Mikan's face morphed in a pure display of disdain and disgust. "Ergh! Never have I heard such strong words uttered with so much conviction. Only for them to end so meaningless and false!"

The fresh scene of him telling them that he loved them flashing through his mind. Julian snapped as he stood up, breaking his chair in the process as he brought his fist crashing on the table, pulverizing it to smithereens. "BULLSHIT! They are my world! I wouldn't hesitate a fucking second to take a blow from a damn Dragon God for them, no matter if I had no garanty they would even live on afterward!"

Mikan, who still stayed seat despite Julian's outburst. Tilted her head as she put a finger on her smiling lips. "But that's the problem that you can't seem to understand. One can only truly love others if they love themself first."

Julian dipped his head and his eyes redened as Mikan continued. "Offering your life for someone else sake is only worth as much as you yourself give to it."

Crossing her legs, she put her elbows on them as she placed her face atop her palms. Taking upon a pitying expression. "And you, my poor little Nephilim. Not only can you not go farther from loving yourself than despising your very own existence like you do. But you also do not accord any worth what so ever to your life."

She stood up and leaned forward, placing both of her arms behind her back as she chuckled. "Doesn't giving up your life doesn't really mean anything in that case?"

She then put a hand before her mouth to hide a creeping up grin. "Just admit it. You do not have the capability to love anyone. No matter how much you tell yourself otherwise. In fact, I think I can go as far as say that the life you led until now. Was nothing but a big, fat lie of your own making. To convince yourself that you were indeed living. While what you were really doing was merely acting like it. All of your smiles, all of your tears, all of your laughs. All of your relationships you wove since your very birth..."

The next words felt like hammers thundering on Julian's mind. Making it seem like an earthquake was ravaging his fragile psyche.

"THEY."

"WERE."

"ALL."

"FAKE."

"SHUT UP!!!"

*BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM*

A coarse bellow shook the ground as the house suddenly exploded.

Two beings flew out of it's rubble as one madly chased after the other who was laughing happily.

"Ahahah~ The two masks shattering, only the holey box and the bomb remain! And it seem I made it explode~!" Mikan laughed as she easily flew around Julian's punchs.

Julian, as for himself, was not looking well. His eyes were reds, and his wings were out as he mindlessly tried to hurt the girl.

But it seemed this state still remain some sort awareness. As he suddenly stopped and a blue rune appeared on his forehead, spreading afterward to his entire body. The runes quickly changed to orange as he created spears of light and threw them with incredible accuracy and speed at the flying form of Mikan.

Dodging the first bunch, the Dragon God stopped flying away as she began to flick them away with her hands.

She whistled as she looked at the devastation the explosion brought to Kuoh town bellow. As the dozen of spears who hit the ground made explosion big enough to destroy entire building.

But soon, the spears thrown also began to change as the formerly grey color of them turned to a more and more dark red. Until they were almost completely black.

These spears were way destructive than the previous one, as not only the explosion was bigger with them. But this very explosion now made everything it touched vanish, destroying them completely.

This continued for a bit before yet another change occured as orange-pink line now ran along the spears like veins.

These spears had the property to suddenly accelerate multiple times over during their flight. And their devastation was on a whole another level than the formers too, as they took out entire chunks of the town in a bright blast of a dark red cloud crepiting with sluggish orange-pink lightning.

Getting bored of this repetitive game, she caught a spear and threw it back. Clapping her hands together as Julian barely evaded it.

She decided that it was time to go close and personal as she flew leisurely toward Julian who only seemed to realized that his spears weren't working. As he also rushed toward his opponent.

After his initial outburst, rationality slowly seemed to come back to him. But he didn't stop as his wrath was still as strong as earlier.

"Finally coming back now that you blew up, uh?" Mikan mocked as both of them collided together, fist against fist. A shockwave of air spreading from the impact.

"I'm pretty confused though. What are trying to acomplish exactly? Throwing a tantrum like some kind of child. I don't even see the point. You just have to admit that I'm right. What's so difficult about that?" Mikan smiled as she weaved and danced through Julian's every blows. Sometime just staying out of his sight by always positioning herself behind his back.

Her words and his inability to touch her aside from the initial blow only served to infuriate him more as he screamed with all of his lungs, pouring into it decades of frustration and crippling mental suffering. "SHUT YOUR FUCKING LYING MOUTH!!"

The runes on his body, as if answering to his pain. Began to glow brighter and brighter as Julian's himself started to glow orange all over. Reminiscing of his fight with Elsa.

He also formed daggers similar the latest spears he created and with a roar, began slashing at the Void Dragon God at double the speed he was moving before.

Mikan, as for herself. Only continued to avoid the attacks for a bit as a smirk gradually appeared on her face. "Me, lying?"

Despite his current state, Julian still got an ominous feeling at that moment. But he paid it no need as he merely put more effort into his strikes. Changing his paterns here and now and throwing some spears.

But suddenly, he felt that something was seriously wrong as one moment he was still attacking with fervor, and the next. His face was grabbed and he was sent flying. The surrounding changing in a blink as he saw only a blur of what seemed to be bodies of water and earth flying past him for a brief moment and the sky turning dark before brightening again.

It was the only thing he could register before he felt himself crash through something, and the previous experience happen again. And again.

He was only stopped when his momentum wasn't enough to completely pass through whatever he was hitting.

Julian took a while to regain his bearing before he began to crawl out of what seemed like an endless combination of dirt and rock.

Somehow, he was perfectly okay despite whatever he just went through.

Julian finally came out of his hole to realize that he wasn't in Kuoh town anymore. In fact, he doubted he was even anywhere near Japan anymore. As he found himself in the middle an endless world of snow, stones and clouds.

His breath came out as mist as he found his breathing becoming hazardus due to the lesser amount of oxygen in the air.

He was facing a sort of soft downward incline, where irregular formations of rock and snow randomly modified the intensity of it. Sometimes they would even finish in a cliff leading to a certain doom.

By the clouds beneath him, it was pretty evident that he should be high in the atmosphere.

However, he didn't have time to ponder more on his location as Mikan appeared before him. "Why would I bother to lie to someone so beneath myself in power? Aren't you putting too much importance on yourself? And here I thought that you hated yourself..." She shook her head, an expression of fake confusion appearing on her face.

Before Julian could even process her words, she added cheerfully. "But whatever! I hope your short twenty five journey through Mount Everest gave you the opportunity to cool your head down a bit."

She waited as Julian turned himself to gaze at the crater he just came out of, and at the now acsending curve above him. And at the same time took notice of the dozen of meters wide holes lying around everywhere in his sight. Holes of which the depth he could not see.

There were exactly twenty five one of them.

"So, did you cool off or not?" Mikan asked, unbothered by the current situation.

Her uncarring attitude comment only made Julian grit his teeth and clench his fists. Because he was frustrated about her mingling in his life. Why didn't she left him alone!? And the fact he was helpless to stop her only made him angrier.

"Still throwing your tantrum? I see..." Mikan took upon a pondering expression. Before she smiled and opened her arms.

"You want to hurt me? Then do go ahead, and give it your all. See if you feel any better afterward." She inched forward, daring Julian with her condescending eyes.

Pausing for a moment, Julian only watched as she offered herself to him.

He slowly stepped toward her as his expression morphed successively to a plethora of extreme.

*TAP*

First step. His mouth crisped up as his teeth grind themselves together and his face twisted in rage and hate remembering what she made him go through.

*TAP*

Second step. He was now grinning like a maniac as sadistic satisfaction was apparent on his face at the realisation that she was being serious.

*TAP*

Third step. His expression gradually lessened in intensity as he thought back about everything the girl before him said.

*TAP*

The fourth step was done with a slower gait. The worst cold he had ever felt passed through his body as he combined and pondered on Mikan's words to the past seventeen years of his life in his mind. Only the slightest shadow of a curve still remaining on his lips.

*TAP*

He immobilized himself on the fifth step, just out of range of the Void Dragon God. All emotions gone from his face as his straight back and his eyes became uncaring and blank as all energy and will to live seemingly left his being.

As he finally realized - No... Admitted...

That everything that she accused him of.

It was true.

All of it.

His entire life, it was all a lie of his own making. A facade he had put seventeen years ago... One he had hoped would one day replace his true self.

But, in a last hopeless act of defiance . He still weakly protested against her judgement. Only, in another form. "Shut up... You know nothing about me. I shouldn't feel..."

In the end, he gave up as he turned himself to gaze at the endless expand of snow that was the tallest montain on earth.

Seriously thinking about just ending it all for real this time.

"You're right."

Julian's eyes shook as he felt a pair of arms wrapping him up softly in a hug.

"I don't know you..." Mikan's sweet voice whispered in his ear. Much like earlier.

"So why don't you tell me more about yourself?" She pressed herself closer to him, as if she was trying to give him some of her own warmth.

"You can tell me everything without fear. I will never judge you." His heart started to pound faster and faster from the prospect.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you with anything I did." His eyes begin to water.

"So, just tell me. Why do you want to disappear so much?" Many memories flashed through his mind. Things everybody would consider so unworthy of granting such a level of suffering.

"Just, be sure to begin from the very start. Okay?"