Chapter 190: The source of my hatred is you

[Present Time]

[Capital City of Galadriel]

The source of her hatred now stood before her. Unblinking. Unmoved. Untouched. His gaze, indifferent, settled upon her with the air of a man regarding an insignificant detail—something beneath his concern. His lips curled into a smile, sharp and knowing, as if that surrounding him was nothing but an afterthought. A mere inconvenience. The civilians stood still—motionless, soundless, yet breathing.

His doing.

Lyra's breath came shallow and quick, each inhale laced with fury. Her fingers curled into trembling fists, nails digging deep into her palms, drawing blood. Yet she felt none of it, her red eyes glowed with rising fury that clawed its way to the surface.

Aelfric moved.

Each step was measured, deliberate—a slow and taunting that carried a mockery of leisure. He walked forward, passing through the crowd as though they were obstacles in his path. And yet, not a single one reacted.

They parted for him.

Like lifeless dolls, their frozen stances remained as they instinctively obeyed the unseen force holding dominion over their existence. Aerinon made a step forward—but Aelfric raised a single hand, a warning in its simplest form.

"Now, now," Aelfric mused, his voice laced with amusement, "If you move, I may have no choice but to use the good people of this city as my shields."

There was no need for emphasis.

No flourish.

No threat.

Just certainty.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Mirabella's voice rang out, raw with anxiousness. Juliana, still tucked safely behind her, flinched at the tension, her small hands clutching at Mirabella's back. Mirabella's mind raced, memories flashing back to that encounter—the Ancestor of Wisdom had fled when faced with Mikoto along with the other Ancestors. Yet now, he stood here, unbothered.

"This," Aelfric said simply. He snapped his fingers.

A woman to his right convulsed violently.

Her body twisted at unnatural angles, her spine arching backward until the sickening crack of breaking bones echoed through the street. Yet she made no sound. Her mouth opened, but no scream came forth. Her wide, lifeless eyes were locked ahead, staring into the sky. Then, in a sudden, burst, her skin ruptured. Blood gushed from every pore—her eyes, her nose, her ears—spilling onto the ground as her body writhed. Her movements slowed, tremors becoming faint twitches, before, at last—Stillness.

She lay unmoving.

Her eyes, now frozen in terror, remained wide open. 

Juliana choked back a horrified gasp, instinctively turning away, shielding her eyes from the gruesome sight. Victoria's expression darkened, her doll-like features laced by an unusual heaviness. She frowned. Deeply.

"You..." Victoria whispered, her voice quieter than before, yet colder, sharper. Her eyes bore into Aelfric with clarity. "You injected your mana particles into their bodies. Seeping into their minds. Overwriting their will."

It was not a spell.

It was something else.

Something far worse.

Aelfric responded with a slow, applause. Mocking. Unhurried. "My, you're a smart one, aren't you?" he mused, tilting his head slightly. But his amusement was quick. His eyes shifted to Lyra, and his grin widened. "But tell me, dear Lyra... why so hostile?" He feigned innocence. "Are you not happy to see one of your own once more?"

"You... You!"

Lyra's breath hitched, her pupils dilating dangerously. Her body trembled—not in fear, but in pure, unfiltered rage.

She wanted him dead.

She wanted to wipe that smirk off his face.

She needed to.

Her fingers dug into her own flesh, her nails cutting into her palm as she clenched her fists tighter. But even through the pain, even through the blinding hatred, she knew—

She could not act recklessly.

Not yet.

"Who... Who are you?" Lucinda's voice finally cut through the tension, her gaze flickering from the lifeless corpse to Aelfric. For the first time, Aelfric's grin faltered.

His narrowed eyes burned with something sharper—something dangerous. "That," he hissed, "is not for you to know, filth."

There was no amusement now.

Only disdain.

"But know this, child," Aelfric continued, his voice dangerously low. "The time shall come when I inflict suffering upon you. That, I promise. But for now..." His eyes flickered back to Lyra, and his smirk returned—slow and cruel. "...I have a more pressing concern. You care more for the other one, yes?" Aelfric continued, tilting his head in feigned curiosity. "My eyes see all. And my, oh my... I do think dear Alyssia would be quite sad."

An explosion of mana erupted from Lyra. A deafening wave of power that sent shockwaves tearing through the streets. All eyes turned to her, wide with shock. Her anger manifested as raw destruction. Market stalls shattered, their products sent flying. The earth beneath her cracked, splintering outward in jagged fractures. Civilians were thrown off their feet, some colliding with nearby walls, others sent tumbling across the ground.

"If you touch him..."

Her voice was a snarl, "I SHALL END YOU!"

Aelfric laughed. As though the sheer magnitude of her wrath was little more than an amusing spectacle. "Ah, you always get so easily riled up," he sighed, shaking his head with exaggerated disappointment.

"Calm yourself, Lyra," Aerinon interjected, gesturing toward the civilians who had already suffered enough. "Lest he kills more."

A visceral glare was thrown his way, one that could have shattered glass. But Lyra saw the truth in his words. Clenching her jaw, she inhaled sharply, forcing her rage into submission. Her mana slowly died down.

("W-what power...") Mirabella could barely comprehend what she had just felt. The sheer intensity of Lyra's mana had been overwhelming. Juliana clung to Mirabella's cloak tighter, trembling.

"Calmed down, I see." Aelfric's voice was infuriatingly light. "Now come, Lyra. You alone." A slow smirk stretched across his lips. "It seems coincidentally, my spawn and the other one are in the same place." He chuckled, the sound void of humor. "My, what fun."

Lyra's fingers twitched. Her teeth grinded together. Her anger was a fury that was barely contained. She would not risk the lives of innocents. But one thing was certain. She would make him suffer. Suffer more than anything in existence.

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[Outskirts of Veron: Forest]

The thin branches of the barren trees reached toward the overcast sky. A thick silence smothered the atmosphere, interrupted only by the occasional breeze of the wind.

Mikoto exhaled. Leaning against the rough bark of a tree, his arms remained folded, his posture relaxed. "Well, damn." The curse left his lips, hushed, as he processed the sheer magnitude of Guinevere's words. His helmet obscured his expression, but his voice carried a tinge of something uncharacteristic—unease. "That's… a lot to take in." His voice was steady, despite what he heard.

Guinevere stood poised, yet something about her seemed different. Perhaps it was the way the light caught her lilac eyes. Despite her usual composure, her voice was barely above a whisper. "I apologize for so suddenly throwing this all at you," she murmured, her gaze distant. "Granted, I am merely relaying what Lyra had told me as a child."

"So an Ancestor is your dad?" The bluntness of his own words made him recoil immediately. "Ah, shit, sorry, my bad," he muttered, recognizing the insensitivity.

To his surprise, Guinevere did not seem offended. Instead, she smiled—a small, almost wistful curve of her lips. "Worry not, I know you meant no ill-will." Her composure, however, did not mask the emotions seething beneath. There was something turbulent about her today, something unlike how she usually was

Mikoto shifted his weight, his thoughts lingering on what she had just revealed. One particular part stood out. (That Ancestor chick mentioned it, so even Death can't resist the Divine Principles, huh?) It was a passing thought, but one that gnawed at his mind. Death itself avoided Aelfric, yet it obeyed the Divine Principles? The implications were unsettling.

Guinevere's voice broke through his musings, smooth but laden with something else. "You must no doubt think it strange," she began, her hands clasped together, fingers pressing against her palm as if grounding herself. "Alyssia, my unwilling mother. I've not met her, yet I want to exact mine vengeance upon Aelfric. All I know of her are the stories Lyra recounted in my youth. A sense of longing gnawed at my being at every word concerning my mother, a woman I never even saw. That longing was only quenched by the existence of Lyra, and that is why I cannot let the Ancestor of Wisdom simply be."

Mikoto studied her intently.

Guinevere was always composed, always seeming one step ahead in her demeanor, as if she held the answers to questions no one had even thought to ask. Yet now, that air of invulnerability had cracked. A frown tugged at her usually serene features, her brow furrowed, and her lilac eyes—held a subtle sheen, as if on the verge of shattering. In this moment, she was not the court mage. She was a furious child. A daughter who had been robbed of something precious before she could even understand what it was.

"Why come to me?" Mikoto finally asked. "Why reveal this much to someone you can't possibly trust?"

Guinevere's expression shifted, unreadable yet sharp. "Tell me, Mikoto Yukio, are you a bad person?"

The sudden question caught him off guard. He tilted his head slightly, as if dissecting the question itself. "A bad person?"

How did one even define that? He had killed before—his first victims were Vel'ryrian soldiers. Did he regret it? Yes. And yet, at that moment, he had not seen them as people. They were animals in his mind, waiting to be slaughtered. The thought made his stomach turn, but was there any justification? "Let's say you met me when I killed for the very first time," he said, his voice laced with something foreign—self-examination.

Guinevere remained silent, watching him.

"I feel strong. Full of life. Invincible," he admitted, his hand clenching into a tight fist. The alloy of his gauntlet groaned under the pressure. "Yet not fulfilled. The thought that I killed was nauseating, even if my victim deserved it. I don't like killing. But at the end of the day, isn't it just a necessary evil?"

Guinevere's expression softened ever so slightly. A smile—small, enigmatic. "Your words hold no deception. There is naught but truth to them," she murmured. Then, she took a step forward, raising a delicate hand to her chest, as if steadying the frantic rhythm of her heartbeat. "I want your strength, Mikoto. For the sake of Lyra and myself. Can you abide this woman's selfish request?"

Mikoto exhaled through his nose, shaking his head with a quiet chuckle. "I'm an aspiring hero. Besides, this damn sword would be pissed if I slacked." The uncertainty of Death still gnawed at him, but if his power could help—if it could serve a purpose in this moment—then that was enough.

Guinevere's lips parted slightly. And then, a rare sight—an angelic smile, serene and genuine. "I... I thank you, Mikoto. Truly, from the bottom of my heart." Mikoto was silent for a beat before he found himself mirroring her smile. Not that she could see it beneath the helmet.

Then, in an instant—

A violent explosion of mana erupted in the distance. The air trembled. The ground quaked. Mikoto's head snapped to the side, his senses screaming. Guinevere mirrored his reaction. A burst of light, raw and untamed, consumed the trees in its path. A teleportation spell. Sloppy, yet effective. The mana pulsed outward, momentarily blinding them as they shielded their eyes from the cascading waves of brilliance.

As the radiance dimmed, Mikoto's vision quickly adjusted.

And then, he saw them.

Lyra. Standing in the dissipating glow, her crimson eyes narrowed in an intense, unrelenting glare.

And opposite her—

Aelfric.

He stood a few paces away, arms hanging loosely at his sides. His posture relaxed, almost casual, yet his presence twisted the very air around him. His eyes lazily scanned the surroundings before landing on them.

Then, his lips curled. "My daughter," Aelfric spoke. Lyra moved before he could take a step forward, throwing herself between him and Guinevere. "Come now, do you deny my daughter the pleasure of seeing her dear father?"

Guinevere, standing beside Lyra, placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"So you're him," she muttered, her voice dripping with venom. "You're far more putrid than I could've imagined."

Aelfric merely chuckled. "Such harsh words. What slander has Lyra been feeding you?"

"Only the truth, you vile piece of shit," Lyra hissed, her mana flaring wildly, dark energy curling around her fingertips.

Aelfric exhaled, his red eyes, laced with something between amusement and disdain, flicked toward Mikoto. "Hm. Perhaps, daughter, your mind is not in the right state, given you've been so close to that filthy spawn of Octavia."

His tone carried no rage, no seething hatred—only a calm, detached disgust, as if speaking of some unsightly pest. His gaze lingered on Mikoto for just a moment longer before shifting back to Lyra. Guinevere's sharp lilac eyes immediately snapped toward Mikoto, her brows knitting together in confusion.

"Spawn of Octavia?" she murmured under her breath, her expression hardening.

Mikoto, still leaning lazily against the bark of the tree, let out a dramatic sigh and rolled his eyes beneath his helm. "Oh, come on."

Guinevere continued to study him, her piercing gaze demanding answers. Yet, he remained unfazed, refusing to acknowledge Aelfric's words beyond that singular, bored response. Still, he couldn't help but smirk beneath his helm.

("For someone who hates spawns of Octavia, he sure doesn't seem to be fuming with me around. Must be the helmet and the fact that I keep my mana hidden. I'm no different than an average person to him. He knows I'm a spawn of Octavia, but he can't feel it.") That thought amused him more than it should have.

Guinevere eventually relented, shifting her attention back to Aelfric, though the question still lingered in her mind. The moment stretched, heavy with tension.

Then, Lyra stepped forward.

"Why have you come here?" Her tone was low, dangerously controlled. "Is it merely to taunt me? To assert yourself?"

Aelfric's grin widened, a slow, curve of his lips. "Why indeed?" He echoed, voice smooth. "Because of my ire, Lyra. You dirty the names of the Ancestors, wench." The insult rolled off his tongue effortlessly, as if it were mere fact. Lyra's body tensed, but she held her ground. "And you insist on associating with filth." His gaze flicked toward Mikoto once more, lingering just long enough to sharpen the insult before returning to Lyra. "As such, I have a small proposal for you."

Lyra scoffed, her red eyes burning with hate. "Why would I ever accept something from the likes of you?" she spat, her voice laced with pure venom.

Aelfric remained unbothered, completely unaffected by her hostility. Then, with a slow, motion, he raised his right hand. A pulse of mana erupted from his palm. Blinding, crimson light poured from his fingertips, twisting into shape—an orb, fierce and throbbing, as though it possessed a heartbeat of its own. The very air around them recoiled. A deep, guttural hum filled the space, a vibration that clawed at the edges of perception.

Lyra and Guinevere—

Their breath hitched.

Their bodies stiffened. The color drained from their faces. Guinevere, for the first time in a long while, stammered. "A... a soul?"

Lyra's expression twisted into something raw—horror. "That's..." Her voice faltered. "No... that cannot be. The Bringer of Death... they held her soul."

Aelfric tilted his head, his grin widening as he relished in their reactions. "I merely hold onto it," he said smoothly. "The Keepers of Order would notice if the Bringer of Death kept it hidden for too long." The soul pulsed violently in his hand, its eerie glow illuminating his fingers.

Then, with a simple flick of his wrist—

The soul began to fade. Lyra's breath hitched. Her body reacted before her mind could even process. Her hand shot forward, as if trying to grasp something not even tangible. A futile, desperate reach toward something that was slipping away.

"No—!" But it was gone.

Aelfric chuckled softly, reveling in the despair he had woven. "The boy's soul for hers." His voice remained sickeningly calm. "An equivalent exchange. No?"