Chapter 785: [The Rewritten Lost Past] [25]

"Stay close, both of you," Amael said as the three of them cut through the sky.

The wind rushed hard around them.

Even this high above the ground, the violence of the Blood Moon War seemed to reach everywhere.

Behind him, Sylvia kept pace beside Lisandra, both of them tense and alert as they watched around.

"What are you afraid of, Mael?" Sylvia asked.

Lisandra, flying just beside her, was wondering the same thing. To both of them, the greatest threat was obvious. The Vampire Witch was still out there, and compared to everything else, she should have been the center of all attention.

Amael did not answer immediately.

His eyes stayed fixed ahead, moving over the distant land as if he were searching for something he could feel more than see.

"I don’t know," he said at last. "I just have a bad feeling. My mother still hasn’t come back, and there’s been no sign from her at all. Something happened..."

"She’ll be fine, Mael," Lisandra said.

Amael gave a small nod, but it was more acknowledgment than belief. He wanted to trust that. He wanted to hold on to the certainty that Belle could survive anything. But the dread in him had only grown sharper since leaving Nevia, and now it sat inside his chest like a warning he could not silence.

The three of them kept flying.

As they moved over the war-torn land, Amael, Lisandra, and Sylvia all searched for any trace of her, any disturbance, any familiar presence, any sign that Belle had passed through this part of the battlefield. But there was nothing. No glimpse of her. No clear trail to follow.

Amael’s unease deepened.

He could not find her, but one instinct kept pulling at him again and again.

The Holy Tree.

Something about it felt wrong.

Then, midway through the flight, he stopped so suddenly that Lisandra and Sylvia nearly overshot him.

Amael’s gaze dropped toward the ground below.

There, in the middle of the battle’s ruin, was Ernest.

Or rather...

Sirius.

He had just cut down another vampire when he seemed to sense them overhead. He lifted his amber eyes toward the sky, toward Amael, and the moment their gazes met, Amael’s expression hardened.

His eyes narrowed.

And then he vanished.

Sirius reacted at the same instant, raising his sword.

-BOOOOM!!!

The collision shook the ground.

Sirius was driven backward several meters, his boots gouging through the torn earth before he lost his footing entirely. He slid hard and nearly fell, but Amael was already on him again.

He pulled back his fist.

Sirius crossed his arms to guard.

-BAM!!

The blow slammed him into the ground with enough force to leave a crater spreading beneath his body.

A grunt of pain tore from Sirius’s throat.

He did not even have time to recover.

Amael seized his chestplate with a string grip and ripped it off barehanded before grabbing the front of Sirius’s tunic and yanking him upward.

He held him there, suspended and helpless, his face twisted with cold anger.

To Amael’s anger, he smiled.

"You shouldn’t have come."

Amael’s grip tightened.

"Where is my mother?"

Sirius met his gaze without flinching.

"Why would I know where your mother is?"

-BAM!

Amael punched him across the face.

Sirius’s head snapped to the side. Blood flew from his lips, but instead of answering seriously, he laughed.

Amael stared at him with open disgust.

"Is this how you repay me, Sirius?" He asked, his teeth gritted now. "I am the only reason you’re still alive today. I asked my mother to spare you that day."

Sirius turned his face back toward him slowly. Blood ran from the corner of his mouth, but the look in his eyes had not changed.

"I have no ill intentions toward your mother, Mael."

Amael’s expression twisted.

"Then why?!"

The question burst out of him.

Not just anger.

But also fear and confusion.

Sirius answered with terrible calm.

"I needed to bring you here."

Amael went still for half a second.

"Why?" He asked again, his fingers digging deeper into Sirius’s clothes.

Sirius looked directly into his eyes.

"To lure out A-Nox."

Behind Amael, Lisandra and Sylvia both widened their eyes in shock.

Amael stared at him, stunned for only an instant before his anger returned twice as hard.

"So you changed your mind?" He said. "You betrayed me, and now you’ve gone back to Lucifer’s side?"

"No," Sirius replied immediately. "I wanted her to pay. I needed her here for that. She wouldn’t come unless you were vulnerable, unless you were exposed and unprotected."

Amael’s breathing sharpened.

"If you wanted your stupid revenge on your mother, then you should have faced her yourself!" He shouted. "Why did you drag my own mother into this?!"

For the first time, something shifted in Sirius’s face.

"I’m sorry, Mael," he said. "That was the only way I could bring her out. Then—"

"Then what?!" Amael shouted over him. "You don’t stand a chance against her! What did you think was going to happen?!"

"..."

Sirius said nothing.

He just looked at him.

And in that silence, everything slowly connected inside Amael’s mind.

The plan.

Using him to lure out A-Nox.

The strange setup.

The way everything had unfolded.

His expression changed.

"Michael..." He muttered.

He stared at Sirius as disbelief gave way to understanding.

"You did this with Michael," he said. "He lured my mother here, didn’t he?"

Sirius’s eyes flickered, but he did not deny it.

"I’m sorry," he said again.

Amael looked at him with contempt.

"After everything you said," he spat, "after all that hatred you had for Eden and everyone tied to it, you still ended up allying yourself with Michael? Out of all people?"

That was the thing that seemed to snap something in Sirius.

His expression twisted, anger overtaking whatever restraint he had left. In one sudden motion, he grabbed Amael by the wrist and struck him hard across the face.

Amael was sent sliding back.

"Amael!" Lisandra shouted.

She and Sylvia were ready to rush in at once, but Amael lifted a hand and stopped them before they could interfere.

Sirius rose slowly to his feet.

"It’s all your fault..."

His voice came out almost strangled.

Then he glared at Amael with open pain and rage.

"You told me to live for myself, didn’t you?!" He shouted. "I did that, and I lost the little happiness I managed to build!"

His voice cracked with something far deeper than anger now.

"It would have been better if I had never felt anything at all!"

Amael wiped the blood from his lips with the back of his hand.

"Where is my mother, Anox?" He asked coldly, using Sirius’s other name

"The Tree," Sirius replied.

Amael turned at once.

For a brief moment, silence stretched between them. Then Amael spoke without looking back.

"All I ever did was show you a path toward freedom," he said, glancing over his shoulder at last. "If you had not spent your whole life believing your fate was sealed from the beginning, none of this would have happened. I will not take responsibility for what you became... or for the choices you made."

He left the words.

Then, without another second wasted, he shot into the sky.

Lisandra and Sylvia followed immediately.

Sirius remained where he was, watching them disappear with an expression so empty it was difficult to tell what, if anything, he was feeling. After a while, his gaze lowered to his right hand.

Around his wrist was a green bracelet.

Viessa’s bracelet.

His fingers twitched faintly against it, but he said nothing.

...

...

Amael flew straight toward Central Vedelia at tremendous speed.

Fortunately, the capital of Valachia lay close enough to the sacred center that the distance could be crossed quickly, especially by him. With his Core Bloodline, Amael’s speed had become something almost terrifying, so unnatural that the air itself seemed to split around him as he moved. He had shared a portion of that blessing with Lisandra and Sylvia as well, drawing them along in his wake and pushing their pace far beyond ordinary limits.

Still, it was not enough to ease the dread inside him.

"Mael..." Lisandra called from behind him after a long stretch of silence.

Sylvia said nothing, but the concern in her face was plain.

"I know," Amael answered before Lisandra could continue.

His voice was quite alopst inaudible because of the speed they moved.

"I know it’s a trap."

He was not blind.

Every piece of it had fallen into place now. Sirius had lured him. Michael had drawn Belle in. The Holy Tree was acting strangely. Too many things were converging too perfectly for this to be anything else.

And yet he kept going.

He was heading straight into it.

"It will be fine," he said. "We take my mother, and we leave immediately."

Lisandra and Sylvia both nodded.

Neither of them argued.

But both tightened their grips on their weapons, already drawn and ready in their hands. They flew with their shoulders tense, prepared for whatever awaited them the moment they arrived.

Central Vedelia came into sight soon after.

And with it, the Tree.

Even from a distance, it was immense.

But now that Amael was this close, it felt far worse than immense. It felt unstable. The power radiating from it felt dangerous when it shouldn’t.

And beneath that terrible force, he felt something else.

A presence.

"Mother..."

His teeth clenched.

Without warning, he accelerated even harder, surging forward so fast that he shot past Lisandra and Sylvia in an instant.

The Tree loomed larger.

Its presence pressed harder.

And the instability around it became impossible to ignore.

Did Sirius do this?

Then why?

The answer came to him almost immediately.

Amael’s expression darkened.

By endangering Sancta Vedelia itself, by pushing the Holy Tree into instability, they were forcing attention onto this place.

Divine attention.

Sooner or later, the gods would notice, if they had not already. Nihil might come. Others, too. An event like this could not be ignored. It would ensure that A-Nox would be cornered, forced into the open, denied any real path of escape.

Everything about it was built toward one end.

To make sure she died here.

Amael couldn’t understand how Sirius had fallen like that.

Athena was already present, but Athena alone could do nothing against something like this. Was she waiting for intervention? Waiting for Nihil?

And where was his father?

Was Nihil aware of all this?

Had he known?

No.

Amael rejected the thought almost as soon as it formed.

This was Michael.

Michael had used his mother. He had taken advantage of the one moment Amael had not been there to answer Belle himself.

"Aniha..."

At once, Amael’s face changed. His eyes darkened, and for the first time since leaving Nevia, something openly murderous entered his expression.

He should have seen it.

He should have understood earlier.

That encounter she had prepared with the real Nevia seemed too good to be out of consideration. She had completely shut him off from his world in that separated dimension and in these empty hours, Michael did something...

"Mael!!"

Lisandra’s cry snapped his head sideways just in time.

Amael raised his arm.

-BOOOOM!!

The impact slammed into him with tremendous force.

He gritted his teeth and tried to hold against it, but the blow was too strong, too sudden. A moment later he was hurled through the air and sent crashing into the ground of Central Vedelia, tearing through several buildings in a storm of shattered stone and splintered debris.

He hit hard.

The street beneath him cracked.

Dust and fragments of masonry exploded outward.

Amael coughed and spat blood, one hand braced against the broken ground as he forced himself upright. Pain flashed through his body, but he ignored it. His eyes lifted immediately toward the Holy Tree again.

Then a voice spoke behind him.

"The Great Lord told me you would come here, Amael Falkrona."

"Mael!"

Lisandra rushed toward him at once.

Amael turned.

The man standing there had long white hair and crimson eyes.

A Vampire but not an ordinary one.

Rucain.

The Regent King of Valachia.

But before Lisandra could reach Amael, another clash erupted.

At lightning speed, Sylvia appeared beside Rucain and swung her sword in a sharp arc. Rucain reacted instantly, bringing up his crimson blade to meet hers.

-BOOOOOM!!!

The collision exploded with a burst of lightning and blood-red sparks, sending a violent shockwave rippling across the ruined street.

Lisandra threw an arm over her face for a split second, shielding herself from the blast. But when she looked up again and turned back toward Amael, Rucain was no longer where he had been.

He had already moved.

He appeared directly in front of her.

And now he looked entirely different.

Crimson horns jutted from his forehead. Scarlet veins, glowing like molten fire beneath the skin, spread across his body in burning lines.

A chill ran through Lisandra.

Rucain raised one hand toward her.

Blood and fire erupted from his palm.

-BOOOOM!!

Lisandra reacted instantly, summoning her dark blue flames around herself in a defensive burst. The impact met her shield head-on, but even so, the force of it sent her flying backward through the air.

Rucain chuckled.

Then he slowly spread his arms.

The aura of a demigod burst outward from him in full release. Blood swirled around his body in currents, writhing as though alive, as though eager to tear apart anything within reach.

He turned his head slightly, smiling.

"You won’t reach your poor mother, Mael—"

-BAM!!

He never finished.

Amael’s fist smashed square into his face before he could react.

The force sent Rucain hurtling away at bullet speed. He tore across the street, crashed into the ground, rolled through broken stone, then slammed both hands down to stop himself. He dragged to a halt, jumped backward, and finally recovered his stance with a rough skid.

When he looked up again, the smile was gone.

Blood trickled from his lips.

Amael stood before him in silence.

His silver hair shifted in the heated air, and dark purple ribbons of energy crackled around his body like living currents. The coldness in his gaze had become something almost frightening in itself.