Infinity| A Time After

|Victoriad pt.2|

Warning!!⚠️
Torture!
Gore!!
A lot of  painstaking emotions!!

Since I missed last weeks update...

Here's another chapter as I promise not long ago~

Here's to being a semi-good writer

Now—ONWARDS INTO CHAOS!!

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|Arthur's POV|

"You never change. In this life and the last." Nico snarled with a glare of undying rage. His fists clenched and trembled at his sides as he turned to face me fully. His flames eating away at anything with range of him. He looked haggard, dark circles lined his eyes from what I assumed to be lack of sleep.

Nothing was left of the boy I'd met in the beast glades, the boy that became my close friend while we were students at Xyrus academy. There was no trace of Elijah in him. Only the shell of a cracked shell of his former self stood before me.

Even so, his words cause a pang of guilt in my chest. I knew he was like this because of me, because of every wrong choice I made in our past life, and I couldn't help my change in expression at the sorrow ebbing away at my heart. I became his friend in this life and the last, yet not only did I fail him back then,

I failed him once more in this life too.

"Don't fucking look at me like that. I don't need your pity. You took everything from me." He said as his flames flared out at me. I scarred him, his soul all but lost in the pain and wrath he felt for me. The burning hatred eating away at his sanity.

But it was nothing akin to mine.

"SAY SOMETHING!" He yelled as black spikes rips from the ground around him, his flames string away the ground below until he is hovering over where the ground should've been. Anger sparked in my mind, setting fire to the initial guilt and ate away any sorrow I felt for him, what would've kept me from killing him.

"What is there to say?! Would you listen if I even tried to tell you the truth? That I didn't kill Cecilia?? That I'm sorry that I didn't listen—"

"NO. YOU DID KILL HER—" before I could react, he sent a wave of spikes toward me. My wings snapped open as I took to the air before his spikes could hit, but he was quick to follow as his hand swept upwards, his flames roaring to life with hunger.

I channel aether into my destruction rune and shimmering amethyst mist pour from my hands before lashing out and consuming the black flames that spread like a pathogen to reach me. The mist of destruction diddled down and Nico darts up at me with a metal pike in hand. He swung the pike horizontally at frightening speeds as I godstepped out of the way, re-emerging behind him with my fist pulled back. His eyes widened as he turned to look behind, only to meet my fist helplessly.

A shockwave erupted from the impact as wind pushed everything back and his body rocketed to the ground, skidding to a halt near the center of the arena.

"So that gives you a valid reason to to try to kill my family? To torture Tessia in a futile attempt to bring Cecilia back?" A cold wave of indifference for the life of the hollow shell of a boy before me. Memories of Tess cuffed down to that medical table replays over and over in my mind. A sickening lividness enveloped my mind as I watched Nico stumble to stand up.