Chapter 250
"I tell you, Vito, it’s a lot of hard work being the king with no clothes,” Erebus’s voice, a rich tone laced with theatrical amusement, drifted through the still morning air.
He and his escort, Vito, walked with an almost careless disregard for their surroundings, amidst the skeletal remains of what was once the grand city of Orario.
The initial cool caress of dawn had yielded to the climbing sun, its fervent rays slicing through the dissipating grey clouds, casting long, distorted shadows across the rubble-strewn streets.
The air, thick with the scent of dust and distant decay, shimmered in the burgeoning heat of noon.
“Now what could that possibly mean, my lord?” Vito responded, a slight, almost imperceptible shrug rippling through his shoulders.
His expression remained a familiar mask of placid indifference, a stark contrast to Erebus’s flamboyant pronouncements.
“You hold this city firmly under your thumb, its very heart almost beaten into submission, and yet you still fancy yourself a foolish king? What a troublesome tyrant you are.”
Erebus chuckled, a low, resonant sound that seemed to vibrate through the broken stones.
“A tyrant, you say? How utterly flattering.” He paused, a glint of mischief dancing in his eyes.
“I should certainly use that one on the ladies. A tyrant in the bedsheets… now that's a true king with no clothes! Hahahaha!” His laughter echoed, a strangely light sound in the heavy silence of the ruined city.
Vito merely offered a faint smile, a polite curve of the lips that never quite reached his eyes.
“Tough crowd, eh, Vito? Would it truly kill you to lighten up, my dear fellow? Your indifference wounds me most deeply,” Erebus lamented, shaking his head with an exaggerated show of despair.
To Vito, the atmosphere was, as always, peculiar.
Erebus, the progenitor of Orario’s ruin, the very embodiment of its destruction, presented himself as friendly, jovial, and remarkably approachable when speaking to mortals.
Yet Vito understood this superficial charm was merely one facet of the dark god’s kaleidoscopic personality – a deliberate, cultivated mask.
Beneath it, there existed another, impossibly cold and brutal aspect; a primordial darkness that was no less integral to the being currently strolling beside him.
‘Before the war, he called himself Eren. Was that just another mask, or a whole, distinct facet of his being?’ Vito wondered, the thought fleeting before he dismissed it as foolish.
A god, by nature, possessed a multitude of faces, hundreds upon hundreds, inconsistent and often contradictory.
To a mortal, attempting to discern which was authentic and which a pretense was an exercise in futility, an impossible question.
“I shall try, my lord,” Vito finally replied, his voice smooth as he deftly steered the conversation away from his own stoicism.
“By the way, and forgive me for being an annoying fly, but what happened with our friends Zald, Mors, and Alfia?” The trio had vanished without a trace since the second day of the war.
“Who knows?” Erebus responded, his tone utterly unconcerned.
“Alfia and Zald are likely off gallivanting somewhere, causing mischief. You know what Zeus and Hera are like. As for Mors, he’s currently occupied with… something in the depths of the dungeon, I believe.”
Vito sighed, a soft expulsion of air that carried a subtle undercurrent of complaint.
“Sigh. You are the one who invited them here, my lord. You gods are simply too carefree for my liking.” He let the mild reprimand hang in the air, knowing Erebus would either ignore it or find humor in it.
He then shifted to another topic of curiosity.
“I am intrigued by another matter, though: how did you manage to convince that dragon god, Falazure, was it, to collaborate with us? To my knowledge, dragon gods are even more unpredictable than most gods, often indifferent to mortal affairs.”
“Hmm, it wasn’t as difficult as you might assume,” Erebus mused, twirling a finger in the air. “Most dragon gods have very little interest in the current mortal world, which is precisely why there are so few of them found amongst our ranks. Falazure is no exception; he likely descended to find something entertaining to do in the mortal realm, but with so many restrictive divine laws, he quickly grew bored.” Erebus paused, a knowing smirk playing on his lips.
“Knowing his insatiable love for combat, I only needed to offer him the strategic information regarding the location of another dragon god for him to eagerly hop on board, of course with a few mutually beneficial conditions attached. Thanks to that, we get to stroll around so leisurely, without that particularly crazy goddess Bahamut hunting us down from the skies.” He stretched his arm languidly, the picture of contentment.
“I see,” Vito muttered, a flicker of understanding finally crossing his usually impassive face.
Just then, the fragile illusion of peace shattered.
A sudden, piercing cry ripped through the stillness as a party of adventurers on patrol spotted the pair.
“Over here! It’s the Evilus! And it’s their… god! Quick, call for reinforcements! Let headquarters know we’ve spotted the enemy leader!” screamed one female adventurer at the top of her lungs, her voice raw with a mixture of terror and determination.
Erebus remained preternaturally calm, an unnerving tranquility in the face of escalating chaos. The adventurers, their faces pale with fear yet resolute, swiftly drew their weapons – swords, staves, bows – and began to encircle the duo in a practiced formation.
“Looks like we’ve been caught, my dear Vito,” Erebus declared mockingly, his expression exaggerated into a pout.
“Whatever shall we do? I truly would like to continue my pleasant walk a while longer.”
“Sigh. You really are a handful, my lord,” Vito replied, the weary resignation in his tone speaking volumes of his long familiarity with Erebus’s demanding, theatrical nature.
“But rest assured, my lord, not a single whisper of our presence shall find its way to the enemy strategists’ ears. All shall be swallowed in darkness, just the way you like it.” With that quiet, chilling declaration, Vito stepped forward, unclasping his dagger from its scabbard with a barely audible shiiing.
Swish! Splat!
The ensuing clash of steel and flesh was no battle at all; it was a one-sided, brutal slaughter.
Vito moved like a shadow, a blur of motion.
He slashed throats with precision, skewered hearts, and impaled his opponents, deliberately ensuring that death was never instantaneous.
He revelled in the lingering agony, the desperate gasps, the raw, visceral terror reflected in their dying eyes.
Within a few short, horrifying seconds, he had carved all of them up, their bodies collapsing like broken puppets, leaking like crimson fountains.
He had used nothing more than a single, wickedly sharp knife.
He even accounted for the lone adventurer who had sprinted ahead, desperately attempting to reach Central Park to report their discovery to Finn.
She, too, met a swift, agonizing end before her first word could reach her lips.
“Hahahahahahah!” Vito’s laughter erupted, a chilling, high-pitched sound that belonged to a child delighting in a twisted game.
“Weak, so weak! Level two adventurers break far too quickly!” he exclaimed, his voice laced with genuine glee.
Seeing that his opponents, already mangled beyond recognition, could not endure the exquisite torture much longer, he began dismembering their limbs, his eyes clearer than a serial killer’s, truly innocent and pure in their sadistic joy, utterly devoid of malice, yet gleaming with an alien delight.
“Looks like you truly enjoyed yourself, Vito,” Erebus observed, his voice calm, almost conversational, once the gruesome spectacle concluded.
Bloodstains painted the ruined street, and seven grotesquely disfigured corpses lay strewn across the ground.
Erebus was viscerally reminded of his followers’ inherent, ill nature as he casually surveyed the scene.
“Oh my, I do apologize for my unseemly behaviour,” Vito said, belatedly covering the wide, sadistic smile plastered on his face with one hand, only to drop it an instant later, revealing his usual, neutral expression.
“I got carried away. It was just so much fun.”
“It bothers me not, my child,” Erebus replied, completely unperturbed by the carnage.
“I just found it curious how your eyes sparkle even while you’re slitting the throats of your fellow men.”
At this, Vito began to chuckle, a low, rumbling sound in his chest.
“Heheheheheh. Well, you gods certainly bother me! For it was all of you who created this world with all its myriad defects,” he said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.
Erebus offered no reply, merely gazing at the ruined cityscape.
“You all let defects like me exist,” Vito continued, his gaze drifting back to Erebus, filled with an emotion that transcended simple love or hate, a complex blend of understanding and nihilism. “While gazing down from your world of perfection, you marvel at my inconsistencies.” He paused, then slowly raised a finger, pointing it directly at Erebus.
“But you, in particular…”
“You, I accept. You, I love! For you alone promise to return this broken world to the oblivion from which it sprung, where it truly belongs. Without utter destruction, a perfect world can never truly be created.” Vito’s confession poured forth, an unsettling revelation of his twisted philosophy, his deepest desires laid bare.
However, Erebus, ever the master of deflection, smoothly sidestepped Vito’s fervent, unsettling affections.
“I am afraid to tell you,” he said, resuming his leisurely stroll, “that only women get me going.”
Vito wasn’t surprised.
Erebus was always like this, so he quietly fell into step behind him, allowing the god his space.
“And if I am to love, it needs to be a proud, strong woman with an unbreakable heart,” Erebus continued, a slow, predatory grin stretching across his face.
“There is nothing, truly nothing, that I love more than to see such a woman weeping, her face twisted in utter despair.” Erebus’s voice dropped to a near whisper, laden with a chilling, sadistic glee.
‘Now, my dear Leon, where could you be? Has your heart now become truly unbreakable, or is it still swaying, susceptible to my touch? Either way, you will be molded precisely as I desire, and when you are complete… Aaaah, I can already imagine the exquisite pleasure’ Erebus mused, a dark, anticipatory thrill coursing through him as he continued his leisurely walk through the ruined streets of Orario, with Vito quietly trailing in his wake.
A/N: Feel free to read ahead on pat3on and donate.