The man continued to speak in the skies, almost as if he were talking to himself and the heirs at the same time.
"It's too bad you can't choose your parents. Perhaps you would achieve wished for a different life, perhaps one without the responsibilities passed down by the last generation. Perhaps you wouldn't have chosen the throne of thorns your parents had made for you. Alas, the world isn't fair, is it?" he smiled and swept his gaze over the heirs, pausing for half a second on each one and finally landing on Valerio.
Valerio's pupils constricted, it felt like a physical blow, a suffocating wave of killing intent crashing into him. The man's words, deceptively casual, sent a chill down his spine:
Once the man's eyes met Valerio's, it seemed as if the world had frozen, isolating the two to make sure the words the man spoke truly penetrated Valerio.
"Weak."
"Deplorably weak," he restated as if he couldn't believe his eyes.
The words echoed in Valerio's mind, drilling into him and his heart, until they reached his very essence.
Valerio's heart froze, an overwhelming sense of dread crawled into his soul, suffocating him under the weight of the invader's gaze. His mind was flooded with a vision.
A man stood tall in the sky, a saber in one hand and the other clawing up towards the sky. Valerio looked up, the sky itself was breaking apart, a fracture had torn through what felt like the world itself. Its size was too large to encompass with one glance, its weight too much to look at for too long. Dark golden lights spilt over from the fracture, and the man in the skies seemed to scream.
Valerio's mind went blank.
It wasn't the sort of scream that portrayed danger nor hardship. It was the type of scream that was the culmination of the last bits of life one had, the type of shrill only let loose in the face of certain death.
Valerio looked down.
His hands were red, the fear in his heart exploded. He frantically shook his hands, but the blood never came off.
'Ah.'
His hands had been drowned in so much blood, for so long, that his skin had absorbed it.
He looked down at the world below him, and there in the vastness of space was a sea of blood larger than his eyes could see. As if he was slowly remembering, figures started to manifest in his visions, yet the only thing he saw was… slaughter.
Everyone died, was dying or had died. He looked to his left, and a man's head flew into the air. The blood from his neck sprayed onto Valerio.
He looked back at his hands, and it was so vivid that he could feel the warmth of blood.
And all at once, the vision shattered. And as if the culmination of everyone's emotions on that battlefield had been cast into him, he lost his will to live, completely and utterly.
'I need to die.'
His body relaxed, muscles slack as his mind began to shut down. The fear, terror, the loss of life were unbearable, and surrendering to death seemed a mercy.
His eyelids grew heavy. 'I'll just… close my eyes.'
'Just for a second.'
One would have thought that Valerio would have slit his wrists, perhaps bash his head against something hard, but he didn't, and that's what was terrifying.
It wasn't that his body had reached its limits; it was his soul that was dying. Normally, a Tier 1 couldn't undergo soul death, but under the vision he'd seen. His soul had dulled.
The world went dark.
Just as he crossed over to the underworld, his dad drew his saber. Simultaneously, a rune appeared and immediately combusted above Valerio's head.
SHING—
He was alive.
Valerio blinked, and then blinked again, his eyes adjusting to the color of the living world.
He shook his head, as if to shake away the haze, and his senses slowly returned.
Following the noise, he looked up to see Maximus standing face-to-face with the intruder, an unnatural silence blanketing the arena. His father's expression was unreadable, his voice cutting through the stillness.
"Good, good, you truly hid well. I'd investigated your branch here; you disguised it well, too well in fact. They're coming right, your directors?" Maximus asked, his tone calm, not out of temperance, but because his anger had reached such an extreme that it had cycled back to calm.
"What does that matter ?"
"Here I stand, and here you shall lie."
Maximus remained silent, his gaze locked onto the intruder. After a beat, he spoke again, this time his voice as sharp as a blade.
"So be it."
The intruder's twisted smile widened. "Come!" he yelled, "Today, you will die. And so will the rest of you."
Before anyone could react, more figures poured from the ship, descending like comets toward Maximus. Their speed was blinding, and for the untrained eye, it was impossible to follow.
***
Diego and Estelle stared at the spaceship from inside the manor, an almost invisible aura of grief and guilt spread through the manor, and an uncharacteristically sad smile appeared on Diego's features. If it had been anyone else, they wouldn't even have sensed it, but Estelle would never miss it.
A whisper made it to his heart, gentle and soothing, "Let's go, dear, you've carried this burden for too long."
Diego knew she was right; it had indeed been too long… far too long.
He couldn't help but remember an old conversation:
"Such is my resolve, Diego. And the only reason I can have it is because of yours. Let the world crumble, let the heavens freeze over, and yet I know you'll persevere."
He hadn't had the courage to say more, the words hadn't come to him, or perhaps he had already spoken everything to say. "Goodbye."
Diego's eyes flashed with a deep blue a she clapped his hands.
The sombre atmosphere disappeared, a resonant sound echoing throughout the room, as if priming their senses.
Then they both took a step forward.
***
As the figures of the invaders closed in, Diego and Estelle appeared beside Maximus in a flash.
And in an instant, all hell broke loose.