Aggressively coughing, Jasmine looked at me with a foggy gaze of confusion while blood oozed out of her mouth, though I couldn't care about her injuries. "17 years ago! A beast horde attacked my village by Oshibana station!" My furious words managed to finally break through Jasmine's confusion as her eyes slightly widened while she coughed.
"You… You're the survivor from that night? It was my first time, and I was inexperienced, so a survivor managed to escape. To. To think that the survivor would be you." See how she calmly reminisced about the slaughter of the village as if it were a fond memory; I furiously gnashed my teeth and clenched her arm, crushing it within my grip, causing her to scream in pain, though that scream slowly transformed into maniacal laughter.
"Hehe, d-did you come here for revenge? I should've hunted you down back then; I just assumed you'd die in that forest. That was my mistake." Staring at her amused expression, I stabbed my hand into her chest, grabbed a rib, broke it, and then yanked it out, causing her to release a bloodcurdling scream while I crushed her bone with my hand.
"Just answer my fucking question!" Slamming her body into the tree, her laughter suddenly stopped, and her body went limp as she fell unconscious; however, by digging my nail into her wound, I snapped her out of her slumber. "Hehehe, w-wonderful sleep." "ANSWER!" "Fine, you want to know? I-I'll have to start from when I was a chil-" Before she could start explaining her whole pathetic past, I bent her leg backward, causing her to scream once more.
"I don't fucking care about your pathetic childhood! Just answer my fucking question! WHY!?" I was on the edge; if she gave me one more stupid response, if she stalled any longer, I'd just say fuck it and tear her to shreds, but thankfully, she finally managed to comply. "Hehe, y-you want to know? Well, i-it all boils down to o-one reason. I wanted to! Hehe, I didn't like seeing others have a happy life when mine was taken away! Since I couldn't have a happy life, no one could! Haha!"
Her words stunned me. I'd thought of Jasmine's motives for the past week, imagining this scenario playing out hundreds, if not thousands, of times. I thought of all the thousands of different responses that would be. A part of me hoped it would be for some secretive grand plan; it made me feel better knowing my family and friends had been slaughtered for a cause. I knew my thoughts were just a coping mechanism, but I still wished it were something grand, something that would put my heart at ease, even if just a smidgen.
However, I never thought, no, I didn't ever want to imagine the reason my whole village was slaughtered was simply because of some petty emotion like jealousy. It made my heart burn with a myriad of emotions as I dropped Jasmine to the ground, her laughter haunting me as I fell to my hands and knees.
'Jealousy? Dad. Mom. Savannah. Old Man Cho. All the other villagers. They… They died because of a woman's pathetic jealousy?' As my heart hammered within my chest, I could feel tears well up in my eyes, only to raise my head and glance at Jasmine, who started speaking.
"Hahaha, I-I take back what I said earlier. I-I'm glad I didn't kill you. Hehe, s-seeing the fruits of my work, even if I'll die, i-it was well w-worth it. N-Now you know how I felt. Hahah–" Jasmine's laughter was cut short, as I stabbed my hand through her chest, ripping her heart in the process.
"Hehe, enjoy your hellish life." Weakly smiling, Jasmine coughed up blood as she departed this world, her final words a devilish wish, causing me to furiously roar as I began to mercilessly pummel her corpse.
I didn't use my magic, no, I desecrated her body with raw, brutal savagery, the same kind that my family and friends experienced. I'd punch her face, claw at her, bite, tear, shred, rip, break; I did everything I possibly could to annihilate her from this world. I didn't want even a single trace of her presence to ever remain; I wanted it to be as if she had never existed in the first place.
As the minutes passed, I could sense my siblings gathering around the crater I'd made from my relentless onslaught of attacks, watching my display of savagery, but I didn't stop; I was too furious to care about anything else.
"Big bro. Big bro. Big bro! COOPER!" Hearing my name called, I stopped attacking the bloody patch of dirt, the only remaining proof of Jasmine, and turned around, glancing at Mira, who was standing near me.
"Big bro, please stop." "S-She still-" Dismissing Mira, I reeled my fist back, intending to continue my violence, only for a gauntleted fist to grab my wrist, stopping me, prompting me to glance at Erza, who was crying out of her right eye. "W-Why are you crying?" "It's you, big bro." Tilting my head in confusion, I thought Erza was sad to see me like this, but that wouldn't explain why she was only crying from her right eye.
However, as I remembered the origins of her right eye, I touched my face, feeling the occasional tear streaming down my cheek. 'Our eyes, they're linked. Since I'm crying, she'll cry.' Wiping my face, I looked down at the faint blood embedded in the dirt, hesitating to continue, only for several more hands to touch me, prompting me to glance at several of my siblings standing behind me with concerned expressions.
Softly sighing, I closed my eyes. 'You. You're wrong, Jasmine. My life won't be a hellish one.' Opening my eyes, I looked down at the dirt, and while I was still furious, there was a layer of calmness to me. However, as the adrenaline began to fade away, the week-long adventure and intense emotions I'd felt hit me like a train as I yawned. "I think I'm going to sleep."
Without any warning, I fell forward, collapsing onto the dirt while my vision faded, darkness consuming my mind.
___
___
Two Days Later
Hearing loud noises, I rolled off the brick bed with a groan and glanced to my left, spotting Mest opening the door to my cell. "The Magic Council will now judge you." "Let's just get this over with." Yawning, I leaped off my bed and approached Mest, who placed what I would call an industrial-level magic sealing cuffs onto my arms. "Damn, I can't break out of these." I saw Mest's expression twitch at my words before he turned around, prompting me to follow.
As I walked beside Mest, a dozen magic knights walked on either side of me, causing me to faintly smirk as I flexed at one of the knights, causing all of them to flinch before backing away. "Hmph, cowards." "Behave, Cooper." "Yeah, yeah." Ignoring the frightened magic knights, we walked down several different hallways before entering a large room with nine chairs situated atop a tall podium, and each one was being used.
Stepping into the middle of the room, Mest stood to the side and began to read off all the crimes I'd committed; while he was doing that, I took this time to observe the magic council members.
'Hmm, weak. Weak. Weak. Decent. Weak. Decent. Decent. Acceptable. Strong!' As my eyes landed on the last one, a young man who looked identical to Mystogan, I grinned; he was the only one present whom I considered an equal… That's accounting for the two Wizard saints I'd fought previously, standing in the corner with slight injuries.
Once Mest finished speaking, the room was engulfed in a weird silence before an old man finally opened his mouth. "Cooper, do you understand the crimes you've committed?" "Yeah, I'm the one who committed them, dumbass." Eyeing the old man, who clearly was displeased at my words, I grunted and spoke before he could.
"Let's not drag this pointless charade. I'm not receiving any punishment; I'm too valuable to be kept locked away, and everyone knows. It." The one to speak next wasn't the old man, but an old lady who was plain annoying to look at. "What makes you think that, Cooper?" "Because I'm not stupid. First off, my crimes weren't that severe. It made you guys lose some reputation, sure, but it was nothing significant; those two lost the most face here." Glancing at the old woman, I gestured to the two wizard saints I'd beaten up, causing them to grit their teeth.
"Secondly, I dealt with a dark mage, one you guys haven't been able to find in nearly two decades. You're welcome, by the way. Thirdly, I have a powerful standing in the Mage community; I'm the one who takes the most quests involving dark mages by a long shot. I can confidently say the reason why Fiore is mostly free of Dark Mages is because of me, and you won't receive positive backlash from the guilds if you lock me away. And last, but not least, from a political standpoint, you all would rather not get on the bad side of someone as strong as me if you could help it. No one wants a Wizard Saint enemy… Except me. Not to mention you'll have to deal with Makarov as well as Laxus, who is my rival and equal."
Once I finished speaking, I looked at the shocked faces of everyone present, including the two wizard saints and Mest, causing me to smirk. "Just so you all know, I was never the stupid idiot you all thought me to be. I just know the less I think, the less stress I have to deal with."