As soon as I violently cast aside Kaius's shattered hand and the aura of darkness faded from my eyes, I did not look back to see his reaction.
I rushed frantically toward Christophe, who was struggling to stay upright, his breaths coming in ragged, shallow gasps—a terrifying wheezing sound that betrayed lungs heavy with blood.
He was in a heartbreaking state; his clothes, usually so pristine, were in tatters, and his body was covered in deep crimson welts.
I grabbed his hand quickly and pulled him toward me with a strength I never knew I possessed, letting him lean his entire weight on me.
I felt his body quiver under my touch, his features contorted in sharp pain that made me dig my nails into my palms in suppressed rage; the marks of Kaius's long fingers were still clearly etched on his neck, like a deathly tattoo that refused to fade.
I led him through the empty corridors, my quick footsteps echoing as I whispered softly, my voice choked with regret while I stared at the floor:
"I'm sorry, Christophe... all of this is because of me... only because of me."
He lifted his head with difficulty, staring at me for a moment with those strained features.
His eyes held a silent reproach, or perhaps astonishment at what he had witnessed from me, but he didn't utter a single word, as if speech had become a luxury he could no longer afford.
We reached the medical wing, and instead of knocking, I raised my leg and kicked the door with all the pent-up malice I harbored, sending it flying off its hinges to crash against the wall with a deafening thud.
I screamed at the nurses and doctors who froze in shock:
"Hurry and treat him! Faster, you fools, or I will make you regret it!"
I placed him on the medical bed with a gentleness that contrasted with my screaming, then stepped back with shaky strides until my back hit the far wall.
I stood there, watching them swarm around him like bees.
Strands of shimmering green energy began to emanate from their hands, wrapping around his exhausted body like a cocoon of light, and his bleeding wounds began to heal very slowly before my eyes.
The scene was peaceful, but my heart was still boiling. I looked at my hands, which were trembling; I had saved him for now, but for how long?
Kaius would not stop, and the fire that had ignited in Christophe today would not be easily extinguished.
Time passed heavier than mountains, each second feeling like an eon etched into my memory.
I stood there watching them with bated breath, until the doctors finally stepped away from him with pale, exhausted faces, after their magic succeeded in stitching the wounds of his torn body.
Christophe lay still for a moment, then weakly raised his hand and placed it over his eyes as if trying to block out the world's light, while his other fist was clenched tightly over the white sheet, his knuckles turning white.
His silence lashed me more than any scream ever could.
I stepped toward him very quietly, as if walking across a minefield.
I stood beside him, feeling the room's chill seep into my bones.
I spoke a single word, in a trembling voice that barely escaped my dry throat:
"Christophe..."
He let out a long, heavy sigh that came from deep within, like the exhale of a weary soul.
He slowly removed his hand from his eyes and sat up with a stiff torso, then directed a gaze at me as sharp as a blade—a look that pierced through all my defenses.
He said in a hoarse voice mixed with resentment:
"Is there an explanation... for this stupidity you committed?"
I froze in my tracks under the weight of his rebuke.
In that moment, I felt like a small child standing before an older brother scolding her for breaking something precious.
Words collided and crashed in my head; what could I possibly say to him now?
Should I tell him the truth? That I have become a "doll" for that cursed prince?
Or should I try to joke to relieve this suffocating tension?
My mind began to wander from the sheer pressure, and I thought with dark irony:
"Oh Christophe, don't worry, I just wanted to crush his royal ego... or maybe, damn it, should I tell him I harassed him and stripped him of his clothes?"
I swallowed my lump and remained silent for seconds, searching for a convincing lie or a truth that wouldn't kill him with grief.
I looked into his eyes, which had just witnessed my transformation into a demon, and said stuttering:
"I... I didn't mean for things to go this far. Kaius is not what he seems, and he... he doesn't understand any language other than force."
I lowered my head, fleeing from the intensity of his gaze, knowing full well that I hadn't answered his real question.
A bitter laugh of mockery escaped Christophe's chest—a laugh devoid of any mirth, filled instead with bewilderment and oppression.
He turned his face away for a moment, as if trying to grasp the magnitude of the mess I had thrown myself (and him along with me) into, then stared back at me even more intensely, a look that pierced my skin to reach my soul.
I muttered to myself sharply while gritting my teeth:
"Damn you, Kaius... and damn your beautiful, cursed tattoo!"
He poured his wrath upon me with a question that froze the blood in my veins:
"Really, Arya? Why in the hell did you strike a contract with him?!"
I closed my eyes tightly, feeling the pressure of words in my throat.
What should I do now? Should I lie? No, let the world burn and let him know the ridiculous truth that led me to this hell.
I opened my eyes and looked at him, saying in a low, hesitant voice, dripping with embarrassment:
"Uh... umm... I saw his dragon tattoo glowing and moving, and I couldn't control my curiosity... so I touched it and stripped him of his shirt just to see how far that tattoo extended... and what happened, happened."
The moment I finished my shameful confession, a dead silence fell.
I looked up at him and saw his eyes wide with horror, as if I had told him I jumped into a volcanic crater just because I liked its color.
He began to laugh in disbelief—a muffled, hysterical laugh as he placed his hand over his mouth.
At times he stared at me with looks oscillating between shock and pity, and at other times he stared into the void, trying to force his mind to comprehend that his
sensible friend had tied herself to the most dangerous man in the kingdom... just because of her curiosity about a tattoo!
The sight of him trying to process this information evoked in me a mixture of wanting to hide under the bed and wanting to scream.
He had seen me as the strong Arya, only for it to become clear to him that I was just a fool whose curiosity led her to the gallows.
A brief silence reigned in the medical wing, broken only by Christophe's weary breaths and his hysterical laughter, which began to fade gradually.
"I don't believe it..."
He said it while staring at me with a look that blended bewilderment and denial, as if he were trying to rearrange the image of "Arya" in his mind after this staggering confession.
I couldn't bear those looks of his; I felt a prickle of embarrassment that made me scowl at him and admit with a childish sharpness mixed with defiance:
"For your information, Mr. Christophe, I am very curious, and I cannot restrain myself or sleep until I satisfy that curiosity!"
But the traces of embarrassment soon evaporated, and my facial expressions shifted into a terrifying sharpness, and I felt the chill of my black energy dancing at my fingertips once again.
I said in a voice as sharp as a blade, my eyes fixed on his:
"But I am not at all regretful about it... I will show him hell itself!"
When Christophe saw that sudden transformation in my eyes—from the "curious girl" to the "predatory entity"—he stopped laughing entirely.
The features of mockery vanished, replaced by a deep, almost fatherly concern.
He placed his heavy hand on my shoulder, ignoring his own pain, and gripped it firmly to force me to focus with him.
Then he said in a low, dangerous voice:
"Arya... the hell you're talking about isn't a place you go to punish him; it's a monster that will consume you along with it. The contract between you makes him feel every desire for revenge that dwells within you... you aren't just fighting him; you are feeding his power with your hatred."
He tried to stand up from his bed despite his fatigue, to stand directly in front of me and block my view, staring into my red eyes which had not yet dimmed, and added:
"If you intend to quench your thirst for vengeance against him, do it with intelligence, not recklessness. Because I will not stand by and watch while you burn your soul to reach him. Do you understand?"
He began to observe my reaction, realizing that I might no longer be the "Arya" he knew perfectly, and that the tattoo hadn't just bound my body to Kaius, but had begun to change something in the core of my energy.
As silence enveloped the medical wing after the storm of my confession, I felt a wall of tension crack within me.
I could no longer bear those confused looks in his eyes, nor the distance this cursed contract had created between us.
I moved suddenly, and with a quick, impulsive step, I threw myself into his arms.
I hugged him with a force I hadn't calculated, and buried my head in his warm chest, searching for that old security he used to give me before my life was tainted by Kaius's shadow.
I felt the firmness of his exhausted body under my touch, and his heartbeat beginning to calm gradually.
Christophe did not hesitate; I felt his trembling hands rise to envelop me, patting my back with a familiar fatherly tenderness, as if he were absorbing all that darkness that had exploded from me moments ago.
His breath above my head made me feel that I was still "Arya," and not just a tool in the hands of a sadistic prince.
I whispered to him in a choked voice, words coming from my depths loaded with a final plea:
"Everything will be fine... just trust me, and do not interfere... please."
I closed my eyes tightly as I tightened my grip on his torn shirt.
I know that this request of mine is the hardest punishment I could impose on him; for how could a man like him stand by while his friend is dragged to the bottom of hell?
But I also knew that his next intervention might not end with wounds that heal, but with a total annihilation from which there is no return.
I inhaled his familiar scent one last time before pulling away, trying to freeze that moment in my memory, because I realized with certainty that the war I had declared on Kaius would leave no pure place in me to return to.
After a long struggle with his stubbornness, I finally succeeded in getting Christophe to his room door.
He was still trying to protest in broken words about his ability to walk alone, but I didn't give him the chance; with a quick movement, I gave him a light tap on his shoulder, making him stop talking and emit a muffled groan of pain.
I chuckled lightly at the sight of his disgruntled scowl; for despite all the strength he showed in class, he now resembled a child being scolded by a parent.
I left him there, carrying that brief laugh as a shield to protect me from collapsing, and retraced my steps to my room with heavy strides.
As soon as I closed the door behind me, everything vanished. A suffocating silence reigned, making the ringing in my ears seem loud.
I headed toward the window and rested my forehead on the cold glass, staring outside with a wandering mind that saw nothing of the night's features.
I let out a loud sigh—a long exhale trying to expel the weight that had settled on my chest since that ill-fated moment in class.
I began to take off my suffocating formal clothes, the ones that made me feel as if I were in armor that didn't belong to me.
I went to the closet and opened its doors sharply, to find myself facing options that were not of my choosing; I pulled out a pair of tight jeans and a sky-blue shirt that also seemed as if it were designed to cling to my body like a shackle.
I put them on reluctantly, then stood before the mirror examining my reflection.
I couldn't stop myself from cursing Vassilios in my mind; damn him and his alleged "refined" taste! Why in the hell is every piece of clothing in this closet so tight and highlights my features in this provocative way?
I exhaled with annoyance while trying to adjust the collar, then raised my hand to let down my hair.
As soon as the strands fell over my shoulders, I felt a slight relief; the roots of my hair had really started to ache, as I was never used to having it pulled and tied so tightly all day long.
I shook my hair so it scattered around me, trying to regain a bit of my identity lost between the folds of this palace.
I couldn't stand staying between four walls; the room began to feel cramped, and images of the golden tattoo and Christophe's screams followed me in every corner.
I left my room with quick steps, driven by an overwhelming desire to breathe the cold air.
I needed it, perhaps it would extinguish the fires burning within me; ease the intensity of my acute fear for Christophe, and cool that resentment and black hatred I harbor for Kaius—that prince who stole my peace and turned my life into a never-ending arena of conflict.
I slipped through the dark corridors like a fleeing shadow, until I was outside the towering academy, which looked in this night like the bars of a giant prison.
I inhaled a massive amount of cold air with ecstasy, feeling its chill penetrate my lungs to expel the remains of the heat of anger.
I closed my eyes for a few seconds, feeling my heartbeat thumping steadily and rhythmically in my chest, as if the nature around me was granting me a temporary pact of forgiveness.
But the tranquility did not last.
Suddenly, a human scream pierced the silence, tearing through the stillness of the night.
It came from beyond the walls, specifically from the direction of the distant forest.
I furrowed my brows in suspicion and whispered to myself:
"How could someone's voice reach this far?"
For a moment, I thought my mind was weaving fantasies from exhaustion, but the screaming returned with even greater force—a desperate plea dripping with terror.
My heart pounded violently, and without a second thought, I lunged toward the Academy's wall.
With a fluid motion, I leaped over it.
Mid-air, I reinforced my leg muscles with the dark Void energy.
I felt the explosion in my muscles as I propelled myself like a red meteor cutting through the darkness of the forest, shattering the tree branches that tried to obstruct me.
I stopped abruptly when the scene appeared before my eyes, and the blood froze in my veins.
Five Academy students were in a tragic state; two lay on the ground with severe wounds, and two others were trembling as they tried to defend themselves with weapons that looked like toys against the opponent they faced.
As for the fifth, he was kneeling, desperately trying to treat his injured companions.
And before them stood the nightmare incarnate.
A massive beast, with the body of a muscular human and bulging veins nearly bursting from beneath its grey skin.
But its head was that of a giant wild boar, with blood-red eyes radiating ancient malice.
Its saliva drooled with a revolting lust as it eyed them like an imminent feast, and the sound of its thick exhaling echoed through the area like a millstone crushing bones.
I looked at them, then at the beast, and felt the Void energy in my hand snarling.
These fools had come out at the wrong time and faced something their textbooks didn't possess.
As the beast prepared for its feast, I felt the chill of the Void energy dancing under my skin.
Instead of fear, a smile dripping with malice formed on my face. I didn't see a monster; I saw an entity that embodied all my suppressed rage.
My black aura rose to tear through the forest's silence, and I lunged toward it like lightning.
In a swift motion, I kicked its massive leg with brutal force; I heard the sound of bones crushing as they split in half. The beast fell to its knees while its ghastly screams filled the place.
But it wasn't easy prey; in a sudden move, it threw a giant punch that sent me flying for miles, shattering the trees behind my back with every impact.
I rose quickly, leaving it no room for celebration.
I launched toward it again like a red meteor enveloped in a Void aura that exploded from pure excitement.
Finally! I found something to vent my suppressed anger toward Kaius.
I kicked its other leg, splitting it in half as well. But I didn't stop there.
I surged forward with a loud, mad laugh—a laugh that made the students tremble with more terror than the beast's own screams.
I grabbed its massive hand, twisted it, and ripped it from its shoulder with insane speed, then did the same to the other.
Filthy black blood splattered everywhere, covering my features, while the screams of the beast—now limbless and a living corpse on the ground—did not stop.
This wasn't enough to extinguish my fire.
I rained down a barrage of punches on its head, which, due to their speed, turned into a burning red flash.
My smile split my face as I imagined him... that despicable Kaius, under my fist.
With one final blow, gathering all my energy and spite, I finished it off, scattering its head into fragments and leaving it a still carcass.
I stood straight, my body stained, panting with breaths that satisfied my grudge.
I looked up at the youths whose eyes were widened in madness, retreating from me in terror as if I were the true monster here, and not the still body behind me.
I stepped toward them slowly, trying to calm my raging breaths which still carried the taste of adrenaline and black blood.
Filthy blood dripped from my hands and the edges of my sky-blue shirt, which was completely stained.
My appearance under the moonlight was enough to strike terror into the heart of the bravest warrior.
I saw their pale faces and eyes that hadn't left the mangled corpse behind me, so I said in a voice I tried to keep as calm as possible:
"Are you alright?"
They took another step back, so I continued as I approached them cautiously:
"Don't worry... I am your fellow student, 'Arya,' from Zeus Academy."
Hearing the Academy's name, I saw their features relax slightly, and the deathly stillness left their eyes, but caution still shrouded their gazes; it was hard to believe that the girl who tore a monster apart with her bare hands was just an "ordinary" student.
I shifted my gaze to the two young men lying on the ground; their wounds were deep, and the earth beneath them had begun to turn red. I said in a serious tone:
"Oh... it seems their condition is critical."
The youth kneeling beside them nodded with a trembling head, while the other who had been defending earlier stepped forward to cooperate with his teammate in channeling healing magic.
Faint green auras began to emanate from their hands, shaking from exhaustion and shock.
One of them looked at me, swallowing hard before saying in a faltering voice:
"Thank you... you saved us just in time... if it weren't for you, this would have been our end."
I stared at him in silence, feeling a strange prickle in my chest.
I wasn't used to gratitude, especially since I hadn't saved them out of heroism; rather, I was venting my hatred for Kaius into the body of that freak.
I settled for a nod, as I began to feel the cold air again freezing the blood on my skin.
A vague sensation that yellow eyes were watching me from the darkness of the trees began to creep into my soul.
••• AL-KAIUS •••
I was standing on the balcony of my royal suite, watching the stillness of the forest with boredom, when I felt it... a silent scream that echoed in my veins before it reached my ears.
Suddenly, a burning pain exploded in the middle of my back, as if a poisoned blade had pierced my spine.
I stumbled and gripped the edge of the marble railing so hard the stone crumbled under my fingers.
This wasn't my pain—it was hers! I felt through the bond her body crashing into the trees; I felt the roughness of the bark as it hit her, and the weight of the blow that nearly knocked the breath out of her.
"Damn you, Arya... what are you doing to yourself?"
I muttered bitterly, while my body jerked in response to every bruise that hit her.
But behind the pain, another feeling began to slip in... a dark euphoria.
I felt her heartbeats racing wildly—not from fear, but from the thrill of the kill.
With every punch she directed at that freak's head, my own fist clenched instinctively as if I were seeing the scene before me.
I sensed through the bond how she was imagining my face while she smashed the monster's skull; her anger, her hatred, and her overwhelming desire to destroy me... all of it flowed into me like intoxicating wine.
I could no longer bear to stay away from this bloody "celebration."
I vanished into the shadows of the place to reappear there, amid the wreckage of the forest.
I saw her... she was covered in filth and black blood, breathing heavily like a wounded wolf.
I placed my hand on my chest, over my heart which was thumping violently in rhythm with hers, and said in a calm voice trembling with the pleasure of shared pain:
"You have made my senses burn, Arya... every bone broken in that monster, I felt its echo in my joints. Was revenge this delicious?"
I stepped toward her, ignoring the terrified students.
I lifted her stained face with my hand, feeling through the touch the pain of her exhausted muscles as if it were embers searing my skin. I smiled venomously as I whispered in her ear:
"Since you exhausted my body with this nonsense, and made me taste your filthy blood through the bond... I will reclaim the price of this pain in my own way. Drive these insects away, for the reckoning between us will be paid in blood."
I was in a state of magical agitation; the pain Arya caused me didn't just anger me—it made me obsessed with that brutal power she displayed.
I decided within myself that I wouldn't allow anyone but me to experience this dark side of her.
I stood there, black blood covering her face in a way that made her look like a rebellious goddess of destruction.
I felt the pain racking her body gnawing at my nerves through the bond, and this fueled my rage; how dare this girl subject me to this much agony for the sake of "insects" like these students?
I wanted to remind her of her place.
I lifted my hand and gathered my black royal energy—the magic that leaves nothing behind but ash and ruin.
I knew she was an "Insulator," but in the logic of magic, even an insulator is affected by pressure, heat, or the explosion resulting from impact.
I wanted to see her body tremble, to see her eyes break before my might.
I released the wave... black magic exploded from my palm like a hurricane of dark daggers, turning the air between us into a raging hell.
And here was the shock that paralyzed my senses.
The magic didn't even "hit" her.
The moment it touched her skin, it vanished completely as if it had fallen into a bottomless abyss.
She didn't feel the heat, her body didn't recoil a single centimeter, and damn it... she didn't even blink!
She stood amid the destruction my magic left in the trees around her—steadfast, impenetrable, as if I had thrown nothing more than a handful of dust at her.
My hand froze in the air. "Impossible..." I whispered to myself.
I thought she was resisting, but the truth was she was unaffected. My magic, feared by the kings of Jinn and Hell, became a pathetic, trivial display before her.
My features changed from anger to a faint, dark laugh coming from the depths of my throat.
I approached her again until I felt her burning breath, and whispered with a bewilderment mixed with obsession:
"Incredible... my magic that annihilates existence finds a silent refuge in your body. You aren't just a forced fiancée, Arya... you are the tomb specifically designed to bury my greatness."
I tightened my grip on her arm—not with magic this time, but with sheer physical strength.
I felt through the bond her slight confusion at the touch of my hand and continued with a threat:
"If magic doesn't hurt you, then we shall see how your soul stands against the rest of my games. Since you are an insulator to my power, it means you are the only one I can break with my bare hands without losing you too quickly."
While I was trying to process the shock of her being an "Insulator" to my magic, she lifted her blood-stained head and fixed her red eyes on mine with a coldness that killed every ounce of authority I was trying to impose.
And in a dry voice, devoid of any fear or awe of my power, she said to me:
"Are you finished?"
those two words pierced my ears like a rusty blade.
She didn't ask for mercy, she didn't ask for the reason for my attack; she asked me with boredom as if I were merely a trivial obstacle in the way of her return.
I felt through the bond the calmness of her pulse; she wasn't trembling, and she didn't fear annihilation.
This steadfastness turned the pain I felt in my body into a type of raging resentment.
I laughed a low laugh, filled with venom, and approached her until our chests touched.
I reached out to grip her jaw with sheer physical force, feeling through the bond the hardness of her will. I said to her in a whisper dripping with spite and admiration:
"Are you finished?.. How insolent you are. The hell we just began does not end with a trivial question like that. If my magic doesn't burn your skin, know that I will find a thousand other ways to make your soul scream through this bond."
I tightened my grip more, enjoying the shared pain that began to flow between us like an electric current, and continued:
"Go... take your wreckage and leave. But remember, every time your eyelid closes, I will be there... feeling every pulse of pain you hide, waiting for the moment this 'Insulator' body of yours begs me to grant it death."
I threw her back violently, feeling a new hunger; breaking her body with magic no longer mattered to me—I became obsessed with breaking that coldness that made her ask "Are you finished" while the world around her burned.
The blood froze in my veins for a second, not from fear, but from pure astonishment.
Arya approached me dangerously, with a move no one in these kingdoms dared to perform.
With swift speed, her blood-stained hand gripped the collar of my shirt and pulled me toward her with brutal force that compelled me to bow to her level.
In that moment, the forest, the students, and the screams of monsters vanished.
There was nothing left but her face stained with filth and blood, and her red eyes shining with a madness that rivaled my own.
Our noses touched, and I felt her burning breath hit my face, while the tattoo boiled, transmitting to me a terrifying mixture of euphoria and defiance dwelling deep within her.
She fixed her gaze on mine and said in a whispered voice, dripping with a confidence that turned the shared pain into a poisoned pleasure:
"Oh, really?.. I look forward to that."
Those words weren't just a reply; they were an explicit declaration of war. I felt her heart thumping madly against my chest, not from terror, but from pure adrenaline.
Through the bond, I didn't sense a single ounce of retreat; she was explicitly inviting me into her hell, as if telling me her magic-insulating body was just the beginning.
I narrowed my eyes while contemplating her very close features, feeling an overwhelming desire to shatter this proximity, and at the same time, a desire to stay in it forever.
My hand drifted to grip her waist tightly, and I whispered to her while the smile still split her face:
"Be careful what you wish for, Arya... because if you enter my game, you won't leave it with a sound body or a remaining soul. That smile... I will be the one to erase it, or bury it in the depths of your abyss."
We stood there, like two entities of destruction each trying to swallow the other, while the bond between us pulsed with a single rhythm, announcing the birth of a relationship that will only end with the annihilation of one of us... or both.