"And in my dear Ruman!", the old woman raised her hands wide and stood up from her wooden chair which toppled to the ground.

Her eyes were seeing some grandeur of Ruman and that of Wallachia, that she had sordidly imagined out of spite for those that ruled her land. Indeed, they were the vilest creatures to her.

I found myself seated in her warm little hut with a cup of steaming water placed on the table in front of me. It was supposed to be tea. I looked between her and the cup of tea. She went back towards her kitchen silently, apparently having finished her story and I finally realized where I was at the moment.

I took the cup in both of my hands and snuggled it close to my face, feeling the rising vapor from it. I brought it closer to my lips, intending to take a sip when she turned around and addressed me. I looked at her without drinking the tea.

"When I was a young girl, my father hid me in that trunk over there for 10 days. I could barely keep my head intact in there. It was hard to sleep", she sat down in one of the stray chairs, facing the other way and continued talking to me, "But he managed to save me that way."

"7 days".

"Huh?"

"He hid you in there...for 7 days, Granny".

She kept staring at me with an empty look on her face.

"Did you find it, you crazy boy?", she looked away weakly.

I nodded.

"Well, you should seize that which you bear. And...if you really intend to end everything, you must know that none of them must survive. If you make that choice, not a single one of their kind will see the next moment. No matter where they might be, they'll burn away. You, crazy boy, will be ending an entire species. Will you be able to carry that burden...see it through? What a sadness..."

***************************

When I opened my eyes to look around, the shadows had dissipated and we were now in a vast wasteland. Deli was there too, still crucified. Felix stood waiting for me to absorb everything.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

I didn't intend to make him wait for much longer though. I made sense of myself and grabbed Ebony. I stood firmly opposite him, without any hesitation.

We exchanged no words and clashed. I went on the offensive and was met by a hoard of the shadow Cerberus that were fighting on his side. Their size seemed to have shrunk, though only barely. I figured this was because Felix wasn't exactly in top shape to be expanding that much of his magic on the first attack.

The fact that those beasts were shadows posed little problem to me. If I cut through them with Ebony, they won't be able to respawn. Because Ebony can cut through anything, even the core of a shadow. At the moment, I was seeing some dozen Cerberus heading my way. I took a deep breath and launched upon them, swirling and drilling my way through them with perfect concentration. I could tell after slashing the first one that Felix wasn't putting his back into it at all. I concluded that he was just testing the waters right now.

"There's no way to surprise me, Seraph", is what Deli often told me during our training together. I remembered what she used to say.

"Even if you try your best, if your enemy knows you beforehand, you can't surprise them. And I do mean even if they haven't seen you fight. That's just how things work. The only way", she had smiled cunningly, gesturing 1 with her finger, "is to evolve during your battle".

Evolve.

This is what I needed to do right now. I wasn't denying his superior strength in this case. I had to use a trump card, something like evolution, perhaps, to defeat him.

Soon I had cleared away all the shadows and once again I stood facing Felix. I gave him a window to attack but it was apparent to me that he wasn't interested in doing so. I had no choice but to meet him head on in the battle.

I didn't spare another moment and leapt straight at him. He dodged my attempts to slash him rather cleanly. I did, however, managed to use footwork, not as good as Deli, but it let me land my first cut. A small cut across his right cheek. He was about as surprised about it as I had been about my insanely fast reflexes.

He quickly backed away after that cut and looked at me wildly. I stood straight, wiping the single trail of sweat off my chin and preparing for another launch. His look slowly melted away into a sad, grim expression.

"Seraph, how could you...?", his look almost sent chills down my spine.

I had no answer to give him, though I was slightly perplexed. I did suddenly feel like my vision was just a bit hazy. I looked down to find I was sinking into the molten ground. It was like a thick swamp of blood and it was swallowing me. I could see Deli, screaming in pain in the distance and calling for me, perhaps telling me to get out. Felix stood in the distance, looking broken and sorrowful as he watched me drown in that thick bloody sludge. All my attempts to escape were futile as I kept on sinking. My strength kept getting washed away, until my whole world went dark. The last thing I saw was the glimmer of a teardrop that left Felix's eye and scattered onto the ground.