It all happened quite a while ago. It had transpired on one those days where everything just felt hot and heavy.

Mae, under the guise of Adelia, had taken off on her “soul-searching” adventure and had left the young King (Prince at the time) Nathaniel more alone than he had ever felt before in his life.

He did miss everything about her. The instructor that had replaced his comrade was just that: a boring instructor. Not a friend.

But this didn’t deter him from his own quest. His want, need--lust for power was insatiable. Part of it, the part he recognized, was for Adelia. The other? Well, he denied its existence, perhaps he was even ignorant of it.

This was it: Everything was for himself.

Nobody else but himself. And that was the largest contributing factor to his greed.

There was no better term to describe his inner self other than a narcissist. Nathaniel believed himself to be the best who only deserved the best.

So of course, it was only natural that he ended up meeting them on that fateful day. Them being a cult obsessed with finding power--whatever the means. Needless to say, this lead them to be a rather cruel bunch.

That’s why he was perfect for them.

Nathaniel, despite all of his bravado, was both weak in a physical manner and involving his metaphorical spine. He was easily tricked and manipulated by them, and by the time that he had realized, it was already too late. He was just a puppet. A puppet with strength that wasn’t his.

And they couldn’t afford to lose such a valuable puppet, so they installed a defense mechanism of sorts. One that they hadn’t thought would be revealed so soon and so easily.

But it had.

When Nathaniel had been pushed past his limits by Xaltiq, the magic embedded in his soul kicked in. Admittedly, it was still a prototype, meaning that there were plenty of things that could go wrong. And as Murphy said… they did.

Terribly so, in fact.

The creature in front of them couldn’t be considered a human any longer, and it barely fit into the category of humanoid. Simply put, Nathaniel had transformed into a revolting being.

Large pustules-like sacks had formed all over his body, appearing to be heavy and filled with viscous fluid that took on a pale blue color. Due to the stretching, most of his skin had become translucent and allowed his spidery veins to be seen. His bones had also taken on a more gelatinous quality, causing him to be unable to stand. Nathaniel collapsed, his limbs twisting and snapping into odd positions as his body convulsed violently, the pustules secreting a liquid.

He screamed loudly, his jaw easily popping out of place and going slack. He seemed to be in a great deal of pain. Unsurprisingly, that is. His body continued to grow, and grow, and grow. Soon, his screams became wheezes, his lungs being pressed against by his other organs. He was going to suffocate this way.

But that was not how he ended.

See, Nathaniel’s stomach was swollen and tight too, also pumped full and seemingly ready to burst.

And burst it did.

The radius encompassing--disgustingly enough--everyone and their surroundings.

“Unexpected,” Erebus admitted truthfully, the only one (along with Mae) still clean because he had managed to block the blast within a split second. “But amusing.”

Xaltiq stood there in shock, not even bothering to wipe his face as the combination of mana and innards dripped from his face. What… had just happened? Had he just inadvertently killed a king?

“It got in my mouth,” Tear whined in the background, trying her hardest to spit out the revolting mixture. “What the hell!”

Mae walked over to the human guards that had been there, their skin burning and sizzling from touching the apparently acidic substance. “Well, I don’t suppose there’s any bringing Nathaniel back from that, hmm?”

“No. But I do say, that was rather anticlimactic. I would’ve much preferred if he had tried to fight us and not simply explode.”

Mae turned her eyes upwards, voice dry. “Isn’t it nice to be surprised for once?”

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“It is.” Erebus chuckled quietly, surprises for him were few and far in between. A welcomed rarity. It grew boring when he knew everything.

“It won’t come out!” a voice lamented in the background. “It tastes absolutely terrible.”

Mae looked over at the epicenter of the blast, a deep frown carving itself onto her face. “What do you suppose that we do?” In all honesty, this had also been out of her expectations. She had been ready for some type of showdown, something to get her blood boiling. Not… this. Not the destruction of her beautiful masterpiece.

She did not show this outwardly, but this fact made her extremely angry. Very. Angry. Her blood was boiling but in a different manner of speaking.

She would squeeze their bodies until they popped just like Nathaniel did. Oh, her sweet, sweet Nathaniel. He had been perfect. So, so perfect for her. She had been waiting to taste him after his time of use had finally passed. Now she could only dream about how he would’ve tasted.

She was sure that he would’ve been the sweetest.

But no. They took him. They took him away from her. How was she supposed to have known they had done such a thing to his precious body? How could she forgive them? She couldn’t. It was just unforgivable.

Oh, her poor Nathaniel! What had they done to him?

She wanted to snap their necks. Whoever did this… they were going to pay--dearly. She’d kill them with her bare hands. Peel their skin off and bite into their meat like ripe fruit. A swift death.

Mae bit down onto her cheek, feeling the metallic taste of blood filling her mouth. She bit harder.

No, no, no, no.

They had to suffer. Die in excruciating pain. She started to grind her teeth together, her hands tightening into fists. If she imagined their bones being in her hands, it made her squeeze even tighter.

Would she use their bodies in experiments? Perhaps she could feed them to each other--keep them like pets. Would they grow to enjoy the taste? Or would they loathe it, but continue to eat because it was the only way to survive? Who would she kill? Who would she keep? She’d have to meet them first. Perhaps she could even poison the meat without them knowing, have their insides slowly rot.

She could imagine the horror on their faces when they realized that they would’ve died regardless. Which would’ve been more painful? Starving or eating the poisoned body of a comrade? How could they have been so foolish?

“Mae,” Erebus said, forcing her attention towards him. “Did you not hear what I said?”

Still trembling with anger, Mae managed to say, “I apologize, I didn’t.”

Erebus--the type who hated repeating themselves, gave Mae a freezing look. “Then focus. I don’t have any use for those who can’t listen properly.”

“Right,” she gritted out, “of course.”

“I’ll say it once more. The ones that have been pulling the strings and that were watching you--still are watching--need to be pulled out of the shadows and crushed. Don’t they?”

Mae nodded her head in vicious agreement. “How are we going to find them?”

Erebus thought on it for a second, rubbing the back of his head in thought. He could do it rather easily by himself, but that was never fun. And he had already told himself that he was going to spectate rather than participate actively, so…

Yeah, that’d work.

“I have an idea.”

…

Wolf had a one-sided rivalry with Xaltiq. From his side, he always felt as if he had been overlooked by Erebus--by everyone else. He had been recruited at the same time as Xaltiq, but it felt as if Xaltiq had an unfair advantage against him. And he wasn’t exactly sure why. He had been trying his hardest to stand out.

At first, he had been very uncomfortable here. All of his friends were dead, he was surrounded by people of unparalleled strength… and ultimately, he was alone. But as the days passed by, he felt himself growing more comfortable and expanding. It seemed as if here he would truly be able to maximize his fullest potential. That’s when the jealousy started seeping in.

So when he was told that he, accompanied by Weryn, were to go down and replace Tear and Xaltiq… he was overjoyed. Finally! Finally, he was getting his chance. And he couldn’t mess this up. If Erebus truly took notice of him now because of his excellence--Wolf had already grown so much without the wisdom of the age-old dragon.

Wolf’s knee was bouncing as he stood there in wait, unable to contain the happiness that he felt. “This is going to be very new to me,” Wolf said to Weryn.

The young dragon looked up, appearing to be the picture of innocence as usual. His eyes shone with mild curiosity. “Is this your first mission?”

Wolf nodded his head. “I’ve been cooped up in the castle for so long.”

Weryn said nothing at this.

“But with this, I can finally prove my worth to the others. I’ve always felt as if I’ve been put on the backburner, you know? But I’m--”

“You’re excited?” Weryn questioned, his eyes cast in darkness.

Wolf hesitated, unsure where he had gone wrong. “Yes…”

“Don’t be,” the bright-haired dragon informed him. “You’re going to end up sorely disappointed.”

Wolf frowned. “Why do you say that?”

He let out a laugh. “Because I was too.” Weryn paused. “Less than disappointment, it’s more like being forced to face reality. This world isn’t pretty. And Erebus is the type of person who enjoys dirtying it more.” Weryn pushed off of the wall. It wasn’t as if he didn’t appreciate his mentor, or dislike him for that matter… but Weryn had lost the stars that used to dance in his eyes long ago. “Well, let’s get ready. Tear should be opening the transportation circle soon enough.”

“Right,” Wolf murmured, following Weryn out of the room and downstairs where the necessary components had been set up for the spell. “What do I expect?” he questioned Weryn. Wolf tried to think of what they were being called down for (Erebus hadn’t informed them), but he couldn’t think of anything that could really require his talents. Wolf wasn’t really specialized in, well, anything. “What do you think is going to happen?”

Another laugh--drier, this time. “The worst.”