Chapter 6: Battle in Darkness

‘Not looking good… I have to do something quick.’

I glanced at Cogito’s body lying on the ground and cursed to myself.

‘That fool. I’m beating him up after this.’

With a sigh, I looked back at my brother and began converting the energy in my hands into light. By now, the weeds had encased his body. I could not see him with my eyes anymore, but I knew that the weed were trying to drag him into the ground.

‘That bastard. Is this Kyrie’s doing? I didn’t expect my brother to be consumed without putting up much of a fight…’

After the weeds dragged him into the ground, his body went limp against the relentless thorn-like weeds that were now gnawing away at his body.

‘What the heck is Cura doing?!’

A cloud of darkness draped itself over his eyes. I didn’t know if I would make it, so I released the light I had gathered around my fist and shot it at Gratus.

“Irritus!”

When my array of light surrounded him, the darkness in his eyes unveiled. I inspected his condition while the thorns surrounding him incinerated into ashes.

‘Good! He’s not dead.’

He seemed to have noticed my presence because he looked up towards where I was floating in the darkness. I smiled at him and waved, not sure whether he could see me.

‘Now then…’

I turned my attention to the octopus-looking monstrosity that was griping onto him. I had my suspicions, but after I had encased my brother with light and incinerated the weeds, I could see what was attacking him.

‘Des Peravi.’

He tried to attack my brother a few more times, but the light I had surrounded him with served as a barrier that warded off all of his attempts. Seeing that his attacks were doing nothing, he released his clutch on my brother and retreated further into the depths of the underworld.

‘Already running? But Gratus…’

His condition seemed worse than I had thought since he wasn’t showing signs of moving to resurface from the ground. Wanting to confirm his condition, I flew towards him and dove into the ground.

‘He’s unconscious. My Irritus spell should have at least alleviated the pain from his body but— Huh? What’s this?’

I wanted to drag him out of the ground, but when I grabbed onto his arm, my hand went numb. A strange force was absorbing the energy in my hands and preventing me from holding onto my brother with any strength.

‘This is bad. What did Peravi do? There’s something going on inside his body. Is this what is preoccupying Cura?’

I noticed that even my Irritus spell I had cast on him was dissipating faster than usual.

‘What should I do? Ah, forget it! I’m just going to beat Peravi to the brink of death and have him tell me what he did to my brother.’

“Irritus!”

Once again, I cast Irritus, but instead of converting the energy in my hands into light, I converted the energy flowing throughout my body. By doing so, a protective light formed around me and the light encasing me revealed the surrounding darkness. Without any light, I would not have been able to see even one meter in front of me underground, but after I extended the range of my light, I could see an additional ten meters.

‘This’ll cost more energy, but I don’t have a guardian like my brother to help me with internal attacks, so I should be careful.’

When I checked my surroundings, I noticed that Peravi had already escaped into the darkness, but his escape did not bother me.

I shouted, “Do you think you can escape me, Peravi?”

My voice echoed in the darkness.

…

There was a moment of silence, but it was broken by an exasperated voice that echoed in reply, “Why are you getting in my way Cedric?”

I could not tell where the voice was coming from, but I knew the general direction where Peravi had escaped. After my eyes had adjusted to the darkness, I could see a trail of faint light that disappeared into the distance.

‘A little unorthodox, but I’m glad I touched Peravi with my Irritus spell. It should be easy to track him as long my light has not vanished from his body.’

I flew forward following the faint traces of light until I could see Peravi once again. He wasn’t trying to escape.

“So you betray us…”

I didn’t bother to reply and continued to dart towards him while expanding the light around my body.

“Then taste despair.”

Before I could smash into him, Peravi squirted out a cloud of darkness at me that concealed the light surrounding my body and blinded me.

“Petty tricks! Do you think this will stop me?”

…

I was expecting Peravi to attack me in my blindness, but nothing happened. There was no killing intent directed at me either.

‘What’s going on?’

It was then that I heard a faint chuckle in the distance.

I focused my thoughts on listening to it when I heard a voice mocking me from afar, “I don’t have time for you. I hope you’ll taste the hopelessness of not being able to do anything as I consume your brother’s unattended—”

“Such wickedness!”

I was enraged at myself for being careless.

‘No wonder he didn’t escape outside my reach! He let me follow him to draw me away from my brother!’

Peravi’s aura of darkness was still sticking onto my body, but I didn’t care. I knew where my brother was and backtracked as fast as I could.

‘I’m faster than Peravi, but this isn’t good. He’s a few minutes ahead of me.’

When I had caught up enough to see Peravi’s silhouette, I knew that I would not make it. He was a few moments away from reaching my brother’s unconscious body. I withdrew the light around my body and focused it all into the palm of my hands.

‘If he devours my brother, then I will take my time incinerating him inside out!’

Peravi let out a wicked chuckle that further fueled my rising anger.

“You’re too late Cedric. He’s mine now!”

Peravi shot out hundreds of thistles from his body and gripped onto my brother’s defenseless body, threatening to drag him into the ground.

‘He’s going to be consu—’

“And you think I’m useless?”

A sudden voice cut my thoughts short. I looked at my brother and saw Cogito holding onto his body, trying to keep him from being dragged into the ground. He had tied a rope around his body and anchored himself to a nearby tree. He was proceeding to tie my brother’s body, but I could tell he was struggling against Peravi’s pull.

‘Just a few more seconds!’

“A Militis? Pathetic! I’ll just consume you both!”

Peravi’s weeds expanded and engulfed my brother and Cogito. As I drew closer, he whipped its long tentacle-like arms at me, but I dodged and smirked. All I needed was to be in contact with him.

“Ignite!”

I injected all the light I had stored in my palms into him.

“Cedric!” Peravi roared in pain.

He tried to flee, but the more he tried to escape, the stronger I gripped his arm while dragging him away from my brother and Cogito.

“Let go of me! No. No!”

There was no visible effect at first, but after a while, Peravi’s skin cracked and molten lava-like light glowed from within his body.

“Betrayer! I hope you relish in despair for all eternity!”

Ignoring his shouts of pain, I watched every inch of his body incinerate into ash. The sight of him burning to ashes eased my frustrations. I held Peravi while smirking until he had disintegrated into nothingness. When there was no trace of him to be found, I resurfaced from the ground and looked at where my brother and Cogito had been.

‘So I was too late…’

I frowned and realized that Peravi had devoured them before I could drag him away.

As I stared at the empty ground, the darkness surrounding me melted away, and Attero before it was engulfed in darkness could be seen once again. The only difference was that I was alone.

----

Covered in darkness, I tried to clear my mind, but since my head was throbbing in pain, it was difficult to focus. Looking down at my arms and legs, I could see the deep scars that were inflicted upon me during my struggle against…

‘Who? Who was I struggling against?’

My head was in a daze, and the pain was growing unbearable. I could not think!

‘Worse than death! This pain…!’

I screamed in agony.

‘I want to die! It would be better to die!’

The moment I felt like committing suicide by biting my tongue off, I felt my pain subside. It was only by a little, but the difference was like Heaven and earth. I looked to see what had happened and spotted a thin thread of bright green light flowing down upon my body. Every time the thread of light touched my body, my pain would ease a little more.

The light lifted me up from the darkness and drew me towards its source. It looked small at first, but as I approached the source where the threads of light were coming from, the light grew bigger and stronger.

“…”

A faint whisper.

I could not hear what was being whispered because it was so subtle, but as I perked my ears to listen, the whispers grew louder and louder. It was a mesmerizing sound that made me want to chant along with it. I could not resist and mumbled along with the whispers until one word appeared in my consciousness.

“Sano.”

While staring at the pool of light in front of me, my body plunged into the light without warning. My body was dowsed in light, and the light moved about finding its way under my skin and into my blood. Once it was in my life stream, the light rushed along my veins, reinvigorating every part of my body. It was an amazing feeling, but it was not over yet.

The light within my body glowed stronger, and my body churned as I felt a battle rage within me. A flare of red light burst out of my body holding all of my sufferings and scars.

“Whoa…”

The sight of the red light leaving my body astonished me. I couldn’t help but feel refreshed once again, but it only lasted for a moment. The pain came back within seconds as my skin ripped open unleashing the green light and revealing deeper scars that carved into the depths of my body.

“Wha-What is happening to me?”

Twisting in pain and agony, I screamed out as the pain grew worse and worse, but just as I thought my mind would rip from pain, Cura descended from a sacred white light that pierced through the shadows of the darkness.

“Gratus! I am sorry. I thought everything would be all right, but…”

‘Huh?’

I couldn’t understand. Cura was telling me something, but I couldn’t focus on her words. My consciousness faded, and my mind drifted back into the deep pits of darkness. Trying to move, my body resisted. I continued to struggle as I felt the grasps of darkness holding me in place.

I felt a blast of icy wind blow into my face, and my mind retreated into darkness.

----

“There’s no hope in a life that has given up.”

I paused and stared at Gratus while reflecting on the words he had once told me. They were words that had once saved me from the snares of despair, but so easily was I dragged away by that very force I tried to push away.

I had no means of telling what was going on, but I knew that the situation was dire. Gratus seemed to be unconscious, maybe even dead. Des Peravi had consumed us both and left us in an empty domain of nothingness.

I shouted in anger, “Dammit Cedric! You’re so clueless! Things would have been fine if you didn’t obliterate Des Peravi into nothingness, but from the looks of it, I’m guessing you did.”

I knew no one was listening, but I needed to vent. After calming down, I reconsidered my outburst.

‘Well, I can’t blame him. Des Peravi did do a number on Gratus. Even though he’s usually so carefree—more like reckless and naïve—even he can be taken advantage of when Gratus is involved.’

*sigh*

“I was supposed to use this against Clautz, but what choice do I have in this situation?”

I sighed while continuing to stare at Gratus.

“Pitiful.”

I unsheathed my dagger with the initials of the Morionis family engraved on it.

“It’s either me or you, Gratus. I couldn’t do anything during the Rift. Even if I went back now to that time, I’d be useless. I would have given up in despair if you didn’t appear. I wanted Des Peravi to devour me, but after I saw you in Attero, I knew things would be different. It’s ironic that we ended up like this though.”

I paused and lifted the dagger above my head and over Gratus.

“There’s no hope in Dominia if you are dead.”

I smiled and whispered, “See you soon,” before ramming my knife into his forehead.

…

There was no blood.

*Crack*

The knife cracked, and the space beneath Gratus shattered sucking him away, leaving me behind.

“Alone again.”

*Sigh*