The human heart - it is a difficult thing to understand.
It gives one courage, yet makes them cower at times. It gives one hope, yet drowns itself in despair all the same. It gives one strength, yet remains everyone's biggest weakness.
This duality of it, this unmistakable division of what people may classify as 'good' and 'bad', this is what truly makes the human heart a subject that is hard to understand.
Yet, it isn't as big a deal as many think it is.
After all, at the base of it all, the human heart desires one simple thing - completion. It requires to feel whole.
And, as long as it doesn't feel whole, it will keep on demanding.
Sneha: "..."
No matter how much one has, it will keep on asking for more.
For every single penny one gains, it will desire two more. For every single victory one achieves, it will desire three more. And, more than anything else, for every single moment of fulfilment, it will desire five more.
Laurie: "..."
That, in the simplest form, is the essence of the human heart.
That, in the base form, is where all the cardinal sins come from.
Whether it is the envy towards someone even slightly better or stronger than one, whether it is the wrath towards being humiliated by an opponent, or whether it is the pride that stops one from doing something just because the opponent suggests it, it all comes from this simple want of a human heart to be whole.
And, while there are many moments of great change or importance in one's life that may stick and change the person and their desires somewhat, a permanent change is hardly ever the case and at the end of the day, one would return to their base desires when given a little push.
In most of these cases, these moments of change only end up being foolish memories that could accomplish nothing worth mentioning at all.
So, this moment,
Sneha: "... Tsk!"
This moment, this place, this carnage,
Laurie: "... Hah! Hah!"
Soon enough, it would lose its meaning too.
Sneha: "E … enough of this!"
Knowing all that somewhere deep within her mind, the Aural brings her hand, imbued with tremendous power, down onto the Hellfire trying to catch her breath.
And with that, it all ends - the moment filled with the human heart's foolish desires, it all ends right then and there.
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"My lady?"
In a polite voice, a man clad in a butler's uniform addressed the woman lying comfortably on her bed and staring into space,
Woman: "Yes, what is it?"
Butler: "There's someone on the door who wishes to see you."
He said so with a troubled look that he did his best to hide but was unable to. And so, this woman, Laurie Brown, sighed with a bored voice.
Laurie: "Isn't it well-known that anyone who wishes to see me needs an appointment? And I don't remember having any appointments today so whoever it is, tell them to go."
She did not care at all who it was that had come to meet her. And so, she was quick in giving her dismissing answer. However,
Butler: "I'm afraid, my lady, that you will have to see this man despite any of that."
Laurie: "What did you just say!?
A sharper tone by the butler led to a sharper tone by her as well, but,
Butler: "If you don't do as I am asking you to do then,"
With his polite smile gone and replaced by a tense and despaired face, he pulled out a gun from one of the pockets of his uniform and put it to Laurie's head, surprising her completely.
Butler: "Then I'll just have to force you."
Laurie: "..."
She was at a loss for words.
Someone had turned her loyal butler to put a gun to her head. Of course, she was at a loss for words. And so, despite not wanting to,
Laurie: "Oh yeah?"
After dismantling the gun with psychokinesis and putting the butler to sleep with a fist chop, She decided to go see who her visitor is.
She was in a mansion, a mansion she wasn't very familiar with because of only recently having come to live there, and so it took her some time to get to the entrance where that man was waiting for her.
But while this may not have been any more than some minutes, it felt like hours to her - all because of her constant irritation and anger. The worst part, however, was that she had no idea what she was so angry about or what she was so irritated about.
And then, she saw that man, and in an instant, something else took over.
Laurie: "Why are … you of all people …?"
She couldn't even word the entire question as she stood there awestruck by the identity of her visitor.
It was none other than Reid Vezalius Rosevelt.
Rosevelt: "Why so surprised? Since you are one of the most talented Psychics in the world, surely you would have expected to get a visit from me someday."
Rosevelt asks her, to which she replies with nothing.
Rosevelt: "Well, in any case, have a seat. Though, I guess I don't have the right to say that since this is YOUR place."
Not at all caring about the carefree tone of his voice, she prepared herself for teleportation so she could escape if she needed to, and then sat down to listen to what the Phoenix had to say, all while her heart's beating kept growing louder than her brain could handle.
Rosevelt: "Well, pardon me for getting straight down to business, Ms Brown, but I would like for you to join Vermilion - as a Hellfire."
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The gates of the old school inn opened and a woman walked in.
Noticing her, all pairs of eyes but one turned to her. And because of her clothing and her beauty, those already there couldn't help but stare at her, all except one man.
It just so happened to be that the man who didn't react at all was the person she was looking for. At least, it felt like it. It wasn't a logical deduction but an intuitional one and to people like her, that more often than not mattered more than logic.
So, she went over to that man and straight-up asked,
"Are you Ethan Kales?"
And then, the man answered.
Ethan: "Yes, indeed I am, Ms Stone."
Sneha: "I see. So you are the one who called me here, correct? What do you want from me?"
She asked, cautious and meticulously investigative.
Ethan: "Well, in simple terms, I want to team up with you and help you reach your goals. Of course, in turn, I want you to help me reach mine."
He said without a sliver of worry or anxiety.
Sneha: "Huh?"
To hear someone so casually talk about helping her reach her goal when she had not ever mentioned her goal in front of another person - it was either downright creepy or downright scary, either of which are not pleasant at all.
Ethan: "Don't look so surprised now. You do want to find out what really happened to the members of your now former Aural school, don't you? And you want to find out why it happened as well, right?"
Ethan suggested, making it clear that he really knows what the Aural's goal was. Some would say this was a simple situation. After all, the Aural just needed to answer 'yes' or 'no'.
Sneha: "..."
But, being asked something like that by someone who blackmailed her to arrange that meeting, she was truly overwhelmed … or did it leave her underwhelmed?
Ethan: "Something wrong, Ms. Stone?"
Maybe it did leave her underwhelmed. After all, to be given a choice to ally herself with someone who mostly spun everything in vague words, what else could she feel but underwhelmed?
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As you all know, this chapter was supposed to release yesterday. I'm sorry it got delayed a day. ><
But, well, I guess the silver lining is that now you can read the entire chapter at once instead of just this part.
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In its purest form, the human heart longs to be whole.
When Laurie Brown, who had lost track of all the achievements in her life and had no idea what she should do to make herself satisfied had been approached by the Phoenix with an offer to do something so extraordinarily dangerous as become a Hellfire, sure, she let her mind run its course, trying to come with all the reasons why she shouldn't join, but her heart had already told her the answer she wanted to give.
Similarly, when Sneha Stone, who had no idea how to find out anything about the death of her fellow pupil and her teachers, whose search had led her to a partnership with Vermilion, one that was not helping much with her investigation either, had been given the offer to find out about them by working with Ethan Kales, sure, she let her mind run its course as well, trying to come up with all the reason why she shouldn't team-up with a man whose way of contacting people was blackmail, but her heart too had already told her the answer she wanted to give.
And, in those moments, both the women did, in the end, choose the answers that their hearts told them to choose, ignoring their intelligence.
And, because of those decisions back then, the two had now ended up in a battle against each other.
One of them comes from a rich family with a history as old as the aristocratic times of Great Britain and the other is the sole survivor of a well-respected Aural school. Under normal circumstances, these two would have no reason to meet each other, much less fight each other.
Yet, they are here - fighting each other, and it's because of them listening to their hearts and not their minds.
And, maybe, at some level, they realized this. And so, in this battle too, they let their minds run their course, coming up with strategies to defeat each other, but, at the end of the day, they chose to do what their hearts told them to.
Laurie's heart told her to not get humiliated, not listen to whatever her opponent says, and attack without healing to hold onto her pride.
This led to her standing herself up with pure Psychic Energy and then charging right at her opponent.
Sneha's heart told her to not attack her while she is so weak but also to not take her attacks either.
This led to her constantly defending against Laurie's strikes.
And this continued for a fair amount of time.
However, as all things do, this had to come to an end. After all, how long could the two keep it up despite knowing the futility of it?
And so, they stopped and got away from each other.
One's mind told her to heal and the other's told her to attack while the opponent's vulnerable but neither listened.
Instead, Laurie Brown convulses Psychic Energy inside her, a move that caused her pain because of her wounds coming into direct contact with rapidly moving energy. But, even so, she doesn't stop doing so. And, when she is ready, she makes herself invisible.
Sneha Stone, on the other hand, first waits for her opponent to become invisible, and then after her opponent disappears from her sight, tries to read Aura to find her and dodge her attacks.
But, this time, the Aural was too slow.
By the time Sneha realized where the attack was coming from, she had no way left to dodge the strike to her backbone.
Her bones audibly crack and her legs lose their strength for a moment as a very crucial part of her body is hit with such force.
But, it isn't all.
Having gotten the chance to attack more, there was no reason for the Psychic to stop just there.
So, she continues.
Laurie Brown continued with her strikes on her opponent's backbone, constantly breaking them without even giving her opponent the chance to scream in pain.
However, all of a sudden, her attacks stop. It's not that she stops, but her attacks do.
Even Laurie herself does not know why her hands suddenly stopped being able to connect to her opponent's body, why her hands suddenly started feeling so drained of energy.
She doesn't even realize why all of that is happening - not until she sees her feet and realizes that she isn't standing exactly where she had stood before.
She has been thrown back by a powerful back kick to the stomach and after her back does, her head ends up directly hitting the trunk.
She wonders if she is already too hurt to realize things like this in time and even feel the pain in time, can she really continue on like this? Or, should she give in and heal?
But, unfortunately, she didn't get the time to answer that question of hers.
In front of her, the Aural who has kept standing straight only by binding her shattered bones together through Aural Energy raised her arm like a butcher's knife and both her glare and her arm faced just the Hellfire.
The Hellfire realizes what is going to happen.
If her head is already so hurt that she can't process things in time and can't even immediately detect it when she is hit on it, then she must already be vulnerable enough to die from a really powerful hit to the head, especially a hit that, by nature, can split open her skull.
For the Aural, attacking this Hellfire was outside of her code until now. After all, they were on very unequal footing.
But, with her backbone broken like it is, that is no longer the case.
They may still not be complete equals but they are no longer so far apart that it is unfair to attack.
And so, knowing all of that, and knowing the futility of everything that has happened in this fight as well as everything that is happening now, the Aural brings her hand down, and the Hellfire did her best to defend.
Gallons of Aural Energy clashed with gallons of Psychic Energy and both pushed each other back.
The Aural almost loses her balance as she is pushed back and the Hellfire feels a sharp pain in her head as the same happens to her.
Sneha: "..."
The Hellfire tries to stand up but can't as the Aural, once again, raises her arm in the same manner, but this time, she no longer holds anything back.
And this time, the Hellfire doesn't hold anything back either.
And so, they clash again.
And once again, they cancel each other out.
The Aural falls and the Hellfire feels an even sharper pain in her head.
Laurie: "..."
But, it is still not over.
They have used all their spare energy but the result has not been decided. So, it is still not over.
Sneha: "... Tsk!"
Laurie: "... Hah! Hah!"
So, for one final time, the Aural stands herself up and takes the same stance. The Hellfire prepares herself with the same defensive stance as well.
Sneha: "E … enough of this!"
And, for one last time, using all their stored energy, the energy they had been using to keep themselves alive with so many bones and organs of their body destroyed, they clash once again.
And this time, whether it is the difference in their stored energy, their concentration in using it, their ability to think clearer, or just pure luck, but the Aural cracks the skull of her opponent open, and then falls down to the ground in pain as the blood of her opponent spurts forth rapidly, bathing her in a dark and deep scarlet.
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