Noir closed his eyes.
He felt heavy.
He opened them.
The world looked much brighter than he remembered before he got stabbed. Except for the dark part where the portal was supposed to be slowly lowering... No, the building was slowly rising.
Had been, Noir remembered. Since Maledict had arrived, the entire place had halted with the portal at the highest reaches of the pillars.
It wasn't the first time he'd felt such pain, but it was the first time he'd felt it so deeply. Felt it enough to know that each of his heartbeats was getting weaker than the next.
There was movement...
He focused enough to see what it was.
Kir, fighting another demonkin. The latter using swift thrusts while Kir used sweeps and strikes.
Maledict, Kir's father, stood still, rotating as he watched the battle with interest.
Noir remembered that it was Maledict's order that saw him dying...
Why?