Bab 32: Chapter 32: Hard Question to Answer
Ares entered the next room, which was circular in shape and had six stone pillars fashioned around the perimeter. In the middle of the room was a raised pedestal with a hole in it, similar to the one at the entrance of the mansion. Ares begrudgingly walked up to the hole and stuck his hand in, bracing for the inevitable. Sure enough, something latched onto his hand again and drained his blood. It lasted a little while longer this time and it kept going until there were blood-red lines weaving around the entirety of the pedestal.
The entire room shook and parts of the ceiling came crashing down before things finally eased up, at which point the pedestal crumbled, revealing a smaller pedestal at roughly chest height that was hidden within. On top of the pedestal was an ornate piece of stoneware. Resting on the plate were a set of crystal, transluscent nerves.
Ares wasn't sure which part of the body specifically the nerves belonged to, or what he was expected to do with this, but he could tell this was what had been calling out to him the entire time. A detached voice in his head was trying to coax him into picking it up, telling Ares that this thing would be invaluable to him, that it would grant him power and that he and he alone could have it. Ares felt a little cautious but, strangely enough, somehow knew the voice wasn't lying to him. It wasn't malicious, there was no ill intent, but it was creeping him the hell out. It's not every day you start hearing voices in your head after all. It wasn't too worrying though as, whenever he heard the voice, he envisioned his blood taking form to speak. Ares guessed it had something to do with his bloodline and that it would go back to being quiet when he took these nerves, even if he had no clue what to do with them.
Ares reached out and the voice in his head kept getting louder and louder as his hand neared the nerves, reaching a climax when he finally touched them, making the voice go from passive but aggressive whispering to frantic screeching.
Ares' whole world blurred and his hands started moving on their own. It was as though he had taken a back seat in his own body and was watching events unfold that were completely unrelated to him.
Ares' hands reached towards his eyes and gauged them out one at a time. Ares was going mad with pain, screaming in muffled breaths in his mind, unable to voice them out loud as his fingers dug into his own skull. Ares almost lost consciousness as his blood-drenched fingers grabbed hold of his optic nerves and began tugging fiercely at them. He went completely stiff and mute when he finally managed to tear one out, only for the process to then repeat itself in the other eye socket. Ares' consciousness was dragged back to reality and he was forced awake thanks to the utter agony he was experiencing. His hand was spasming as it forcefully shoved the new nerve through the socket and into his brain. Ares dreaded every second of this hellish torture as he already knew that he would go through it again for the other eye whether he wanted to or not. His mind blanked out as his fingers wormed their way through grey matter to rewire his nerves and, just as he barely recovered, it happened again in his other eye. His hands were feeling numb and weak and he was feeling light-headed and sick, but his hands just kept moving no matter how much he tried to make them stop. His blood-drenched hands grabbed one of the eyes that they had torn out previously and began wedging the eye back into Ares' head. He thought that, at the very least, maybe, that side was done now, but then he felt a jolt of sharp pain that seemed to last an eternity as the nerve pierced through the back-end of his eye to connect itself. A warm feeling oozed out of his eye as yet more of his blood poured out through his retina. He could feel his bloodline working and trying to heal the eye, but that didn't stop his hands from going to work on his other eye as they repeated the exact same process as before.
As the second nerve pierced through the second eye, Ares fell to his knees and his arms slumped down along his sides, dragging across the floor, covered in blood. His eyes were aching and he was, for the second time today, completely blind. Ares just sat there motionlessly as his mind worked on repairing itself after the pain it had just endured, feeling betrayed by his own body that he wasn't able to control. The thought of losing control like that was horrifying, but it was over now. All that screaming in his head, his loss of free-will, that urging sensation, it was all gone as if it had never even existed to begin with. It was just Ares, alone in a deathly silent, frigid room, kneeling on the stone floor.
The room rumbled and started breaking down again. The floor fell away, revealing the watery hellhole residing under the cliff, and the whole building shook violently. Ares could see none of this, but could feel everything coming down around him. He still couldn't bring himself to move and felt compelled to just let fate take him. What more pain could this house possibly inflict upon him that he hadn't already experienced? It was clearly obvious by now he was only going to suffer, not die. He was too tired to care. The stone beneath him disappeared and the wind rushed past him as he tumbled through the air towards the sea.
"ARES!?"
Although Ares could hear Aejaz's voice, he couldn't see anything, so he just assumed he was hearing another voice like the one in his head.
It was just his imagination.
There was no reason for Aejaz to be here… Or so he thought.
Meanwhile Aejaz watched aghast as an entire mansion faded away with parts of it, Ares included, plummeting into the sea below. When he got over the initial astonishment, he sprinted over to the edge and dove after him.
"AEJAZ"!?" Now it was Allie's turn and she too jumped off the cliff.
"ALLIE!?"
"ENYO!?"
"BELLONA!?"
Gladius meandered over to the edge where Charity had just jumped off, with a degree of a clarity the others before him lacked. Like lemmings, everyone else had now gone barrelling over the cliffside. What was this if not six degrees of separation at its finest!? Gladius simply shrugged his shoulders and sighed while shouting out a completely unrelated person's name, "GERONIMO!"
By now, several people had already landed in the 'water', only to find it was actually a whirlpool of spatial magic, or rather, a teleportation spell that had been cast when the house began fading away on the sea underneath it. Ares was the first one out as he was tossed onto the soft, springy earth that he immediately recognised. He couldn't see, so he didn't know the specifics, but he was definitely somewhere back in the forest. He was tired and couldn't be bothered to move, plus his mind was still reeling from the earlier events, so he just lay still on his stomach at a loss as to what to do next.
"AHHHHHHHH."
Thump
Aejaz landed square on his back, next to Ares, with a loud bump.
"EEEEEK."
"OOF."
Allie came speeding down straight into Aejaz and inadvertently tackled him, dragging both of them a short distance away.
Enyo and the rest of the Legion Clan all landed on their feet in an orderly fashion and came over. They paid no attention to Aejaz other than giving him a quick glare for being so impulsive and bringing everyone with him, and walked over to Ares. "Ares? What the hell was that about? Why are you covered in blood? What are you holding?" Enyo was the first to speak, and she had a lot of questions to ask him.
"..."
"Don't ignore me damnit!" Enyo picked Ares up by the collar and he just dangled silently, unmoving. "YOU…"
"Wait!" Charity stopped Enyo before she could start shaking him. "He's exhausted, his mind is in shock. He won't be able to answer you right now. You should put him down."
Enyo let go and Ares just collapsed back on the floor.
Bellona winced. "Couldn't you have been gentler?"
"I… Didn't expect him to just fall over…" Enyo turned her helmet-hidden face to the side.
"If you're done brutishly beating up my patient, could you please step aside?" Charity complained.
"Diagnosis!"
Charity's eye had a runic pattern on it as she investigated Ares' condition further. She opened up his hands, which had been clenched shut around something and checked his facial region before coming to a conclusion, "Ok, well, you don't see this every day. Also, yeah, he's definitely a revenant. Unless of course you think him walking around with at least three holes in every organ like nothing happened is completely normal. As for… This." Charity gestured at his face and hands. "Honestly? The most likely explanation is that he went insane.
"Why? What happened?" Gladius asked.
"These are nerves." Charity held up the things Ares had been holding onto. "His nerves to be precise. It seems like he tore out his own eyes, yanked out his optic nerves, replaced them, and put his eyes back in. Why? Fuck knows. Whose nerves did he steal? Fuck knows. What was up with that funky ass mansion? Fuck knows. You'll have to ask him when he comes back from Lala land." Charity took out a blindfold and put it around Ares' eyes as they were sensitive right now and needed to heal. She also used her healing mist on him again.
"I swear, the longer I put up with him, the stupider the situations I keep finding him in get." Enyo shook her head in disbelief.
"Actually, I've heard of that mansion before," Gladius spoke up. "Apparently, even transition realm cultivators have died in there, the place is infamous. I'm surprised none of you have heard about it. For a long time, people kept trying to figure out what was inside, but nobody that ever went in, ever came back out. Over time, people gave up on the idea of exploring it and it became a no-go zone. It single-handedly put Baja Forest on the map. Did none of you research this place?" Gladius looked around at everyone who either avoided making eye contact or started whistling to themselves. "Of course not," Gladius' eye twitched as he spoke in a deflated tone.
"That aside, our grand entrance made a lot of noise. We should leave before any monsters come on over as protecting someone who's injured will just be a hassle."
Ares was barely conscious enough to let out an unappreciative groan as if to complain about being called a 'hassle'.
"Quiet you schmuck." Enyo felt a strong desire to kick Ares.
"Ah, too late." Bellona nodded her head at the monsters that had gathered.
"Tsk, of all the places we could have ended up, we landed right inside treetop tiger territory," Gladius fussed.
"Uh, why do I feel like those deer want to eat me?" Aejaz was being stared down by a few hydra deer.
Something clicked in Ares' mind and he kept letting out small grunts to try and get everyone's attention.
"Will you shut up?" Enyo couldn't care less about Ares' squirming.
Ares put all his remaining strength into lifting up his arm and clicking his finger twice in quick succession.
The treetop tigers stopped growling and the deer tilted their heads at this familiar noise. One of the tigers, memorable thanks to his distinct pattern, plodded over to Ares in a harmless, almost cute fashion with no ill-intent, so everyone just watched. The tiger sniffed Ares a couple times and turned around to the rest of the monsters and mewed loudly. The rest of the tigers all came running over and started licking Ares, with a few even plopping down on his back and curling up to go to sleep. The deer also came over and found resting spots near Ares before taking their naps. It was nothing short of bizarre watching these vicious monsters all start cuddling with Ares, purring and meowing like trained house kittens. Everyone just stared dumbly as Ares raised a thumb to signify everything was fine before he blanked out. Perhaps they were in the presence of an animal whisperer? Honestly, nothing involving Ares ever made any sense anyway.
"Uh, I guess we'll be safe here then?" Aejaz questioned.
"Aww, they're all so cute!" Allie and Bellona had snuck over and started playing with a few of the mini tigers that hadn't gone to sleep.
"A… Allie?" Aejaz was more than just a little worried.
"Well, whatever. Who's on watch duty? Not me, of course," Charity asked as it was getting late and she wanted to sleep.
Ares had entered the mansion at night and been battered and kicked around for a full 24 hours.
"I will," Enyo volunteered, although it sounded more like a threat to anyone who was willing to challenge her.
"Alright then, goodnight." Charity and Gladius made no effort to argue.
"Sorry little fellas, but I'm kinda sleepy too. We'll play more tomorrow, ok?" Allie said goodnight to everyone, tigers included.
"Goodnight." Aejaz found a place in between Allie and the tigers, just in case.
Allie noticed this before she closed her eyes and smiled at Aejaz' back.
"Are you not going to sleep?" Enyo asked Bellona, who was now hovering around her.
"Nah, at least not before you and I have a talk," Bellona whispered quietly so no one else could hear and simultaneously nodded her head towards the forest.
Enyo was reluctant for two reasons; one was that she really was trying to keep watch, the other was that she already knew what the conversation was going to be about. Realistically, everyone would be safe here for a while with all the monsters around. No creature would be foolish enough to venture into the tiger's habitat anyway, so she couldn't use that as an excuse not to go. Enyo realised she was just going to have to bite the bullet on this one. She got up and headed out of ear-shot of everyone else with Bellona and found a cosy area with a log bench that someone, presumably Ares as he'd clearly been here before, made.
Bellona sat next to her and didn't say anything.
"... Fine, you win. I'm sorry," Enyo owned up to being wrong without even being prompted.
"You know, what bothered me more about you leaving back then after our argument wasn't that you left without saying anything, but that you hadn't learnt anything because you hadn't listened to a word of what I said. I don't need an apology from you, I'm just glad you're finally learning what it is that our mother taught me and tried so hard to teach you. 'There will come a time when you have to question whether or not your responsibilities are worth being responsible for,' she used to say. I guess that time is now, huh? I saw that dagger in your hand earlier, the one you always carry around 'just in case' you come across a revenant, but you stopped when you saw the state Ares was in."
"I can't do it. Ares. He annoys me but I don't hate him. Not enough to kill him, and then keep hunting him down and killing him as a child over and over. The weird thing is that I don't feel irresponsible, even though I should."
"Should you really? According to who? Our father?"
"I see we're going to have this conversation again."
"Yeah, well, it's pertinent, don't you think? Also, Allie told me that Ares reminds you of dad."
"Tsk, that backstabber. Now I know how Ares felt, betrayed by a sibling." Enyo wasn't actually mad, just a little annoyed she had no way out of this talk.
"I think he reminds me more of mum."
"Yeah… You're right. I only originally said he reminded me of dad because of an argument we had."
"Mum would be happy to see you again, I'm the only one that's gone back to her since we all left. She'd be overjoyed to know you've started making your own decisions."
"I'll admit, I'm worried she'll knock me around for a while first though, you know what she can be like."
"Mhm, I also know that if you tell her about this, the only thing she'll ask you is, 'why couldn't you kill him in particular?' You should think of an answer before then, or she'll interrogate you 'till the sun comes down and then some."
"I told you already, it's because I don't hate him enough."
"Nope, it's not. Not only have you killed revenants that you haven't hated, because you'd never even known them, you also probably 'hate' Ares more than every single one of them combined. He drives you insane and, according to you, is nothing but trouble. I don't buy it."
"Maybe… I feel sorry for him, I guess? It's not like his situation is that different from ours, if anything, he's probably had it worse."
"And so have a lot of the other revenants we've killed. I don't buy that either."
"Then I have no clue. Honestly? I don't know why but, when I looked at him, I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I know I say he's troublesome a lot, but I don't actually dislike him. He cares for his makeshift 'family', he can be surprisingly thoughtful and, as much as I hate to say it, we get along just fine in spite of all our arguments and how annoying he is. Aejaz once said we're quite similar. At the time, I thought he was insane but, the more I see of Ares, the more I realise that Aejaz was maybe right. Of course, there are still differences. He can be really easy-going a lot of the time, but I think part of me is slowly realising that I want to be more like that; like you, like mother, like him."
"I think you're slowly getting it, and being around Ares has helped you a great deal, I think. You aren't the same Enyo you were before you met him, that's for sure, and you've only known him for a week. Still though, none of those realisations answer the question I asked. You should think about it some more before you next see mum 'cos, unlike me, she'll just tell you the answer, and I think you should figure it out yourself."
"Wait, you already know? Then why are you asking?"
"Because I think it would do you good to take it into consideration. I'm your sister so, naturally, I have your best interest at heart and, while I may not always be right, I feel pretty confident that if you can figure out the answer to my question, you'll be happy you did."
"Who says I'm not happy?" Enyo sounded offended.
"I meant happier. By the way, on a somewhat related topic, is it me, or has Allie seemed peppier than usual today?"
"Yeah, she has. I was going to find some time to ask her about it, actually."
"Ha, slow as ever with these kinds of things. I'll spare you the trouble. She and Aejaz are hitting it off. I'm not sure what's been said, but something has definitely been said."
"How on earth could you possibly know that?"
"Because I'm not blind as a bat when it comes to stuff like this."
"Neither am I," Enyo objected. "I think I would have noticed if those two were that much closer than before.
"Nope, clearly not. In fact, I don't even think you would notice if someone was in love with you."
"Don't be silly, of course I would. You think I don't know about Trew? God, I wish he'd leave me alone."
"Screw Trew, he's far too obvious about his intentions. Trust me, anyone else and you'd have no clue." Bellona stuck out her tongue at Enyo.
"Hmph, if you say so. What about you then?"
"Me? Of course I would. Actually, I have noticed. I've just never cared."
"Why not?"
"Oh please, spare me. No way in hell I'm gonna go anywhere near one of our clan members, they'd just bore me to death."
"That didn't stop mother."
"Yeah, and even though she still loves dad, she still considers it a mistake to this day."
"Then who? One of the other clans? Or someone from this domain?"
"Dunno, as long as they fit the bill, who cares?"
"And what type is that, exactly?"
"Hm, I guess… Someone like Ares." Bellona smirked.
"W… What!?"
"Yeah, I mean, why not right? An above average, and quite unique, look. He's strong, capable, reliable, kind-hearted, caring, and funny. He's got a lot going for him. Besides, I've always said I want a man whose magical output synergises with my unique aspect. I really like my unique aspect, which is why I want the person I dedicate my life to to be able to make use of it in a way that no other man can. From what I've heard of his magic, it would certainly be a sight to behold."
"Uh… Good luck, I guess," Enyo sounded a little unsure while giving her 'supportive' response, and Bellona was more aware of this than Enyo was herself.
"Who said it had to be Ares?"
"Huh?"
"I said someone LIKE Ares, not him specifically. I was just listing qualities."
"Oh, I see. Why not?" Enyo's uncertainty in her voice had all but vanished.
"I get the feeling he wouldn't be interested." Bellona chuckled.
"Why?"
Bellona could tell that Enyo was subconsciously worried that, because they were similar to one another, this indirectly affected her chances too, even if she had no clue that was why she was actually asking. Enyo wasn't in love, per se, but she was definitely slowly getting there. Given some more time with Ares, she would figure it out herself. He was changing her, and she was actively trying to become more like him. She admitted it herself after all.
"I know this might sound strange." Bellona tried not to cackle evilly as she prepared herself to deliver the final blow. "But I think you'd be more his type."
"W… Wha… ME!?" Enyo was taken aback and momentarily speechless. "Have you seen the way he acts with me!?"
"I'm just sayin'." Bellona put her hands in the air like it had nothing to do with her but, inside, she was overjoyed to see the usually stoic Enyo get flustered like this. More importantly, Bellona cared more about the fact that Enyo's first response wasn't that she wasn't interested. It didn't look like she was even thinking of saying it. That thought hadn't even crossed her mind.
"No… No, I doubt I'd be his type." Enyo shook her head.
"Strong, independent woman that he respects? Determined in her beliefs? Proud? I think that's his type."
"Well…" Enyo didn't want to put herself down and say she wasn't any of those things, and she couldn't in good faith say she didn't think that was Ares' type.
"Well, I think that's enough fun for tonight. We should get back and make sure the tigers haven't started eating anyone yet. Aejaz would for sure be a goner, but at least his little act of heroism might mean we still make it in time to save Allie," Bellona joked.
"..."
"What's on your mind?"
Enyo replied meekly, "Nothing,"
Definitely not nothing, Bellona mused. She had done her part and planted the seed, now it was Ares' job to water it. The main reason Bellona felt like helping Ares was because he really had been having a positive effect on Enyo and they both seemed to get along well with one another. Bellona truly believed they would be happy with each other otherwise she wouldn't have done a thing for Ares, just as she hadn't lifted a finger for Trew.
The two walked back and moved silently when they returned so as not to wake anyone. Bellona found a spot and waved at Enyo before turning around and dozing off. Enyo sat back down and looked over at Ares, who had been practically buried in a mountain of fur underneath the tigers. Even a few of the deer had repositioned and were sleeping up against him now, resting their heads contently on him. Although she was supposed to be keeping an eye out, she spent most of the night looking at Ares with countless thoughts and questions racing through her mind, the main one being, 'Why couldn't I bring myself to kill him?'
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone