Chapter 93

"What's playing?" Yahweh wiped his hair with a towel and walked over to the sofa.

"Chopin's Nocturne in F minor, Op. 15, No. 1," Xida swayed her pale feet, lounging lazily in the sofa's embrace. "My favorite."

"This vinyl player…" Yahweh ruffled Xida's hair and plopped down, shoving her to the other side of the sofa. "Did Lucy bring it?"

"Mm, I just came home and brought some small items and spare clothes," Lucy nodded lightly from by the window. "While you used showering as an escape tactic."

"Ha…" Yahweh chuckled awkwardly, avoiding a reply, and changed the subject stiffly. "Xida likes Chopin's nocturnes. What about you, Lucy?"

Lucy glanced at him and sighed.

Endless rain, mixed with scattered lights, fell vertically behind her, as if draping her in a misty, magnificent cloak.

"I like Chopin too… especially his Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor…"

"The Funeral March?" Yahweh asked.

"More precisely, the third movement of the Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor," Xida moved her foot onto her boyfriend's warm abdomen and softly corrected him.

"I thought you knew everything," Lucy whispered, hugging her knees, curling into a tiny ball.

"He's just lazy…" Xida stepped on Yahweh's foot and teased him with a grin.

"That's called restraint! Humility!" Yahweh mimicked someone's posture, tilting his head up and stubbornly insisting.

"Are you imitating Xida?" Lucy, having regained her composure, delivered another blow.

"Ah! Why are you two suddenly teaming up to bully me?" Xida cried out, sitting up from the sofa's dip and flinging herself into Yahweh's arms, playfully wrestling with him.

"Cough… I'm still here…" Lucy murmured softly.

Foolish couples are fine in every way—except that they're constantly flirting and teasing, which is unfriendly to singles like her.

"Hehe, now we're complete," Xida ended her playful tussle with Yahweh, breathing lightly, her voice thick with amusement.

"You and me against him, you and him against me, me and him against you…" Like reciting a tongue twister, a faint smile curled on her lips—Lucy, rarely willing to join such childish games, joined in.

Seeing the atmosphere successfully enlivened, Yahweh exhaled in relief.

"Where were we? The third movement?" Xida leaned on Yahweh's shoulder and asked softly.

"The third movement…" Lucy nodded. "But nowadays, in 2074, hardly anyone listens to it anymore."

"After all, death is too common, and few can afford funeral expenses," Xida sighed.

Too many people still struggle desperately in the limbo between hell and the human world, just as she once did.

Unwilling to fall into hell and become a ghost, they cling to the cliff's edge, exhausting every ounce of strength to climb upward.

But when they finally reach the top and look around in confusion, they find the human world is already full.

There are no empty seats left for these pitiful creatures.

◎

The man's agonized scream became an invincible sword, as if ready to cleave through the thick, rain-laden sky.

Rovina gripped the blade in her hand, staring at her former captain and dearest friend kneeling on the ground, her eyes rippling with emotion.

"Beros, I wanted to turn a blind eye…" she spoke, her voice hoarse.

"But you've killed too many people…" Her tone surged like a tidal wave as she roared in fury.

The corpses of her former comrades still bled warm blood.

In a nearby alley, an innocent vagrant, like his old radio, shattered into fragments and scattered across the cold ground.

Too many innocent people, like them, had died silently in Beros's hands.

"You ask me why—I ask you why! Captain! Beros! Why have you become this way!"

The roar faded, and the rain rushed in to fill the silence, like hounds drawn by the scent of blood.

"Why?" Beros stared blankly at his single remaining arm, endlessly questioning himself.

The dragon-slayer, stained with the dragon's evil blood, inevitably becomes a new dragon.

Having spent his life hunting madmen, would he too be consumed by madness?

"No, that's not right—it's that…" He suddenly understood, mouth open, ready to speak the truth.

Before the final word could land, Rovina, consumed by rage, raised her blade once more, slicing through the air like an invisible flash.

Helpless, he raised his Mantis Blades—the same blades that had slain countless enemies—to defend against the attacks from all sides.

Wind and rain were swept away by their combined force, leaving only a dry, circular clearing.

Beros closed his eyes, standing still, swinging his single arm according to instinct.

Each movement of the Mantis Blades anticipated Rovina's incoming strikes as if foreseen by prophecy.

Without exception.

Three minutes passed. In an invisible space, the one-armed man with closed eyes and the furious woman fought at close quarters, their blades briefly touching for an instant before snapping apart—like countless passionate, fleeting kisses between lovers.

No matter how powerful a Sandevistan cybernetic implant is, it cannot transcend time endlessly.

So the battle ended.

The iron-tower man stood firm, not a single step moved.

The red-haired woman, her back steaming, knelt on the ground, leaning on her blade.

The rain returned, mocking them, instantly swallowing both.

"That drug… it's flawed," Beros whispered.

"Drug?" Rovina panted, asking softly.

"We're drinking poison to quench our thirst…" Beros shook his head.

He looked down at his arm—the unbreakable Mantis Blades now covered in cracks and fractures.

"Is Melissa still alive?" He walked to Rovina's side and helped her up.

"Her? Long before I went out for snacks, I already warned her…" Rovina shook her head gently. "She's probably hiding somewhere, as I told her to."

"Good," Beros replied.

He turned and walked toward that ruin, toward the blooming scarlet flower.

"Beros?" Rovena called out to the man's towering back, "What do we do next? Rise up and fight?"

"You liked him, didn't you? Rovena." Beros did not answer; he only knelt before Bit's broken corpse and asked softly.

"Bit... he was scum... how could I..." Rovena reflexively refuted, only realizing a second later that no one would rush out to refute her anymore.

"Forgot to mention..." Beros lowered his head, "That medicine has an effect of greatly enhancing brain function, so I... even with one arm, could block all your attacks."

"Beros..." Rovena wiped a tear that had accidentally spilled from the corner of her eye and slowly walked to the man's back.

"Finally... I'm sorry, Rovena..." Beros said softly.

His tone was lighter than ever before, like a tender sheet of paper, which in an instant was easily torn apart by the clamorous rainstorm.

"What did you say?" Rovena shook his body, but received no response.

The man's heavy body fell to the ground, into the debris and pools of blood.

As if covering his former teammate one last time with a raincoat.

"Captain?"

Rovena shouted loudly, but there would no longer be a voice like thunder to make her instinctively cover her ears.

He was dead.