The room was silent. Completely silent, save for the sound of breaths, Elias and the unconscious Kade were taking.
"I..." Elias glanced at the green box in his hand. "...Should start."
’What am I even hesitating for? I already knew I had to do it at the end of the day.’
Elias shook his head and gulped down the healing potion.
"I am only wasting this thing, sigh."
He looked at the empty bottle in his hand with a wry smile. This thing wasn’t going to do anything anyway, and Elias knew.
In the end, he was once more back in his dilemma. Was it a dilemma?
Of course not. It wasn’t a dilemma. He already knew from the start that he had to kill Kaden.
There was a second option. It was to let Evelyn take care of it, like all the things she was doing. She would have been quite happy, too.
However, Elias wanted to do it himself. He wanted to kill the man with his own hands. It was so that he could prevent himself from panicking if a situation arose.
’I have already seen a lot.’
Blood. A lot of it.
Countless dead bodies and several twisted games with mounting numbers of painful deaths.
One of the twisted examples was right in front of him.
Ba-dump!
The heart was clearly visible, the muscles contracting and relaxing as it beat in rhythm. The torn muscles, the dried blood, and the caved-in rib bones—all of it was grotesquely visible.
Signs of healing were also present, pointing towards the fact that some amount of healing potion was given to the man sitting in front of Elias with his eyes closed.
’It’s clearly a lot. Overwhelmingly so!’
Still, thinking about something and doing it were very different things.
Yet, Elias was not going to chicken out.
He shook his head.
’I should focus. It’s not that bad a thing considering the number of things I have seen today. Still...’
Elias clenched his jaw.
"Let’s... get to it already."
Ha...
Silence curtained. It was suffocating.
Elias sat before Kade, both in designer cushion chairs. The only difference was that Elias was alive and doing perfectly fine, while Kade sat with his head hung and eyes closed, passed out, and teetering near death.
’Focus.’
In his left hand, Elias had a gold coin. On his right, he held the green octagonal box.
There was no sign of panic on Elias’ face now as he stared at Kade.
After a few seconds, which felt longer than ever, Elias threw water on Kade’s face from whatever was remaining in the flowerpot.
Splash!
No reaction.
Water dribbled, wetting Kade’s broken face, but he still remained unconscious.
’Seriously! What am I even doing?’
Elias threw the jar aside.
He stood up and took hold of Kade by his blond locks.
"Hey," his voice echoed, tearing through the silence of the room. "Wake up."
He shook Kade’s head aggressively.
No matter how much injury he had sustained, Elias was not even thinking of giving him any drop of healing potion, which a normal person would have considered, considering the guy was still not waking up after minutes of shaking his head aggressively.
’The healing potion has already worked. Why is he not waking up?’
Elias confusedly slapped Kade. He didn’t want to give any potion to the guy in front of him. It would be going to waste anyway.
Slap!
Kade still did not wake up.
So, now Elias was slapping Kade while shaking his head aggressively.
Fortunately, the hard work showed its result.
Kade opened his eye. The remaining one, of course.
"...Uuh..."
Some words leaked from his mouth.
"You woke up finally," Elias smiled as he freed Kade’s hair.
Kade blinked. His blue eye stared right at the young man before him.
Before—
His right eye burned. It felt as if the socket were empty without the eyeball.
His right hand’s thumb also felt lost.
His chest felt split.
His face felt caved.
His arms felt wrecked.
His...
His whole body felt as if broken piece by piece.
The pain. It came crashing down.
The senses overloaded. As if Kade were experiencing all of this for the first time.
"AA...! ...AAUUUHHHH!!!"
He screamed, his eye bulging.
The scream continued to echo. After minutes of screaming, Kade looked at Elias with tear-filled eyes and asked in a hoarse voice.
"Wh... aa... Why are you doing this?"
Elias didn’t answer.
"Let’s first get over this quickly," he said, as he opened the octagonal green box. "I will tell you then, okay."
Seeing the box, Kade’s body shook, as if refusing.
"No! No, no, no!"
He started to deny, trying to shake his head.
Trying to do anything that could keep him away from the thing present in the box.
"There is no need for you to worry." Elias took out the thing present in the box.
It was a ring.
It was nothing short of extraordinary-looking. Instead, it was simple-looking and looked to be carved from iron. No gemstones, no nothing.
"You are going to die anyway. Even if I don’t kill you, you will die."
Kade’s face twitched, his eye straining at Elias.
Elias didn’t say a word. His face was blank as he pointed towards the red box present on the table near them.
Kade’s eyes followed.
He blinked, then his gaze trailed down towards his own body. His senses felt something missing.
Kade’s eye shook, his pupil dilating.
"...N-o..."
Kade looked back towards Elias.
"Why?"
He choked out.
But as always, no answers came.
Elias, disregarding Kade, brought the ring and slipped it on his right hand’s index finger.
For a second, Elias didn’t do anything; he only stared at the ring on Kade’s finger before finally backing up a little.
Looking at the face of the man before him, which was etched with an expression that told him he had completely given up on struggling, Elias didn’t say anything.
The silence persisted before, at last, Elias broke it.
"Are you ready?" He asked, standing in front of Kade. Kade didn’t answer; however, Elias still continued. "The rules are simple."
Elias pointed towards the gold coin in his hand.
"If face comes," he said as he showed the number "1" carved on the coin to Kade, who had simply lost all of his will and seemed to be looking into a void. "You will win, and I will have to free you. Not only this, but I would also return the demon core to you and kill myself and the woman that came with me."
Still, no reaction from Kade.
Elias didn’t care. He turned the coin and showed the part where the symbol of a radiant sun was carved beautifully.
"However, if the Sun comes, you would lose."
Tick tock.
The sound of the second hand on Elias’ watch echoed. He flipped the coin in the air.
The coin spun, the gold shining under the light of the chandelier.
Elias’s eyes followed the coin.
Suddenly, Kade spoke up. The light in his eye had vanished.
"Why are you doing this? Why me? Are you really from the organization or..."
Elias’s eyes continued to follow the coin.
Tick!
It landed on the floor.
"You are just unlucky. Nothing else."
Elias at last answered.
The coin spun before it started to stop. The face came!
"I see."
Kade replied, a smile forming on his face.
Thud!
A sudden rattling echoed, shaking the whole room and the coin... it flipped, now showing the sun.
Elias turned to face Kade now.
A smile was on the face of Kade.
"Thanks for answering."
As these words left Kade’s lips, his hurt stuttered and came to a halt. His body twitched, the blood vessels swelling, twitching above the skin.
Seconds later, they disappeared.
Following this, Kade’s skin started to tear apart.
One by one, blood came out. His internal organs burst; his eyes burst.
SPLUURCHH!
Every part of his body tore as his internal organs burst.
The death was gruesome. Only crimson remained, as Kade’s body went limp.
The surroundings reeked of metal, and Elias got covered in blood.
Turning his head rigidly, Elias glanced at the forefinger of Kade, where he had slipped the ring on him.
Now, there was a glow. A green glow.
It was emanating dangerously.
Like a machine, Elias moved his hand and removed the ring from Kade’s finger.
The ring had now totally changed. It looked nothing like earlier.
Its body had now changed into a dark metal, as if sucking the surrounding darkness. Jagged teeth-like structures jutted out, holding a gem-like structure that sat on top.
However, it wasn’t a gem. Instead, it was a transparent glassy cover that held a small roulette inside, which glowed green.
Elias stared at the ring for seconds before removing his glove and slipping it on his right hand’s index finger.
A sharp sting passed before the ring settled, as if it were the place it always wanted to come to.
After this, Elias put back the glove and turned towards the door of the room, where a certain blood-covered figure stood.
"You are back."