"...I was blaming my teenage hormones," Atlas muttered, voice rough as gravel, "but this fruit was at fault all the ti."
The chamber breathed in with him—stone, stale smoke, and old regrets.
A flicker in the shadows.
A breath held.
Then—
"Yeah. That was convenient," Veil drawled, stepping forward.
Its single eye glowed faintly beneath the cowl, the rest of its form barely more than suggestion—like a sketch soone tried to erase from existence but couldn’t quite finish. It didn’t walk so much as ooze across the ground, like ink spilled by a careless god too tired to clean it up.
Atlas exhaled slowly. Smoke slipped between his lips, curling into the air above—thin, fragile, vanishing like forgotten prayers.
"I was right," Atlas muttered, almost to himself. "It wasn’t my fault I slept with Isabella of all people."
Veil tilted its head, just slightly. A twitch. A grin hidden sowhere in the folds of shadow.
"...No man," it replied after a beat. "It was yours. Your eyes told everything."
Atlas snorted. The sound was bitter, low. "What the fuck, you’re talking like you were there..."
Silence.
Too long.
A pause so heavy it felt like the world stopped breathing.
Then—
"...Oh yeah," Atlas said quietly. "You were."
He turned slowly. Eyes narrowing, jaw tightening. "Damn," he muttered. "You enjoyed the show?"
Veil didn’t answer imdiately. Instead, it raised one clawed hand—graceless, curved like a broken crescent—and brushed the air. Mimicking a touch. A caress. Sothing it could witness but never have.
"Like I ’elaborated’ before," Veil whispered, voice unnaturally smooth. "It was freaking traumatic."
Atlas scoffed, brazing his hair back, it was getting longer, unbecoming of a prince.
"Fucking hell. You’re disgusting."
Veil said nothing. It didn’t need to. The silence did all the talking—thick, pulsing with sothing unspoken. Not guilt. Not sha. Just... hunger.
Always hunger.
Atlas leaned back, arms braced behind him, spine aching from more than just strain. His gaze drifted upward to the moon—blood-colored tonight, as if the sky had been wounded and never healed.
"...I’m going to join the war," he said suddenly, the words cutting through the silence like a blade drawn too quickly.
Veil blinked once.
Just once.
"Finally..." it murmured. "I can flex a bit."
"No," Atlas snapped, voice edged now. "You ain’t coming."
Its body tensed.
Not with rage.
With confusion.
A twitch in the dark. Like a shadow forgetting its master.
Veil’s single eye flickered, pale and phosphorescent, as if it didn’t understand what it had just heard. For once, it didn’t crack a joke. Didn’t sneer. Didn’t mock.
Just stared.
"What the fuck... what is it now..."
Atlas stood, stretching the tension out of his shoulders. His joints cracked like dry wood under pressure. There was war in his spine, and resignation in his breath.
"Take care of the mage," he said, tone clipped, cold. "I don’t want him assassinated or turned into so Kingdom-bought at puppet. He’s important."
Veil tilted its head. That eerie tilt—the kind that made mortals sweat and gods reconsider their taphors.
"...And what do I get?"
Atlas smirked, tired but sharp. "All the corpses I kill in the war."
A pause.
Veil blinked once. Then again. And then—
A wet, guttural chuckle rose from its throat like tar from a poisoned well.
"10,000," Veil said, his voice low.
"...If I get to devour that many, then..." Veil added, a devious smirk curling across his face.
"Then...?"
"I will evolve, dumbass. Humans are filled with mana. Every part of their body has a dense, delectable taste of it..." he muttered, saliva dripping from his mouth and pooling on the floor.
"...What the fuck... You’re drooling all over the damn floor. Disgusting. Did you forget I’m a human too?" Atlas said, pulling his foot back before the drool could touch his shoes.
"...You? Human?" Veil paused, his voice darkening. "Atlas... I stopped considering you human the mont you defeated . The mont you ate the Fruit of Life and danced with in the shadows."
Atlas felt a chill. The words were sharp—too sharp—but undeniably true. His body was a ss, one he’d long chosen to ignore. His heartbeat was unnaturally slow. His blood carried the scent of a mana core more than iron. And his so-called seed—his bloody, fucking sperm—it wasn’t human anymore.
"Haaa..." He sighed. "...Seems you carry more wisdom than I do. Fine. Deal. Ten thousand it is," he said, extending his hand toward the shadow.
Veil grinned wickedly as his shadow stretched out, forming a hand of darkness that gripped Atlas’s firmly.
"Deal."
Atlas narrowed his eyes. "Wait—really? No argunt? No cryptic nonsense about fate, or threads of destiny, or how the moon’s whispering secrets to your spine?"
Veil stepped forward slowly, its form coalescing into sothing halfway between man and monster, as though choosing not to decide.
"You’ll be fine," it said, like it was stating the color of the sky.
Atlas crossed his arms. "How the hell do you know that?"
There was a beat of silence. Then, Veil’s voice softened—not kind, but precise. Like a blade sheathed in sarcasm.
"Because Loki, Aurora, and ... we’re the only ones who can hurt you."
Atlas blinked.
That wasn’t a threat.
It was a confession.
His mouth twitched, but the humor didn’t reach his eyes. "Wow... I can’t believe I’m being emotionally blackmailed by my own shadow."
He exhaled, bitter. The sound carried like a curse. "Fuck my life..."
Veil turned to leave—but then paused.
Its voice drifted back, low and dry.
"Oh, fuck ... for caring. I’m gonna go. Gonna eat so of your books again. Hopefully annoy that simp-giant while I’m at it."
Then it vanished.
Not with a sound. Not with a shimr.
Just... absence.
Like a word you forget mid-sentence.
Atlas stood there for a beat longer, rubbing a hand through his disheveled hair. His mind still buzzing from what Veil had said. And not said.
The room was quiet now. Almost too quiet.
The scent of singed paper lingered in the air.
Atlas muttered, more to himself than anyone else: "this guy...where is he learning to speak those words...Twitter or so shit..."
He shook his head.
"Nah. Probably the notes I wrote..."
He squinted at his cluttered desk, eyes landing on an empty parchnt scroll.
A beat.
"...Wait."
He leaned closer.
His pupils dilated.
"...Did he just eat the note I wrote about the war sim?"
A strangled groan escaped his throat. "Motherf—"
He cut himself off, hands dragging down his face. Then sighed.
"Hmph... gonna just forget about it ever happened . I ain’t built for this kind of crazy."
A pause.
Then—
"I need to talk to Claire. She’s gonna roast alive for disappearing the whole damn day."
He turned, pacing toward the corridor. His boots echoed against the marble like a trono ticking toward inevitable conflict.
His thoughts spiraled. Not about the Yggdrasil seed. Not about Isabella. Not about Veil’s cryptic truths.
But Claire.
How much he was hiding from her.
How much he still owed her.
And how much of him she already knew—without him ever saying a word.
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