Marcus knew who he was.
"Nicholas Vahn," he called out the na of the man sitting on the throne of the broken hall.
Nicholas kept staring at Marcus. He didn’t utter a single word.
But in his eyes was rage that had been killing him even after his death.
"You rember the na," Nicholas spoke, and rested his head on the fist of his hand, supporting it on the armrest.
"Of course, you do..." he continued. "You always rember what’s useful to you, that’s how traders are..."
Marcus’s gaze remained on Nicholas. He did not have the slightest hesitation, fear, or regret in his eyes.
"Tell ," Nicholas spoke. "Do you know how I died?"
"Or was that part unnecessary?" he asked.
Marcus exhaled quietly and closed his eyes.
Nicholas’s lips curved into a smile.
"There it is," he murmured.
"Always precise, composed, distant..."
Nicholas let the words settle for a mont. He was testing whether they held any aning.
"It made sense, at the ti," he continued. "A man who doesn’t rush. A man who doesn’t lose himself in impulse. Soone who understands consequence before action."
"You were the sole reason my beliefs existed. You were the push I needed for my army. If I hadn’t t you, I would’ve been yet another ally of the duke who’d still plan and build his forces, but you..."
"You and your help pushed to the depths of hell," Nicholas growled.
"I watched as my wife, the woman that I love, was raped by countless n and Duke himself while I was unable to do anything,"
"I watched my children run in fear, shivering their way through the cold of Vahn. I watched my n lose their lives helplessly, my aides fall apart, my servants defiled, all because I-"
"All because I ASKED for your HELP!"
"I asked. I never demanded. And you used , my territory, my people, my loved ones just for your ambitions, your trade, and your selflessness!"
"DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MAKES YOU?"
Nicholas’s voice rose through the ceiling before silence settled back again.
Marcus opened his eyes and looked at him.
"I do," Marcus replied.
"Then say it!" Nicholas growled.
"When you ca to , you didn’t co as a victim," Marcus began. "You ca with intent."
"You wanted power, independence, control, you wanted to change your fate,"
"I wanted to survive. My children, my peo-"
"And you believed power would get you that," Marcus cut off Nicholas’s words.
"You asked for resources for a war you were already planning,"
"And you gave them," Nicholas replied, "With conditions that I didn’t see."
"With consequences you didn’t account for," Marcus corrected Nicholas.
Nicholas stood up from his throne and paced down with heavy steps.
"What you’re doing is reframing," Nicholas said.
"You’re taking sothing simple and making it sound inevitable," he said.
"Tell , was there no other way to do this? Couldn’t we have negotiated? Couldn’t we have put our trust in each other?" Nicholas questioned, walking slowly towards Marcus.
"Krells were a dukedom of wolves. And you were a tick sucking the blood of those wolves." Marcus replied.
"You wanted to be a wolf by consuming their blood, and rule over them eventually, so you tell ...Would you place your trust in a tick?" Marcus questioned back.
"Ha! A tick? A TICK? Is that how you saw ?"
Nicholas let out a hollow laugh.
"A tick?" he repeated, murmuring the word.
"All that talk about consequences, planning, betrayal, remorse, and this is how I’ve always been in your mind? Just a tick that sucks blood?"
"You speak as if I chose this end," Nicholas said. "As if I walked willingly into ruin with my eyes open."
"You did," Marcus replied.
Nicholas’s jaw clenched as he stood in front of Marcus.
"You’re doing it again," he said. "That tone... that distance. You stand in front of everything that was destroyed and reduce it to a matter of choice."
"Because it was," Marcus said.
"You’re a man who wanted control without uncertainty," Marcus continued. "You wanted the outco, but not the risk that defines it."
"And you?" he demanded. "You embraced the risk?"
"I calculated it."
"And gambled with my life?"
"Yes."
Nicholas’s composure faltered.
"You admit it so easily." He said.
"mory isn’t selective, Interpretation is." Marcus said.
"What?"
"Stage one was the faltered perception. Stage two is selective interpretation." Marcus concluded, and Nicholas tilted his head as if he wasn’t able to understand anything.
Just then, a fine black katana manifested, piercing the neck of Nicholas as he choked on his own blood.
Marcus gripped the hilt of the katana and slashed it in a fine arc, burning the tears of flesh and blood on the blade.
*Zzz-Sizzle*
The world dimd to darkness, and again, Marcus found himself standing on the dark water, lamps hanging in the vastness of the dark realm.
Sitting on the throne just like Nicholas was the coiled mass of purple threads, head resting on the fist, leaning forward in interest.
It leaned, and the lamps in the distance flickered with its movents.
"Bravo," the humanoid spoke. "You again exceeded my expectations, Ymir Celestie of Lunar."
The humanoid gave a low, appreciative hum.
"A prince must never mistake the performance for the kingdom. Nor the reflection for the man. You have passed the first two trials with admirable composure. Faltered perception... selective interpretation. Most n drown in them. They rewrite their sins until the lies feel like truth."
It crossed its arms and nodded playfully. "Alright~ Alright~ Alright~"
"Now we co to the third, and probably the most delicate stage." It said.
"The mont where a ruler is granted the cruellest rcy, which is one more chance to act differently. To choose again, knowing every consequence."
"Most when faced with this mirror discover a side of themselves that they’ve never shown to anyone, most think twice before coming returning back to reality, and so even dream of it to be a reality."
"You see, to understand the nature of the people, one must be a prince. And to understand the nature of a prince, one must be of the people. So the question is...Are you a Prince who’s one of the people? Or are you a Prince who defines his title?"
*Zzz-Sizzle*
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