(Surrounded by the ruins of Ixtal, Leo’s POV)
"Did this really happen because I went away for a single hour?"
Leo couldn’t help but wonder, as his mind raced back to the argument he had with Amanda a few days ago, where she had asked him as to why he could not simply stay home for a few years, instead of chasing distant threats across the universe.
He remembered how calmly he had answered her then, as he explained that he could not remain home all the time because dangers did not wait politely at the doorstep, and because someone had to look beyond the horizon to ensure that the horizon itself remained safe.
And yet because of that very decision, because he had chosen vigilance over presence, he now no longer had a home to return to, no longer a family waiting behind its doors, and no longer a Cult capital where he could pretend to be a leader instead of a man who had just lost everything.
"Amanda... baby... where are you?"
He muttered, as he turned slowly amidst the drifting ruins, scanning the endless debris field with desperate eyes while wondering which fragment of shattered stone might conceal what remained of her body.
As slowly but surely, his perception expanded across a wide area of the broken expanse, his senses searching for the faintest biological residue or spiritual imprint, as the realization struck him with merciless clarity that there might not even be a body left to find.
*Gulp*
Leo gulped nervously, as the thought settled into him like ice.
He suddenly realized that let alone seeing her for a last time, he might never even be able to give her a proper burial, as there was a chance that the woman who had shared his bed, his burdens, and his children had likely been reduced to nothing more than scattered atoms lost in vacuum.
"CALEB! CALEB, WHERE ARE YOU?
Mairon? MAIRON?"
He shouted into the empty space in front, as his voice carried uselessly through space while his thoughts drifted helplessly to his children’s smiles, to Caleb’s stumbling steps and to Mairon’s bright, innocent laughter.
"So young... they were so young... so innocent..."
He muttered, as tears streamed freely down his face while something inside him began to splinter beyond repair, as the image of their small hands reaching for him clashed violently against the emptiness before his eyes.
Guilt began coiling around his heart, as he could not stop himself from wondering whether this was karma for killing Raymond in a moment of rage, as he could not help but question whether his own immaturity in provoking enemies beyond his scale had brought this annihilation down upon his family?
"Mairon... please e back,"
He whispered brokenly, as his shoulders trembled in open space while the debris field rotated silently around him.
"I’ll see the painting you made... I’ll even sit down and paint with you... just e back to me, son..."
He begged, as grief unlike anything he had ever known tore through him pletely, leaving behind a hollowed shell of a man who no longer knew whether he was a protector or the very curse that destroyed everything he touched.
"Was it painful? Did they scream for me as they died?"
He wondered, as despite [Monarch’s Indifference] trying its best to stabilize his emotions, Leo somehow felt the skill fail pletely, as rage and grief flooded him like never before.
Images of how Ixtal must have suffered in its final moments overtook his mind without mercy, as he pictured the sky splitting above the capital and the ground fracturing beneath familiar streets while panic tore through the crowds below.
He imagined Amanda grabbing the children instinctively as buildings crumbled and as the air itself began to tear apart around them, her eyes scanning the heavens for him while the impossible descended without warning.
"Father!!!!!"
Caleb’s voice echoed in his thoughts, stubborn and brave even in fear, as he imagined his son shouting for him to fix it like he always did while the world around him disintegrated beyond saving.
While he imagined Mairon clinging desperately to his mother, terror evident in his innocent eyes, as the planet before him trembled and the horizon itself split in two.
*Shiver*
*Choke*
A violent shiver ran down Leo’s spine as the imagined scene grew clearer inside his head instead of fading, his aura pulsing erratically outward as fragments of debris nearby cracked and splintered under the pressure of his spiraling instability.
*Pant*
*Pant*
His breathing grew uneven and shallow as he forced himself to consider the possibility that his family might have remained conscious for several horrifying seconds, long enough to understand what was happening and long enough to search for him in those final, desperate heartbeats.
The thought that they might have called his name while the sky burned above them struck him harder than the destruction itself, as guilt coiled tightly around his chest until even the silent void felt suffocating.
"I’m a failure...."
"I failed as a husband, a father, and a Cult Master...."
Leo muttered, as [Monarch’s Indifference] flickered within him like a failing lantern in a storm, as the technique that had once numbed him to massacre and bloodshed proved powerless before the image of his own children dying without him.
*Tremble*
His hands trembled uncontrollably as tears drifted away in weightless droplets, his mind spiraling further as the line between reality and imagination blurred into something equally unbearable.
"What good is all the training in the universe?
What good will e of me being a God, even if I achieve the pinnacle anymore.....
Without my family to protect....
Is reaching the pinnacle even worth striving for?"
He could not help but wonder, as for the first time in his life, he realized without a shadow of a doubt as to how important his family was for him.
As although he always knew that his family was one of his biggest motivations to grow stronger, it wasn’t until today, until he lost it all, that he realized just how important they really were, and how lost in life he would be without them.
’In the end.... You’re destined to walk alone.’
The words echoed in his head, as he was reminded of a warning he heard long ago.
A warning that had long since informed him that if he continued to go down the path he was on..... that sooner or later, he was bound to walk alone.
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