ALL NOVEL Chapter 90: Fanatical Determination
Pain. Pain. Pain.
Bones melting and renewing.
Eyes burned and insides churned.
Body fights back and regrows again and again.
A constant of destruction and creation.
Ears bleed continuously, but mended within seconds.
Every bone is cleansed.
Every sinew of the muscle, reconstructed.
Continuous burning followed within the blood.
Within the blood is purification that mends all diseases.
Each one fights the destruction.
The vessel holds on to the continuous pain.
In the body there is an astral sky similar to that of a black canvas.
On the black canvas are the dots of light that signifies the boons.
Sixty-six dots of lights shone on the black canvas. Each dot of light connected to one another until they formed a net that seemed eager to catch the black canvas in the net.
The mind of the vessel holds on to endurance.
The toil is tolled.
The traveler gazes upon the vessel and flicks a trace of hateful mercy upon the vessel.
***
The vessel laid in the room with his skin melted.
He gathers the will and the boons to make his body obey.
His will was a tide against the inferior pain and suffering that the vessel experiences.
The vessel showed no emotion.
His mind, although it wanders, was pulled to the next goal.
The mind resents.
“WHY WHY WHY YOU PROMISED ME MERCY”
“I did promise you mercy, friend.”
The vessel answered.
“YOU PAIN ME. YOUR TOIL MELTS ME. WHY HAVE YOU NOT RESTED YET.”
The vessel smiled at the mind.
“The unity was promised because of this. You will get your turn, friend. I have used your way to do what needs to be done. You are my mentor, my ally, and my friend. You who understood a lonely child, drove him to the path in which he could fit in the pants of someone who had warped, turned into the path of a vigilante who drove those who killed his love to the death and returned to his home, judging himself with a barrel of a gun on his forehead.”
The mind calmed.
“You...how long until you are free?”
“Not long.”
“Are you afraid?”
“Your memories are my guide...strangely. I’ve improved myself and used the memories that I got from you to act wiser than my age. How could a child ever get this far without the scheming and determination of an adult who had lived a life of chasing upon the killers of his parents?”
The mind shook.
“I understand your fear...but I wouldn’t dream to think of us reaching this far. You let me guide you to your path, using my memories, and mold you by using my strength and prior wisdom...although I am not nothing more than a memory of a person who had strived to be a good member of his family, only to end up going down the path of a hunter.
“You are your own master, yes, ruled by my memories, but one day, once the promise is met, you and I will be free...yes, this is freedom that we strive for.”
The mind turned into that of a different being. A rugged person who was carrying a revolver in his right hand.
HE does not exist other than the palace of the vessel’s mind.
“It is painful.”
“I can do nothing...I am only the mind, and you, the vessel, must endure this. But until that day I am nothing more than a tool you use to further your goals on this world.”
The vessel remembered the fragments behind the mind. Beyond those memories of this world, was a world where the mind lived. He had insisted on learning from these memories, turning them into his advantage.
“But you...are still nothing more than memories that I used as a tool. Just like I used everyone around me for the sake of this burden.”
“Yes, I am nothing more than your mind. But beyond that, what do you see?”
He simply didn’t know.
He was lost if he was without purpose.
The barrel of the gun on his forehead was his first answer.
Her confession swarms at his heart, threatening to involve herself, but in the end the vessel refused to let her in.
“You are afraid of her. Afraid that she’s still Viola Whitefall, the one who carries the Imperator’s Mark, the Butcher of Dinia, the Soon-to-be Imperator of the Magnar-Azia Continent.”
The mind paused for a moment, as if afraid of the truth.
No matter how much she tries.
No matter what she does.
Until the Exiled One is not removed from this world after the seal.
The Mind and the Vessel cannot agree.
It must fulfill the promise that has been made.
The Promise in that hill where two lives become one.
For the boy who had done everything he could get his revenge, and change the sorrowful future he saw.
And for the one who had been given a chance to lead a boy to be free from this burden.
And yet the path the boy who saw the memories in the hill, was almost impossible to achieve.
It was a miracle itself that they were able to reach this far.
Even meeting a traveler who had given them time.
It did not cease their worries.
The mind and the vessel were in pain at the thought of the Greater Enemy that was before them.
The Exiled One.
The mind knew of the enemy that was coming.
The vessel was afraid of the enemy that was impossible to defeat without the power of knowing.
Not even in this world could possibly know how to defeat this Exiled One.
Only the mind knew what he was facing.
Although the Hounds might have an idea of what they are facing because of their battles with the Magi and the Nullers.
The enemy before them can only be defeated by thorough preparation.
They had never thought of this before and was readying Aunger and the Hounds to face this imminent threat if the Imperator who holds the mark is subdued and sealed.
Truthfully, the mind and the vessel argued if such time ever comes.
And the time had come.
The mind and the vessel refused to submit.
The vessel that melted became whole again.
The mind that was in pain regained its clarity and returned to the vessel.
Mavin Tomas awoke in his room.
The Mavin Tomas that knew how to look at the ones he cherished vanished. The man in the room was the same man that saw them as tools.
What mattered now was the defeat of the Exiled One.
Mavin Tomas returned to his own war.