The silence stretched on...
The loose camp fire flickered, twisting in on itself, reflections dancing against the mirrored camp’s air, their forms wavering.... uncertain, shifting. The crackling wood gave a slow, rhythmic sound, almost a silent whisper, as if the hollowed flames themselves breathed in the heavy quiet that settled between them.
Hela exhaled softly.
She leaned back, the motion fluid, calm m, unhurried, as if she had all the time in the world to do anything. Her fingers traced the rim of her cup, slow, absent. Then, with a quiet breath, she broke the silence.
"You know..."
Her voice carried a weight to it... not heavy, not emotional, not burdened, but something deeper, something lingering in the mirrored space between words.
"If I remember correctly, there was once a time I was an innocent little girl. A girl with a good heart."
She let out a low, quiet chuckle, mocking, self-derisive.
"How pathetically stupid I was back then... If only I could delete those memories.."
The words held no bitterness. Only fact.
She lifted the cup to her lips... only to pause. The liquor inside was gone. A moment passed before she reached for the bottle, tilting it to pour another round. The liquid fell in a smooth, fluid, steady stream, swirling as it filled the wooden cup.
"They say drinking removes stress."
She took a sip. Slowly. Letting the warmth of the liquid sit on her tongue before swallowing.
"Can you believe that’s a lie?"
Her fingers tapped against the side of the cup, rhythmic, steady, as she let the thought settle.
"Well... quarter true. The rest of it? False."
This chapt𝒆r is updated by frёewebηovel.cѳm.
Another sip..
The firelight cast shifting shadows across her face, flickering at the edges, distorting the lines of her expression.
"Sure, it removes stress. But only for a moment. A fleeting, worthless moment. Only while it’s on your tongue, while you’re tasting it, while you are feeling it, before it’s gone."
She let out a slow sigh, barely more than a breath, a smirk curling at the edge of her lips, though the faintest flicker of something else.. something quieter, lingered in her gaze.
"But after that?"
The smirk didn’t falter, but her grip on the cup tightened slightly.
"No matter the drink. No matter how drunk you get."
She smiled. But it wasn’t the kind that reached the eyes.
"The sadness stays."
The words were softer now. Calmer.
"The pain stays. The suffering stays."
The cup tilted slightly in her hand.
"This bastard world stays."
A pause that lingered for a brief moment before she continued, "And the funniest part?"
A slow, quiet chuckle, barely above a whisper.
"We’re all in it. Stuck in it. And there’s not a damn thing we can do about it."
She brought the cup to her lips, tilting her head back as she swallowed the rest in one mouthful. The warmth burned down her throat, but it didn’t linger.
She reached for the bottle again.
Tilted it.
Nothing.
Hela’s lips pressed together, her jaw tensing for a fraction of a second before she clicked her tongue, muttering a quiet curse under her breath.
With a flick of her wrist, she flung the bottle aside.
A hole in space yawned open, sucking the very air and swallowing the liquor bottle whole.
The cup followed soon after.
Then, silence.
For a moment, she simply stared upward.
The mirrored sky stretched endlessly above, reflecting nothing, holding nothing. Just dark, empty space.
Her gaze lingered for a moment before she opened her mouth, "That was my last one."
She said it softly. Almost absentmindedly.
Still staring at the mirrored loose sky as the silence returned, distant, empty... Haunting..
Only the fire flickered, its light casting long, shifting shadows across the mirrored loose ground as Hela sat there, still, unmoving.. until she wasn’t.
Something happened..
It began slowly. Her body.. fading, unraveling at the edges, dissolving in a way that wasn’t quite breaking apart, yet wasn’t simply vanishing either. Like dust carried by a wind that couldn’t be seen. Like ink bleeding into water, the shapes of her limbs softening, the definition of her form blurring, piece by piece.
She didn’t flinch.
Didn’t panic.
Didn’t speak.
Her fingers remained curled against her knee, relaxed, as if this was always meant to happen. As if she had been waiting for it.
The silence stretched.
Across the loose camp fire, Celia and Jess watched. Neither spoke. Neither moved.
Celia had seen it... thirty times over. Thirty futures, each one leading to this moment, to this unraveling. She could have stopped it. Could have undone the damage, overridden the ending, altered the course of death, overlapping and crashing down all the timelines she died in, leaving only the one she lived.... It wouldn’t have been difficult.
But it was her choice.
Hela had chosen this. Had decided, long before this moment, that she wouldn’t fall by anyone’s hand. That she would dictate the end on her own terms.
So Celia let it happen.
Jess hadn’t known. Not exactly. She hadn’t seen the futures like Celia had, hadn’t predicted the poison slipping through Hela’s system, unmaking her from within. But she had understood, in some instinctual way, that this was inevitable.
Though Hela... the girl disappearing before them, had been an enemy.
But yet.. That word felt hollow to them.
Because the truth was cruel, merciless, undeniable.
They weren’t enemies because they chose to be. They weren’t enemies because of hate, because of vengeance, because of some grand ideological war.
They were enemies because this twisted world had only ever given them one path forward.
Evolve. Or die.
Hela had made her choice.
And now... This was the result of it...
The mirrored air held still.
The fire crackled under the calm emptiness of this hallow world as silence.. deep, heavy, mourning, settled over the mirrored loose camp.
A silence that did not end. A silence that did not waver..
A haunting silence...
***
Hela’a form had nearly unraveled completely.
Her body was no longer solid, no longer whole.. just fragments, dissolving, scattering like embers in the empty night. And yet, even as the nothingness consumed her, she remained steady. Her voice, though weakened, did not waver.
"Just a quick reminder…"
The words drifted, light as dust carried by a dying breeze. Her lips curled in something almost amused, almost cruel.
"You two weren’t the only Wanderers we marked down."
Celia’s breath paused slightly...
The moment the words left Hela’s mouth, a name crashed into her mind.. Agon.
The memory surfaced instantly. Agon, just just beyond the fire’s reach, his form half-shadowed, his voice distant. He had excused himself earlier, slipping away when Celia was calming down Jess who had been lost in her own sadness..
Now, Celia understood.
Her deep blue eyes remained calm, her body didn’t tense... The flames before them crackled, flickering against the mirrored ground, but their warmth no longer reached anyone...
Hela’s expression didn’t change. She had already begun to fade, her features softening, dissolving into the still air. But the smirk never left her face.
"You trust his capabilities, huh…"
It wasn’t a question.
It was an observation. A sharp, knowing one, spoken by someone who had spent too long in a world where trust was nothing but a whispered illusion.
Celia’s grip on her knees loosened slightly. Though her throat felt dry, she forced the words out anyway.
"He’ll be fine."
Hela exhaled, soft and slow. The sound barely carried.
"You think that," she murmured, voice growing fainter. "But I know the capabilities of Haran."
Her fading smirk deepened, but there was no humor in it.
"He’s a bloody demon, Celia." Her gaze lifted slightly, as if seeing something beyond them, beyond the mirrored empty sky. "He doesn’t care about loyalty, companionship, fairness, or honor. He only cares about his benefits. And no matter what it takes.. he will get them."
The weight of those words settled heavy in the air.
Jess clenched her fists slightly... Celia didn’t move.
The mirrored loose camp fire between them burned on, indifferent.
Hela’s form flickered. What little was left of her seemed to dissolve all at once, her body collapsing into scattered wisps of nonexistence. Only her eyes remained for a second longer... gazing upward, staring at the false, empty sky above.
And then... she whispered...
"Trust…"
It wasn’t meant for them.
A thought.. left unfinished, unspoken, unheard.
A longing, perhaps. Or a regret.
The last piece of her faded.
The air swallowed her whole.
There was nothing left.. no trace, no mark, no sign she had ever been there at all.
Only her final words remained, lingering like a ghost, echoing in the silence.
"Finally… I’m free from this world."
Celia watched the space where she had been.
She did not speak immediately.
Then, softly.. softer than the wind, softer than the dying fire, she murmured,
"I hope you find peace."
And then....
The mirrored loose world shattered.
The ground split. The air cracked.
The illusion collapsed.
And reality came crashing back....