Guy was assaulted by another scene like that from a warzone straight out of his past life. The brothel was burnt to ashes, and the authorities were retrieving charred corpses whose flesh had melded into their bones, and whose bones were half a step away from crumbling into ashes. The retrieved bodies, or what remained of them, ranged in size and gender (though the latter was much harder to decipher). An acrid smell of burned flesh pervaded the already congested atmosphere.
"All the entrances and exits were unlocked, why did no one run out?" Guy eavesdropped on a conversation between two constables nearby.
"Heck if I know! It's creepy, I tell ya! Eight other locations, the exact same modus operandi. We have ourselves a serial arsonist in Sunspear."
"No survivors?" The first constable inquired. To that, the second man leaned closer and whispered in a barely audible voice.
"On paper, no survivors. But, all of the Beggars' Sect's... 'investments' made it out alive."
The first man visibly cringed at the connotation hidden in the accentuated 'investments' and probed, "Do you think it's them?"
"Can't be them. There were a lot of affluent individuals caught up in this arson case. There were some government officials from real high places - high as in close enough to whisper into the Emperor's ear level of high - that were killed in the process. Then there were also a few Sect Elders from the Four Greats... No one would be stupid enough to antagonise so many people in power!"
The second paused before highlighting a gruesome fact, "Although it is hard to make out given the state of the bodies, there's some creepy stuff... The investigators found that most, if not all, of the male bodies, had their genitalia removed - castrated - while the female bodies were skinned alive. Whoever did this... they tortured them before burning them alive."
The first shuddered as a chill passed through him. "This can't be just one person, right? The attacks occurred all over Sunspear. This has to be some kind of terrorist cell or an Unorthodox Sect flexing their power to make a point!"
Guy struggled to swallow his saliva as their conversation continued. When they listed the approximate death counts, his legs turned wobbly once again. He held back his anxiousness and let his feet carry him around Sunspear. He wanted to see, with his own eyes, just how much destruction he'd wrought. Guy remembered the locations of the establishments under the Beggars' Sect's umbrella from the map, he noted that the breadth of their reach was wide. He had no idea of how "he" managed to get from one place to the next so quickly and inflict so much damage within such a short time span. It also didn't help that security had ramped up significantly given the nature and coordination of the attacks. One thing was for certain, the Other Guy was a criminal mastermind of another calibre. He had single-handedly overturned the Capital and had done so without leaving a single clue. Guy wasn't delusional to think that the authorities at Sunspear would be bumbling idiots; they must have the cream of the crop in terms of forensic technologies both scientific and magical, and yet they were unable to discern the culprit as he visited each crime scene personally.
The weight on Guy's shoulder, which he had so expertly offloaded through carefully crafted rationalities, was starting to regrow at a frightening pace. So much death... So much carnage... Within weeks, Guy had turned into a murderer... There was a limit to just how much the mind could stretch, self-correct and fix itself from the cracks forming on it before it broke apart completely. Guy managed to rescue himself from that fate earlier, but the burden had grown beyond what he could handle.
After finding himself in a secluded alleyway, Guy collapsed against the wall and cradled his head. His eyes lost their lustre and turned dull. His lips flapped as he muttered unintelligible drivel. Guy was broken.
This was a crucial juncture for Guy. From this point, he would walk down one of two paths. He would either recover, or he wouldn't. In the latter case, his shattered mind would remain fragmented, and his psyche would devolve into madness forever. In the former case, he would come out the other side a changed person. Would the change be for the better or the worse? That would depend on whom you asked.
Guy wasn't a person weak of heart or mind. He had inoculated himself for the many atrocities the world could inflict upon the beings inhabiting it from his many ventures during his past lives. Guy wasn't squeamish to death, not anymore. He was just feeling disgusted by just how easy it had been. He could estimate that he had essentially snuffed over three-hundred lives all within a day. Not even the most efficient of weapons in his past life was both so devastating in the breadth of its reach and so surgically precise when eliminating its targets. Guy had achieved all of that, with just the power of his voice. It was a terrible power. It was a power that should not exist!
Unbeknownst to Guy, a majestic event was transpiring inside him, deep within the compartment of his soul he feared the most. Within the Church, seated upon the benches, were the five ethereal figures of Markus, Jean, Kano, Dora and Marie. Their luminescent forms had grown more opaque since their presence first graced these hallowed halls. The Church was infinite, thus the presence of just those five evoked a sense of emptiness. However, one by one, figures started to pop into existence beside and behind the five figures. The first figure to achieve a translucent form was that of the blinded boy, Yohn. It was then followed by Kevan, the boy's companion. Then another, and another. All in all, over thirty new entities spawned onto the benches, all of them kids of both genders.
In the outside world, Guy was immediately snapped out of his downward spiral by a series of hushed whispers.
"He's here! I told you I saw him walk in." It was a boy's voice.
"Scream louder, why don't you?" Another boy retorted with heavy sarcasm.
The conversing figures peeked around the alley's corner, and Guy managed to catch their faces. He knew them. He had met them earlier.
"Sect Leader Larks!" Yohn called out as he stepped forward carefully. He used his stick to navigate and stood giddily in front of Guy. His voice was oozing with excitement and his expression augmented this with an outward showing of gratitude.
"I-I don't know what to say..." Yohn continued. He was unable to stop his teeth from showing as a smile split his face from ear to ear. "Frankly, when you promised that you would seek justice for everything my friends and I suffered at the hands of those... monsters, I was doubtful that you would be able to achieve it. And for that, this lowly one is filled with guilt."
At this moment, Kevan stepped forward and took over, "We were forced to leave our homes at the whims of mages drowning in the madness brought on by power. At every step of the way, we were forced to face disadvantages with our lives on the line, because of mages. So our scepticism was warranted when another Mage just pulled out an offer too good to be true out of nowhere. But Sect Leader Larks... You proved yourself to be different. You were the first person since we left our homes to properly care for us- to treat us like people."
The two boys tried to suppress their sobs, but a harmony of whines and sniffles still made it into Guy's erected sense of hearing. Guy turned towards the source of the sound, and the boy's followed his gaze.
"Come out!" The boy's called. "Come out and pay your respects to your Sect Leader!"
A small battalion of kids garbed in worn-out clothing stepped out from around the corner. Guy recognised a few more faces within the group, but the rest were all new.
"Sis, that's the man..." A little girl, maybe a year older than Dora, peeked from behind another girl around Jean's age and said with a low voice. "He's the one who got rid of all the bad men."
"She was sold to a brothel operated by the Beggars' Sect," Kevan clarified. "When Sect Leader eradicated those dens of evil, you saved her life as well."
"I did?" Guy blurted out. In response, the little girl inched closer and handed Guy an opaque, red-velvet cloth that was often used to blindfold (un)willing participants during... adventurous and dramatic activities supplementing the pleasures of the flesh.
"Mister told me to wear this tightly around my eyes and to hold on to it until we meet later," the girl said. "You said that after I put on this blindfold and counted to a hundred, all the bad people hurting me would be gone, and I would be safe."
"Lili here was to be sold to the Vice Minister of Finance for... a disgusting purpose. However, Sect Leader saved her, just like all of us here. And for that, we are infinitely grateful!" Yohn joined in.
Kevan nodded and declared, "If the Sect Leader would still have us all, we would love nothing more than to become part of the righteous establishment headed by such a benevolent and courageous figure."
"Please accept our bow, Sect Leader Larks!" All the kids bellowed in rehearsed unison. They then all got down to their knees and banged their heads against the ground. They repeated this again, and again. With each collision of skulls to the ground, Guy was incrementally brought out of his state of dissociation.
'That's right! It was all for them. What is the value of one degenerate and debased life when compared to that of innocent kids like them? If their deaths could bring these kids the peace they so urgently need, and the freedom they desire, then it is all warranted!'
Guy's mind bounced back from the endless abyss he was stuck in instantaneously. What was broken was now fixed! And thus the most pertinent question lay suspended in the air: Was the new Guy better, or worse?
'Those low-lives deserved all that came to them!'
"It was all for you," Guy said inaudibly while raising Yohn from his prostrated state and dusting him lightly. "This was all for you..."
A warm smile graced Guy's face as he beheld all the kids' show of respect. The fact that he saved all of their lives by himself, and so effectively at that, filled him with happiness, unlike anything he'd felt before. It even superseded the emotional high he'd feel after completing a mission for educational development at a remote village in his previous life.
'It is ironic that it took me a second life for my actions to make meaningful and long-lasting differences,' Guy thought to himself with a wry smile.
____
A/N: Hopefully this wraps up the character development arc for Guy. More will come, but I will no longer go into Guy's emotional turmoil should he resort to violence in some form in the future.
Just to be safe, I must emphasise that I don't condone violence!
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