And the tension turned to blood. Minutes after the first shot, the bodies lay on the ground. Walls of ice had formed along with gales that drove helicopters away. The people watched from a distance, praying that nothing would affect them.
Gyne leaned on the blades, breathing deeply. The general had disappeared with the other general. Only he and Rito remained. He clenched his fingers, making cracking sounds. He admitted he hated hitting a child, but Gyne was too stubborn to stay standing.
One of the soldiers threw a pistol, which he himself held as if it were something divine. And then he pointed it at him. He briefly explained that technology had advanced in recent years, allowing him a weapon as lethal as any bomb...
Something that fired antimatter.
The boy quickly reacted with a horizontal slash. Rito fired. And the ice-imbued weapon crumbled in his hands like dust. His eyes widened and he fell to his knees, panting, his breath barely escaping as if begging for mercy.
The leader laughed. Mercy was for those who cared about humanity, for those who would give him the power to fight against the Renkai Energy...
Putting the pistol against the boy's head, he bid him farewell. However, a scream echoed through the smoke.
Carolina crawled on the cold ground. She begged him not to kill her, he was just a boy. And, if he really wanted to kill someone...
Let it be her.
In the coldest hills...
***
There they were.
Two men, two generals.
They were panting incessantly.
Hite leaned on the weapon in his arms, spitting blood away. The other general knelt, his gloves hitting the ground. The one carrying the weapon reminded him that all this was happening because there had been no surrender of land. The other, though hesitant to respond, said he would never allow anything to be given to people like them. Cruel, corrupt, and opportunistic. Hite let out a grumble mixed with laughter and exclaimed, "The world has always been like this; it's impossible to gain power, to protect the place you love, without succumbing to corruption."
He proposed that if the one wearing the gloves judged him, he should speak of his actions, whether he truly cared about the people or had only become powerful to gain access to the underworld without the queen noticing.
And then "Carlos" fell silent.
He stood up, placing his hands on his knees.
And told him to shut up.
Hite let out a bitter laugh and asserted his stance. In his words, if the man before him didn't want to answer, they should speak with their fists.
If he truly had something noble behind his actions.
So he threw the weapon away and took his position. He recognized the folly of that attitude, however, it was no more foolish than the war itself.
Then "Carlos" did the same.
Their sharp gazes didn't waver, their fists clenched. And they wanted to prove a point...
Then they advanced.
The exchanges of blows were swift. There was no use of magic, they were ordinary men. Their skin turned purple, their lips swelled, their vision blurred, and blood splattered the snow.
One carried the weight of the other to throw them to the ground, they tried to dominate each other, but neither remained on top of the other.
With a final blow to his face, the general fell to the ground, his dark clothes flapping against the snow. Hite stood over him and held his neck, squeezing slowly, his teeth grinding.
"Carlos" struggled, trying to push his hand away. The air began to run out, his face turned purple, his strength began to wane. The stone beside him tried to reach...
But he felt a cold sensation against the skin of his neck; it was a ring from his enemy's finger.
Then he dropped the stone.
And simply channeled the rest of his strength into a punch against the man's face. The body froze, and the shock of the blow echoed in his ears. He fell beside him, breathing rapidly.
And so he remained silent.
After a long time of sighs and breaths, one of them asked why he hadn't killed him with that stone.
The other only replied that he knew what that man was fighting for.
For someone...
...Just like him.
On the battlefield, the woman allowed herself to be held with an arm around her neck. She felt the cold barrel against the side of her head. She showed no fear, but a smile towards her brother, who tried to move, but his body betrayed him. He pleaded for his sister's life, but she interrupted him, asking him not to despair, for everything would be alright.
Rito, adjusting the woman's position, asked her for her last words, and she shook her head in denial.
However, footsteps echoed across the field, and he appeared.
Their eyes met, lips locked, tears streamed down both their cheeks.
She called him by name, Carlos, tried to move, but her arm reminded her of her situation. She looked down with the same smile and asked for a chance to say something. Rito allowed it.
The woman tried to speak, but nothing came out except the cold wind. But when she finally did, she asked him what he had done during the years he was gone, how he had survived, and why... why he hadn't returned to her.
And Carlos, with the snow pressed between his fingers, a tear fell to the ground. Survival was... cruel, he had to eat the most rotten meat to avoid dying. He had changed his identity to join the army because he wanted to get closer to her. And why he hadn't returned... it was because he feared her reaction, he was a coward, he was afraid of being rejected, that the queen had found love and forgotten his friend... he wanted to be strong, to be intelligent, to be better so that one day, even if it took years...
He could love her, even if he couldn't be loved in return.
Carolina trembled with each word, her brother watched the other man and remembered the same man who used to play with him when his sister wasn't around. If before he had doubted, thought the possibility insane, now he could understand that it was truly real. Carlos Rezon was there, in front of him, declaring his love for his sister, who could only cry softly in the arms of the man who had decided her fate.
When he calmed down, he said, between jumbled words, that he had never in his life thought of giving his heart to another man. Even if he believed in his friend's death, he knew that his heart belonged, and would always belong, to the man he loved. Not a single day of all the years he lived without him had he stopped thinking and dreaming of Carlos...
But now, it was too late to dream.
And it was Rito who reminded them of this before firing.
The sound made everyone turn their faces away... including Carolina, who opened her eyes in pure shock.
The dark ammunition was held by something indescribable, like microscopic brushes holding a cancer. Wires wrapped around the weapon and pulled the leader's fingers away, almost breaking them as he tried to remove the gun. He pushed the woman away in reaction, and she fell into her friend's arms. He held her, touching her hair, her face, trying to feel her in his hands.
When he turned around, Rito saw a figure staggering in the distance in the clearing smoke.
That wasn't human.
And even if it was...
It had stripped almost all of its humanity.
And in that dark gas, white eyes never left the man's face.
And a familiar voice, mixed with the robotic, called him a bloodsucker of power.
Therefore, that power belonged to her:
Aurora Sinhaygter.