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How many times had he failed her?
How many times have he failed them?
How many times had he watched everything he held dear crumbled before his eyes?
As monsters far beyond his strength destroyed everything precious to him. As his power, which had never been enough for someone who could not even awaken as a dragon, proved powerless to save anything that mattered.
Countless deaths.
Countless ruined kingdoms.
Entire worlds swallowed by death and despair. His citizens, his family, and his beloved, all vanished into nothingness.
Even when King Louis tried time and time again to relax, to take things easier, and to finally live the peaceful life he deserved after so many years, the memories refused to leave him.
Sometimes, he could still hear them.
Their voices. Their cries. Their unbearable agony.
All those he could not save.
"Louis..."
He tried to ignore the voices.
"Louis..."
But then,
"Please... help me..."
His eyes widened in horror.
He found himself standing in the middle of a ruined castle, covered in dust and blood. His younger self, weak and pathetic, stood powerless to change his fate or fight against his predestined doom. His messy, blood-covered face twisted in despair as he cried over his beloved lying motionless on the floor.
"Mirai!!!"
He ran toward her, only to trip over the rubble and fall hard. His heart raced wildly as he coughed up blood, feeling his crushed ribs and the black swords piercing his body.
"Mirai...!"
"L-Louis..."
"No, no, no, no!!!"
He gathered her into his arms, sobbing uncontrollably as she had already stopped breathing. Her body grew cold in his embrace, her wounds far too deep. She had held on just long enough for him to find her and carry her, but then her strength finally gave out.
"Mirai...!"
His tears fell onto her still form as he cried out in pure agony and despair.
But he was not alone.
RUMBLE!
From the rubble and wreckage of the destroyed castle, a gigantic figure rose. It was not a monster in the traditional sense, nor was it a demon. It was another human, like him.
A woman with dark gray skin and long black hair, her eyes eternally weeping streams of black miasma. Her body moved slowly toward him, crying desperately. The world around her flooded with darkness as countless specters and twisted creatures surged forward. Gigantic black hands emerged from the shadows, eyes blinking open on their palms and staring directly at Louis.
"My child... come to me..."
"Get away from me!!!"
Louis screamed, clutching Mirai tightly in his arms while desperately brandishing his spear.
Suddenly, dozens of heads sprouted from the woman's body, all of them crying and screaming in unison.
"Why do you reject us?"
"Isn't it better if we all die?"
"If we all enter paradise together?"
"Everyone is waiting for you over there... my dear child..."
"Please... stop running away!"
Louis screamed again, his faint white aura flickering weakly as he thrust his spear with all his remaining strength toward the incoming attacks.
"No! Mirai! MIRAI!!!"
He watched helplessly as they tore her away from him. Her body was not even allowed the peace of death. Countless cultists offered her remains to massive, hungry maws that formed within the woman's swirling miasma.
Louis roared with everything he had left, but he was ultimately overwhelmed. Torn limb from limb, his soul was seized and crushed into thousands of pieces.
As darkness swallowed him once more, he returned.
He tried to change his fate again, becoming only slightly stronger than before. Yet everything still ended in vain.
"Mom...! MOTHER!"
He ran desperately toward his mother, only to see her being carried away by monstrous demons clad in black and red armor.
"No!"
He charged forward, slashing through the creatures they sent against him. A massive portal of black void opened in the sky as they dragged his unconscious mother away.
"MOTHER!!!"
The demons halted him, shoving him back and impaling his body with thousands of spears and swords.
He watched in horror as his mother disappeared into the void, destined to become a vessel for a malevolent being. And as he died once again, he returned.
"I'm sorry... Louis..."
He ran as fast as he could, trying once more to change destiny. He fought with everything he possessed, yet he could not stop them all from dying. This time, his father paid the ultimate price. A giant blade sliced through his head after he had fought bravely to protect Louis's mother from being kidnapped.
Louis arrived a second too late. He saw his father's head fall to the ground, blood spraying violently from the severed neck. The demoness responsible laughed mockingly at him, sneering as she licked the blood from her blade.
"Fufu, looks like you were a second too late, Prince Louis~!"
Paralyzed by trauma, Louis stared at his father's face and his own trembling hands. The world around him twisted into shades of red and black.
His Fantasy Heart shattered.
Crack. Crack...!
CRASH!
Something deep within him broke free. Countless black branches erupted outward as a tree of enormous proportions consumed everything, allies and enemies alike, along with his castle and kingdom.
He still remembered it clearly, the moment when he had finally had enough and his Fantasy Heart shattered, transforming him into an aberrant Grievance, a vengeful monster. When he became a Fractured.
He remembered well what it felt like to become that monster above all else. A gigantic being so powerful that even his greatest enemies could only flee in terror. How it felt to fully embrace his madness, sorrow, and despair, becoming exactly what the world had forced him to be.
A colossal dragon tree with five heads, gazing down at the world from above the clouds. Its branches spread endlessly, tearing everything apart without mercy or pause. He destroyed his own kingdom so no one else could take it from him. He killed his own people so no one could steal them away.
At that moment, he lost everything and was consumed by an endless, dark desire.
Oh, that feeling.
It felt good.
To finally give up everything...
That sweet whisper in his ear. That thing buried deep in his heart.
The monster had been born from his suffering. His true self.
Where did he begin and where did it end? He could not quite tell anymore. He could not quite remember.
But he could remember one thing clearly.
She had entered his Broken Heart, venturing deep into the garden of dreams woven by the Grievance to keep him trapped in false happiness. She found him there and brought him out, holding his hand tightly while telling him that this place, this fantasy, was not real.
That he had to wake up.
Conquering his own fears and madness, Louis stepped out of his fractured heart and returned to reality, only to see her fading away into ashes, her bones crumbling onto the floor.
What he had thought would finally be a happy ending by her side turned into yet another abyss of despair.
"Mirai..."
Realizing that a world without her meant nothing to him, he used his own hands to pierce his heart and destroy it along with his soul.
As darkness engulfed him again, Louis fell into an eternal spiral.
"Dad!"
A Spiral of Madness from which he could not escape.
"Hello? Dad?"
For how long?
"Louis?"
Just how long would he have to suffer?
"Honey, what's wrong?"
Time itself felt meaningless. The more he lived and died, the more everything blurred together. Overcoming challenge after challenge, only to die over and over again...
"Father!"
Louis's eyes snapped back to reality. The sorrow and despair he had just relived lingered heavily within him like a bitter aftertaste. His eyes looked utterly exhausted.
The King realized this was reality. These endless dreams, where time itself seemed to leak and bleed, were merely the mixed and traumatic memories of a man who should never have endured so many deaths.
"Are you okay, honey?" his wife asked, her voice filled with worry. "You look exhausted. I told you that you were pushing yourself too hard..."
"I..." Louis muttered weakly. He felt deep sorrow, yet also relief that it had all been memories and flashbacks slowly eating away at his sanity.
"Dad..." Elizabeth, whose Spiral abilities allowed her to glimpse such memories, stared with widened eyes full of disbelief. "Dad, are... are you okay?"
"I'm... I'm fine..." Louis forced a weak smile. "I'm perfectly fine... Don't worry about me. Really, it's... it's all okay."
He looked down for a moment and fell silent. Elizabeth and Mirai exchanged worried glances, deeply concerned about what Louis might be enduring.
His stare seemed aimless, yet his mind remained in complete chaos. He constantly tried to push these memories away using his abilities, but he knew that if he deleted them all, he would stop being himself.
Elizabeth, who had originally intended to ask her father for permission to go out, quickly walked over to him. She realized that the accumulation of stress had likely made these tormenting memories even stronger.
"Dad..." she muttered softly. "I love you! Don't be sad!"
And she did the only thing she knew how. She leaped onto his lap and hugged him with all her strength. The Light of Harmony within her flowed outward, gently encompassing him.
"E-Elizabeth...? Ah... this light..." His eyes widened.
FLASH!
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