?


    "You both want to be like Orion. No, it''s better to say you want to BE Orion, am I wrong?" She smirked, causing me to lightly shrug in agreement. "Well, that''s the problem. You have too much pride to be him and Cy doesn''t have enough. Yours is the most challenging one though as there wille a point where you will need to give up your pride in order to seed or possibly straight up survive… or would you rather die clinging onto that useless pride of yours?"


    I stared at her, grimacing at the words that had juste from her mouth. It was annoying but she was right. It was so fucking annoying that it scraped the back of my brain, egging me on, telling me that she was right, yet that piece of nobility deep within me just shrugged it off.


    …


    At that moment, when Be awoke on the dawn of her fifty-seventh death, something shifted within her. When the man appeared, ready to ughter her once more and see her suffer, he was disappointed but also pleased to see her down on her knees, forehead ced against the floor, moments away from begging for mercy.


    "Mercy. Please have mercy…" Those words. Those slimy words filled to the brim with agony and conviction flowed from her lips like water. It ran up from her throat like it was nothing but carbon dioxide. The merman smiled with pleasure. Yet, at the very moment, little did he know, Be was smiling as well. An uncanny smile unfit for the chains of human flesh.


    The man smiled as he saw the woman groveling at his feet. He lifted up his foot and mmed it against the back of her head, pressing her face even further into the ground while he soaked in the radiant pleasure wafting through his body.


    "Kekeke… at least you know your ce."


    As he turned around, the woman got up upon seeing the man gesture for her. Be''s expression was one of terrifying nervousness that forced her to follow every move of the man. He walked, and she walked. He talked, and she talked. He breathed, and she breathed. It was as simple as that.


    "You''re quite the pretty thing, aren''t you?" The man smiled, cupping her chin. And with a disy of suppressing emotion, Be gulped down a drop of saliva and leaned in, her face weing the man. "Maybe I''ll take you as my wife…"


    Their lips nearly met, but at thest second, Be diverted andnded her chin on his firm shoulder. The man chuckled, surprised at the woman''s actions but was strangely weing to it as he slowly pushed her off of himself to get a better look at her.


    "I''m not that easy…" She smirked, slowly stepping around him while feeling his chest from inside his robes. And as she swirled around, exactly one-hundred-eighty degrees, small pink tattoos shaped into that of wings embed themselves under her eyes, imprinted onto her dark eye bags.


    "Oh… trying to seduce me with one of your skills…" The man continued to smile but this time licked his lips, pulling her in by the waist and cupping her chin once more.


    They took a step back. Another step back. And another. It was almost like they were dancing, a contemporary art of death. Be leaned in with the man''s hand cupping her chin, and then, their lips met. Her right hand squeezed, balling into a fist, only to rx upon feeling both of their feet stop, right at the edge of the arena.


    The man, arrogant and so horribly reliant on his skills and strength, leaned in, using his tongue. Be tried to retreat her head, but the man swerved his arm around her hips and ced his free hand on her long green hair, balling it and grabbing it before pulling her in.


    This match-up was unfair. In every single way, whenparing their statuses, the water lord outssed Be in every category. Even their intelligence had a chasm between each of them, yet, at that very moment, everything was set up in her favor.


    From the man''s arrogance to the man''s ruling perspective, she could use it. And the only variable that made this entire thing possible was a weapon that she had brought from the beginning rounds. A simple iron sword that she thought nothing of, but as soon as something snapped inside her, everything came together. A n that was so quick that even Orion would have no choice but to apud.


    Her foot shuffled under the leather handle and as soon as the two came apart, saliva disgustingly strung from their lips, the man had been drawn so deep into her skill: [Eyes of Seduction], that he could only focus on her. His pupils had practically turned into hearts and his guard was instantly let down.


    Ting… SWOOSH


    Echoes of the sword clicking up from Be''s foot resonated through the chamber of waterfalls and death. Her right hand instantly caught the leather handle and with one inward swing, that dug up from his sr plexus and straight into his heart, the man smiled.


    "Did you think I seriously didn''t know of the presence of that sword… but how pitiful…" the man smiled, seemingly unphased by the weapon lodged into his chest, causing Be''s face to crumble with fear. "Yes… that''s right… no normal weapon can damage me- oomph…"


    All of a sudden, he leaned forward and coughed up a mouthful of blood, his pupils shaking with surprise. And as his face paled, his head tilted upwards, only to see Be''s fearful expression wiped from her face, reced with an uncanny grin that sent shivers down his spine.


    "You… bitch…"


    "I got lucky, taking such a weapon. And, if you were aware of its magic-negating properties you would have taken it away from me at the beginning of each death of mine… on top of that, you were careless. If you were a careful person you would have taken it anyway even without knowing of its properties so don''t me me…" Be''s expression darkened into a cold nk sheet of emotions. "... but me that tiny fucking brain of yours."