Chapter 82: Bad Man.
Vincent came to a complete stop.
For the first time in a long while, he genuinely didn’t know what he was looking at.
The enormous cloud of black miasma was racing towards him at terrifying speed. He knew Damien was somewhere inside it, but what he couldn’t understand was how Damien had managed to move that quickly. Damien wasn’t exactly known for his speed, especially compared to most Awakened.
Then the miasma suddenly split apart.
An enormous white beak burst through first, followed by the Therizon’s impossibly long neck. Moments later, its colossal body emerged from the darkness, charging straight across the frozen landscape with enough force to shake the surrounding ice.
Perched comfortably atop its back was Damien.
He was gripping the two long black feathers behind the Therizon’s head like the reins of a galloping war horse while the undead miasma rampaged wildly behind him.
Vincent simply stared, for perhaps the first time in his life he was completely speechless.
The Therizon thundered past him without slowing in the slightest. As it did, Damien casually lifted one hand from the feathers and gave Vincent a friendly wave.
"Afternoon."
Then both rider and beast disappeared into the distance.
Vincent remained standing exactly where he was.
"At least he got it handled."
Vincent shook his head, pushing the absurd sight of Damien riding the Therizon to the back of his mind.
There were more pressing matters.
He kicked off the frozen ground and shot towards the direction Naomi had fled. His physical body surpasses ordinary Awakened. Every leap carried him across vast stretches of ice, his figure becoming little more than a blur as the frozen landscape rushed beneath him.
It didn’t take long before he spotted her.
Naomi was completely out of sorts. Instead of travelling in her dissolved state, she was actually running in her human form, her breathing uneven as black blood continued trickling from the corners of her mouth.
Vincent’s pitch-black eyes narrowed, he immediately activated Deadlock. This time, Naomi wasn’t expecting it.
Her body suddenly stiffened.
Blood burst from her eyes, nose and mouth as though something deep within her soul had cracked apart. She stumbled forward, nearly collapsing onto the ice before instinct finally took over.
Without even daring to look behind her, Naomi dissolved into black sludge.
Only then did the crushing pressure on her soul ease, allowing her to barely escape before Deadlock could completely tear it apart.
Naomi slipped into a narrow crack in the ice, her dissolved body flowing effortlessly through the opening before disappearing deeper beneath the frozen world.
Vincent followed directly above.
His cane crashed into the ice again and again, each strike shattering another layer beneath his feet. Enormous fractures spread in every direction as chunks of ancient ice collapsed into the darkness below.
Naomi didn’t fight back.
She ignored him completely and continued descending, forcing herself deeper and deeper into the frozen ground, caring only about putting as much distance between herself and Vincent as possible.
Eventually, the crack opened into a small underground chamber.
Her dissolved body gathered together before reforming into her human shape. Naomi stumbled forward a few steps before slowly lowering herself onto the frozen ground.
She drew her knees tightly against her chest and buried her face between them, then soft sobs gradually echoed in the silence.
"Leslie, I’m so sorry".
... ...
Vincent had become like a wild beast.
The muscles across his bare back tensed with every swing as he repeatedly brought the base of his cane crashing into the ice. Each impact shattered another massive section of the frozen ground, sending cracks racing deeper and deeper into the abyss where Naomi had buried herself.
"Why are you hiding?" Vincent called out, his voice carrying through the fractured ice. "I thought you enjoyed standing at the centre of attention. Well, here’s your opportunity. Come out... let’s dance, Naomi."
He bent his knees before launching himself high into the air. Moments later, he came crashing back down.
The frozen ground exploded.
A massive crater opened beneath him as enormous slabs of ice collapsed, yet it still wasn’t enough. Vincent’s pitch-black eyes never wavered. He could still feel her soul moving somewhere beneath him.
"You know..." Vincent continued. "Andrea warned me about you long before we even met. She admitted she was a hypocrite, but she also told me you were a rat."
He raised his cane once more.
"At the time, I thought she was simply venting her frustrations."
The cane slammed into the ice again. Another section of the frozen ground collapsed.
"I was mistaken."
"Andrea’s methods may be questionable, but at least she genuinely tries to save whoever she can from this nightmare. You...You care about nothing beyond yourself. Even the people willing to die for you are nothing more than disposable tools."
His grip around the cane tightened.
"When your sister died, did you even mourn her?"
The question echoed through the fractured ice.
"I watched complete strangers shed tears for her. People who had spoken to her only once grieved more than you did. Meanwhile, you locked yourself away and carried on as though nothing had happened."
Vincent slowly lowered his cane.
"And that’s the difference between the two of you." His voice was calm, but every word landed like a hammer. "Andrea may be a hypocrite... but she’s still human."
His pitch-black eyes stared into the darkness beneath the ice, then a faint smile surfaced on his lips.
"You, Naomi... You’re just a fucking rat."
BOOOOOOM!
The frozen ground erupted.
Dozens of black sludge tentacles burst from beneath the ice, twisting violently in every direction. Wherever they touched, the ancient ice hissed and melted away, collapsing into pools of black sludge before freezing over once more.
Vincent immediately leapt backwards, putting several metres between himself and the writhing mass.
The sludge slowly gathered together.
Naomi’s figure gradually emerged from within it, her head hanging low. Long strands of black hair concealed most of her face as the sludge slid from her body and returned beneath her feet.
For several long seconds, neither of them spoke, then Naomi slowly lifted her head, faint tear stains ran down her cheeks.
She looked furious. Yet somehow, she had never appeared calmer.
"Vincent," she said quietly. "You really are a bad man... you know that, right?"
Vincent answered with nothing more than a small shrug and the faintest smile.
"Bad men do bad things, good men do foolish ones. You don’t need to be Einstein to figure that out."