Life Delusion Chapter 10: Chapter X : Pain

Read chapter 10 of Life Delusion by The_lite on NovelPedia.

The air in the ruined sanctum tasted of copper and ash. Dust from the shattered marble pillars clung to their sweat-drenched skin, making every breath a chore. The battle had dragged on too long, draining their mana and leaving their muscles screaming in protest. It was supposed to be the final push. But they were too late. The God of Wrath stood amidst the rubble, breathing heavily, his divine armor cracked and bleeding a dark, viscous ichor. He didn’t cast a grand spell. Instead, with a weary, hateful sneer, he reached into the debris and pulled out a sword. It wasn’t glowing or majestic; it was a jagged, ugly piece of dark metal that seemed to absorb the dim light of the room. It just looked wrong. Before the god could even adjust his grip, the sound of scraping metal cut through the tension. One of his loyal knights—a battered, mindless husk of rusted armor—lunged forward. The knight snatched the sword from his master’s hand and pivoted in a single, terrifyingly fast motion. His target wasn’t the room at large. It was Aqua. Aqua’s boots were rooted to the floor. His mind registered the threat, but his exhausted body refused to respond. He saw the dark, jagged tip of the blade coming straight for him, cutting through the dusty air. “Aqua!” It wasn’t a heroic shout. It was a panicked, frantic scream. Rose didn’t think. There was no time for a spell, no time to parry. She just threw her entire body weight against him. The collision was clumsy. Her shoulder slammed into his chest, sending him sprawling backward. Aqua hit the uneven stone floor hard, scraping his elbows, the breath knocked out of his lungs. He looked up just in time to hear a sickening thud . There was no dramatic explosion. No shockwave. Just the wet, heavy sound of metal burying itself to the hilt in flesh. Time seemed to stutter. Aqua scrambled to his knees, his mind struggling to process the image. Rose stood completely still. She looked down at the blade protruding from her stomach, her hands hovering uselessly over the hilt. She didn’t scream. “Rose…” Aqua choked out, scrambling toward her. But no blood fell on the stones. Instead, a pale, shivering mist began to seep from the wound. Aqua reached her just as her knees gave out. He caught her, but the moment his skin touched hers, he felt a horrifying cold. He looked into her face. The vibrant green of her eyes was fading, replaced by a dull, glassy stare. Above her, the pale mist coalesced into a faint, translucent outline of her own body—her soul. But it wasn’t ascending. The dark metal of the sword hummed with a low, ugly vibration. Right before Aqua’s eyes, the translucent figure of Rose’s spirit began to crack. Fine lines spread across the ethereal projection like dry earth. Then, with a sound like stepping on brittle autumn leaves, her soul simply fell apart. The glowing fragments didn’t linger; they dissolved into the dirty air, turning into nothing. The physical weight in Aqua’s arms shifted. It was no longer a person. It was just an empty, heavy shell of meat and bone. “Rose?” Aqua whispered, his voice cracking. He shook her shoulders. “Rose, wake up. Stop it. Look at me.” Her head lolled back. She was gone. Something snapped inside Aqua’s chest. It wasn’t a sudden burst of power; it was a hollow, suffocating agony that quickly boiled into pure, unfiltered rage. His vision swam with tears, blurring the ruined temple. He carefully laid her head on the stone, his hands shaking violently. He turned his head toward the knight and the God of Wrath. He opened his mouth to scream, to tear the god apart with his bare hands— And then the falling dust stopped mid-air. The wind died completely. The agonizing sound of his own heavy breathing vanished. The world had turned into a static painting. Aqua found himself trapped, unable to blink, unable to move a muscle. The silence was absolute, pressing painfully against his eardrums. The God of Time had arrived. The ancient deity had cast a temporal lock on the e