Chapter 16:
Revenge
EVERYONE IN THE COMMAND ROOM watched on the monitor as Brave dissolved. Mia’s eyes were wide, her breathing erratic.
“Sir…Knight?” she croaked in a hollow voice.
She couldn’t comprehend what she’d just seen. It felt like an awful nightmare.
She clutched her head, her hair tangling around her fingers. “This can’t be happening,” she said, fat tears falling swiftly down her cheeks. “It can’t be. It just can’t!”
Finn had always been so kind to her, always protected her. But Arroganz had killed him—a fact she struggled to digest.
Moritz gazed at her sadly but offered no words, instead turning back to the monitor. “Our strongest knight has fallen.”
The others in the command room looked devastated. They’d counted on Finn to defeat the Scumbag Knight, but he’d been bested. The other high-ranking Demonic Knights had likewise lost their lives in the battle. Worse, Arcadia’s reactor had been destroyed. There was virtually no way to come back from this.
Arcadia glanced at Mia, then turned his bloodshot eye on Moritz. “It can’t end like this. I won’t accept it.” Even with all their losses, and the odds against them, he wouldn’t back down.
Moritz shook his head with a haunted expression. “It’s over. We’ve lost. There’s no point fighting them anymore.”
“We have not lost!” Arcadia shrieked at him. “Under the waves all those years, I dreamed only of destroying those filthy machines and annihilating old humanity along with them! You cannot begin to fathom how long I spent down there—long enough for anyone to lose their mind! Anyway, we still have some hope left.” His gaze turned again to Mia, who had crumpled to the floor in tears.
Moritz choked out a derisive laugh at Arcadia; their defeat was inevitable. “Your fortress is sinking. I doubt it’ll ever see the world above the waves again.”
“Then I’ll just have to absorb all the demonic essence leaking out and completely destroy the place these lowlifes call home! As long as I have the princess with me, we will be victorious. We cannot possibly fall to them.”
Everyone in the room held their breath, shocked at Arcadia’s scorched-earth plan. His desperation to achieve victory for new humanity at all costs made Moritz suspicious.
“If you ruin the planet, there will be no future left for the empire,” he reminded Arcadia.
“The empire?” Arcadia’s mouth narrowed in a crescent-shaped grin. “I’ve never had any interest in your empire or its people.”
“What?! You told us that you’d help us win this war! That we had to fight to protect our citizens!”
Arcadia gazed at him without interest. “You’re nothing but impure specimens. The only true member of new humanity among you is the princess. Anyway, I never lied to you. What I said about the world being safe for you if the empire won was true. But now that it has come to this…”
Moritz’s mouth hung agape. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing. The empire was insignificant to Arcadia. “Y-you’re saying you deceived me? Tricked me into killing my own father?”
“You could say that, yes. Unfortunately, you were far less useful than I’d hoped,” replied Arcadia.
Moritz gnashed his teeth, brows knitting together. He yanked his sword out and threw himself at Arcadia. “You monster!”
“So that’s how you really feel. Glad we cleared the air.”
Moritz’s blade failed to reach its mark. Arcadia’s magic thrust him back and threw him into a wall. He sank to the floor soon after.
The command room erupted in chaos. Soldiers rushed to their emperor’s aid, then turned their weapons on Arcadia. “Protect His Imperial Majesty!”
Arcadia’s magic easily forced them back. Once they were sufficiently subjugated, he drifted over to Mia, who was still sobbing on the floor. “Princess, I am so sorry. I should have been able to prevent this, but instead the royal army overran us. Regardless, we must get you to safety.”
Though he’d been cold and unfeeling with Moritz and the other imperial soldiers, Arcadia was incredibly kind and attentive to Mia. He considered her his mistress, worthy of prioritizing over all else, since she’d awakened as a full-fledged member of new humanity.
The other Demonic Creatures in the room circled Mia, sharing Arcadia’s desire to whisk her away from the dangerous battlefield.
Mia swallowed her tears and shot to her feet. Her gaze focused on the monitor, which was locked on Arroganz. She watched it yank Finn’s longsword from the fortress’s deck.
Her eyes went dark, all light snuffed out. “Arcadia,” she said.
“Y-yes?! What is it, Your Imperial Highness?”
Mia’s eyes darted over to him. She let the hate growing inside her fester, overwhelming all other thoughts and feelings. “Help me avenge Sir Knight.”
“What? B-but we have to get you away from here.”
“No! That’s not what I want!” Mia shouted, unleashing a shock wave that ripped through the command room, leaving a large crack in the monitor on the wall. Only true members of new humanity could wield such power.
Sensing that Mia had unlocked her full potential, Arcadia bowed his head subserviently. “As you wish. But I must ask, are you certain about this?”
“Yes. As long as I can avenge him, I don’t care what happens to me.”
“Don’t do it!” cried Moritz, having regained consciousness while Arcadia and Mia spoke. “The war’s already over! If you keep going—”
“It’s not over!” Mia snapped back, the tears flowing anew. She glared at Moritz, her whole face pinched with anger. “Not yet. It won’t end until I take my revenge. I’m going to make that murderer suffer the same way I’ve suffered.” She clutched her chest as if the pain was too much to bear.
“Trust me, I will take care of everything.” Arcadia’s jaw cracked wide open, and he leaped forward, swallowing Mia whole. She didn’t even struggle.
Moritz shook his head in disbelief. “What’re you doing?”
After consuming Mia, Arcadia absorbed the other Demonic Creatures as well. His body swelled, expanding so rapidly that it fissured. Mia’s naked upper body appeared from a crack, rising from the belly button up; it was completely covered in a silver coating.
She threw her arms open wide. A black, tar-like substance flew through the air and gathered inside Arcadia’s body, which grew and grew.
Mia didn’t speak. Instead, Arcadia’s joyful voice echoed through the air. “Princess, together we shall destroy old humanity’s descendants!”
Mia’s form was like a silver sculpture, and when her eyes cracked open, they shone red as rubies. She and Arcadia burst through the ceiling. Unable to intervene, Moritz watched helplessly as they left.
“I can’t believe this. What have I done?” he murmured.
✦ ✦ ✦
✦ ✦ ✦
As he battled his own regret, his cane rolled across the floor and bumped his feet. It was the same cane that Carl had so loved using during his reign.