Did I ever want to be left alone? I feel the urge to call him back, back into the room, and back by my side.

And then I could ask myself in the same, Did I ever want someone by my side? Did I ever want to rely on someone so much as to have my life and death placed in their hands?

To have the king be bested by the pawn?

And to hear empty thoughts and words spill from the corrupt world around me...

Only to have them ring a venomous silence in my ear?

I want to escape from this emptiness. I want to escape from this prolonged silence. I want to feel relieved of the empty soul inside me. I want to be released.

But that sensation...to be released...I wonder if it is just a oasis. A thought provided by my conscious to escape the unbelievable, the vile, and the bloodshed of my current situation.

And I wonder if the trust I hold in that demon, my trust in Sebastian...I wonder how strong that link really is. And if the trust I hold is just...a false sense of security. He really just wants my soul in the end, doesn't he?

But yet...I still place my trust in something so aloof. Something so cold and unwavering. Something that would torture me, kill me, and eat me at the slightest sign of hesitation.

I place my trust into a promise of freedom after the contract is completed...and that's...that's all I really wanted. To be relieved of the vile course of my life.

All I wanted...right?

Or is all I wanted just a...Hallucination?

I let my head fall to the desk with a soft thud. Of course this is what I wanted. If it wasn't, wouldn't...wouldn't I have let myself die on that day so long ago?

Or was I just afraid to let go of the world, the thing that I now want to be so desperately freed from? Afraid...to die.

And is revenge just an object for me to cover the fact that I felt...That I feel like this? Is Sebastian just a hold on reality, so that I don't give up what really matters?

Or is this the Hallucination? Giving in to things that matter most to me...

But...what really matters? What matters to me anymore? Except revenge, false hatred, and the small recognition of those few people dumb enough to want to follow me into my damned path? And...do those things even matter anymore?

Or am I slowly turning my back on the real reason I wanted to live? I wanted to live. I wanted to live. If I keep saying it...it seems close enough to touch. To feel. And to believe that's what I truly wanted that day. But...maybe. Maybe it would have been easier to just die. To die and leave this corrupt life behind.

I raise my head to my left hand. And with a shaking right, I attempt a sip of long chilled tea. I let the coldness burn a path down my throat, and I...I feel this reality pulling me back in. As if it wants to be fueled by my hatred and suffering. And as if...it refuses to let me die.

I turn my head toward the left path of the hall.

As I walk I continue to think.

Was all of this...

Just a Hallucination as well?