The stump of where his hand once was is tingling.
Squalo can barely think beyond making sure his breathing is right. His eyes shut and his mouth wide open as all he focuses on is breathing, and the rest of his limbs may as well be dead, but the ghost of his left hand is numb and buzzing as if it has pins and needles.
It wants more, hungers for the next thing, to feel that rush of a well-earned kill afterward, I mean, his hand is gone but it's climaxed to something momentous and is this the part where Squalo mellows out and then dies for the next emperor like Tyr - wait, how long has this battle been going for - wait.
He thinks, he breathes in deep, that he's aged a hundred years, and he could die now and feel content with the life he's lived, all fourteen years of hard work and dedication to the sword. He could die here and now, lying down in the middle of nowhere. He doesn't need anything else than this moment. What is glory and arrogance, he doesn't know. This, this pride is knowing he was worth enough to defeat and finally kill the Sword Emperor, make the older man the First Sword Emperor, and become the Second Sword Emperor himself. Perhaps there will be a Third Sword Emperor, since he's pretty much made it a thing.
It's taken him four years, but he's here now, finally killing off the old, pretentious asshole literally named after a Norse god.
He's won.
So why does he feel like he's missing something?
A hundred metres away at a safe distance, Lussuria smiles softly, and cuts off the video, "LOOKING GOOD SQU-CHAN! JUST ONE HUNDRED MORE FIGHTS TO GO TO STAY SWORD EMPEROR!"
...Oh. Right.
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thanks for the sweet reviews :) I actually wrote a heck of a lot nonstop (despite the fact that i was very, very behind in uni). im talking staying up to sunrise just to keep writing. never happens. wow. will update on sundays (even tho it's friday morning hehe).