AN/ This is set in the present. Flashbacks of the past will be separated with two dots like this:

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Vantablack

Chapter Twenty.

The connection was lost.

Lars realized that his breathing wasn't completely settled, the stirring on his chest was persistent and he brought the phone off from his ear to stare at it blankly. He heard the dial's deaf-tone and he understood that Rakuen must have ended their call.

He shook his head, cleared his throat and he leaned back on his office's chair. He closed his eyes, his beating felt disturbed, the crease that furrowed his eyebrows wasn't in the least pleasing and he realized he couldn't control it.

Nakura… why can't you understand…

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Fragile hands that ripped in tremors held on tightly to his pants, Rakuen was on his knees, blood around his toes and the smell of copper and smoke danced macabrely around them, the blood splatters dripped in gruesome dyes all around his shivering form "P-please… help me…" he pleaded again. Almost mercilessly, Lars grinned and leaned down to cup his delicate tear-stained face between his hands.

"Why would I?" Rakuen's tears continued falling, dripping over the fingers that cupped each of his ashen cheeks.

"P-please…" he begged as he closed his tearful eyes, his teeth bared in sorrow and Lars' realized he wasn't anywhere close to stop crying.

"I just killed Zoguza," Lars whispered as he nuzzled his nose against Rakuen's "Isn't that the end of our deal?"

…

"H-he ate them…" Rakuen swallowed hard as more wreckful tears fell from his golden eyes, "y-you let him b-but-" the weeping demon grabbed Lars' wrists as tightly as he could, "Y-you can bring them back to life with Hoju-no-tama," he sobbed, "you can help me. Please I beg you…"

Lars snickered, "And what can you give me in exchange?" Rakuen's crying eyes widened, "Ah," he continued maliciously, "Nothing really right?" Lars went in close and planted a kiss on Rakuen's salted cheeks, "There, there, sometimes one loses everything, sometimes ones wins it all."

Lars let go of his face and hovered above him, his demeanor went back to being serious. "Sometimes you just become one of the two sides."

Rakuen broke down in painful cries, his hands grabbed the blood-blemished soil in between powerless clutches and he finally understood that there would be no mercy, no forgiveness and no love. And bitterly, he realized that he was the one who lost it all.

"I have to go now Nakura, here our quest finishes." Lars turned away, "the head of the little girl is still recognizable, you can still bury her and bring her flowers." He shrugged, "If you'd like to."

Lars clicked his tongue as he started walking, "By the way, I'm going to marry in a week so I need to be early in Yokohama. I really hope we don't get to see each other aga-" His words tied themselves as two thin arms hugged his waist from behind.

"Wait…"

...

Why can't you just hate me?

Lars' eyes widened, he was certain it would be the last time his body would be so close to Rakuen's. "Please… Kill me…"

The younger demon's arms quickly gave up the embrace and when Lars turned around he saw Rakuen's blood stained cheeks marred with tears and his huge eyes looking at him empty and void of life. "Please."

Lars had always despised those eyes because they simply made him feel.

His own fingers riveted in black smoky venom and in a swift slash, he threw the poisonous smolder directly against Rakuen's eyes. He heard a doleful groan and he saw Rakuen stumbling back to kneel on the floor, both hands desperately shielding his newly poisoned eyes, shaking and trembling until blood oozed out of the once magnificent orbs.

"I hope that suffices." He said coldly as he turned around, "isn't that worse than dying Nakura? At least you won't torment anyone with those horrible eyes of yours."

With that Lars walked away.

And he couldn't help but feel like he deserved to die.

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"Wasn't what you did horrendous?" Abby leaned on the frame door, the intrusion made Lars startle out of his remembrance, "That's what I call being heartless." She placed a finger on her chin, "Soulless is more like it, right?"

"Abby what are you doing here." He snarled.

"I see you affected," she hummed, "what were you remembering? Is not that I don't know," she shrugged teasingly.

"What the fuck are you doing here." His tone severed.

"Oh?" she grinned, "Your people called me to snitch on Russian's ambassadors. Your wifey wanted to speak with me and my birdies."

Lars stared inanely at her, "Leave my office then. I have nothing to speak with you."

She simpered, "Aw come on," she winked, "I know you since we are fifteen, I kind of consider myself your best friend that you only once fucked." She giggled, "I also wanted to come and see if my birdies were right and you and Rakuen had a little conversation."

"If you listen to my private conversations then I have not options left but execute you. Today"

She dismissed his words with her manicured hand, "I don't care about corporative business, I'm all for your youth's drama. After all my birdies told me everything that you did to that poor boy back then." She sighed, "And I feel so responsible about it oh lord." She slumped dramatically.

"That's none of your business."

"It is not," she grinned, "But it is always entertaining to watch strong demons self-destruct themselves."

His eyes became slits "You wish."

"I know."

"You don't know me."

"Ah, I don't?" she shook her head, "Let's see… you were angry because the boy wouldn't stop loving you isn't it?" she dipped her head, "Isn't that the reason you did that to his eyes? Isn't that the reason you let his family get killed?"

Lars remained quiet. She continued as she closed the door behind her, leaving them locked inside his office "Somewhere along the lines you were offered to marry a powerful woman. Therefore you'd also become powerful. That's what you told himself." She sighed as she pointed him "But 20 year old Lars wanted to marry this man instead right?"

She walked in towards his desk and sat the vacant seat in front of him "Ugh but this power-hungry, megalomaniac side of you got upset with you and with him, because you were so helplessly in love. The man that loved Rakuen was no longer what you deemed as yourself." Her lips stretched in a grin, "Or so you thought."

Lars raised an eyebrow "If I was as helplessly in love as you say I was then I wouldn't have been able to do what I did."

"You weren't." she said simply, "You've been trying to smother yourself all these years, even then," she twirled a strand of hair "You also died the moment you did that to him and the Lars that loved him wasn't the same who hurt him, isn't betrayal supposed to come from the same person you love?"

"I don't need this Abby." He shook his head and grabbed a folder.

"Let's see," she placed a finger on her lower lip, "Throughout Kurashiki and to Temple Horaiji, You had this boy in this odd limbo as you tried to figure out what side of you would win. Because at the same time that you desired the power that the Earl offered, you also didn't want to speak with him and tell him that you were done with him. Because you also wanted him."

Abby shook her head, "You ignored him for a complete week after you told him you didn't wish to live with him anymore and eventually, you used him for your own sexual gains a couple of times more."

Lars sighed, trying to ignore her.

"He helps you inside Horaiji and helps you retrieve the jewel, he gets stabbed in the abdomen as he guards that nobody comes near you while you do." She pointed at him, "Now I would have killed you right then and there," she laughed, "After that, you didn't even try to help him."

"I didn't understand him."

"He loved you is that simple." She looked down at her nails.

Abby looked at him and then gladly continued, "Then both return to his human village and Zoguza is there, he has eaten the wolves-demons that guarded his people and now Zoguza is eating his family and he throws in thunder, making the beast all the more angrier, Zoguza then rips his family with sharper teeth and spits the head of the infant down his feet, he is bleeding and dying and all the while he is screaming for your help, he tells you to at least tell him where is the real Zoguza."

"…"

"You decided to remain quiet."

"I did."

"Not to say immobile." She clicked her tongue, "You then kill Zoguza's real body as well as the puppet, but you do that only after the boy has lost his entire world. You let him see a very dark color of yourself and it frustrates you that he doesn't hate you yet, he asks you to kill him and instead you blind him with poison, leaving him unaided and oh-so heartbroken with an abdominal infection that almost took his life in the following days after your departure."

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"...How did he survive that?"

"Against a neighboring village, an old lady tended his wounds for 11 days straight, he remained asleep." She shifted, "All the while you were getting married."

…

"...Did he lose his eyes?"

"For 125 years he remained blind," Abby informed "But don't feel as bad for him, around that epoch, he became very respected as he could perfectly fight and win without his eyes."

She dragged her red eyes across his luxurious office, her chair swooned playfully "You know Lars, even when he was blind and I went to talk to him, I remember I asked him about his feelings for you," she hummed thoughtfully, "he told me that he didn't hate you… at all."

His tone was reserved "He didn't?"

"No," she moved her head, "But you know? I feel responsible."

"Why…"

"Let's say the guy's worst mistake started because I told you to go to him." She smiled sadly, "I really feel the more accountable because he was a healthy young man."

"…Isn't him now?"

"No, Rakuen is dying of god knows what," she moved her hand, "125 years after being blind he started his life anew, at least that's what he thought but things never went well for him, I guess that after all that his mind became ill. A little too sad to be healthy."

"...I see."

"20 years ago a wannabe witch threw a spell on him and bounded him to marry her. Out of his will, he had two kids with this woman but I was told that he fell out of her spell a very casual day when his son stared directly at him." she made an explosion gesture with her mouth, "Poof! the spell was simply gone, Rakuen grabbed the child and left with him, supposedly to take care of him but then... things never went good for him."

"…"

"If I'm honest Lars, I don't know what kind of karma is he paying, he wasn't a bad person at all." She turned to look at him, her tone rested in solemnity "You should go see him, these are his last months on this earth and I bet you want to hold him."

Lars moved his head defeatedly, she smiled and her words persisted "Come on I bet you want to, now that you know your choice tasted bitter. I bet you want to see him. At least once. Ask him for his forgiveness, knowing Rakuen, it will not be hard for him to forgive you."

"I can't ask to be forgiven for something I'm not sorry for."

"Oh you wished you felt that." She rolled up her eyes, "You would give every damn thing you have to change almost everything you have done Lars now come on."

"Where would I be had I stayed with Nakura." Though a rhetoric question, Abby managed to smile and genuinely respond.

"You'd be happy."

With that she stood up, "Go see him," she turned away and walked out of his office, "I left his address in your desk, you don't want to regret that forever, now do you?"

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