Hello again, it's been a month and a half already?

God, how time pass. My mistake, I finished my year, but I made the terrible error of starting bloodborne again for the umpteenth time and above all discovered the incredible ELDEN RING! My last week was very... occupied with this game.

So... Yeah... I was slightly behind the schedule I had set myself. So, no I'm not dead and yes, the story will come to an end.

In the meantime, good chapter to you!

Chapter 19 : Insanity and sentiment

Ashton woke up slowly. His night had been good, and that surprised him more than anyone could imagine. Why hadn't the nightmares taken him tonight?

What had changed?

He looked at his hunting fork, seeing it glow with a soft greenish glow, now tending towards a soft yellow.

It was the first time this had happened. He looked around and spotted his comrade of fortune sleeping peacefully in her sleeping bag.

Her face was calm and gentle, almost peaceful. It warmed the hunter's heart to know that the night had been good for her as well as for him, though he didn't really know why. The ghost of a smile appeared on his face. Calmly, he grabbed his cleaver from nearby and silently snapped it to examine it.

Still the same violent, aggressive form from the first day he had carried it. He felt both happy for this constancy, but sad that nothing had really changed.

The hunter sighed as he ran a rag through the teeth of the weapon, removing the excess dirt that had accumulated there. He didn't know what to make of this new world since he arrived. Everything seemed so strange, so out of place. But not in a bad way as Yharnam might have been, but in a complete misunderstanding of his surroundings.

And as he began to get used to it, slowly but surely, new feelings and a new way of apprehending the world were being made in him. It was too surprising for the young hunter.

At least... In the dark corridors of the dungeon and the earth, he could return, if not permanently and accurately, for a time to a cold and morbid habit of killing or being killed.

"Maintaining your cleaver?" asked a voice that startled the hunter.

Aiz was standing just over his shoulder, watching the amount of waste being removed from the weapon. He hadn't heard it coming. The blonde looked at him for half a second.

"Did I surprise you?!"

There was a certain shock on her face. In all their hours of training, she had never managed to catch him off guard.

"Y-Yes," the hunter breathed, calming down. "I was focused on something else."

She watched him continue to polish his weapon with application. It was true that she never did this, leaving the work of sharpening and repairing to the smiths of the Familia. As she watched him do it, she wondered if it was part of his way of handling the weapon.

"Shall we practice?" she asked.

The hunter froze slightly, she could tell something was troubling him. Finally, he snapped his blade a few times, checking that it was still working properly.

"Fine, we just won't fight each other, I'm not in the best shape for that."

She nodded understandingly, Aiz had no desire to push the hunter, especially given what seemed to have happened last night. She'd been feeling a strange feeling since she'd talked to him, since he'd explained some of his philosophy, what she didn't know was that the hunter felt a similar thing.

"Good," he said, getting up. "Since we don't have a dummy, I thought I'd help you with the defensive gaps. Then... I thought you could explain to me how the adventurer markings work?"

Aiz remembered offering and smiled slightly. She could repay him a little for his time and the progress she had made.

"Let's do it that way."

Walking a little further from their camp, the hunter began to examine the trees meticulously. He took out his skinning knife and made a cross mark on a tree and stood beside her pointing to the one he had just marked.

"I don't suppose I need to explain that a battle is fought with death at stake?" asked Ashton.

Seeing Aiz nod he turned to the tree.

"Sometimes battles are unfavorable, like what we had yesterday, a more numerous, bigger or stronger opponent. Sometimes all at once. Still, there is a method to defeating even the most powerful, the enemy's flaws and deficiencies in their attacks or defense."

Aiz nodded, remembering a lesson the hunter had taught her.

"But, sometimes, none of these three things can be found in the opponent. So don't just focus on finding gaps in their attack or defence. Sometimes, it will be necessary to pressure create your own openings."

The blonde frowned, she who relied heavily on her natural strength and magic to break down defense, this seemed counterintuitive.

Ashton felt amusement rise in him, this lesson she had already applied unknowingly in the fight with the queen.

"Like a waltz, it's about manipulating the opportunities offered by everything around you. The fight is like a dance or a play, depending on your preference. The enemy plays according to his own role while you practice according to your role. When the enemy gains confidence and releases his guard, you must strike.

Aiz quickly made the connection with the insect. When the sword woman had given her the initiative, the queen had released her guard which she probably wouldn't have been able to break with her sword alone, giving him the opportunity to kill her."

"Hmm... So sometimes monsters create rifts themselves?"

Ashton smiled with satisfaction.

"Right, though, sometimes it will be necessary to create them yourself, by weakening a point of defense sufficiently or forcing it to change its method by awkward actions like magic. He pointed to the tree with one finger. "Normally, you wouldn't be able to take down this tree, however, it is technically possible to break it easily if taken correctly."

"I have to take him down by creating a weak point," Aiz understood.

Without saying anything, the hunter simply offered to move closer to examine his target. She looked at the cross he had made, if he had decided to do it here precisely, there must be a reason. Rubbing her hand against the bark, she felt a slight creak and some form of gentle resistance.

"Hm..." she breathed.

She remembered that Riveria had taught her several things about plants and trees, including this one. The young woman began to search through these thoughts and remembered. The inside of the trunk was partly rotten, so it was weaker.

Continuing to examine, she spotted a crack along the bark.

"A few hits on the pulpit should weaken it enough to spread the crack and make it fall under its own weight," she said, looking at the hunter.

Ashton merely shrugged indifferently as he stepped back slightly.

"Your turn to try."

A few minutes later, a long thud echoed through the forest as the tree toppled over onto its side. Beside him, a proud and confident Aiz stood there, already thinking of other ways to apply her newly learned lessons.

Ashton merely shook his head in mild amusement at the young woman's delighted actions.

"So," he said in a calm voice. Will you teach me the signs?

Back at the camp, Aiz stood before the hunter. She was rather pleased with herself. Sure the training was more of a lesson and had been short, but it had opened up a new avenue for her to hone her skills, especially Ariel.

If she perfected the attack further with what she already knew, she could have a powerful area attack. By releasing the wind magic just...

"So this sign here is to indicate a flying monster zone?" asked the hunter sitting next to her.

The blonde returned to the present moment.

"Yes. Be careful with the point, it should always point to the area where the monsters are coming from" she indicated.

"Hmm... Certainly an interesting information system..."

As she continued to explain the runes to him, she saw the rune the hunter was wearing on his cloak again and remembered what she was supposed to ask him. What were the mysterious shapes at night?

About to speak, she saw the calm look in the hunter's eyes and decided to postpone it, if he hadn't mentioned it, it must not be as worrying as she thought. Perhaps it was something peculiar to hunters and to this strange city of Yharnam?

"Why didn't I ask?" were Aiz's first thoughts during the night.

Ashton was struggling in bed, seeming to defend himself against some mysterious force. As the blonde woke up with a start and turned around, she saw the same hellish scene as two nights earlier. Dozens of eyes had formed in the hunter's shadow and were looking from right to left, but more importantly, ghost-like hands were slowly emerging from the ground all around him, caressing the sleeping hunter's face.

She could hear the hunter's useless struggle. A chill had run through the woman's body, it was worse than before. Claws of some sort had sprung up, but most of all, it was the human form standing at the hunter's side.

It looked like a decrepit young boy, his skin covered in shaggy hair. It was naked, its skin white and as bright as moonlight. His flesh was wrinkled and missing in places with deformed feet. A distended belly protruded below a narrow chest, arms widely deformed into a parody of a wolf or dog. Above a half-severed throat, she saw a face that inspired no sympathy. It was an unholy mixture of beast and human, half the jaw seeming to merge with the nose while the right eye, fully sunken into the skull, oozed a scarlet pus-like liquid.

This thing looked down on the sleeping body of the hunter and clapped its hands steadily as it came too close to the sleeping young man's face. For a moment, a hand clawed at Ashton's arm, and the creature growled in hatred, grabbing the hand that had caused the damage, yanking it back violently.

The creature finally noticed the blonde and looked up with pure blue eyes at the Loki Familia member. Aiz expected to read some form of malice in them but felt nothing but sickly fear and concern.

Grabbing her sword, the Sword Woman took cautious steps forward, approaching the beast that looked at her with a form of hope tinged with surprise.

"What are you!" the Sword Princess scolded as she assumed a fighting stance.

The beast shook its head and before Aiz could move, stretched its huge paw towards her. No time to dodge, no time to react, a kind of coldness had frozen its body.

As the paw touched her skull, all she heard was a hoarse, rumbling voice, seeming to come from the depths of a distant cave.

"You don't need to remember that night, just know that I am a friend and need your help.

Aiz froze and felt her mind go blank. She tried to resist as the memories of the hands in the cart, of the beast, faded.

The creature withdrew its hand, looking at the stymied Sword Woman, whose eyes stared forward at Ashton. The hands that tormented him were gone; his breathing was simply still horribly heavy.

May you find reason in this world," the shadow muttered in a loving voice.

As if nothing had happened, it disappeared in a hue of brilliance.

Aiz came to her senses, she could hear the hunter's heavy, panicked breathing, just like in the wagon, and this time she summoned her courage to wake him up. Whatever the nightmares were, she had to understand more.

As he opened his eyes, she heard him let out a panicked hiss.

"What's going on?" asked Aiz as she saw the hunter retreat like a cornered animal.

He couldn't turn his back on Yharnam.

"I-I can't talk about it," the hunter said, backing away.

Why was he so cold? What was that wet feeling on his cheeks.

"Please don't look at me like that," he thought.

"Why?" asked Aiz simply, watching him cower back.

Then, all cracked up, he couldn't hold back what he had been hiding for so long. He told in one simple sentence everything that had happened to him, from London to Yharnam, his terrible night, the fear that engulfed him. A simple sentence so that everything could be understood.

"I am a beast."

The blonde's gaze was heavy to bear. He would have liked her to insult him, to spit in his face calling him a murderer far from any possible salvation upon hearing the admission of what he was. Everything would have been simple, just as he was already living Yharnam. A life alone in a dark alley waiting for the end.

"I wouldn't say I can understand," Aiz announced. "But you're not a beast."

"The old lady, brother..." tried to justify Ashton to remind himself of all his crimes, his failures.

"It... comes from your guilt, I suppose? I don't know what happened to you, but you didn't ask with me so I would do the same."

She was absolutely right. He felt guilty for never having made it out of Yharnam earlier, for killing, for abandoning his brother to his terrible fate.

However... He couldn't choose her no matter what.

A choice he could never reach, no matter how much he might reach out for hope.

"Haven't you done that enough though?" questioned Aiz. "Like in the cave, not everything is your fault."

After a moment, he had understood why he never wanted to talk about his past before.

Aiz... Her words were soft, seductive.

"Don't try to help me. Don't try to comfort me or my resolve will tremble. I may lose to the sweet temptation. Please stop this," he begged the young woman.

Aiz wasn't sure what to do, then she remembered what Riveria had done when she had a similar case with the black dragon.

She took him in her arms and held him tight. The facade he wore collapsed entirely, and he began to cry in her arms, feeling the one for whom he'd developed unknown feelings rub his back as she soothed her.

"You have..."

His voice was cut off. Like the nightmares of his troubled nights, he saw the shadow and was engulfed in it.

He turned frantically, waiting for an entity to be there. But instead, nothing. Suddenly he felt a tug on his sleeve. It was a child, a small child that looked like him. The child whispered to him in a hollow voice.

"Am I your past or your future?

The words caused physical pain as the hunter fell to his knees.

Ashton closed his eyes as hard as he could, trying desperately to lose his sight. But nothing changed. He still saw the child, he still felt the excruciating pain. When he opened his eyes, he found himself in his old London home, long before all hell broke loose in the capital. His bed... Why? Why was he there?

Quickly, he got up and headed for the ground floor. It was a dream, he knew. But the desperation, the fear gave him hope that it was all real.

Then... In the middle of the living room, he found his mother, father and brother side by side, sitting on the couch and staring at him as he walked down the stairs.

"Mum?" he asked.

As he approached, he saw an unbearable disgust in their eyes.

"Monster," his father said simply.

The man he had always admired simply said the words he didn't want to hear.

"I-I can explain!" he tried to temporize.

"You don't have to say anything," his mother retorted harshly.

"But..."

"No justification," his brother said softly, looking at him. "You killed me!"

"N-No!"

He held his hand out towards them and saw that it was beginning to decay into dead flesh, oozing a greyish black liquid usually found on the beasts of Yharnam. He was becoming like her.

Ashton looked around, looking sick and destroyed, nothing was real here, but he knew one thing. Running forward, the hunter grabbed the poker from the fireplace and threw himself at the sharp steel, impaling himself on the steel.

"He did not want to become a beast. A hunter had to die human."

The blood flowed, but not enough to kill him. He grabbed his own neck and began to choke on himself, screaming in a hollow, desperate voice.

"YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF.

The light faded from his eyes as his hands tightened around his own neck. As the light faded from his vision, he saw all his memories flashing in his mind.

Every mistake he had made, every person he had hurt, every sin he had committed. They all flashed before his mind.

The memories distorted as the people in his sick visions became hateful monsters, screaming at him. He tried desperately to escape his own mind.

But the whispers did not stop, the memories taunted him again and again and again, his mind filled with every regret, every fear.

He screamed, begging for it to stop, trying to tear his own chest with his bare hands, but feeling only his hands tearing at his own skin.

In a desperate move, he plunged his head into the flames of the burning fireplace.

The flames rising in his throat burned his internal organs. At this point his neck was broken, but he would not die, held alive against himself. His eyes flooded with tears, blood and the strange black liquid oozed all over his charred face, his ears flooded with whispers though they were caught in the burning bite of the flames, he could still hear.

As he begged, he felt his throat catch. Why was he begging and trying to kill himself?

This house... These people... They were already dead. Looking at those hands, in the middle of the flames, he saw the gaunt skin they had become. What if he was just a desperate fool? Why was he apologising?

And for a moment, just a moment, it was quiet. And in that moment of silence, he stepped back from the flames, pulled the stake out of his belly and collapsed to the ground.

"I'm tired," he said, this time directly to heaven. Despite his throat choking with blood and completely burned out, he managed to articulate painful sentences.

"Let me explain Father."

"You are not my son. You are a filthy, monstrous killer," he spat in a violent voice.

He looked at his family, who had not moved, and smiled a bitter, distorted smile on his burned face.

"I ask no forgiveness, father, for I am no monster, I only did what I had to do to survive and bring what little I could into the madness that engulfed me.

"Your excuses are worthless!" scolded her mother. "I... We taught you better! You should have jumped with your brother!"

"I'm not sorry and I wouldn't seek your forgiveness for not following him where to save him. I did not ask for the life that was given to me, but it was given to me nonetheless, and with it I did my best, helped those I could and did more by my hands.

He stood up and grabbed the poker, walking towards his family.

"Are you going to take my life again?" his little brother asked ironically with an almost unhealthy smile.

It was the same face as before that cairn of flesh and blood. It was all just crazy memories of his broken mind.

Ashton raised the steel and brought it down on the three figures in turn, watching them collapse in a pool of richly coloured blood.

He did not kneel, did not beg, did not apologise. The hunter dropped his makeshift weapon and headed for the front door. As he opened it, in a final movement, he looked behind him.

"This is not goodbye. I'll be back to see you soon enough, for now, let me enjoy the moment."

As the light returned to his eyes, he looked at the form of the blonde woman before him.

"You have been forgiven," he heard her say in the distance.

And he hugged her as tightly as he could, using her as an anchor. Nothing else mattered. Then he felt her arms tighten behind his back, returning the embrace.

As their fluffy moment came to an end, there was a soft silence between the hunter and the adventurer.

"I... My instincts were first," Ashton said softly, stepping back.

Aiz, who was standing silently in front of him, responded by doing the same.

"Likewise. I... I felt I had to help you. That I could let you do it."

The two sat down, looking at the floor.

"It wasn't just that I was strong that made you do it?" asked Ashton hopefully.

Aiz shook his head.

"No... I think... there's something else. Our common history and our difference in will."

Seeing the incomprehension on the hunter's face she continued.

"I hate monsters, just as you hate beasts. You are like me in that. But... What I don't understand is your will. My hatred has gone numb and still burns while everything in you seems to be off..."

He put his head back.

"It's not extinguished... Simply, appeased. I've given too much to go on."

"Why? Why do you stay back?!" asked Aiz becoming more aggressive.

This was what she couldn't grasp and what made her question herself. He had the strength, the power, but he wasn't using it, seeming to accept his situation fatalistically. Why didn't he want to break and take revenge on those who had wronged him? Why did he seem to be endlessly dwelling on the past and not trying to move forward?

"Because I'm tired."

She widened her eyes for a moment at the look in the hunter's eyes. A scarred person, far beyond her years stood before her.

"I understand your hatred... I've lived it. There was a time when I laughed in the midst of the massacre. Then, everything calmed down when I understood one thing. What I had given in my quest for blood.

He looked at her and had only one sentence.

"What will you do after your hunt?"

She opened her mouth but realised that she could not answer immediately. The blonde had never thought about it. All she cared about was killing the monsters, slaughtering them in hopes of becoming powerful enough to face the black dragon.

But then what?

Aiz had never thought that far ahead. Cutting her off in her thoughts the hunter sighed.

"I'm not saying that hate is bad. It just needs to be directed towards a goal and a will of the moment. So... what are you fighting for? For whom?"

Loki would be his obvious answer, but it felt wrong. For herself? No... She had given up on that. For her mother and father? She herself wasn't sure. Killing monsters had simply become a kind of habit. And it all seemed quite macabre now that she was thinking about it alone.

Ashton sighed. The rising sun was beginning to show through the trees. The hunter stood up.

"We need to head for the village, the wagon will be here soon."

This chapter was a pain to write in the first part, but I'm very pleased with my portrayal of Ashton's madness about his family and the way he deals with it. This chapter laid the groundwork for the feelings between the two and showed that they each felt something new that they will need to understand!

Other than that, nothing else to say. Take care of yourself and your loved ones and see you next time!