Author's Corner
I'M ALIVE! Sorry for making you worry. I had crazy writer's block for this fic. Long story short, I was debating with myself over whether or not I wanted to include a certain plot point later on, and I couldn't really progress with the story until I'd made up my mind. NaNoWriMo also turned out to be a Colossal Failure, but we won't talk about that lol.
On a more positive note, shout-out to victoriarogue's wonderful fic Hell Doctor, which just celebrated its 13th anniversary! Thirteen years! Now that's what I call an achievement. Keep it up, bud!
(P.S. A lot happens in this chapter. Some good, some bad. Enjoy the ride! I sure as hell didn't...)
EIGHTH BLOOD
Chapter 114: Covenant
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"You stand before the Lord of the Western Lands," Jaken announced. "Please state your name and confirm your status to the court."
The newcomer knelt before the dais and lowered his head respectfully. "My name is Roku," he said. "I have been sent here as an official representative of the Ether Clan's matriarch, Mineru-sama. Ordinarily, she would have made the trip herself, but her husband has recently fallen ill, and she is reluctant to leave his side lest his condition worsens."
"You have my condolences," Sesshoumaru replied courteously. "If you require a healer, you need only ask."
The ambassador smiled. "A kind offer, my lord, but that won't be necessary. My people are well-versed in the art of medicine. Our healers are likely perfecting a cure for Jiahao-sama's sickness as we speak." His smile faded as he raised his head and looked Sesshoumaru dead in the eye. "Mineru-sama was sorry to hear about your current plight. She has asked me to deliver a message to you. Will you receive it?"
Sesshoumaru nodded. "Proceed."
Octavia's brow creased as she studied the ambassador's face from her seat. Perhaps it was because he was also a canine, but he bore a striking resemblance to Sesshoumaru. And Inuyasha, to a certain extent. The ambassador's long, silver hair was scraped into a high ponytail, and his eyelids were painted blue to emphasise the gold in his irises. He even had the same square jawline and pointed nose.
"The Southern and Eastern Strongholds must be avenged," Roku declared. "The Ether Clan has always tried to remain neutral, but that can no longer be the case. This threat is too great to ignore. Therefore, Mineru-sama is prepared to dispatch warriors to both the North and the West to serve as further protection against our common enemy. All she asks in return is that you agree to the merging of our two clans via matrimony."
Outraged whispers flooded the room, prompting Sesshoumaru to raise his hand and motion for silence. "Continue," he told the ambassador once the murmuring had ceased.
"Mineru-sama offers you the fruit of her loins—her only daughter and heir, the Lady Mikan. Take her to wife and the Ether Clan's legions will be yours to command, my lord."
Octavia held her breath as she waited for Sesshoumaru to respond.
"And it has to be me that weds her?" he asked finally. "No one else will suffice?"
"That is correct, my lord," replied Roku. "Mineru-sama was very specific about it."
"I see. When do you plan on returning to Mount Reimei?"
"As soon as possible. Time is of the essence, after all."
"That it is." Sesshoumaru's eyes narrowed. "You are dismissed for the time being. I will summon you again when a decision has been made. Food and lodgings will be provided for you whilst you wait, and Jaken will attend to your every need."
The ambassador bowed again. "Thank you, my lord. You are most gracious."
Octavia watched Jaken escort him away with a knot in her stomach. She felt Cyril's eyes on her and turned to face him, but her uncle's perturbed expression only served to unsettle her further.
Sesshoumaru didn't linger. As soon as the ambassador had taken his leave, he was already on his feet and marching towards the exit like his life depended on it. Octavia waited until the rest of the crowd had begun piling out of the room before following their lead. Kagome tried to collar her on the way out, but Octavia quickly ducked out of her way and used the sea of moving bodies to her advantage.
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At noon, the weather took a turn for the worse. Storm clouds gathered overhead, blocking out the sun, and thunder boomed menacingly in the distance.
Octavia searched high and low, but she couldn't find Sesshoumaru anywhere. She might as well have been looking for a needle in a haystack. Eventually, she had no choice but to enlist Ah-Un's help. The dragon followed its master's scent beyond the stronghold's walls to an isolated plateau that was home to an enormous camphor tree.
She spied him standing amongst the roots with his sword drawn and poised to strike. Ah-Un flew lower and landed on the edge of the plateau, then pressed its belly to the ground so that she could dismount more easily.
Sesshoumaru didn't acknowledge their arrival. Keeping her gaze fixed on his back, Octavia patted both of Ah-Un's necks before walking towards the Daiyoukai.
"What are you doing?" Her mouth twisted into a frown when he ignored her and carried on slashing the air with his sword. "I know you can hear me. Cut the crap and tell me why you're messing around out here instead of—"
"They ask too much of me," he said without turning around.
She frowned harder. "Who? The Ether Clan?"
He sheathed the Bakusaiga and tilted his head sideways so that he was looking at her from over his shoulder. "That leader of theirs had the gall to accept my invitation of friendship only to immediately begin issuing demands. I am the Lord of the Western Lands. Not her servant. She cannot expect me to marry someone I've never met."
Oh.
"We knew it was a possibility," Octavia reasoned. "It's not uncommon for treaties to be formed through marriage. Look at Nagisa and Hiroto—"
"I will not surrender my integrity in exchange for an alliance with those leeches—"
"You have to."
He turned to face her and stared in disbelief. "Have you lost your mind?"
"Have you lost yours?" She sighed at the bewildered look on his face. "We need that army, Sesshoumaru. It's not exactly an ideal situation, I know, but what's the alternative? We have nothing to fall back on. If we turn them away, we're as good as dead."
"I will not subject another woman to what my mother was made to endure," he hissed.
"That was different," Octavia whispered. "You know it was. You said so yourself. He loved Izayoi. And she loved him. Your mother accepted it. Why can't you?"
"I will not repeat his mistakes," Sesshoumaru said quietly. "If this union were to go ahead, then my duty would be to her, not you . . . Is that what you want?"
No.
The idea of him being promised to someone else made her chest tighten with jealousy. And yet, the feeling paled in comparison to the fear that consumed her body and soul when she thought about Augustus marching on the Western Lands and decimating them as he had the others.
She'd gotten a taste of what true despair felt like when the usurper had seized the stronghold in Sesshoumaru's absence. So many people had died that day. She still remembered the pain she had felt whenever she'd considered the possibility that Rin could have been among them.
She never wanted to feel that way ever again.
". . . I want us to live."
A flash of light swept across the sky, followed by a clap of thunder and a few stray drops of rain.
She turned to beckon Ah-Un, but Sesshoumaru reached out and grabbed her by the wrist.
"We will find another way," he said.
"There is no other way," she countered harshly.
"Then we kill him."
"Who?"
"Your brother. We track him down and put an end to his miserable life."
She scoffed. "And then what? Augustus isn't our only problem. The Church existed before he was even born, and if the Radiant One survives, it will go on existing long after he's dead."
It was raining hard now. The tree provided relatively decent cover, but it wasn't enough to protect the ground from being drenched by the sheeting rain.
"Don't do anything rash," she implored him. "At least meet with this woman before you come to a decision. She might not be so bad. Hell, you might even like her—"
"Impossible. She is not you."
Her eyes burned with tears. Why did he have to make everything so difficult?
When she didn't respond, he lifted her wrist and laid her palm flat against his unarmoured chest, letting her feel the rhythm of his pulse. She closed her eyes in an attempt to keep the tears from falling, but they escaped anyway and rolled down her cheeks to mix with the rainwater.
Her heart raced when she felt his lips brush gently against hers, before capturing them in a heated kiss. It was almost enough to make her believe there was another way, after all.
Pulling away, she wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his neck. He seemed relieved and melted into the embrace, oblivious to what was coming next.
"I'm sorry," she breathed, tightening her hold on him. "But I can't keep watching you screw things up on account of me. Kanetsugu was right. If it weren't for me, you never would have gotten roped up in any of this—"
"Octavia—"
"Don't." She unwound her arms from around his neck and took a couple of steps backwards before meeting his gaze again. It was the hardest thing she'd ever done, yet it was nothing compared to what she was about to do. "I mean it. It's better this way. We had a good run, but we should quit while we're ahead. In hindsight, it shouldn't have happened in the first place. We weren't thinking clearly. I see that now . . . And I think you do, too."
His jaw clenched. "What are you saying?"
She exhaled slowly, then answered, "I'm saying that if it ever came down to a choice between our 'relationship' or people's lives, I would choose the latter every time. And I sure as hell wouldn't jeopardise the safety of our friends just to avoid doing something that I didn't want to do."
"That wasn't my intention. I was trying to—"
"I know perfectly well what you were trying to do," she snapped. "You can blame your morals all you want, but it won't change the fact that you're afraid you'll prefer this woman over me like your father preferred Inuyasha's mother."
His eyes widened in horror. She didn't think she had ever seen him look so offended.
"What a ludicrous claim," he said through gritted teeth. "I would never be so fickle."
It was working. She could feel his anger rising.
She hated herself for manipulating him in such a way, but she had to stop him from ruining their only shot at beating Augustus and the Church for good. And if that meant sacrificing her own happiness in the process, then so be it.
"Open your eyes, Sesshoumaru. What sort of future could we have had, anyway? You're immortal, for God's sake. I might be Erem's Vessel, but I'm still human." Her vision blurred as she spoke. "We won't grow old together. I'll age and die just like every other mortal. Not like you . . . You won't want me when my hair is falling out and I'm covered in wrinkles."
"I will," he argued over the pouring rain. "There will only ever be you."
The certainty in his voice made her resolve waver ever so slightly, but not enough to stop what she was doing and fall back into his arms. "Liar. You only like me because I'm young and passably attractive. If you could see me with all of that stripped away, you'd be disgusted."
He shook his head. "You're wrong. I know exactly what you are. Besides, you've witnessed my true self many times now, and your heart has never once wavered because of it."
"Is that what you think?"
It was the least convincing she'd sounded so far, but it didn't matter. The damage was already done. Sesshoumaru's expression hardened, and he scrunched his hands into white-knuckled fists.
Fresh tears pricked her eyes as she inhaled sharply and willed herself to keep going. "Your true form repulses me. The teeth, the fur, the tail. Even the thought of it makes me feel physically sick—"
"Enough. You've made your point."
"No, I haven't—"
"Yes," he snarled, eyes filling with red. "You have."
She choked on a sob when he transformed into a sphere of light and launched himself into the heart of the storm. There was no way of knowing if the subsequent flashes of light were his doing or simply more lightning.
Octavia clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle a wail, before collapsing to her knees on the wet, squishy ground. Ah-Un bounded over to where she'd fallen and lowered its heads so that they were eye level with her. The dragon whined when it saw her tears and rested one of its heads on her shoulder, whilst the other mussed her sopping hair with its snout.
"I'm sorry you had to hear all of that," she said between shallow breaths. "I didn't mean it. Of course I didn't . . . I was only trying to protect him. Without that alliance . . . You understand, don't you?"
Ah-Un made a soft rumbling sound in response, then drew back to look at her again. The pain in its eyes caught her completely off guard.
She sniffed loudly and wiped away her tears. The dragon made another rumbling sound before presenting its saddle to her. Breathing harshly, she clambered onto Ah-Un's back without a word of protest.
There was no point waiting. Sesshoumaru wouldn't be back for a very long time, and that was assuming he even returned at all.
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Sunlight filtered in through the canopy, accompanied by a warm drizzle of rain that misted the ground below. The perpetual buzzing of insects caused Asuka's temples to throb painfully, and the humidity made her robes cling to her like a second skin.
According to Augustus, they were in a country called Peru, which was on a continent known as South America. They hadn't been able to pinpoint an exact date, but the consensus seemed to be that it was sometime during the twentieth century. This particular rainforest spanned over six million square kilometres and eight separate countries, making it the largest rainforest in the world. As beautiful as it was, Asuka would have preferred someplace a little less sweltering, but beggars couldn't be choosers.
After Octavia had destroyed the portal in Greece, they'd been forced to abandon the kasbah and traverse the schism in search of a new path.
Fortunately, the Reikon Blade did far more than cut souls and eat dreams. Although it had lost the ability to create gates, the Commander had been pleasantly surprised to learn that it could be used as a sort of dowsing rod. They had followed the light from the crystal through countless dimensions before finally arriving at their desired destination.
Asuka peered up at the canopy and narrowed her eyes as the blue glow of the schism shone down on her through the tangle of branches. Japan was over nine thousand miles away, but thanks to the light above their heads, they could be there in a matter of seconds.
Averting her gaze, she concentrated on wading through the undergrowth and made her way through the sprawling campsite. The Commander was waiting for her inside the tent with the dome-shaped roof. Her heart raced as she stepped over the threshold and let the flap fall back into place behind her. The pungent smell of aloe vera mixed with tea tree oil made her nostrils blaze.
The Commander was standing with his back to her as he leaned over a gurney in the centre of the room.
"How is she?" Asuka asked bluntly.
"The same as she was yesterday," Augustus replied without tearing his eyes away from the gurney (and, by extension, the figure lying comatose on top of it).
Asuka waited for him to finish applying ointment to the woman's skin before moving to join him. Her stomach tightened as she examined the extent of the damage. She'd heard the rumours, but it was her first time seeing the after-effects of Octavia's magic for herself.
The Dressmaker's once flawless skin was covered in burn scars, and her right arm had been amputated just below the elbow. Her hair was also significantly shorter than it had been before and was now only a few inches longer than Mei-Hua's closely sheared scalp.
"How is she still alive?" Asuka whispered. "I was there when it happened. The blast alone was enough to knock me unconscious, but I saw the flames devour her. She should be dead."
"You're right," he agreed. "She should be, but she isn't. And I intend to find out why."
The Dressmaker's eyelids flickered wildly. She was dreaming again.
Augustus placed the pot of ointment on the table beside her amputated arm and slipped the Reikon Blade free from its sheath. Asuka's eyes widened as the crystal in the hilt suddenly flared to life, as if it were sensing something.
It was said that sharks could smell blood from up to a quarter of a mile away. Perhaps the dagger was the same. Could it smell when someone was dreaming and was unable to resist the temptation to sink its fangs into anything with a working pulse? Was that why they called it Dream Eater?
Before she could even think to ask what was happening, Augustus touched the tip of the dagger to the Dressmaker's forehead, triggering a noise that sounded an awful lot like glass shattering.
Asuka yelped as the tent began to flood with glowing purple water and floundered on the spot, panicking over how quickly it was rising. Contrastingly, Augustus seemed completely unperturbed. He held his position until they were fully submerged underwater. Only then did he meet Asuka's terrified gaze and motion upwards with his spare hand.
She swam after him, kicking against the current until her head broke the surface of the water. By that point, the Commander had already climbed out of the pool and was crouching by the edge, taking in their new surroundings.
Asuka did the same. They were in a small room with stone walls and two steel pillars protruding from opposite ends of the pool. There was an upside-down cone balanced between them with water flowing through it and into the basin she was sitting in. A column of symbols was etched into the metal, separated by horizontal lines that curved around the cone like hoops.
"A water clock," Augustus muttered. "I've never seen one this big before. Amazing."
"Where are we?" asked Asuka.
He turned to face her and grinned. "Where do you think?"
She reached for the hand he offered and let him help her out of the pool. "It's not quite what I expected," she mumbled. "Why would she be dreaming about a place like this? Is it just a figment of her imagination or is it real?"
"I'm not sure," he admitted, still grinning. "Let's find out."
They exited the room with the water clock and found themselves standing on a long, winding staircase. The walls around them were plastered with varying types of clocks—analogue, digital, pendulums and hourglasses. Tick, tock, tick, tock. The clamour of clockwork bounced against the stones, making her eardrums rattle.
"Sir?" she started apprehensively, but he was already sprinting on ahead.
Her heart was in her throat as she raced up the stairs after him. The higher they climbed, the louder the ticking became. When they finally arrived at the top of the staircase, the noise was almost unbearable. Asuka resisted the urge to cover her ears as she waited for Augustus to finish admiring the woodwork on the huge door in front of them.
"This is extraordinary," he gushed, reaching for the ivory-coated doorknob. "Have you ever seen anything like it, Asuka?"
She hadn't.
Before she could reply, the sound of frantic footsteps echoed from somewhere beneath them. Asuka's fingers curled around the handle of her whip, but the Commander simply smiled wider and leaned over the edge of the stairwell to get a better look.
Less than a minute later, the Dressmaker came bounding up the steps and barrelled past without even sparing them a glance. They watched as she threw open the door and practically fell through it, landing unceremoniously on her hands and knees. Panting heavily, she pushed herself into a sitting position and tipped her head back to reveal her tear-stained face. Her clothes were in tatters, and her pale blonde hair was streaked with blood and dirt.
"Come out!" she yelled suddenly, startling Asuka with her anger. "Show yourself, you conniving bastard!"
"In what way am I conniving?" a second voice responded from the shadows.
Asuka followed Augustus's gaze to the other side of the room, where a shadowy figure was silhouetted against the midnight sky. There was no wall behind them, so the floor gave way to a drop of immeasurable height, but that wasn't the worst part. Fear churned deep in Asuka's belly when she noticed two tiny specks of light glowing in the darkness, not unlike the eyes of a nocturnal animal.
"You knew this would happen," the Dressmaker all but snarled. "And yet you did nothing to avert it!"
"Neither did you." Asuka shivered as the shadowy figure doubled in size and stalked towards the Dressmaker's kneeling form. "Suitopi warned you this would happen. Do not project your own failures onto me, tailor."
"You son of a bitch—"
"Why have you come here?"
Her rage seemed to dwindle somewhat. "You know why."
Laughter meleed around the room. The sound made Asuka's stomach shrivel up like a rotting piece of fruit. She turned to Augustus for comfort, but his gleeful expression ended up having the opposite effect.
"What will you offer me this time?" the voice asked once it had finished laughing. "Everything you were is already mine. Your hopes and dreams, your emotions, even your name. You have nothing left to bargain with."
"Actually, I do have one thing left—my life." Her puce eyes burned with determination. "Do this one thing for me and it will be yours, too."
The entity's glowing pupils shone brighter in response to her offer. "You really are desperate. What is it that you want exactly?"
"A do-over," she answered instantly. "I want you to send me back to a time before the disaster, so I can find a way to stop it."
"A pointless endeavour. The course of this destiny cannot be altered."
"I don't care! I have to try, I—" Her shoulders slumped forwards as she whispered, "Please. I made a promise. It was a long time ago, but a promise is a promise. Surely even you can understand that?"
Asuka's chest ached. She had always found the tailor incredibly creepy and off-putting, but here she seemed so vulnerable and . . . human.
The darkness parted just enough for Asuka to make out the shape of a woman with sleek black hair and glinting armour. The entity glided closer until she was looming over the Dressmaker like some ghostly apparition.
Her mirror-like pupils gleamed malevolently as she extended a hand to the Dressmaker and said, "Very well. I accept your proposition. In exchange for your life, I will send you to a world where the disaster has not yet transpired. It is a world much like your own, but also vastly different. Now, do we have a deal?"
Trembling, the Dressmaker lifted her own hand and slipped it into the strange entity's waiting palm. "Yes."
As soon as their palms touched, the tower walls fell away to reveal an icy tundra and a seemingly infinite night sky. Asuka held her breath as Augustus walked over to where the pair had previously been standing and bent to inspect the ground. The snow was impossibly hard, but it cracked apart easily enough under the pressure of his hands. The soil beneath looked similarly frozen—so much so that there wasn't a single blade of grass growing out of it, dead or alive.
Asuka shifted her gaze to a snow-capped knoll on the horizon. Her eyes widened when she saw a hooded figure standing on top of it with their head tipped back to stare at the sky. She opened her mouth to garner Augustus's attention, but a bright light appeared in her peripheral and burned the words out of existence.
A shooting star, she thought, marvelling at its wild beauty. She had never been in such close proximity to one before. There were others too, but those were much further away and not nearly as spectacular as this one was.
"Look," Augustus breathed.
Asuka followed his pointing finger beyond the star to a much larger one with a beacon-like head and a blinding white tail that split the sky in two. It was the source of all the other stars, she realised then. Pieces were breaking off and hurtling towards the ground at impossible speeds.
Hours passed by in the blink of an eye. The shards pierced the cloud cover and fired down from above like a barrage of arrows. Asuka instinctively reached for the handle of her whip, but Augustus stopped her from drawing it by covering her hand with his. The unexpected touch sent a jolt of electricity shooting up through her arm and into her chest.
She stole a glimpse at the Dressmaker, who was on her knees and screaming in rage, though her voice was drowned out by the whirring and rumbling of the comet shards as they completed their descent. The one closest to them blazed brighter as gravity dragged it down, vaporising the ice and snow beneath their feet. Asuka screwed her eyes shut and braced for impact, but the dream seemed to have other plans for them.
When she reopened her eyes, it was the middle of the day, and the sky was empty save for a few clouds and a flock of seagulls. The comet was nowhere to be seen.
A loud crash sounded from somewhere behind them, followed by a shrill-sounding wail.
They found the Dressmaker on the floor of her mountain hut with her knees pulled into her chest, sobbing uncontrollably. Asuka's eyes strayed down to the ceramic plate she'd dropped, then to the fragment embedded in the heel of her hand. Blood trickled down her arm from the wound and dripped onto the floorboards, but she didn't seem to care. Her tears were for something else.
"My, oh, my. What a humiliating sight."
Asuka turned and locked eyes with the strange entity from the tower. It was wearing a different face this time, but there was no mistaking those eyes.
"Go away," the Dressmaker muttered without raising her head.
"I don't think I will." Asuka moved out of the way as the creature glided closer and knelt before the Dressmaker. "We had a deal, tailor."
When she failed to respond, the entity reached out to touch her, only to be swatted away like a fly. "Don't you dare touch me," the Dressmaker hissed. "Not with those hands. Not my daughter's . . ."
The entity's expression soured. "It looks like you do have some emotions left, after all." The frown was quickly replaced by a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "You didn't seem to mind when it was your beloved Midoriko's hands."
"Fuck you."
"Tut-tut. Is that any way to speak to someone who just saved your life?"
"I didn't ask you to!" Asuka winced as the Dressmaker ripped the fragment out of her hand and flung it at the nearest wall. A torrent of blood gushed out of the wound, staining her skin and clothes a crimson red. "Why am I here?" she keened. "You were right. No matter how hard we try, some destinies can't be altered. I tried to warn them . . . I tried—"
"And you'll keep trying," the entity purred. "Over and over. Until I grow tired of watching you make a fool of yourself."
The Dressmaker sucked in a sharp breath. "What?"
"Was my meaning not clear? Or is your brain still scrambled from the reset?" A sinister smile spread across her lips. "Looping is such tedious work, but you're worth it, darling."
"That wasn't what we agreed—"
"Oh, but it was." The creature shifted forms again. This new one was male, with plaited black hair and a tattoo on his forehead in the shape of a four-pointed star. "Your life belongs to me now. You gave it to me, remember? What would I gain from letting you die? Being timeless is nice and all, but it can't stop you from dying. Only I can do that."
Asuka's stomach turned as she watched him cradle the Dressmaker's injured hand in his own. Her puce eyes were full of tears.
"You wanted to live forever," the entity whispered seductively. "Don't worry, my dear. I'll make sure that you do."
She didn't reply, but her silence spoke volumes.
Asuka looked to Augustus for answers. He was gazing at the pair so intently—especially the creature that could alter its appearance at will. Did he know something that she didn't? She opened her mouth to question him about it, but the words never made it past her lips.
The strange entity was looking at her. Not the Dressmaker. Not Augustus. Her. The realisation made her stomach drop and her heart miss a beat.
It could see her.
Technically, they weren't even really there, but it could see her.
She tried alerting the Commander, but the room suddenly became too distorted to see, and they were thrown backwards by an invisible force.
.
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Asuka's eyes flew open and she gasped for breath whilst clawing wildly at her chest. They were back in the tent, but if the creature had been aware of their presence within the dream, who was to say that it couldn't follow them to the waking world?
"Easy," Augustus said gently. "You're okay. The first time is always the hardest."
"What was that thing?" she asked between harsh breaths. "It wasn't human. Was it . . ."
"Real?" he guessed.
She braved a nod.
"Yes," he answered with an excited grin. "It's a creature of incomprehensible power. In some cultures, it's even revered as a deity. The Church call it the Endless, but most people refer to it as Time." His brow creased when she failed to react with awe. "Are you all right?"
Shuddering, she pushed herself up with her elbows and whispered, "It saw us."
He shook his head disparagingly. "It couldn't have."
"It did," she insisted. "It was looking right at me."
"That's impossible. We weren't actually there. It was just a memory."
She swallowed the fear in her throat. She wanted to believe him, but she could still feel the weight of the Endless's terrible stare.
The Dressmaker hadn't moved an inch. Asuka followed the Commander's example and rose to her feet, only her movements were less graceful than his. The dagger had really done a number on her. She wondered if he had been the same after his first experience with it.
"I still don't understand how she survived," she mumbled. "Being trapped in a time loop doesn't make you invincible, does it? I mean . . . We saw her die in that memory. So it's not like she can't be killed."
"I don't understand it either," he confessed. "But for whatever reason, something is keeping her alive."
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Author's Corner
In case it wasn't clear, this chapter features the Endless wearing the faces of Midoriko, Suitopi, and Midoriko's father, Kyūseishu. This was done exclusively to taunt the Dressmaker because of her past relationships with the three of them. And before you ask, yes I did imply that the Dressmaker fucked the Endless whilst it looked like Midoriko. She's a freak ok? Hate sex just hits differently when it's with a deity.
On a more serious note, I've been looking forward to writing the Endless for absolutely ages, so I can't tell you how good it feels to have finally gotten to this part of the story. It only gets weirder from here, folks!
Big sad for Sesshoumaru and Octavia, though. Breakups are never fun, especially if one party is only doing it to convince the other to marry someone else for political gain. #JustGirlyThings
Thanks for reading! Don't forget to review :)