Chapter 319 - Destiny Still Arrives

After Zeel completed his message, he turned to Alice and made a series of even more complex hand gestures.

Alice didn't know what Zeel was doing but she suddenly felt her eyes brighten, her mind gained clarity, and the nanites in her body jumping around excitedly.

There was another space added to her storage dimension filled with everything in Zeel's and Elizabeth's storage dimension.

"I removed all restrictions from your nanites and stored all my unlocked memories into your subconscious for when you encounter something you cannot deal with…

My memories are dangerous and can cause emotional damage to humans so be careful when you access them…

You now have the same level of nanites access as myself and…" Zeel paused as something appeared in his hands, something infinitely precious to him and the Homo-Superior Race.

Alice and Elizabeth gasped when they saw the Forbidden Cube materialize in Zeel's hands. It wasn't until then that Alice and Elizabeth realized that Zeel really was truly preparing for death.

"Receiving this cube comes with the last mission of my race… you will have to take up the task and it will be a difficult journey…" Zeel said, a small smile of relief edging its way onto his face.

Alice shed tears since she realized that Zeel was truly relieved that he would be dying.

"You're right… I am relieved but that doesn't mean I won't fight to live," Zeel said clearing Alice's confusion "I will fight with everything I have to live but I guess I always wanted death,"

"Why?" Elizabeth asked feeling sad but also somewhat happy that she would be dying alongside Zeel.

She had never really felt connected to Zeel as she did right now since she was guaranteed to be with him during his most difficult time while Alice would live.

How could she ask for anything more?

Zeel stared into Elizabeth's eyes as he pondered her question and chose to give an honest reply, not that he had much of a choice with the Ring of Candor on Alice's fingers.

"Humans call it PTSD – Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome… human warriors that have their minds messed up after returning home from the battlefield.

Ever since I survived training on the nameless planet as a child, I have had the opposite of human PTSD called 'Post Peaceful Reluctance Disorder'…

When I don't fight or enter battle for a prolonged period of time, I begin to get sick so I have to look for the next fight or I'll become undone mentally,"

"I felt it," Alice said, remembering all the peaceful nights that Zeel would tremble in his half-sleep "I always feel your shivers and your irritation when we watched the stars in my Universe,"

Zeel nodded, walking towards Alice and placing the Forbidden Cube in her hands.

"So you see," he said reluctantly "There was never a future with me,"

Alice didn't even notice when the Forbidden Cube in her hands had dissolved into her body, she was too busy staring into Zeel's eyes.

Elizabeth embraced Zeel from behind, her head placed on his back as she listened for the echo of her own heartbeat that Zeel's body would unconsciously replicate as a soothing technique.

Alice glanced around and noticed that Nick and Jenny were also having their own final words, while Himiko was just staring at her with hesitation and fear.

As if understanding Alice's confusion, Himiko answered "I know you live through what happens next and escape, but I don't know if I will be able to escape,"

'Escape? Escape from what?' Alice thought and shifted her gaze to Henry who was just flipping through the pages of a strange book that gave off intense amounts of fate energy.

"Maybe there is some way we can…"

"Don't even think about it," Himiko replied stiffly "A Time Shadow is absolute… whoever shows up in one will die guaranteed… it is like Destiny"

"Fuck Destiny!" Alice shouted irritatedly.

"Stop it, Alice," Zeel said sternly and continued "There is one thing I want you to remember for the journeys ahead:

In time, you will know what it is like to lose… to feel so desperately that you are right yet to fail all the same… Dread it… run from it… Destiny still arrives… it is inevitable after all,"

Alice clenched her fist and slugged Zeel in the mouth with anger.

"I have never seen you more pathetic in my life!" Alice shouted, sending a slight sensation of pain trickling through Zeel's heart.

"You have a plan for everything… are you telling me that even with your paranoia you cannot find a way to turn this around?" Alice asked, also glancing disappointingly at Elizabeth who had now released Zeel.

"Even with all my paranoia, we are still here at this moment!" Zeel shouted back "That tells me that whatever I try does not work in the end and is doomed to fail…

I planned for everything but I still failed in the end… even now I can't even come up with a way that I can die with all the trump cards I have but the Time Shadow knows that I do!"

A sudden familiar energy permeated the room as Henry's Book of Fate began to glow with a wild golden light that forced everyone but Zeel to cover their eyes.

Henry entered a daze and started to read the new passage that had magically appeared inside the Book of Fates.

"Three strums… three precious things lost… what is the cost?... What is the cost?

The First Strum of Deceit and Revenge…

The Second Strum of Love Lost…

The Third Strum of The Soulmate's Demise…"

The moment Henry finished his short poem, he snapped back to reality and looked around confused as if he had no memories of what just happened.

"We've been looking at this the wrong way…" Elizabeth said while shaking "Zeel dying is nearly impossible because of his paranoid nature but there is an easier way for him to die…"

"Kill his soulmate," Alice said in realization as she glanced at Zeel horrifically.

From Zeel's memories, she knew how painful it was to kill Aurolana's physical body. It hurt so much that Zeel had to trap her in purgatory just to avoid killing himself.

What would happen if Aurolana's soul was killed in Purgatory? After all, not even Zeel could take the pain of a soulmate truly dying. Killing Aurolana was the same as killing Zeel.

And as if to confirm their dreadful thoughts, Zeel spurted a mouth full of purely gold blood and toppled over onto his knees.

A painful sensation ran through his soul as if someone was slowly mincing his soul into small pieces.

"Aurolana is hurt," Zeel whispered through gritted teeth as codes flickered across his pupils.

He was lamenting the fact that he was too late to notice. Ultimately, it wasn't Zeel's fault since Purgatory had every kind of defense mechanism known to the Homo-Superior Race.

However, Aurolana was always a bit sentimental and that meant that she had invited someone into Purgatory since nobody could get in otherwise, or at least nobody could stay inside without her permission.

Zeel's mind entered a mess of thoughts, overloading his nanites to the point that they ceased to function entirely.

The pain shared between soulmates was just so overwhelming that even Homo-Superior technology could not quantify it.

Seeing Zeel was a mess and everyone panicking, Alice knew that such a scenario would directly lead to the Time Shadow they were currently standing in front of.

She had to think of a way to break the Time Shadow as soon as possible.

"Wait… Zeel," Alice shouted, slapping Zeel to return brief clarity "You don't die here… look at the place you all die… it's engulfed by darkness,"

Everyone finally noticed that Alice was right, they didn't die in this Underground facility and that realization brought with it a faint flickering flame called Hope.

"The dagger…" Zeel whispered inaudibly through bouts of pain, but almost everyone in the room had superhuman hearing.

"The gem in the dagger is the trigger," Zeel said and shakily rose to his feet through the intense pain.

If Aurolana was in pain, then he just had to make his own soul unshakable to give her some relief and comfort through whatever battle she was currently having in Purgatory.

*twrp*

*twrp*

*twrp*

Time slowed to a crawl as Alice, Elizabeth, Zeel, Himiko, and Ahmanet darted towards Nick in an effort to destroy the red gem in his hand.

Himiko and Ahmanet knew that such an action would be useless since the Time Shadow already showed who would die, but they tried nonetheless.

Himiko tried because she was ultimately a good fallen angel and was quite fond of Zeel, Elizabeth, and Alice.

Ahmanet tried because she could see that Seth would betray her from the Time Shadow. After all, he was the only one with the power to return her to being an ordinary mortal.

However, a moment before anyone could touch the gem, a bright red light flashed and everyone was gone from the room.

What followed their disappearance, however, was a massive Earthquake beneath the streets of London that quickly decimated the entire city.

Time was a complex Law of the Universe, and it seemed that 'Time' was determined to take London City on this day.

What Time couldn't achieve in Zeel's alternate Time-Line, it made sure to achieve when the group had disappeared – the destruction of London City.