Ch21. Death by hatred

I didn't need to think even once.

The energy flowed through my body like it was part of me.

I felt electric.

'Shadow Walk', I thought, and when Quintus's fist was about to hit me in full, I just vanished in front of him, letting my body do the rest of the work, lowering myself and evading the punch to get behind him.

I uncloaked myself right after that, going towards Rodrick and Evellyn.

"Are you okay, guys?"

"Wait... Wha- how?" Rodrick asked me, his jaw dropped to the floor.

"No time to chat, leave and take care of Evellyn, she seems in a pretty bad shape."

"But, what about you...?"

"Take her, and leave. Today, not even that psycho can take me down." I smiled.

Quintus was sending wave over wave of telekinetic power, trying to make me stumble, but I felt like it wasn't much, holding it all back with ease.

In the last second, I remembered one thing I should ask the guild leader before he left.

And my brother kept attacking from his distance, getting even more pissed that his power wasn't even phasing me.

"Hey, old man?"

"Yes."

"Do you have my back when the association come after me? We'll discuss the terms later, but as of now, I'm stripping myself from the Blake name, and disowning myself from everything they have. And I'm also accepting your offer to join the Shadow Guild. So, what do you say?"

"Young man," Rodrick looked at me with a strange seriousness in his eyes "if you kill Quintus, I got your back to the ends of the Earth!"

He turned around, and left.

That's what I needed to hear.

Now, that everyone had vacated the building, I could go all-out against Quintus, without worrying about anything.

Everything felt just so right inside me, like a silent storm building up, ready to obliterate anything in its wake.

My [INVISIBLE HAND] acted like a shield, protecting everything and everyone behind me, but now that I didn't need to protect anyone, I just released my invisible shield, and let Quintus' mana storm wash over me.

And as I imagined, it felt like a breeze.

I didn't know the parameters of the system for comparing rankings and levels, but one thing I knew, for sure.

Right then, I was stronger than my brother.

Quintus stopped attacking, once he saw what his attack did to me, his jaw dropped, but his eyes were bloodshot with rage.

"For a member of the association's monitoring division, you sure have a short temper."

"YOU LITTLE PIECE OF SHIT!" He shouted.

But everything became suddenly quiet, and his telekinetic storm ceased completely.

"You always find a way to turn things to your favor. How?"

And he sprinted towards me, now, unsheathing the sword that only now I noticed he was carrying.

Things were going to get more interesting.

"If you weren't such a bully, I wouldn't have needed to find ways to turn things my way."

I evaded his attack with a single movement sideways.

He kept striking, slashing, cutting and lunging, but his blade landed on nothing but air, as I easily dodged all of the strikes.

"IF YOU WEREN'T BORN, MAYBE I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SUCH A BULLY!"

I wanted him more pissed off, more enraged.

I wanted him aggravated.

Only then I would be able to see the true extent of the power that frightened me my whole past life.

But he didn't seem to change his pattern ever, and I was getting tired of games, so I summoned the [MIDNIGHT SISTERS] and turned [SHADOW WALK] on.

"Is that truly all you got?" I asked, while Quintus slashed all around, in hopes that I wouldn't come closer.

I evaded, dodged, and blocked all his strikes, cutting his thigh and his elbow.

He dropped his sword right after, screaming and exploding that enormous power storm that I already felt once, but stronger, somehow.

It felt like a tornado had come down to Earth.

And Quintus began bleeding from his nose and eyes.

"See, little brother? I can do it, too!" He spoke, but his voice sounded completely out of tune, with a maniacal laugh dripping all over it.

"Yeah, and I'm proud of you for it, but I learned from last time, brother..."

I swirled all mana around me in the opposite direction of Quintus's, and it felt much smoother than the first time I tried it.

I didn't need to do this, but I had to show him.

I had to make him know, even if only at death's door, that I wasn't that Kurt anymore, and that he should acknowledge it.

I went closer and closer, the two mana streams colliding like waves, sending sparks of black and dark red energy everywhere.

And then I strengthened my stream even more, overwhelming him completely.

I commanded the mana around him to restrict him, like he did to me countless times before.

Like he did to Nikolai, before he was killed.

And like he did to Evellyn, before I arrived.

I wanted to ask him why he hated regulars so much, and why he hated me so much.

But he spoke first.

"Did you know that after you were born, I was cast aside, because of the little genius you were?"

He had a bitter smile on his face, and the blood looked like tears in his eyes.

"What?"

"Yeah... You learned anything they taught you, so fast. And even if I had the best grades at school, or even ingressed in the association, it wouldn't matter, because Octavius Blake had a new little genius. But then, suddenly, everything changed. And he changed. And then I didn't have a single chance to get his approval on anything, because he was so obsessed with his new project. I thought that I had to kill you, so that I could get his attention once more, but it didn't seem like it was going to cut, so I just took it personally, and you became nothing but a thorn in my side. So I decided that I should end you for good."

"Wait... You hated me so much just because father didn't put you in first place?"

Even I didn't remember father doing such a thing to me.

Then how...?

But Quintus, then, burst out laughing.

"I'm just messing with you. You're always so innocent, it gives me nausea! Until the day before yesterday, you were nothing but a regular, and you even seemed to be the weakest of them all, so why shouldn't I pick on you?" He gave a brief pause, and his grin became a frown. "But then, you suddenly awakened, and became quite hard to hit. I even admired you a little bit. The tiniest bit, after our first fight. But I did. I don't know what makes you so special, but once I get rid of you, I'll give your body to father, so he can study you, and maybe... Give you to..."

Snap.

Listening to him talk only made me feel sick.

How in the world there were such sick people?

But he got an ending perfectly fit to him, dying with a snapped neck, just like Nikolai, in my previous life.

"Now you won't have anything to hate, anymore. I just hope you find a better purpose in your next life."

I was tired, and I thought that killing someone would make me feel different.

Guilty, perhaps.

But I felt nothing.

I turned around to go downstairs and check on Rodrick and the Red Oracle, but as soon as I took the first step, I heard behind me.

"Don't take another single step, if you want to live..."