Chapter 30

I breathed a sigh of relief, pressing my one good hand against my chest. Yet, the damage it had done was very real. I stared at the corpse of half a man right beside me, his eyes still opened in terror despite being very, very dead.

“H-Hey…”

I looked up to see Aria’s eyes filled with sick worry. Her clothes were covered with chunks of snow. Her hands were dyed red, still dripping with blood. Half of me saw the very same girl that I had grown to love and spoil…and the other half saw a divine…thing. Something whose understanding reached beyond my own. A god made flesh.

“Are…you back?” I dropped the axe. The fight was over. Yet I saw the worry on her face turn to a frown. Her eyes avoided mine.

“That wasn’t Cestra. That was me, Charlotte, that was me too.”

I could hear the soft pitter-patter of blood dripping from her hands onto the white snow. I clenched my wounded arm even harder as a pang of burning pain seeped deeper into me.