A Second Chance

Part 12 - It's all my fault

Let's make a situation. 

You're picking one out of a 100 buttons without looking. You press and pick a button. The button that you pressed represents a person's luck taking a dark turn.

As ridiculous as this situation sounds, I guess that button turned out to be me, not just once but twice. 

Their bodies lay before me, soaked full of blood. Their arms are legs were severed, meaning that this guy brutally tortured all of them before delivering the final blow. And the worst thing was that this guy enjoyed it and dismissed it as "them being in his way."

So, screw it. 

I let the despair that I hid in another part of my mind take over. The pain that the despair brought would substitute for strength. Let the strength be strength to hurt, not strength to win. Beating this guy won't mean anything: he'll keep killing people. I want to make sure he never kills anyone again.

"End him" Mark's voice was full of anger. "Show him what pain looks like,"

I'm not a killer... I promised myself that. But, I guess it's time I send people directly to prison, not just beat them up and expect to send a message. 

What was I thinking, letting these creatures run free? Why did I make it look like a publicity stunt over doing the right thing? Was I so desperate for a second chance that I forgot to send these guys to prison?

"What's taking so long" Blur probed. "Come on, show me somethi-"

I landed a lightning infused punch to his face, blasting him back to the wall. 

I feel that numbness that I felt while fighting The Swordsman, but to an even bigger extent. Alongside that numbness, I feel a mix of despair surfacing hidden anger. To put it into simple words, I'm the guy who sounds like he's calm, but in reality, seething with rage. I'm just good at keeping that rage hidden. 

He sprawled, struggling to get up: I remember The Trickster saying that his endurance wasn't that high, meaning that a hit like that should cause a lot of damage, enough to temporarily stun him.  

"Why?" I demanded. "You people...you're so hard to understand. What do you guys gain out of this? All this killing, this suffering you inflict upon others, what's the purpose? How the hell were they 'in your way'? In your way to what? A greater good that doesn't exist? Just...why?"

A burst of disturbing laughter escaped his lips, a haunting echo that filled the room.

"Is that the only reason you have for fighting me?" he taunted, getting back up.

The wave of despair surfacing my anger started to dissipate. With the anger now showing itself,  I demanded answers, refusing to let him evade my inquiries.

"Answer my questions!" I pressed, my voice barely concealing my seething emotions.

"Let me give you a clue. Do you truly believe that a conglomerate or a faction of our scale needs reasons for the atrocities you described? We do what we do simply because it's for the greater good that you're talking about," he replied, his words resonating with a chilling sense of malevolence.

"You..." I uttered, momentarily at a loss for words.

In a desperate attempt to regain control, he lashed out with a kick, but to his surprise, it had no effect on me. My rage made me impervious to his feeble attack.

"So what if you defeated The Trickster?" he taunted, a smug grin on his face. "I'm far stronger than him!"

Unleashing a devastating blast of spinjitsu, I sent him hurtling backward. Thankfully, his lack of familiarity with such techniques worked to my advantage.