Ms. Nine Tailed Fox

Chapter 15

"What? Surprised?" The little girl asked.

Her half-taunting and half-teasing sneer was a raw provocation from her end, and her boldness was daring to say the least. Confronted with the blood-curdling visage of Aklis's maggot-infected stitched face, she stood upright and unbothered. Even a blind dog could tell that the other's intention of manipulating her dream into this specific memory was nothing but an act born by malice. But, still, she had the gall to scorn the other.

"Tsk, tsk. Really, they say never judge a book by its cover, but here I find such an exception. Aklis, it's plausible for one to be ugly, but it's one heck of a talent for you to have such a rotten heart and nasty mind to match your revolting appearance." The little girl reproached.

Her words, though veracious, were unforgiving as well as infuriating. However, to the recipient, her nasty comments seemed to inflict nothing greater than a prickle as the baleful figure let out a smile. When his tightly stitched lips stretched wide, the stitches moved along the movement of his lips, very much resembling a crawling centipede.

A little beast with a loud mouth, a hoarse scratching voice sounded inside Seraphina's head as Aklis's fingerless bloody hand reached out to the grand duke, who was still frozen stiff along with Reagan and their beasts. Initially, his outstretched hand was only a finger width away from Amaris's pale shapely lips, and thus, with a little to no effort, his hollow skeletal palm, thick with rotten blood, touched the other's lowered chin.

The action was enraging. Previously, before Seraphina tore off her pretense, this move would have been nothing more than a replica of a memory that haunted and tormented her. Now, despite realizing Seraphina's awareness, for him to touch the grand duke's face in this manner was a vile insult, disparagement, and a declaration of what he did and was capable of doing again. It was a reminder that this place was his creation, and the end of this nightmare could only be dictated by himself.

A flame engulfed everything. Like a valiant spirit, it exploded within the air, tearing off the other's death-reeking black flesh and bone from the man's fine face. Various hues of blues of the flame burned down the surroundings, breathtaking but, at the same time, fatal, and the dream, which Aklis created with Seraphina's most vulnerable memory, was shattered into ashes. Two men, one whom Seraphina loved with her dearest and the other whom she loathed to her gut, and a young woman whom she felt most disappointed with, were all burned away like a thin paper along with the shadow beast and ice dragon. A moment later, only the little girl and the horrid creature stood remaining.

To Aklis, a blinded fallen angel, with his eyeballs dug out and upper and lower lids stitched shut, only the pain was evident. He could not see the beauty of the blazing blue flames, but the torment of his burning soul was indisputable. The moment the hungry flames licked his skin, he immediately withdrew his hand, thoroughly confounded as to where that soul-scorching burning sensation came from. As his originally mutilated and now charred hand pulled back, the flame also dispersed instantaneously. He slowly raised his head towards the little girl, who adorned her slight smirk, serene but haughty.

"Now it all makes sense," her knowing mockery echoed through the night.

You... how did you, the other's hair-raising scratchy hoarse voice once again fell inside Seraphina's head.

"I thought you would be accustomed to pain, but it seems that is not the case. You knew I was an ancient divine beast, specifically a nine-tailed fox. Yet, daring to pull such a prank on me and repeatedly test my patience, was this not what you sought?" Her lovely chirping voice fell, accompanied by a sweet chuckle.

The thick frigid frost nesting inside the little girl's stirring golden irises was missed.

But you are still a cub. You should not be able to summon the heavenly blue flame. Aklis voiced his befuddlement, the scorching pain still lingering and tormenting his heart.