『Schadenfreude』▷ jaesahi。

m e l o d y

Leo had known.

Leo had known, from the very beginning, when he had first seen Ettore of the Calhalev. He wasn't blind. He had known that he had seen the man elsewhere instead of this place, for he could perceive the vestiges of familiarity from the man's square form, ephemeral as it vanished once he espied the mauve markings circled around his pale wrist. Gray and purple to embellishing blue was its color, vines streaked with ornamental leaves stretching out to two gladiolus flowers that sat on top of the edges of his ulna.

At first he had thought of a boy he hadn't seen for more than two hundred years as he beheld Ettore, but he knew that boy was no aristocrat for him to bear his age at his wrist so gone was that from his mind before the latter's hollow voice filled the sepulchral room.

"Leonzel Yshid Krneluce."

Leo's response to his call was as much as the light in noirceur.

"You are to recompense for the murder of the great clairvoyant Alkhela for five hundred years of imprisonment," he announced. "May the Devil see to you."

A depreciating guffaw left Leo's lips before he could realize it himself, lips pulling up into a smile he didn't mean. It was unbidden, but he couldn't stop the words that he spoke.

"How amusing," he mocked. "The blessed man prays to the devil. You surprise me, Sir Ettore."

A sword was pressed against his throat in no more than a second.

"Then," Ettore said. "May God bring death upon you."

Leo split his sides as laughter escaped his mouth, cackling rancorously. "You truly are amusing, are you not?" he chortled. "A devil's spawn with a name bestowed by God. What more do you hide, do tell?"

"You sure are one to talk, filthy Krneluce."

"Oh?"

"A blessed vampire is strange, indeed it is," Ettore murmured through his sun-engraved mask, scarlet orbs peering from beneath. "But do you know what is more peculiar?"

Leo grinned. "What is?"

Ettore stepped towards him, sheathing his blade.

"A man who does not even exist."

Leo's eyes dimmed at his words, but the smile on his face remained selfsame.

"How amusing, indeed."

Fortwith he was raised to his feet by two knights, hands shackled to his back and raiments sullied by soil and blood; then dragged away towards what would be his penitentiary for five hundred years more, a wicked grin playing on his rubescent lips in spite of the undesirable future ahead of him.

Apologies, Micah. It seems I will never return to you.

And as he looked back to Ettore's cold gaze, wondering what could be beneath that golden mask, Leo decided that no, he didn't know this man at all.

-----

"Play it again!"

Leo huffed, chuckling slightly as he lifted his fingers from the piano keys. "Do you truly adore it so much?" he asked. "I've played it four times, Estelle. My hands have gone numb."

"I like it because you made it for me," Micah scowled, declaring fearlessly. "So play it again, would you not? I want to hear it once more."

Lacking the velleity to deny the boy of his wishes, the older relinquished.

"Listen closely, alright? This piece was created solely for you, only about you."

To Leo, that piece had been the attestation of his being the boy's nepenthe, borne by the affection he felt for a younger brother. To Micah, however, it had been more; it was the melody of a promise to return, composed by his beloved for him and no one else.

-----

Kill them, Leonzel.

Bring death upon them.

Avenge us, our child! The Calhalev must die!

Again and again, for eight hundred years, they had been ringing in his ears and mind. Silence was nothing but a foreign concept to Leonzel, for each time he was alone there would be voices that commence an anechdoche in his head.

They told him only one thing; and that was of his truth.

They told him but one thing; and that was to kill.

The Lucif, the Lucif! Kill the royal family! they cried. Kill them all, for siding with the atrocious Calhalev!

Our child, heed us.

He was neither alive nor dead; neither vampire nor human, nymph nor barbarian. With the blood of the Devil coursing his veins, the Krneluce's name at the end of his own and a synthetic smile so beautifully plastered to his face. Leo had gone many a moon ago, and now he was Leonzel, the last Krneluce. The man who didn't truly exist, for he was no true vampire, merely a manifestation of the Krneluce's wrath and vie for lethiferous revenge. He was but the physical form of a curse born from hatred, living to kill those that those who created him told him.

Quell our pain with the blood of their brethren.

Thence came the day called Dies Irae.

-----

It was with a splatter of blood and a gasp of agonizing pain that Leonzel realized, he had failed. Seymour's scream echoed blaringly but it hadn't been him to be pierced by the sword, in front of him as if to protect was Ettore, with a blade perforating his chest and blood spilling from his mouth.

Leonzel had failed, so terribly he had; and he could not accept that his death would be caused by himself piercing through his obverse's heart.

Ettore was his life, and death all the same. That had been the only law of his malefic existence. He was a curse, and Ettore was a blessing. The sole purpose Ettore's birth was to bring his life's end, ergo after his death Ettore could no longer live— and facetiously enough, he was not allowed to end Ettore's life by his own hands.

Ettore lived to kill him, and he couldn't kill Ettore.

And now, by his hands, the man named after the sun was dying in place of Seymour, the one he had truly meant to kill. His hatred for Seymour pervaded throughout his being and all reason was lost as he casted the moribund man aside, raising his bloodied blade once more to slit the crown prince's throat, and with a war cry he attained success.

However, as Seymour bled to death by his feet, he descried the form of an iridescent nymph stood far across him and he saw her mouth in the language of her land,

"Live."

Dread pooled in the depths of his chest and he bared his sword again as Daemon's own transpierced his heart with a cry.

He gritted his teeth in irk.

"You're coming with me, Daemon of the Hearthsong!"

The head of Seymour's valiant knight flitted the air with gore and blood, soul brought along to the next life that the nymph had granted Leonzel.

-----

Asahi: dies
Jaehyuk: is dying
Also Jaehyuk: kills Yoshi
Haruto: stabs Jaehyuk

Jaehyuk: bitch I'm already dying how dare you stab me I will kill you and bring you over to my next life to torment you—