Chapter 68: [65 – writer; the protagonist]

Two men walked out of the shimmering mirage in the forest, calmly as if nothing had happened. They looked the same as when they had entered, although one sported darker eye bags under their eyes and an exhausted, yet relieved, look.

The other looked rather relaxed, strolling casually with a smile tugging at the corner of his lips while his hands carefully held onto a certain package.

The package came in the form of a sleeping figure, curled up and evidentially comfortable as their chest rose steadily. A single, slender arm hung on the side while snowy locks of hair gently brushed their face.

"Welcome back!" greeted Alvara excitedly, rushing forward as her eyes landed on the slumbering man. "Thank goodness, seriously!"

"You are back, Raphael. I'm pleased that you were successfully able to retrieve Ren." said Vendra with a soothing smile.

Raphael chuckled. "Of course."

Then he walked over to a tree and carefully placed the person in his arms down, adjusting it so that they were in a comfortable position. In order to make it perfect, this task took several minutes to complete.

Once if was confirmed that Soren had comfortably settled against the tree, Raphael turned around and smiled.

It only took a second.

Before everybody's welcoming eyes, a curled hand flew across the air and slammed against a particular person's cheek, the resounding noise echoing in the forest. The attacker didn't hold back in the slightest.

The victim didn't retaliate — no, they'd closed their eyes as if expecting it.

Stumbling back as a brilliant red welt blossomed on their face, they fell backwards. For such a prideful person, this would be humiliating. But they said nothing, as they stared up in wait. It took them a moment as a jerk of pain flared in their cheeks.

A pair of cool, knowing eyes stared at Raphael.

Raphael grinned, though confliction flickered in his dark eyes, glancing at his knuckles and back up at his friend. "If you aren't aware of why I did that, Vin, I'll be a little disappointed."

Vincent breathed deeply. "I am aware."

Brioc whistled on the side, skipping up as his smile widened at the vivid red that now made a rather striking contrast against Vincent's pale skin. "Woah~ that's quite the way to return, but I like it!"

Vendra quickly stepped forward. "Was there a conflict between you two that was revealed during your time in the Forest?"

"A rather important conflict," nodded Raphael with a wry smile. "Ren's memories were chaotic, you see. They melded with mine, and I saw glimpses of his own past."

Vincent's posture stiffened, and expression more complicated. Under Raphael's gaze, he couldn't speak.

The protagonist lost his smile, eyes darkening threateningly as he lifted his chin slightly. Arrogant and dominating, he who knew all wrongs.

"You were a bastard, Vin. While you had your own circumstances, that doesn't make you less of a fool."

"...I am aware."

There seemed to be a faint tremor in the typically aloof and steady voice.

"And while I'm your friend, whether this other idiot forgives you or not is not something I'll help you with. But in knowing your mistakes, you should put effort into redemption. Even if he never forgives you."

Raphael was sympathetic, and understood people down to the very bone. It was his terrifying skill, but that didn't mean he didn't have his own opinions, even after understanding.

He didn't think Vincent was overall a horrible, unforgivable person. He'd little interest in befriending such a person.

However, watching the glimpses of the past that Soren experienced in this world — the neglect, the abuse and so much worse — the anger had come naturally, like a boiling wave rushing over his head.

How had that little prince felt, under the scrutinizing gaze, under the loveless words?

A child that had never known love or care, how could they be expected to grow?

Society was quick to assume and judge, place blame and labels on the surface of people, without truly understanding who they were and what made them. And if somebody didn't truly know a person, what right did they have to judge them?

Vincent swallowed and nodded solemnly. "I understand, Raphael."

The words were few, but Raphael understood the severity behind his words.

It was time for the first prince to change.

The others watched the exchange and said nothing. After all, this was a matter between the two princes, and Raphael, who acted as a bridge between the two.

In fact, being a bridge between a conflict was a difficult task — it was hard to stay clear minded, and even harder to be tugged between two sides. However, Raphael was a person who understood others like he understood himself and wouldn't have his morals shattered by simple words.

Raphael grinned at Vincent's words, and patted his shoulder. "You're not so bad, Vin. Just a little stupid."

As simple as that, he offered a hand and pulled his friend up, even kindly patting the dust off his shirt.

"...." All the crown prince could do was nod.

"I don't know what that was," Celine gestured at the scene with a casual shrug. "But nice punch, Mr Hero. What's next?"

"Did Ren find what he was looking for in the forest?" questioned Vendra with a polite smile.

It was only then that Raphael realized the way she addressed the little prince, and he paused.

"...you call him Ren?"

"Yes?" She tilted her head in confusion, ocean curls swaying with the movement. "He introduced himself to me as such."

"Ah, I see."

Brioc directly laughed out loud, his eyes flickering between the sleeping man and Raphael’s conflicted expression. "Are you jealous~?"

"A little." admitted Raphael with a shrug. "But it's a name that originally belonged to him, so I think it's good."

The protagonist said it so bluntly that Brioc frowned — his original intention to tease was destroyed. In the end, this head-strong protagonist wasn't so fun after acknowledging his feelings.

Although Soren was also blunt with what he liked and disliked, he was awkward when it came to emotions.

Really, Brioc hoped that Soren would wake up soon.

"What's Renren doing, anyway?"

"Sleeping." said Alvara as she walked beside him. Brioc squinted in response.

"Really~ I thought he was wide~ awake."

At such obvious sarcasm, Alvara didn't even flinch and said plainly, "I think you need to get your eyes checked."

Brioc sneered at her childishly and crouched down in front of Soren only to have somebody loop their arms around him and drag him away. The magician tilted his head back with a frown.

"If it was your boyfriend, would you drag him away so crudely?"

His body swept the leaves off the ground as he leisurely teased. "You wouldn't, would you, Raphy~? Tsk tsk, I'm so heartbroken~"

Raphael dumped Brioc to another corner, patting off the dust in his hands.

"If it was my boyfriend, he would lazily allow me to drag him wherever." said the protagonist calmly. "He might even close his eyes and rest while I did it."

Brioc paused, sprawled on the ground before nodding. "You're right, you're right. I was wrong~"

"Hey, you never answered my question." repeated Celine, strolling forward to interrupt them. S he was impatient to know if a method of waking Uriel existed. 

"Well,"

"Oh, congrats on your marriage, too." added the saint casually.

"....." Raphael smiled and raised a brow. "Thank you."

Alvara pursed her lips and squinted suspiciously. "...hey, hey, I don't think that's quite right."

Raphael nodded. "Of course, consent is necessary."

"That's... yes, you're right?" replied the teenager in clear confusion, brows knitted together as she processed his words. 

Simply put, they weren't married... but Raphael intended to propose? 

What? Is that what it meant?

"Is it fun to tease children?" inquired Damien as he stepped forward from the shadows, joining the group. Although his words seemed to be protecting Alvara, there was a lazy amusement laced in his tone.

Raphael chuckled, raising his eyes to look at Damien. The latter didn't look away. "I said I had a question for you, kid."

There was something strange about the atmosphere between the two -- a dangerous, lurking tension between two people who could read each other cleverly. A violent gush of wind blew through, causing the shadows of the leaves to cover Damien in their shade.

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As if he'd disappear into the lurking dark at any moment. 

Emerald eyes glowed in their piercing stare, all-knowing. "I'll answer?"

"The reason why Ren seems to know so much, and the thing that he's searching for..."

The bloody lips twitched into a faint, curious smile.

"...you know it, right?"

"And why," wondered Damien with a tilt of his head, those innocent and deadly ears quietly listening in the tuffs of raven hair, "do you think that?"

A showdown between two people who had the unique skill of reading others. 

Secrets that only they could discover, knowledge only they knew. Raphael was the hero who would save the world, and Damien was a simple side character who stayed by the man's side in the original story. 

But the ending was unknown, hidden between missing pages of an incomplete tale. 

A novel of betrayal.

"You know of the ending of this world." replied a voice that was not Raphael, soft yet terrifying as a chilling pair of eyes gazed at the scene. Sounding as if they'd just woken from a long dream. 

"An ending that even I don't know."

Soren had been thinking about it for a long time.

He couldn't predict or suspect others as easily as Raphael, who watched every single movement of the other, but Damien was dangerous and unpredictable. He had been there since the very beginning, and was there until the very end.

The fox had once said to Lydia, "If the ending is a tragedy, then it can be rewritten. If it ends with no ending, then one can only wait out the future."

When Celine's identity had not been the second leader of the Third Religion, but simply the Death Saint, the fox had warned Raphael, "Pull your hood up, Sir Raphael."

How Damien knew where the entrance was, knew that Raphael was involved with Soren's memories, how he'd simply reply, "Do you think I'd reveal my sources?"

In the book, his identity was the leader of a fox tribe who had access to information all across the continent. But even for him, could he know information that was so hidden even God couldn't reveal it?

Lydia had told Soren to search for the missing pages of the book. And Damien had been especially curious about the book that Soren sought.

Because he'd been there the entire time, they'd overlooked a single fact. The most suspicious character was not Celine who was part of the Third Religion, or Soren who was searching for answers he couldn't reveal.

It was Damien, who always knew the answer to whatever they questioned.

"Where are the missing pages of the book, Damien?"

The very thing he was searching for had been in front of him the entire time.

Damien's tail swayed dangerously behind in quiet understanding. "Where was the first place you woke up in, Master?"

The Forest of Beginnings and Endings.

It'd been there all along.

"Why would it be there?"

"Why wouldn't a book be in there? You read it for the first time, in that place, didn't you realize?" Damien watched carefully as a look of realization covered Soren's pale features.

He hadn't thought about it the first time — one, because he was busy figuring out where he was, and two, that library never had much significance to him until he remembered Raphael. 

An abandoned building in the middle of a forest. Old and broken, but quite intact. 

The Forest of Beginnings and Endings that could bring a person anywhere, so long as the person imagined it. A forest that was connected to everywhere. 

Soren jerked his head, wide-eyed to Raphael, who stared in the same disbelief at him in return. The answers they were looking for — it was in the one place they both couldn't forget anymore. Such a loop was confusing and unbelievable.  

"Kid," said Raphael slowly. "Who are you?"

"The reason why I know all that I do," said Damien with a curious tilt of his chin. "is because I read the same story that Master did. And the reason why I know the ending that he doesn't, is because I wrote that very ending."

Damien believed that a story without an ending was foolish, but a story that ended in tragedy could be fixed. Therefore, when he found the slivers of paper with no end, he wrote that very tragedy.

For a story he wanted to see to the end.

But there was another truth revealed in this moment, one only this teenager and Soren knew.

Raphael didn't miss out any words. "...story?"

"The world is a story, Sir Raphael." said Damien in a polite tone that was almost mocking, as if laughing at Raphael for not understanding it earlier. "And you are the protagonist meant to save the world."

Raphael paused and slowly looked at Soren. "I'm the main character in a book?"

Soren froze and slowly nodded. "Yeah."

"Then what about the memories of the apocalypse? Of the first world?"

"That's real."

The memories had been confirmation to Soren that Raphael was not a simple character in a story he had read, but a real person that had existed by his side. 

"...everything I've experienced, was it just pre-planned? Predestined?"

"I... don't know."

Several thoughts danced across the protagonist's mind and suddenly everything clicked together, like gears that had finally begun to turn. "The book at the auction. I wondered why you wanted it so badly... is that the novel you read?"

"Yeah."

"Then in the beginning, before you remembered me, you approached me for what reason?"

It had been before, when Soren had cared little about the world or the characters, only wishing to live his own life. When Raphael had been a person he admired, but felt nothing more for.

"I approached you so you could save the world."

"Why?"

"…Because it was my obligation to the original, and the hero that I admired."

Raphael rubbed his temples, unsteady on his feet as he processed the information. Everyone wore similar looks of confusion on their face, but only Raphael had been directly affected. 

One hundred lifetimes.

All destined to fail. What had he been working so hard for?

"Alright." breathed Raphael. "Alright, let's go. We'll head to the forest immediately."

Nobody said anything in silent acceptance. There was no way to refute him, when his words were of absolute command. As if his words were on a tethering line, ready to snap at any moment. 

Soren's hand shook as he reached out. "You stupid hippo," said the prince quietly. "Are you going to abandon me?"

He'd never been worried about the truth being discovered — until now.

Raphael stopped in his tracks, swallowing. Then, without hesitation, he turned around and tugged Soren up, wrapping him into a warm embrace of messy thoughts. 

They were quiet, and neither side said anything. 

Finally, Raphael sighed. "Even if everything in my life had been useless, nothing I've said was a lie. I will not abandon you, little prince, because my feelings were not decided by fate, they were chosen by me."

Soren said nothing, and Raphael pulled away for a moment.

"Trust me. And if not me, trust in the you reflected in my eyes." said Raphel with shaky calm. "Am I supposed to blame you for reading a book? For not telling something that most people would call you crazy for?"

Even if his entire world had been shaken by the truth, Raphael would not blame Soren. 

"Raphael, you're the hero I admired the most."

Soren closed his eyes against Raphael's hold. "I promised you, I would help you save this world."

Screw fate. Screw destiny. Screw the stupid story that had only resulted in tragedy. And so what if they were characters on a page, words written up to play a certain path?

To themselves, they were more real than anything else.