Omega's Rebirth-Chapter 843: No Simple Girl ()

"A reunion should be a happy occasion, shouldn’t it?"

When Mykael came into view, Azkar was caught off guard. He was quick to regain his composure and exhaled a slow breath of relief.

Perhaps today was not the day he died.

However, his relief was short-lived after Mykael’s first words.

Azkar glanced between Beoruh and Mykael and it didn’t take any special effort to understand. He had been replaced.

It was a swift turn of events, if Azkar was asked. But it wasn’t surprising.

In the stronghold, there had only been Azkar. He was the strongest and the best precisely because of that.

That was no longer the case.

"You made it back." Mykael’s tone dripped with boredom. "Yet you have not returned to the Isle. Shall I consider that an act of rebellion?"

Azkar scoffed beneath his breath. It was ironic that a fallen dragon would talk about rebellion when he had been living the very definition of the word for centuries.

"Return?" Azkar echoed, shaking his head slightly. "You knew Celeste set me up and you did nothing when she raided my halls in my absence and pushed Leon to his capture."

"I don’t think you wanted me to return at all." He replied blankly.

"Since when did you become so sensitive?" Mykael quizzed, tilting his head to the side. "We are allied with our purpose. That doesn’t make us friends."

"You failed to outsmart Celeste. That is on you."

Azkar nodded slowly, he hadn’t expected any less. Amongst people like them, there was no such thing as friends, only allies. And even then, alliances were not set in stone. They only held for as long as it was favorable.

Loyalties...such things simply didn’t exist.

"Why have you come then?" Azkar asked blankly. "To witness my end? Make sure I am unable to return this time?"

Mykael didn’t respond immediately. He merely stared at Azkar in silence.

"You saved the girl." He said finally. "I should have known when you wouldn’t hand her over, that Celeste was right."

"You, Azkar? Harboring a meagre and mediocre thing such as feelings? For a simple girl?" Mykael clicked his tongue. "I didn’t wish to believe it."

Azkar pursed his lips. He wanted to protest, to deny it with everything in him. But the words died on his tongue.

And instead he said, "She’s not a simple girl."

"What?" Mykael asked, frowning.

Azkar sighed, looking Mykael dead in the eyes. "She’s not a simple girl, Mykael."

"Without her, your grand plan will be futile. You need her alive... remember?" Azkar continued, his gaze unreadable.

"Are you saying...you saved her for my sake?" Mykael raised a brow in question.

Azkar pondered over it for a moment, but it didn’t require much thought. He knew what he had done and exactly why he had done it.

And perhaps his motives were not entirely pure, but it had nothing to do with Mykael.

Mykael hadn’t even been a consideration in his mind.

"Whatever your reasons were, I do not care to know." Mykael asserted. "Why am I here, you asked?"

He took a few steps forward till he was some paces away from Azkar. Azkar was tempted to back away, but he suppressed the thought immediately.

He had retreated many times since the uprising. Telling himself his day would come. He had lived for decades just like that... waiting to fight another day.

But not today. He wouldn’t give Beoruh the satisfaction.

"To give you a chance, Azkar." Mykael continued, 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

"A... chance?" Azkar trailed off, his brows furrowed in confusion.

"A chance to move past this slight...bump, in our alliance." Mykael confirmed. "If you so wish, you don’t ever have to see Celeste again. She has been nothing short of disappointing since you left, you see."

Azkar didn’t need to guess to know where Mykael was headed, or the magnitude of the demand he was about to make and so it was no surprise when his next words were,

"Where did you send the girl, Azkar?" He demanded, his voice was slow and deceptively calm.

But Azkar knew better. He knew Mykael too well. Had watched him fall into the madness and depravity alongside the King he was sworn to,

Had watched him dedicate his life to Asrig’s cause and sacrifice his body as a subject for one of Asrig’s many vile experiments.

The memories shamed Azkar’s own darkness and still gave him nightmares.

And he was the sorcerer.

Mykael...he had no will or existence of his own. He was simply an echo of Asrig left behind in this world.

And while Azkar didn’t regret many things in his long lifetime, a sense of foreboding blossomed in his heart at this moment.

Perhaps he should have let this alliance fall through with Asrig’s death.

"I do not know." Azkar replied, holding Mykael’s gaze.

It was not entirely true, but it was not a lie either. Azkar knew where he had wanted to send her, but at that last moment where he summoned the portal, his magic failed him again like it had in the realm of the Forlorn.

He lost control of the portal and he still couldn’t understand what had gone wrong.

While he had a safe destination planned out, he didn’t know... where she had ultimately been taken to.

But she was a woman who had singlehandedly thwarted their every plot since she first appeared in the stronghold.

Wherever she was... she would be fine. Azkar was more confident in this than he was in his own fate.

"You don’t... know?" Mykael asked in disbelief. "Or you won’t tell?"

Azkar shrugged casually. "Whichever rhymes better."

He was pushing it. Azkar knew that. He was outnumbered with Beoruh alone, but Mykael was not an easy opponent either.

He couldn’t tell how he had gone from being wary of his own death to actively seeking it.

"The rune is in her possession." Mykael hissed darkly.

Azkar blinked. He hadn’t thought of that.

But if the witch rune wasn’t with the dragons, or Beoruh... and it wasn’t here either, who else would have it?

Only now did it hit him. He hadn’t even considered the possibility that while facing her death, she would still think to snatch the rune off Ida. And just like that, Beoruh’s plot had reached a standstill. Azkar’s lips twitched slightly despite himself.

She was no simple girl.

"And without me, you won’t ever find her." He added. "Kill me if you dare."