Beast Gacha System: All Mine-Chapter 63: Collapse

"I never knew you loved me."

Cecilia had arrived prepared for many things. A war council, a den of schemes, a gathering of grim-faced allies. She had not arrived prepared for this.

For the sight of Eastiel Edengold, a man she’d always known as the bright, warm sun, standing before a crowd as a raw nerve of controlled fury. And for the way he looked at her now, as if she were a trick of the light he was too weary to dismiss.

"You know a great many things, Saintess," Eastiel answered, his voice soft, almost dreamy. His eyes held a warm, dazed mirth, the look of a man humoring a pleasant fantasy. "But you don’t know everything."

He smiled and gently chided her. "Now, if you please, I know I need to sell my grief to move this war, but a hallucination won’t do my credibility any favors. Can you be a dear and disappear for now?"

Cecilia’s eyes faltered.

"Brother," Elias’s hand clamping onto Eastiel’s arm. His eyes were wide with horror. "I see her too."

Around them, the stunned silence shattered. A wave of gasps and exclamations rolled through the courtyard. "Lord Edengold, it’s the Saint—!"

"She’s alive!"

Chaos erupted anew.

But in the center of the maelstrom, Eastiel remained an island of eerie calm. While others reeled at the miracle of her presence, he descended into a private chasm of disbelief. His gaze swept over her, not seeing the living woman, but hunting for the flaw in the illusion.

And he found it.

"You have no heartbeat," he murmured, the words a clinical observation that cut through the noise. His warm daze evaporated, replaced by a sharp, agonizing suspicion. "You can’t be real. Cecilia... don’t deceive me..."

"I see I don’t look real enough for you," Cecilia tried to smile, but the expression crumbled. "Do you have tactile hallucinations too?"

Eastiel gave a faint, helpless shake of his head. "I don’t. Not so far—"

GRASP.

She moved, a sudden blur of motion, and buried herself against his chest, her arms locking around him with a fierce and undeniable solidity. The impact forced the air from his lungs.

"Then I’m not too late," her voice was muffled against his robe. "Feel it. Will you believe I’m not a hallucination now?"

Her embrace was real. The pressure of her arms, the slight give of her body against his. It was a sensation so vivid it bypassed his tortured logic and spoke directly to the beast within that had been howling in a void for days.

The last vestige of his conscious resistance shattered.

Perhaps this was one of those dreams. The cruelest one yet. One so sweet it would break him when he woke.

But this time, he didn’t want to wake up.

Eastiel’s arms came up and closed around her, his embrace desperate, clutching her to him as if she were the only solid thing in a dissolving world.

Cecilia felt the terrible tension in his body begin to melt into a bone-deep exhaustion. His weight started to sag against her.

Elias, watching with panic, lunged forward. "Brother!"

He grasped them both, bracing Eastiel as the Lion King’s knees finally buckled, the last of his formidable will expended, leaving only the stunned, clinging man holding onto a miracle he no longer had the strength to question.

"What is happening?!"

"Is she alive or dead? Can anyone explain this?!"

"Is that truly her? I’ve never seen the Saintess in person! Someone tell me the truth!"

"Please, everyone, calm down—" Hettor’s voice rose, trying to weave order back into the scene, but the chaos was a living thing, fed by shock and dread.

Then, as if a switch had been thrown, every hair on every neck, beast and human alike, stood rigidly on end. A silence slammed down, heavier than any command.

From the shadowed archway behind Cecilia, two more figures emerged.

One was the familiar silhouette of the Black Wolf King of the North. The other was a being most knew only from bedtime stories and hushed, half-believed legends.

His long, mist-white hair seemed to hold its own light in the courtyard’s gloom. The proud, sharp curves of his black horns were a crown no man would dare forge. He moved with an economy of motion that spoke of impossible age and power, and he did not look at the gathered lords. His focus was on the collapsed king.

"Let’s get him inside," Oathran said, his voice a low vibration that bypassed the ears and settled in the chest. He bent, effortlessly taking Eastiel’s arm and draping it over his own shoulder, handling the Lion King with a matter-of-fact care more unsettling than any show of strength.

"...S-Sir...?" Elias was left flabbergasted, torn between protecting his brother and the sheer, knee-weakening awe of the entity now supporting him.

"This way," Cecilia directed. She glanced at Arkai, who gave a single nod, agreeing to handle it from here.

As Oathran, with Eastiel’s dead weight, and Cecilia disappeared back into the archway’s shadows, the crushing pressure in the courtyard eased by a fraction. But the Black Wolf King remained. He stepped forward, his dark eyes sweeping over the assembly.

"I will explain everything," Arkai Dawnoro stated. "Right from the very beginning."

***

"That can’t be true!"

"Ruby..." Nikolas let out a long, weary sigh. "You haven’t left my side for a single moment since you arrived. You know I didn’t go anywhere, didn’t order any attack on the Vasilievs."

Ruby looked at him, her eyes a complex swirl of wariness, sadness, and pitiful appeal. Yes, she knew he might be telling the truth. Logically, he hadn’t had the opportunity. But it was still possible that it was him. There were still chances, agents acting on old orders, loyalists taking initiative.

"I... I believe you didn’t do anything..." she began. "But why are you so quick to say it was Arzhen himself who... who could do that to his own father...?"

She closed her eyes tight, as if the very thought pained her heart.

She knew Arzhen was capable of ruthlessness. He’d proven that with Cecilia, after all, killing a woman for a flower she hadn’t even asked for. But patricide? That was a different beast. The reports said Anton was missing, not confirmed dead. Perhaps... perhaps it was just a strategic disappearance? A trick?

She didn’t know! Everything was spiraling. Arkai’s survival, the attacks on both lords, what vile turn would come next?

"If I didn’t do it, then who?" Nikolas’s frustration boiled over. "Then, if he didn’t orchestrate it himself, who attacked my father? Ruby, why are both our fathers targeted in such a short time? The logic points in one direction. It’s one of us, or both of us, or..." He paused, his gaze sharpening on her. "Something else. But can you tell me who?"

Ruby shrank into herself, her eyes lowering to the floor. This again. The demand for prophecy, for divine certainty she had to fabricate from scraps of regressed memories and desperate guesswork.

How could he demand the gods to tell her anything at all? The gods do whatever they like!

What could she offer now? What if she was wrong again?

After everything she had given him. The future knowledge of mines, of market trends, of his mother’s lost necklace, precious secrets entrusted to bind him to her. Was it her fault the world refused to follow the script?

No. She had followed her memories perfectly. It wasn’t her fault. It was theirs, Nikolas’s and Arzhen’s, for being so stupidly, violently competitive. After all she’d done to elevate them, why did they have to fight like this? She understood it was for her, but could they do it without... without... hurting her?

Why were they so... selfish?