I Refused To Be Reincarnated-Chapter 924: Patient Rage

Adam opened his eyes in Alina's living room. The rot snaking from the cracks on the wall he always leaned against to sleep, the irregular bars of the cradle beside the table, and the sound of the rushing stream filtering from the old window... They were so nostalgic that a soft smile pushed its way across his face.

Slowly, he moved to the cradle. Sixteen years apart... So long... Even though he tried not to let longing dim his mood daily, he missed Julius so much. He wanted to see his brother, even as a baby, even in one of his earliest memories. His fingers found the small, smooth section of the rough bars. They were the size of a child's hand, the place Julius gripped to gaze at Adam each time he wanted to be flown across the room.

But behind them, no one...

He sighed before locks of brown hair that sprawled on the dusty planks forced his gaze beneath the table.

There, he saw Alina, her hazel eyes open and glassy, lost on him. The pallor of death marked the rosy lips she used to smile at him and Julius. Her chest didn't rise and fall. All it did was leak blood through her sliced dress, through a heart-deep knife wound.

Adam's eyes widened, then narrowed into slits. She was his mother, too. It hurt to see her stiff in death.

"So that's how you want to test me?" His voice rumbled across the room, yet the corners of his lips remained curved. "Do your worst."

A ghostly figure phased through the door. Its luminous eyes lingered on Alina for a heartbeat. Then, it gripped Adam's forearm and rushed out. "We must leave, Adam. Now!"

Adam followed it through the dilapidated outskirts, the hint of his smirk subtly broadening. "To where?"

"Theodor's shop." The ghost's voice cracked with hidden care. "You'll be safe with him."

"The old coot?" Before Adam knew how, he stood inside the shop of his first friend.

The multicolored vials glistened over the counter. Their medicinal scents blend with the stench of old books from the library tucked in the corner. He had read Theodor's modest collection of books hundreds of times and ground the content of the vials thousands of times. Yet, he never thought he would see this place again, nor the old man.

Ignoring the counter, he entered the backroom, where he and the old man had brewed their first potions. They were amateurs, terrible even, a commoner without mana and a clueless ghost. But he couldn't look at their curiosity from back then and their stumbling without his chest warming.

And there he saw Theodor.

Head deep in his blackened cauldron, flames roaring beneath, the aged man flailed his arms powerlessly. His gurgles filled the room as scalding liquid suffocated him.

A plop of his arms on the cauldron. Then, silence. Deep. Eternal.

Adam slammed his clenched fist against his chest, replacing the silence with the sound of flesh and bones. "Even under torture, you never told Gaston where we went. You died for us, with more honor than even the orc warriors. I told you adieu years ago, but I'll never forget you, my friend. As for the one travestying your death to affect me..." His smirk broadened. "Let him have his share of fun. My turn will come soon enough."

The ghost beside him subtly frowned before its grip tightened around Adam's forearm. He rushed out, and Adam simply followed.

"Where now? Doesn't seem like any place is safe."

"The college!" The ghost stifled a hopeful breath. "Your friends are there. They'll help you out. Trust me as you always did."

Like the shop, Adam didn't know how he found himself inside the Common Hall of Brineheart's college. The nostalgia here didn't exist. He had just eaten there this morning. And therefore, what he saw lacked any subtlety.

Students hurled spells, incinerating, freezing, and flattening each other. The madness that choked the Hall didn't spare his friends. Desmond flashed across the room, lightning blade reaping heads like wheat. Sarah stood behind three undead who bashed shields against skulls and drove swords through hearts. Elliot waved his war hammer, the roaring wind seemingly coming from the lion's head they had emblazoned together as he shattered sides. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

Adam felt he had entered a brutal slaughterhouse, a nightmarish sight that made him want to fight with his friends. Yet, he didn't move from the doorsill.

When Desmond paused to wave his hand after noticing him, and a vagrant gust split him in half, Adam didn't move. When Sarah cried out for help when the other students climbed over the shattered remains of her undead, he didn't move. And when Trevor turned Elliot into a coral sculpture he then shattered with the boy's own hammer, he still didn't move.

Instead, he turned toward the ghost, his smirk almost fully shaped. "Sarah never showed me her undead, Elliot's star magic is missing, and Desmond can be foolish, but he now has more experience in battle than half the students combined. I'm not even talking about the teachers' inaction." He waved his forearm, glaring at the ghost who held it. "Where next?"

"The blessed land!" The ghost's voice grew restless as he tugged Adam outside. "Follow your big brother."

"Big brother?" Adam let out a chuckle that held no warmth as he found himself inside the kitchen of his palace. "So, now I'll see Misha die?"

And as expected, the woman he loved and who loved him in return, bled on the ground. Her golden hair dyed crimson with blood rustled with each of her ragged breaths. She nudged her shoulder toward him, likely willing to extend the arm that lay beside her, along with her other dismembered limbs.

"I'm glad you're safe..." She murmured without strength, tears trailing down her cheeks. "I'm... sorry, I couldn't protect the blessed land in your absence. Leave Adam. You must live." Her voice dropped below a murmur, and her golden eyes lost their glow. "I love you."

Adam brushed her face tenderly. "Among everyone I know, Misha and Julius would never lose in my absence. I trust them with my life. I love Misha, not an impoverished fake version of her." He gazed at the ghost over his shoulder, then at the flames consuming his blessed land through the window. Archmage William, Quintella's father, and the children were likely dead, too.

"But... I wonder where Xie Lian is?" He tapped his forehead with his middle finger mockingly. "You don't know her? That's fine. You'd be dead if you did. Where next, my dear, dear imposter?"

"You wouldn't trust even the big brother I saw in your memories?" The mist coiled around the ghost, and the darkness obscuring its face vanished. The failed imitation of Adam stood opposite him, wide-eyed, shivering. "Your mother, friends, lover... how can you be so calm?"

"Calm?" Adam arched a playful brow, but his voice echoed like a collapsing mountain. "I'm as enraged as I was when you kidnapped Quintella. No. Not calm. I'm patient. So, what will you show me next? Quintella dying? Or will it be me?"

"T-The cave—"

"Gaston?" Adam cut the imposter off with a dry laugh, but found himself inside the cave before he could continue.

He saw Julius chained to the ground, and Gaston, in his evil ghost form, clutching the gray ghost by the throat. Julius cried out his soul, pleading not to hurt his big brother.

"Do you remember the powerlessness, the pain?" The imposter snarled. "You're no different from back then. A child barely stumbling on the path of magic. Watch, watch what would have happened without your guardian!"

At his words, Gaston tore the ghost's neck, leaving its soul collapsing onto the ground. The mist weakly tried to swirl into place, but eventually faded to reveal a ghost core that made Adam exhale. "That one hurts..."

He tilted his head, his smirk blossoming.

The imposter stepped back, his eyes widened. That smirk! The same the ghost had each time he felt its glare inside Adam's memories.

"I mean, seeing myself die, of course." Adam continued, his sharp eyes glinting with revenge. "You got it all wrong. The child is Julius, my brother. I've always been the ghost. You're inside of my mind, my territory, my fortress. Did you think you'd breach my walls with a flip of your hand and a couple of entertaining, but pathetic, visions of death recycled from Quintella's memories?" He spread his palms wide. "Now it is my turn to test your mind."

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Super 1k4 word chapter. (All the previous ones were long already.^^)