Eighteen Times She Chose the Mortal Chapter 07
Aresion’s POV
Bang! Bang! Bang!
A desperate cry and the sound of pounding ripped through the cold rain of the Isle.
“Aresion! Open the door! Please, just let me see you!”
I paused my work grinding starlight herbs and frowned slightly.
The Isle of Oblivion is a forbidden land. There are never any visitors.
I wiped the juice from my hands, walked to the door, and lifted the heavy bolt.
The moment I opened it, a woman, soaked to the bone, fell at my feet.
She was a wreck.
The once shining armor of a war goddess was torn and scorched, marked by the backlash of divine power.
Blood, shocking and dark, poured from her lips with every gasp.
The terrible power of a Styx curse was raging through her, the force of it audibly cracking her bones. It was the price for breaking the most sacred of blood oaths.
But she seemed to feel none of it. None of the soul-crushing pain.
She clawed at the doorframe, lifting her pale, bloodless face to me.
The moment she saw me, the despair in her eyes ignited into a feverish, manic light.
“Aresion…” She reached for me with a trembling, wounded hajid, sobbing like a drowning soul. “I finally found you… I’m here to take you home!”
She threw herself at me, trying to embrace me.
VMMM.
Before I could even step back, a shield of pure silver light shimmered into axistence around me.
The gentle but absolute power threw her backward without mercy.
She landed hard in the mud, coughing up another mouthful of blood that stained the puddles red.
I stood calmly on the steps. I didn’t reach for her. I didn’t speak.
Inside me, pure starlight power flowed, steady as my own breath.
After drinking from the Waters of Lethe, I had let go of all will to fight, all attachments.
This state of perfect emptiness had unexpectedly resonated with the ancient Titan magic of the island.
The Tartarean venom had vanished.
The island’s primeval gods had even granted me their power-the purest, strongest starlight.
And now, the island’s magic sensed the violent, warlike energy in this woman.
And so, my shield rejected her. Automatically.
“Why…?”
She sat in the cold mud, staring at the shield in disbelief, her voice shattering.
“It’s me, Cassia! You used to go crazy with worry if I got even the smallest scratch… Now… you won’t even let me touch you?”
“Stranger, you are bleeding.” looked at her broken form. My voice was gentle, as if were speaking to a lost traveler. I felt no curiosity towards this trespasser, this woman dying from a broken oath.
She stared for a moment. Then her eyes widened horror. She scanned my face, desperately searching for something.
Soon, the last flicker of light in her eyes died.
Because she found it. Nothing. No anger. No resentment.
Only the placid confusion of a stranger.
“No… impossible…”
Her body began to shake violently. She shook her head, spitting blood.
“You’re just blaming me! You’re punishing me!”
She fumbled frantically in her clothes, not caring as her nails broke against her armor.
Finally, she pulled out a blood-stained stone.
She held it in both hands like a lifeline, and on her knees, through the agony of the curse, she crawled toward me.
“Look! It’s our vow stone! I brought it!”
She was sobbing, gut-wrenched, laying bare a past that meant nothing to me.
“It was me! I was selfish! I was blinded by vanity! For a mortal’s empty praise, I ignored you for three whole years!”
“I almost got you killed! I deserve to die!”
She slammed her head against the steps, rain and blood matting her hair to her face.
“Please, forgive me! If you just come back with me, we’ll go to the eternal flame right now! We’ll complete the binding!”
“I swear, I’ll never look at another man again! Just give me one more chance! Please!”
The storm raged.
She looked up at me, her face a mask of tears, her eyes filled with a desperate, begging prayer.
A broken worshipper, begging for mercy from a god she herself had destroyed.
I listened quietly to her confession.
And then, I let out a soft sigh.
“I’m sorry, Goddess of War.”
I looked at the weeping woman and spoke in the kindest, cruelest voice.
“The island’s guardians told me I had a past, before this place.”
A flash of wild hope lit her eyes. She thought I was finally remembering.
But my next words cast her into the abyss.
“But in my memory, you are a stranger.”
She froze.
The hope on her face curated becoming pathetic and absurd.
I looked her right in the eye and continued, word by word.
“And so, your tears and your promises… they mean nothing to me.”
The blood-soaked vow stone slipped from her hand and fell into the mud.
It was as if her soul had been ripped from her body.
She gaped, her throat tight, as if she’d forgotten how to breathe.
In the eyes that were once so proud, so entitled, there was only the purest, most absolute terror. The final collapse.
She finally understood. The man who had been willing to die for her… was dead,
And she was the one who had killed him.
I didn’t pick up the stone. I didn’t help her up.
I simply took a step back and gave her a polite nod.
“The rain is heavy. You should go home and tend to your wounds.”
I turned around. I closed the heavy oak door.
“NO!”
As the door clicked shut, a raw, animalistic howl of agony came from outside.
It was followed by the sharp crack of breaking bones. The ultimate punishment of the blood oath, delivered at last.
I slid the bolt home. I picked up my cup of warm starlight tea. I didn’t look back.
I left her to be swallowed by the storm, to be crushed by her broken oath and her despair, alone in the long, dark night.
