The Broken Halo

The God of War’s cut had nearly separated Simon into two pieces.

It ran diagonally through his torso, passing through muscle, broken ribs, and the wall of his Demon Heart. Only the depth the attack had narrowly spared kept his body together.

He had not twisted away. He had not raised a defence.

He was still whole because of luck.

Blood spread beneath him, filling the cracks in the scorched road. His right hand had fallen open when he struck the ground, leaving the Chaos Blade beside it.

Simon tried to breathe, but something caught inside his chest. The attempt ended in a wet bloody cough, and his vision darkened around the edges.

’My heart...’

The thought broke apart before he could finish it.

Unholy Regeneration had already begun working. Torn vessels reached toward one another. Thin strands of new flesh appeared within the wound, trying to reconnect what the god had severed.

Then several of those strands parted again.

The god’s foreign aether remained inside the cut.

It clung to his damaged flesh and resisted every attempt to knit it together. Simon felt his regenerative power pressing against it, repairing a little only to lose part of that progress.

He still possessed demonic energy. Getting it through the ruined pathways was another matter.

’Heart... first.’

He gathered what he could around his injured Demon Heart. Its next beat sent pain through him so violently that he nearly lost the fragile current he had formed.

He held it.

A small section of the damaged wall began closing.

’Don’t fight all of it. Keep it... away from the heart.’

His control was exceptional, but his ability to use it while his body was coming apart was not.

The power inside him had come from Darius’s reservoir of Aether. Simon recognised something of the human’s energy beneath what it had become.

But passing beneath a god’s presence and control had transformed its quality. It was far more refined, far more destructive, and governed by a Will the human could never have imposed upon it.

Driving it out was nothing like clearing the remnants of Darius’s flames.

Simon could barely force it away from one patch of flesh before his concentration slipped.

The fact that it was borrowed Aether was another reason he remained alive. Had the God of War struck with his own aether or actual divinity, not even Unholy Regeneration would have saved him.

Even now, survival was uncertain.

The wound was healing, but not quickly enough. Blood escaped faster than the damaged vessels closed, and his awareness kept fading between one effort and the next.

Fearless could make him calm and silence any seed of terror, but it could not replace the blood leaving his body.

’Stay... awake.’

A familiar voice reached him through the darkness gathering at the edges of his mind.

[Do you need my help?]

Lilith.

For a moment, her voice was the only thing he could follow.

[Let me take control. I will fight him.]

Simon tried to focus on the torn wall of his heart. Another strand joined, held, and strengthened beneath the energy he directed toward it.

A weak beat followed.

[The... price?]

[A favour.]

She answered immediately.

There was no explanation of what that favour would be. No promise that the price would be smaller than the life she was offering to preserve.

Simon remained silent.

Blood touched his lips again.

[Don’t worry about it.]

A brief pause followed.

[What?]

[I’ll handle him.]

Lilith’s voice lost its earlier ease.

[You are lying in your own blood. Your heart is damaged, your body is barely holding together, and you could not even react to his hand moving. You will most likely die at his hands.]

Simon knew.

He had seen the flash. Nothing more. The god had not needed a weapon, a stance, or even a serious expression.

[Is this pride? Stubbornness? Or are you so wary of what I might ask that you would rather gamble your life?]

Her words reached him while he guided another thin current around the foreign aether.

He did not try to expel all of it at once. He isolated what he could, giving the regeneration small places in which to work.

[There are worse things... than owing a favour.]

[Then accept.]

[That isn’t the only reason.]

The pressure inside his chest eased enough for a shallow breath. It bought him a brief moment in which his thoughts held together.

[I’ll fight him myself. If I lose... so be it.]

[You call this fighting?]

[I’m still alive.]

His fingers moved against the road. The sword was close, but reaching it remained beyond him.

[There will always be someone stronger, Lilith.]

He paused as the next heartbeat dragged pain through the wound.

[If every impossible enemy teaches me only to call your name... what am I learning?]

Lilith said nothing.

[The day you cannot answer, I’ll have no answer either.]

He was not pretending he could already defeat the god. That was precisely the problem. He had to learn what remained possible when strength alone was insufficient, when the enemy could cut him down before he moved.

Surrendering control would save him from facing that question.

Until the next time.

[I will accept help. But I will not make your presence the condition of my survival.]

His mental voice weakened, but the decision did not.

[A path that ends wherever you stop carrying me was never mine.]

Silence settled between them.

Simon returned his attention to the wound. A newly joined vessel held through another beat. Beside it, flesh split again beneath the foreign power.

The struggle had not become easier because he had made a declaration.

[If that is what you want,] Lilith eventually said, her tone unreadable, [then so be it.]

Her voice faded.

Simon had no strength left to wonder whether she was displeased.

A boot entered his blurred vision, then another stopped beside it.

He forced his eyes upward and found Darius’s restored face looking down at him. The God of War’s iron-grey eyes followed the faint movements of flesh beneath the torn clothing.

He had been watching.

”A renegeration ability... interesting.”

There was genuine interest in his voice.

The god leaned slightly closer, and his brows drew together above the black markings.

”What are you, truly?”

Simon swallowed blood. His throat worked, but he did not attempt an answer.

”A One-Horned Demon. A demonic cat. Neither race should be able to regenerate a wound like this while my attack is still inside it.”

His gaze lingered over Simon’s chest.

”Yet your heart continues beating.”

A distant cannon thundered. Simon heard it faintly, as though the battle were happening behind a thick wall.

The god looked into his eyes.

”I am beginning to wonder whether killing you would be a waste.”

Simon kept a thin stream of energy moving around his Demon Heart.

”Perhaps I should take you apart more carefully. Discover what made you this way.”

The god’s expression became thoughtful.

”Or perhaps allowing something this abnormal to live would be careless. Your rank is low, but the number of things wrong with you is not.”

The god’s attention shifted.

The Chaos Blade lay beside Simon’s hand, its black surface gleaming faintly above the blood gathering around it.

Immediately, interest sharpened in the god’s eyes.

Simon tried to close his fingers, but they only scraped against the stone without reaching the hilt.

The God of War noticed the movement and smiled faintly.

”We can decide what to do with you afterward.”

He bent toward the sword.

”First, let me examine this.”

His hand lowered, fingers opening to take the Chaos Blade’s hilt.