Last Born Of The Desdemona

Chapter 251: Chapter 251: Who Killed Coco?

Chapter 251 – Who Killed Coco?

”She is dead.”

Naomi muttered in a blank tone, looking at the corpse in front of her. It took her a moment for her brain to properly register what she’d just done.

She’d killed someone.

No, that wasn’t new by any means. But it was the first time she’d killed...someone who had been so close to her.

She looked at Coco’s corpse, noticing how the dead young woman’s right hand was stretched toward her, nails clawing at the ground in a failed attempt to summon a shred of mercy.

Naomi took all of that in, and understood it with a chilling coldness.

Then slowly, steadily, almost unintentionally, her heart began to race, and the full weight of what she’d done crashed down on her like an avalanche.

She gasped, and both bloodied hands snapped to her mouth in an attempt to swallow a high-pitched scream.

She barely managed it.

’What...what did I do? I didn’t want to kill her! I truly didn’t want to kill her!’ She shouted inwardly, then began to crawl toward Coco.

Naomi touched the body and felt a coldness she’d never felt before. It was different. Completely different.

Cold — but the kind of cold that felt final, immutable.

”I...I just wanted to punish you.” She stammered, her eyes wide, bloodshot, ”Just like always. And just like always, you always survive! You always survive, Coco! Don’t die now!”

Naomi’s mind was in complete shambles.

She was losing her grip on reason more and more, all because of fear.

Fear of her Palatine.

Fear of what her future would be if she didn’t act to save herself.

And yet...why did it feel as though she’d just doomed herself even further?

That question was answered instantly when the door of the chamber cracked open, and hurried, worried, hesitant footsteps, along with the tapping of a cane on the ground, boomed restlessly through that light-starved room.

Naomi snapped her head toward the sound and saw Cripple running with everything he had, his face a mix of anger, fear, and deep, crippling sadness.

”No! No! No!” Cripple bellowed, his voice desperate, like a man who’d just seen the only light in true darkness snuffed out, ”Tell me it’s a lie! Tell me it’s a lie, Naomi! Naomi, what did you do!”

Naomi flinched at his beastly shout. She stood and immediately put distance between herself and Coco’s corpse, her body shaking, as if none of this had anything to do with her.

”I...was just asking a question.” Naomi muttered, overwhelmed by everything happening, ”I just wanted to save myself. But she...she hates me! Coco hates me!”

Cripple couldn’t bear to listen to Naomi. No, he had no strength for that right now.

He reached Coco’s body, knelt, and cradled her head.

He broke down instantly, bloody tears falling onto her closed eyelids.

”No...no...no...Coco, not you! Not you!”

He could feel, vividly, that she was dead. There was no mistaking it. Yet he pulled out a healing potion, forced her mouth open like always, and began to pour it in.

Like always.

And like always, Coco would come back and talk and smile.

Yes. Like always.

But not that day. And not any day after that.

Coco’s body stayed limp in his arms, dead beyond dead.

Cripple’s mind twisted, and he nearly blanked out in profound despair, his heart gnawed by grief so intense he felt like tearing it out just to escape a pain that would surely kill him.

He snapped his head toward Naomi, his cheeks streaked with bloody tears, Coco still in his arms.

And visibly, one could see Coco’s body shrinking, as if it were rewinding time, unraveling itself.

”You destroyed my eyes, Naomi. You did it, and I said nothing. You did it, and I bore it inside me. You did it, and I DID NOTHING!!!” He screamed with intense, unfathomable fury, ”Now you dare kill her? Coco? Coco Jones? She was my only light in this fucking hell! She was the only one who listened to me! The only one! HOW DARE YOU!”

Naomi flinched even harder, her body unable to stay still. After the act of killing Coco, it felt as though something deep inside her had been permanently broken.

She looked at the world with an existential fear, as if only now realizing how fragile life was, how easily she herself could die.

She began backing away from the wrathful, grief-stricken Cripple.

”It was...for your own good.” She said, teeth clenched hard, ”I did it for your good! I killed—! No, I saved Coco from this life! Yes, I saved her! How dare you shout at me! How dare you, Cripple! Without me, Copycat would have killed you! Don’t you dare forget what you did!”

”And I will kill you.” Cripple said, in the most matter-of-fact tone imaginable, ”I’ll take an Oath before Mother System, and I will kill you. I will, Naomi. I swear I will. I fucking swear it. I will kill you. And I will kill all of you. I swear. I SWEAR I WILL!”

His body shook furiously, veins bulging across his face.

Naomi gritted her teeth and hurriedly rose from the ground. She looked at Cripple and at Coco’s dead body one last time, then ran from the chamber, her voice trailing behind her.

”I will not become a slave. I will not die. I will survive in this hell! You can’t stop me, Cripple!”

In an instant, Cripple was left alone with Coco. Alone, as they had always been.

But now she was dead, and he was still living.

Life had already lost all its color in Cripple’s eyes.

And the only thing that had kept him going was Coco’s voice, a voice that tried to sound cheerful despite bearing a pain few could understand.

A voice that tried to smile, despite having every reason to cry.

A voice...that just wanted to stay alive.

Now that voice was gone, and with it, all his inner strength.

Instantly, the loud, angry words he’d just hurled at Naomi felt laughable.

Kill her? Kill all of them?

It was impossible. He couldn’t do that.

He was a cripple. And he was Cripple.

And Cripple couldn’t even save himself, let alone avenge anyone else.

So he did the only thing he could. He hugged Coco even tighter, not minding the coldness slowly spreading through him.

”I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Coco. I couldn’t save you this time. I couldn’t.” Bloody tears poured down again, ”and I failed to save myself by failing you. I can’t go on anymore. Forgive me, but I can’t avenge you. I’m weak and blind. You know that. You do, Coco. So let me follow you.”

He sobbed, biting his lip to choke back the cries.

However, at that instant, Cripple suddenly went still, sensing a presence behind him.

Not one. Two.

The presences were completely unfamiliar to him, meaning they belonged to people he didn’t know at all.

He began to panic, thinking Naomi had sent others to finish the job alongside her.

But almost immediately, he regained his calm, as if nothing had happened.

’Yes...let me join you.’

But that wasn’t what happened. Instead, he heard one of them whisper something:

”...Angel?”

...

”...Angel?” Nafi called out to Cassius.

Cassius didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer.

He had been searching for a good location to handle his business with Nafissatou, when she’d mentioned something strange she’d noticed with her Omniscient Skill.

He hadn’t initially planned to get involved. But he’d reasoned that any business conducted this late at night was likely to be sensitive, and he didn’t mind gathering sensitive information about anyone.

What he found, however, was something else entirely.

He found a murder. And the person murdered...

”...Coco?” Cassius called out, hidden dismay in his voice, unable to believe his own eyes.

Yet there was no denying it.

Even though her whole face was in a horrific state, he could still recognize her.

But how?

How had Coco...

He didn’t even finish the thought, remembering instantly Naomi, the woman he’d met earlier in the cafeteria.

The woman he’d ignored to talk to Coco.

[...Cassius.] Ananke whispered, knowing exactly what her Blessed was thinking. [You asked her if she wanted help. You asked, and she said she was fine. You did what you could. Don’t blame—!]

’But I knew...I knew she wasn’t fine.’ Cassius thought silently, his heart pounding.

[You can’t force help on someone who didn’t want to be saved.]

’What if she wanted to be saved...but was afraid to ask? Why didn’t I try harder? Why didn’t I do what I did with Isolde, when I forced myself into her life? Why...why didn’t I do what I did for Raven? For Klaus?’

The more Cassius questioned himself, the more Ananke fell silent, and the more obvious the answer became to him.

It was simply because he hadn’t cared about Coco enough to go out of his way to help.

Because he’d seen her as nothing more than a sweet, adorable girl who deserved happiness; but not someone he was willing to actively work to make happy.

Cassius became acutely aware of his own feelings.

He knew he hadn’t been technically wrong. He knew what he’d done was right: to respect the person’s will.

Yet emotions were never rational.

So it was no surprise that he felt like he’d failed someone who believed in him.

Just love. Love for who he was. Or rather, for who she thought he was.

And he’d failed to be who she thought he was, by letting her die instead of saving her.

Cassius took a deep breath at the weight of it all.

Nafissatou stood beside him, choosing silence.

She didn’t know why, but she could feel something terrible was coming.

Someone had died. And not just anyone, judging by her Palatine’s expression.

’Coco was someone good and kind to me, without expecting anything in return but my simple acknowledgment of her existence.’ Cassius thought again, processing the senseless scene in front of him, ’How did I not see that? How was I so blind to all of it?’

Cassius had promised himself not to care about every random person who loved him and wanted to be close to him.

He couldn’t afford to. But some people always managed to slip past that barrier, no matter how small it was.

Coco had succeeded.

Coco had died.

”What...what did she do?” Cassius asked the man in front of him, his voice hoarse with something deep inside him.

”Do...what did she do?” Cripple laughed harshly, his bloody tears falling only faster, ”Nothing but trying to survive. Nothing but trying to live. And oh...Angel...it’s you, right? I have heard so much about you. Oh...she loved you. She loved you so much that she joined your fan club. She joined it, yes, waited four hours for a damn t-shirt. And she did it knowing Naomi was waiting for her. She did it out of love for you...because of what you represent to them...you, who saved your own maid. You...Angel...”

Cassius’s heart pounded hard against his chest. Instantly, he remembered his Aunt Seraphim’s words.

’If you force yourself to be who they think you are, you’ll never survive the war between the factions. Never.’

He clenched his fist, regret and shame at failing such a person clawing at his heart.

He approached the blind man and the dead Coco and knelt in front of them.

Cassius’s eyes were now dead cold.

”I’m sorry if I’m not the Angel you think I am.” He said, looking at Coco’s disfigured face, and reached out to touch it, ”But let me show you who I am.”

He paused, then spoke in a tone that made both of them shiver.

”Who killed Coco?”

—End of Chapter 251—