Глава 13

Blood rain falls incessantly, as if it will never stop.

Logos and Amiya's shoulders have been soaked red by the rain.

The white-haired Vampire, however, seems to stroll casually under the rain, completely spotless.

Look at the sorry state of yourselves.

Lost in confusion, losing sight of what matters.

Even if no one answers your cries, you can't waste the stage you've been given, don't waste your chance at a grand farewell.

'I state it, therefore, it is prescribed.'

'The wind and rain cease, deprived of the right to flow.'

The moment the words are spoken, the blood rain freezes in midair.

Like curtains, like stars, it refracts the sorrow of the sea, the brilliance of the moons.

The Sanguinarch squints, seemingly unsurprised by the incantation of the Lord of the Banshees. Rather, it is as if he is appreciating a piece of art drawn between heaven and earth.

You've halted the surging? Impressive. Blood pauses at your command.

But—I am its master.

The suspended beads of blood suddenly burst in the air, splattering anything they can reach.

The knell will decay, the order will wear, no?

If you so disdain your noble blood, I might as well extract it and return it to your mother, Banshee.

She will play for you a mournful whistle.

Amiya!

The Vampire only gives Amiya a momentary opportunity, but it is more than enough.

Amiya's palm presses against the Vampire's body, sticky blood burning her palm.

Is this your blood?

Heated by Arts, heated by your talent.

But the hot blood I've seen—

—has all been for the sake of resistance, for the sake of life.

And those people, their blood is much hotter than yours.

Black lines burst from Amiya's palm, piercing through the Vampire's body.

Hngh.

Amiya, fall back!

You didn't get his vitals!

Oh how cold, King of Sarkaz.

A monarch of such little grace you are.

Sanguinarch of Vampires, Prince of the Crimson Court, your offspring fill every battlefield the Sarkaz touch.

You proclaim to them that slaughter and conquest are the ancient traditions of the Vampires.

You've shaped your court into what it is today. You've made the people see all Vampires as nothing more than twisted creatures of desire like yourself.

But the Vampires I know are not like you.

They haven't gone mad like you.

They've only managed to conceal their desires, conditioned to deeply by this age in which they have no home.

Some choose to bow down to the invaders, and I pity them.

No, that's not it.

How do you interpret the blood that your court stands for?

The sufferings of the Sarkaz need no elucidation. All Sarkaz, even those who submit to you, inevitably know the taste of blood.

Overturned in dark alleys, intercepted in dark forests, sometimes a throat is cut, sometimes cold daggers are thrust between ribs.

It awakens the siblings, who now know the cost of submission, and they come to rebel until they too are covered in the blood of their enemies.

How pitiful.

Kill or be killed, this is the cycle of blood that the Sarkaz carry.

Is that how you define the meaning of blood? A cycle?

The first time any of us felt blood on our skin, wasn't it... when we were born from our mothers?

Blood is the foundation of human life, heritage passed down on umbilical cords, inevitable stumbles when exploring the outside world, and wounds that will surely heal.

But you see it only as a synonym for torment and death.

Your obsession makes you bloodthirsty.

You, with all your arrogance and pride, lead them to believe that this is the path the Sarkaz should take, the things they should do.

I reject you, Sanguinarch.

I reject your actions, your words, and your court.

Ahahahahah! What is this I'm hearing?

You, an outblood, reject me?

A mere crown has inflated you to what... <i>King of Sarkaz?</i>

The blood sea churns, its waves cover the moons.

Crimson removes all other colors.

I don't care what I am, or what I'm called.

I only know what I need to do.

The Prince stops moving for a moment.

A voice echoes in his mind.

Is this how you manipulate the King's power, Cautus?

Will you share some profound words? Try to shake me with shallow emotion?

You're welcome to try.

Shake? No.

This is a rejection.

The rolling of the waves slows, together with the moonlight.

I reject you.

I reject you, the way you reduce the King, the Sarkaz, and Kazdel to concepts of power and tradition.

I reject you, how you entrust the future to the past, entrust life to slaughter.

Theresa, the King, the Chancellor, the leader of Babel, she showed everyone a path.

Maybe that path is too idealistic, maybe her promises won't bear the thousands of years of hatred of the Sarkaz.

But that's not now, not your choice.

You'd laugh at my weakness? Say it's not my place to talk about the Sarkaz with you?

Or you'd mock Logos for not making use of the blood you 'awakened' just now?

Oh, <i>King of Sarkaz</i>... You eavesdrop on my thoughts? Is that your ability?

Then of course you know what I'm going to say.

I do.

But we've never said that the Sarkaz should give up their resistance. We've never said that suffering is justified.

On the contrary—

Those rebels who awaken from their suffering and hardship, from the abyss of hatred—

They will be much, much stronger than you.

The lost homeland of the Sarkaz is not in the history you keep looking back to, an eon ago.

It can't be a slogan, or fantasy, or symbol.

It's right here, where the Sarkaz came from.

In the city called Kazdel, where so many real people live, people that you've only condemned to a void of ideas.

You've imagined the present from the past, and the real future can never be born.

It's time to stop, Vampire.

Amiya's ring shatters, sending splinters flying.

Cold anger burns within Amiya as she scrutinizes the enemy before her.

She thought her anger would rise, burning like a fire that could scorch the ocean.

But no, that's not what's happening.

Amiya feels more than just anger, also an intense... sadness.

The Sarkaz, a people who have lost their homeland.

Yes, they believe that it is only through violence and war that they can reclaim all they've lost.

It's easy to blame them, with cliche words of morality, justice, and kindness.

Words that have been spoken over and over again, even as the war continues, and hatred spreads.

Because that is how this world treats them.

This world has imposed on them violence and war.