The Author's POV

"Huuu.."

I took a deep breath. As I moved away from Octavious, who was lying down on the ground in front of me, I experienced a range of conflicting feelings.

'This is as far as I can extract…'

I was only able to retrieve a limited number of memories from his mind before my abilities started to fall apart and I was ejected from his consciousness. It was the first time that something like that had occurred, and I must admit that it caught me off, guard.

That being said, I had seen enough.

'The orb must be a defensive mechanism to stop anyone from prying any deeper. A pity it stops right when things were getting spicy...'

It was the only explanation that I could think of at the moment.

Thinking back about his memories, I wasn't sure how to react…

'I somewhat expected this after seeing Melissa's memories… but this runs deeper than I originally thought.'

I finally found the answer to a lot of the questions that had been plaguing me for quite a while.

'…So this is why Kevin sent me over here.'

It was to make me realize that there was another power within the world that was controlling everything from the shadows.

While I wasn't completely sure of its purpose, from what I'd witnessed, it appeared as though its goal was to eliminate and stop all those that had certain levels of talent, leaving only Octavious to reign at the top… someone whom they had full control of.

'The real question is… who is the one controlling everything?'

It had something to do with the records… that I knew, but I wasn't sure if it was the records themselves.

'Protector of the Seat of Diligence? Was that what he said?'

"Hmm."

My brows furrowed as I pondered over the memories I'd witnessed. It was then that I heard a slight groan coming from beneath me.

"Ukh."

Octavious slowly opened his eyes, and our gaze met. Staring at him, I extended my hand and thin white threads forced themselves out from his body before moving toward my direction and entering the palm of my hand.

With each passing second, Octavious's eyes became clearer and clearer, and once I reached the point where I could no longer take in any more of the white thread, his eyes turned completely clear.

"Ah... I..."

He started mumbling incomprehensible things while looking around him in a confused state.

His face was pale and he seemed to be displaying all sorts of different emotions at the moment. He was a far cry from the Octavious that I knew.

Compared to the stoic and powerful man that I knew, the man that was before me was a frail shell of what he once was.

He seemed broken…

down to meet his

about it? Have you come to

***

felt like

a

He felt powerful.

of all, he

to forget all the pain that had haunted him for a very long

did not last for

comfortable dream started to crumble right before his very eyes, revealing to him the truth that lay behind that sweet

A nightmare.

"Huh…ah, what's going on?"

less come to an understanding of what

"This… Ah…"

head to stare at his hands. His lips were dry, and his body was weak. He felt pain all over… and most

all at once as different images appeared within his vision displaying all

them, and all of them were of him

Killing, blackmailing, kidnapping...

"Ha…ahh…"

as if he were in the deepest part of the ocean, surrounded by water, pressuring him

It made breathing impossible.

you

a soft voice that brought him back out of those depts and he raised his head. It was there that

had an idea

that had

"Y,you…"

struggled to find his words. He tried, but every part of him hurt. He wanted to say

that, Octavious felt the two

of our fight were a bit stronger than I

Darkness overtook Octavious's vision.

***

wanted to ask him a few questions, but it

He was in no state to

and four people appeared before me.

I smiled.

Did you

saying a word. The way they looked at me felt rather uncomfortable, but I somewhat expected

was a power that far surpassed this world. To them, I looked

they had a similar level of strength in

Edward in the distance. He seemed rather haggard at the moment with a pile of people

them from the aftershocks of

"Oh, right."

felt apologetic and waved my hand once more. The barrier that was surrounding us

the

but let's go for now. There are a few

I looked toward Octavious.

need