The ten souls brightened the moment his attention grazed them. The shift was subtle and awful. Their torn, glitching outlines smoothing into suspended silhouettes. People frozen in mid-breath.
Helen's soul, at least Cecilia was sure that that blue soul was her crush's one, reached toward her. A hand almost touching, fingers halted like someone had pressed pause at the worst possible second.
Cecilia felt something land right in her chest.
A pressure. A want.
The cruel temptation to keep Helen safe.
Safe from monsters and broken systems and the five-hundred-year grave Hyperborea had crawled out of. Safe from the existential horror of learning that 'the game' had eaten lives to become real. Safe… No.
"That's not safety. That's taxidermy."
Her fingers closed around the Chrysalis Scepter until her hand shook.
Muvetheret tilted his head. He didn't blink.
"Is it cruelty to halt the blade a moment before it strikes?"
