There Ater was.
Still alive. Still holding on.
'H-hold on… Ater was there too?!' At that point, Rey realized his memories had been misleading all along.
He thought it was just him back then.
But to think Ater had remained with him until the very end.
He truly meant those words back then.
He was loyal.
Back to the scene unfolding…
"Such suffering," Zagan mused as he stepped forward, hands behind his back. "It is beautiful, in a way. How tightly your soul clings to the corpses of the dead. I must say, I'm impressed… worm."
Rey did not respond.
His body trembled. His lips bled from biting them shut. His eyes—once bright and burning—now dulled, stared with a madness only known to the broken.
"You look confused," Zagan continued. "You prepared so diligently. I don't know how you managed to study Ancient MajiK, but you even did that too. You ascended to new understanding, trained day and night… and yet, this is how it ends."
