+Jago?+
Someone was calling him.
The voice did not seem to come from beside his ear, but from some corner deep in his heart.
It was soft and clear, carrying a shy curiosity. +Jago? Are you still alive?+
No.
+No?+
Sevatar groaned, briefly dragging himself back from the sea of pain made of Old Day Phantoms. He could clearly feel the parts of his body that were missing, and the waves of phantom pain left by their departure.
Then he smelled blood.
To him, the scent was all too familiar. In his long, sin-ridden life, killing had been indispensable. Killing was always accompanied by blood; the latter flowed from veins because of the former, and the former became resplendent because of the latter.
Blood, killing, death. Things his life could not do without, the few things he alone was good at.
But now was not the time to concern himself with them. He did not want to think about them, at least not now.
Not at all.
He opened his eye—his remaining left eye cracked open slightly, a slit bringing a little light and gradually clearing his muddled mind. Fragments of memory flashed before him, and he realized this was not the first time he had regained lucidity.
Half dreaming and half awake... Was he too badly hurt? Sevatar questioned himself with a rationality even he did not quite understand, but received no answer.
Then, after a while longer, he abruptly realized that he could not move.
Am I crippled?
After realizing this, he instinctively wanted to show a mocking smile. He used to do that often. Smiling was a means of protecting himself, but now he found that he could not even do that.
And so he lay where he was, waiting for death to come.
+Jago?+
The voice