Chapter 596: A Scar Forever Imprinted
For one, the fury in his eyes.
They seemed to fade, replaced by a coldness that shook its soul as it stared into those silvery eyes.
Their insides seemed broken—so mesmerizing, Morne felt itself lost within their endless, still depths, only awakening from the pain of its wing claws being ripped straight out from its back.
Instantly, it turned around, its massive talons cleaving towards Ryuk, who simply took a step back and stretched his hands toward it before clenching to a fist.
In an instant—
RIIIIIIIIIIIPRIIIIIIIIIIIPRIIIIIIIIIIIP
Pillars of ice burst forth from behind, tearing into its skin and skewering through, as it watched with wide-open eyes, Ryuk calmly raising his hands upwards, opening his palm to the sky,
A ball of frost whose shape morphed into a five-pointed snowflake, etched with runic lines swirling over its entirety.
And for the first time, horror bloomed in its gaze as it noticed the aura.
“The Aura of a Primordial Rule…”
The conjuring of the frostflake seemed to take years, but it was done in a heartbeat as Ryuk floated higher and higher into the air, before silently flinging it down toward Morne.
Immediately, fury and defiance flashed within the depths of its eyes as more wings and claws sprouted from its being.
It pierced forward toward the approaching ball, before its beak opened up, conjuring the most massive amount of Abyssal Ball it could form—
But when all touched the snowflake…
Their fate was paused mid-step, a sudden, unexplainable stillness followed by an incredibly cold sensation that made Morne lose control of its own attack, leaving it numbed.
And finally, fine cracks spread over its attacks and outstretched claws as they dispersed into nothing but snowflakes.
And it could only watch with widened horror when the frostflake reached it and carved a hole directly through its body, blasting the pillar of ice that held it into pieces as its body slowly flew down from the ground.
“I lost…”
The thought echoed in its head, yet…
Yet—
It was all, so painless.
Like its death was but a whisper—barely felt, barely heard.
But quickly enough, that thought changed, as it watched Ryuk suddenly appear an inch from it, his hands grabbing at its beak, holding it in the air just before it could crash into the ground.
For a second, silence seemed to hold on, as if the world was holding its breath.
Yet it all unfurled into chaos as it watched crimson black veins shift out from every inch of Ryuk’s face.
“I’ll let you know the meaning of PAIN!!!”
‘Activate Sovereign Rewriting!’ Ryuk ordered.
A golden pulse appeared all over the airspace around both, and in an instant, his will flooded toward Morne’s body.
It seeped through the blood and its scales, and then—
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIP
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIP
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIP
Every single cell in Morne’s body suddenly had its structure eroded—
But they didn’t fade.
They became sharp, thorny crystals that dug through every single organ.
Ryuk’s hands held its beak tightly, yet they couldn’t prevent the spine-curling scream of pain that followed, as the claws beneath Morne’s back pierced forward Ryuk’s head, trying to deal one last heavy blow—
But they were paused in mid-air from Sovereign Rewriting before their direction violently changed, and then—
PUUUCHIII
PUUUCHIIII
The ends of the wings pierced into Morne’s eyes, blowing its eyeballs into dust, as another skin-crawling scream rang out.
Its entire body became a porcupine, as the remaining shards skewered through it—blood crystals piercing out from all over its frame before Ryuk slowly released its body, watching it fall into the air amidst blood-curling cries.
“Burn…” he muttered to himself, as his hand reached forward, a void flame coating it before it swung toward Morne, enshrouding its agonized figure.
And then came another wave of agony—
A flame that burned not just the body, but the soul itself.
An agonizing pain it had never before felt—nor even thought possible.
“Burn to ashes too…” Ryuk murmured, watching the Knull slowly disperse into ashes.
And in his eyes, the falling bird image faded away—
Replaced by an image he could never forget.
The image of watching Uncle Bob disperse into ashes.
Somehow, they both felt so familiar.
Except that Uncle Bob had disappeared with a prideful smile on his face,
While now, there was nothing but screams of pain and sorrow from the fading Knull.
Even after it was long dead and reduced to ashes—
The mind-curling screams were still ever-present, ringing through the world, reminding it of a pain that exists beyond the physical.
Ryuk floated downward moments after, but his knees collapsed a second later, his fingers curled into a fist, tears of blood dripping from both eyes.
“Uncle… Bob.”
“I’ve… done it.”
“I’ve gotten revenge for your death…”
“Yet… Yet…”
On both knees, blood dripping from his palms from how tightly he clenched his fists, with tears of red raining down his face, Ryuk realized a bitter truth:
In this world, there are some pains never go.
That time itself never heals.
Pains that are never meant to leave, but to be remembered and relived.
And one of those pains was the pain of losing his uncle.
The pain of losing Uncle Bob.
A pain that would never leave, even after he had killed the one who ended his life.
A scar forever imprinted.
Silence was all that remained as Ryuk stayed kneeling on the ground, until he lost count of time.
But he couldn’t care less for anything that happened outside of now.
But soon enough, he heard the steps.
The sound of walking, following the descent of an aura he felt more than familiar.
An aura that haunted him every night since Uncle Bob’s death.
But now, he was too tired to care about it.
Or maybe—too broken to.
The footsteps came to a stop before him, pausing just at the ashes of Morne—before a hand moved downward.
A skeletal hand that grabbed a handful of Morne’s own ashes.
“We finally meet… Little Dark One.”