Pained screams echoed throughout the area around him, filling the air with a sound so loud and high-pitched, it was probably fortunate no one could hear him.
It felt like his skull—no, his whole body was being expanded to the point of splitting ten times over, and then some.
For all he knew, it probably was. He was going to die right here and now…and he’d certainly welcome it; an escape from the absolute suffering.
But, though he couldn’t see it, he wasn't growing. There wasn't any blood, aside from where the Crown had punctured him.
There was just him, screaming bloody murder as an unseen force tortured him for breaking the rules he was meant to abide by.
He didn’t know what that meant, who the voice belonged to, or where it was even coming from, but he didn’t care. He couldn’t care. Not through the pain…
It kept repeated, like some sort of morbid chant if he ever heard one.
Over and over…
A͜l̀͢͠ļ b̨ù̢͢t ̵̡͠o͜͝n̡e͏͏̢!̸
Until that phrase had burned itself into his mind…
…and, at some point, he realized what it meant.
One rule.
Only one rule hadn’t been broken during that stint.
And he would pay for the other three…
…no. The other four.
A rule he hadn’t known of…though it wouldn’t have made a difference…
The pain continued…for how much longer? It felt like it’d never end…
Eventually, he lost his voice...
Even unable to scream anymore, however, it didn’t end.
He wasn’t sure when it did. All sense of time had been lost now…
The pain suddenly disappeared, without any warning or reason, just as it had arrived.
The Master Crown fell off his head, and rolled a ways, not that he noticed.
With blood dripping down his face from the only wounds he had earned, he tried to catch his breath.
His sight frequently shifted between clear, blurry, and completely black as he recovered.
His body still burned, as prove his ordeal hadn’t been dreamt up…
All but one…
It echoed in his brain, soon becoming his only thought.
Automatically, his hand started moving without his permission, dipping a finger in the blood, and beginning to write the phrase on the ground.
It was a lesson he never wanted to forget…