ON JAYCE.
As in the words of the Herald himself, Viktor does not hate Jayce. Viktor has long since superseded pittances such as hate and envy, else his most prominent priority beyond the Glorious Evolution would be ruining Stanwick’s reputation as he ruined his, and to a lesser extent, even Jayce’s.
But Jayce is a variable-- a dangerous one.
Jayce is the variable Viktor negotiated with for the crystal. Jayce is the variable Viktor, with great irritation, knocked unconscious with that crystal in hand. Jayce is the variable that stormed in to his treatment of the ailing sufferers of the Sump’s toxicity, destroying the crystal and collapsing the warehouse, Viktor’s hopes for an expedient Evolution among the rubble and broken hybrid bodies. Jayce is the variable that has forced Viktor, back against the wall, to transform his agnostic movement into a religion in a bid for crucial followers.
Viktor may have liked Jayce. Viktor may have believed Jayce to be a valuable partner in his artificer research in Piltover, arrogance and egoism just a piece of Jayce’s greater genius. Deep somewhere in the well of his heart, Viktor may have even held feelings for the man, fleeting as they might--
--but, above all?
He has had enough of this variable.