The love between a hunter and a soldier... "Your will..." "Your courage..." "Your passion..." "Your wisdom..." "Our dream..."You will be someone's courage...
I stood there with an ugly frown of disgust, silent, waiting... The Lord of all Evil grinned at me with sickening hope and gave a raspy chuckle under his breath.
“You name it.” he continued. “I’m a generous Lord. I know the value of a soul and thus, even I will not screw you over on it. There is no secrecy about what it is worth. Name your price and I’ll pay it. Or at least do whatever I can to do so.”
I grit my teeth and scowled as I clenched my fists. “You are the one who created the evil in this world in the first place!” I shouted. “It is despicable and disgusting to think I should have to pay you to clean it up a little.”
The devil threw his head back and laughed a grotesque, raspy laugh that brought an awful itch to my ears. “You are a righteous one, aren’t you?! Stupid, but righteous. There is indeed more power in your soul than in most. I look forward to having it. Won’t you look forward to my payment for it?”
I unclenched my fists and lowered my head, releasing the wind in my sorry lungs through my nose. I fell sad. How could I not? How could anyone not... “My price is
the future of my loved ones.” I finally answered.
The devil pouted his lips. “Aww... Isn’t that sweet?” he mewled, mocking me with big black eyes.
I resented anyone who would say I was weak for loving. But I did not fight his words in my defeated heart as I inched towards the end of my future. “Nothing less than their future. Their lives. Their freedom.” I told him, in a lower but firm voice.
The devil looked at me with a raised eyebrow and studied me for a moment in silence. He lightly bat his pitchfork from his right hand to his left before pointing it straight at my heart. “You have a big one, don’t you? You might resent me but I at least will always be honest with you. Do you know the value of a soul? It is the single most sacred thing that Heaven can bestow on a being. It is a gift. It is the breath of life. It is agency. It is the man inside the body that would otherwise just walk and talk without meaning or reason. Only when that soul is awoken in him does he become Himself. Do you remember the point in your life when yours was awakened?” he asked, a suspicious look in his eye telling my senses that he was certainly scrutinizing me and weighing my soul’s worth like a merchant in a market fondling the apples in a bin.
I hated listening to him. My dry throat itched horribly in the fiery pocket of Hell where we stood as it held back my screams and my knuckles throbbed with a desire to hammer his hideously beautiful face into oblivion. But I had to do this... “I remember. It was the sunny spring when I turned 9. A boy I had grown close to and fond of brought me a book, and raved about the outside world that we were forbidden to even think of, and wishing that he and I might see it together someday. It was a life I would’ve given anything to live as nothing ever seemed to stir my soul in a world where we were deprived of everything. I grew furious the more I thought about it. Fell more in love with the idea of freedom with every passing minute. And fell angrier and angrier as the unforgivable transgression of our leaders sank into my mind. The world was caging us away from our freedom. And so I made it my life’s mission to gain it back.”
“This boy with the book,” began the devil with a tone I despised as I knew he began trespassing into subjects in his mind that I would forbid him to touch. “he is very special to you, no?”
“Free the people I love or my soul is forever mine!” I growled, furrowing my brows as I mentally assumed my most powerful stance of defense.
“Ohoho, you are cute.” he laughed.
My screams finally found their way out and my throbbing hand flew out to grab his cloak in my fist. “Don’t fuck with me! Do as I said!”
My threat did not seem to faze him whatsoever. He shooed my hand away and looked at me with dreadfully confident eyes. “You think you get to decide what would pay for your soul?” he asked, waving his hand mysteriously as though casually attempting a spell or something, but I felt nothing. “You see, I cannot just take it as you say. It is locked in place safely within you, and firmly, I might add. It may be worth the world- and it certainly is, I can see that it is a grand one that is capable of loving the world, indicating just how much power dwells within it- but only that which it desires most is the key to unlocking it from your being so that I may take it from you. You must give up the thing you truly love most. Or the person, rather...” he said with a smirk.
My face had already dampened with sweat since arriving down here, but now it began pouring from my forehead and cheeks. “I’ve already given him up. Take my soul. Free my friends.”
His expression did not change. It smirked right along at me until I might give him what he wanted.
“...You will not harm--”
“No!” he interrupted in an annoyed but ever bemused voice. “I told you very plainly, I want your soul, I’ll give you whatever you want to get it, as it is a precious and valuable resource to me for the specific power it possesses. But I cannot receive it until you unlock it by relinquishing your love which binds it so tightly. A soul that already loves another might as well belong to them instead of you. What is it that keeps you from releasing it? What is it you keep clinging to?”
I was so angry at him I could’ve destroyed him. I was so angry at the world I could destroy it. I was so angry at anyone who could be so cruel as to force the purest of wishes into the mouths of monsters to devour. Who could hurt people like the man I-- How cruel... How cruel... I closed my eyes as they welled up and I fell to my knees with a slump. “How cruel...” I whimpered, quivering pathetically. “How cruel...” The devil stood still, listening, but I did not look up at him. I practically forgot he was there at all. Only the retched thought of what I was finally about to give up was at the forefront of my mind. “His name is Armin Arlert...” I began, not caring that the devil had no use for surnames. “He is a beautiful boy with golden hair and big bright eyes that widen and gleam for the dreams he has. He is my best friend. My soul mate. The reason I wake up in the morning and dream at night. The reason I smile in an otherwise boring, cruel world. I love him more than life itself. That always frightened me. Almost as much as the idea that he felt the same way and would die for me or alongside me without a second thought. I don’t know what awakened his soul, as it seemed to be awake for as long as I can remember knowing him... But I would give anything to give him the freedom he deserves. Even my most cherished possessions. Even my mortal life. Even my soul... And yet it clings to a hope within me to still be with him someday when it’s all over. To be free with him...”
There was a silence about us for a long moment after my voice trailed off. Only the crackling sounds of fire and the unheard droplets of my own tears hitting the ground as I laid the key to my soul out before me. I studied it as it appeared to me. It was so precious. It was the thing which breathed life into me. My dream of seeing the world with Armin for the rest of our lives. My would-be partner, and a love that would take on the armies of the world that hated and caged us with a cackle of pride. A love that would certainly follow us forever after death and beyond. I really must relinquish this tiny, childish bit of hope? Why? This is too cruel. To take a person’s soul, is by far the cruelest sin of all.
“Release it.” the devil finally commanded in a low tone. “For the life and the freedom of the man you love. For the people you love. Relinquish your dream. And give me your soul.”
...
I love you, Armin. I fear you may never know how much. How ironic and unfathomable love is that it can make you stupid enough to trade the very essence of yourself that your protesting companion loves to begin with for them, and render yourself rightfully repulsive to them in exchange. I traded my soul for you. To become the monster I have become and perform the role that I must perform for the greater good of this world, and the freedom I’ve always wanted for you... I traded my soul, so that you may live. Tell me, my love, in all your ever honest terms... Can you ever forgive me?
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