Just as she was about to retort, Tristessa felt a sudden tremor that shook the foundations of her mind palace.

"What the...?!"

It was such a strong vibration that it made her open her eyes to reality. She removed her hands from her face and she saw, in front of her and covering the light of the midday sun, a very handsome man.

He had pointy ears, crimson hair and a countenance of concern, focused on those piercing blue eyes, wide open like two gems.

"…!"

Tristessa, mouth agape, wanted to say something. Speak, say anything. His name, which she knew very well.

No words left her mouth, but tears of joy from her eyes.

"In the name of Kantrus, at last! Dammit, girl..." the man sighed, relieved and on one knee so he was almost at Tristessa's eye level. He wore a traveling cloak over a shirt and tie, black trousers, and shoes. "Honestly! Didn't your parents teach you not to trespass on private property?"

"S-sev…!" she tried to say, her throat being choked by the pressure of an unhinged number of emotions. Powerful, violent ones, about to burst like a bomb.

"What were you thinking, sitting here as still as a turned-off automaton of a Shadow Army dungeon? First, they scam me out of the price of a black-scale demon's head; the last thing I needed is a comatose girl on my doorstep!"

The man complained nonstop, so offended that he didn't notice those bright eyes and general trembling of that girl. His hands were clutching her shoulders, which he had been shaking in an attempt to snap her out of the trance resulting from the use of her Divinity.

"Do you want me to die of…?!"

Before he could finish his second question, the red-haired man was taken by surprise by Tristessa's sudden leap to close the distance with him and enclose him in a tight hug.

"S-Severus…" she cried, her face buried in the blood elf's hair, tickling her nose. He smelled of fish and perspiration, but to Tristessa, it was a heavenly scent. A scent of hope. "Severus, Severus…!"

"Y-yes, it's me! And who are you?! An admirer?!" The blood elf didn't know what to do, nearly falling on his ass under the full weight of this stranger. "Oh, by the Gods, you smell so awful! What's all this thick Discord about?! Let me go, you and your miasma are making me throw up! Are you listening to me?!"

The answer was no. Tristessa was sobbing and doing her best to not break and creep that man out even more than he already was, but she could barely control herself. Her heart was beating with a bittersweet mixture of sorrow and bliss, emanating the warmth of life and new energy throughout her body like waves of pain.

"I finally found you! Finally…!"

"C-calm down, girl…" Severus managed to utter, so confused that he didn't know what action to take. He patted her back a few times, in a harmless way, but firmly enough to know he didn't want to be in that position for a second longer. "Can you let me go?"

"Y-yes, sorry!" Still excited and laughing, Tristessa pulled away from him, though with some involuntary resistance, as if she feared he might vanish in the blink of an eye. "That must have been awkward, haha… I'm just so happy to… to see you alive…"

Saying it out loud sounded so good. It made butterflies flutter inside her, brimming with happiness.

"You're alive… You're alive!" She exclaimed, not realizing how weird she looked and sounded saying that, with so much joy out of context.

"…yes, of course I am. And I will continue to be unless I run out of soul-jewels and creditors come looking to collect on some debts," he hissed as he straightened his shirt and tie.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

At his feet was a briefcase filled with salt, marked glyphs emanating an aura of extreme cold, and the monstrous head of an abyssal fish protruding from the frozen white layer. Leaning beside the briefcase was his thaumaturgy catalyzing cane, its crystal transparent and deactivated.

"Hmm, I think this is the first time I've felt a soul as dark as yours, and believe me, I've met all kinds of people in these fifty-nine short years of my life. People with so much Grace that their egos were higher than the Jagged Mountains, people with so much Discord that they couldn't bear the social condemnation and took their own lives…"

As he chattered, Severus leaned closer to her, invading her personal space and looking at her as if she were a never-before-seen specimen. Just as he had when they first met, the elf's natural curiosity made him look her up and down, sideways, with a furrowed brow and his hands behind his back, his cold distrust contrasting with Tristessa's trembling smile.

"At first glance, you don't seem dangerous. Tell me, why did you come? How do you know me? I don't think I've seen you before in Entrana, or at least in the slums."

Tristessa opened her mouth, but found she couldn't get the words out. She had gone over in her head so many times what she would say to that blood elf once she found him, and when the moment had arrived, her voice betrayed her. Even her lungs refused to accept air, making breathing a painful necessity to continue living.

It was a sudden fear that paralyzed her. Seeing those inquisitive blue eyes, waiting for an explanation and so full of distrust, suffocated her fragile soul with a miasma heavier than Discord itself.

She was afraid of saying the wrong words, of ruining everything like what had happened with Tiara in another loop… Seeing that man become her enemy, judging her an enemy for her dark soul, her suspicious attitude, her irrational way of reacting when being face to face.

"I-I…ah…I-I'm…" she stammered, trembling and almost panicking, if Severus hadn't noticed and taken matters into his own hands.

"Relax, you have nothing to be afraid of. I won't do anything to you unless you give me a reason. I have a weakness for cute women like you," he assured her with one of his seductive smiles, joking to break the ice. He squeezed her fingers harmlessly, wanting to convey peace with that touch. "Seriously, take it easy. You look like you've been through hell…"

"…!"

With that last sentence, Tristessa couldn't hold back any longer, and tears began to stream down her cheeks.

The walls surrounding her soul, tortured through four loops of unspeakable horror, crashed down under the pressure, like a dam made of glass trying to hold the might of an entire ocean.

"Y-yes! Yes, I have!" she screamed, her voice breaking into thousands of pieces, as the elf stared at her in shocked silence. "I have, Severus! I know what hell looks like! I-I have…"

She had experienced that bottomless void many, many times. The curse that represented her [Divinity of Death and Resurrection] prevented her from forgetting, while Severus, he was oblivious to the dark fates he suffered in those inexistent past cycles.

Only she was cursed with the weight of such a mountain of despair and darkness that seemed to get bigger and heavy with each passing day, and with each Death and return to Life.

How long was her soul going to resist such torture? How long until the day comes when it breaks and falls into oblivion?

Her heart ached as if a sword had pierced it -a feeling she knew- when that memory of herself resting over that blood elf's chest resurfaced, as they both waited for the impending end in the Forest of Dead Titans, inside the Evil Dream.

A memory that represented a small breath of fresh air among the ashes, boiling blood and the smell of Death… Doomed to be corrupted, by the brutal killing of the same man she had in front of her, at the hands of the evil Priestess of the Black Eye.

"S-Severus…! I-I… I'm so sorry!" she cried, finally falling to her knees and letting all her emotions run wild. There was nothing stopping them now. "I tried to make everything right! I really tried! I was so afraid…so scared, and yet everything went wrong! A-and now…now that I'm here… I-I don't want…"

I don't want you to die.

I don't want the Mercer-Archeos to die.

I DON'T WANT TO DIE.

She couldn't say those phrases out loud, as the sobs and the deep pain that burned in her chest prevented her from doing so. Her cries moved Severus, leading him, someone who had no way of understanding what the girl was referring to, to bend down again and take his turn hugging her.

"I'm sorry… For being such a useless coward," she sobbed, like a child. "F-forgive me!"

But the elf kept caressing the back of her head. Comforting, and conveying a single message that she needed to understand:

"Everything is all right," he whispered to her, making her feel that same light of hope that had been so far away, so far beyond her reach. "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere… Just don't fall in love with me, alright?"

Typical of Severus, being able to make her laugh at a time like this.

"I'll try…"

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