“Let’s go, Seianes.”
As soon as the words ended, a sharp sound began to tear through the earth.
From behind Abrisius, terrible underground energy spread out uncontrollably, drawing a large circle. The dark power that bloomed in midair descended upon the earth.
Kiiing, kwaang—!
The ground roared as the earth split with Seianes at the center. At the unbelievable sight, Cairens, who was beside Abrisius, widened his eyes.
‘I have to stop Abrisius right now!’
Seeing the collapsing ground, he struggled to move his body. However, as if blocked by something, the more he tried to move, the more he stumbled uselessly and his body kept collapsing.
“Why…”
Dark underground forces swirled around Abrisius. A massive aura enveloped him. When Abrisius’s red eyes flashed as he looked at Cairens, regardless of his will, Cairens lost his strength and retreated several steps.
He could no longer stop Abrisius.
Meanwhile, Seianes, who was standing on the shaking ground, staggered. With the earth’s crust shaking, it was difficult to maintain his balance.
Kkigiigeuk—!
Strange sounds echoed around him as the ground split, and Seianes, looking down at the ground slowly collapsing beneath his feet, couldn’t hide his shock.
“Ah, aah…”
The endless darkness visible through the splitting earth was opening its mouth toward Seianes.
From that center, Abrisius walked, stepping on the ground piece by piece. Even though the ground beneath his feet was collapsing, he looked too calm. That appearance created even more disharmony.
“You have to be careful. It hurts if you fall.”
Finally, Abrisius stood before Seianes, who had lost his balance and fallen, and bent down. Instead of helping Seianes up, he gently overlapped his body and carefully nestled into Seianes’s arms.
“Abrisius, quickly… we have to run away.”
Without even thinking to push away Abrisius nestled in his arms, Seianes said urgently with a trembling voice. The entrance to the underworld was opening its mouth, waiting for the two to be completely separated.
“The ground is collapsing, the underworld is… visible… We have to run away quickly. To my temple, hurry.”
Although he felt the eye-stabbing dirty dark energy around Abrisius, Seianes hadn’t realized that the person before him was the culprit behind this situation.
No, perhaps even knowing it, he couldn’t accept the fact that his beloved Abrisius would do such a thing.
“What do I have to be in danger from?”
But whether knowing or not knowing Seianes’s urgency, Abrisius laughed leisurely. Abrisius, who chuckled at Seianes whose lips were trembling, buried his face in his neck.
“I was born in the underworld, Seianes. Why would you think it’s dangerous when I’m going home?”
“What… does that mean? That makes it more dangerous. If you go there, you can never return to the surface. Then we’ll be separated…”
“No, that won’t happen.”
Abrisius lightly blocked Seianes’s words explaining the worst-case scenario.
“The only way for you and me to be together is to go to the underworld.”
“You…!”
Before Seianes could answer, indescribably ominous black smoke wrapped around the two. A terrible, unapproachable energy swirled around them.
Kiiiiiii—!
It sounded like mockery of Seianes, or like a voice welcoming Abrisius, the prince of the underworld.
‘I have to run away quickly.’
Instinctively sensing danger, Seianes fiercely embraced Abrisius. Denying to the end that Abrisius had done this, Seianes tried to move to somehow escape with him.
“Where are you going?”
But as soon as he moved, Abrisius caught him. No, more precisely, it was right to say the power flowing from behind Abrisius caught Seianes.
The underground energy that had been flowing surged up, causing tremendous upheaval. Only then did Seianes realize that all of this was Abrisius’s doing.
“You… don’t tell me.”
Unable to speak, Seianes looked at Abrisius, who was nestled in his arms and smiling. The red light flowing behind the pitch-black smoke. The more that power seeped into the ground, the more the ground beneath their feet tore.
He wanted to deny the unbelievable truth, but the power flowing from Abrisius was explaining all the circumstances.
That it was Abrisius who had caused this ground to split. In an instant, cold sweat ran down his back.
“It’s a lie.”
“There’s no use denying it, Seianes. I came from the underworld, and now it’s time for me to return to the land where I was born.”
Whispering against the neck of the pale-faced Seianes, Abrisius bent down and wrapped his arms around his waist. Burying his face briefly in Seianes’s abdomen, he raised his head. The pale face of Seianes was captured in his eyes.
“But I love you, Seianes.”
Love. As that word popped out of Abrisius’s mouth, Seianes’s pupils shook. A chilling premonition that something bad would happen swept across his back.
“So come with me.”
“Let go, Abrisius. What are you trying to do…!”
Seianes struggled to escape from Abrisius, who was binding him. But the more he did, the more Abrisius tightened his embrace.
“Come to the underworld with me.”
Kkigigiigeuk—!
Finally, the ground beneath the two people clinging together collapsed. Between the fragments scattering down like daggers, Abrisius and Seianes’s bodies floated. Space distorted as all kinds of monsters wandered around like phantoms.
Monsters that once existed on the surface but could no longer exist were mocking Seianes, one of the culprits who had driven them underground.
Now you’re in the same situation as us.
“I love you, Seianes. Now we’re together.”
“No, I don’t want this… Stop it now.”
Pulling Seianes into the deepening darkness, Abrisius whispered. Seianes struggled to somehow escape from him and return to the surface.
What would happen to him if he entered the underworld? He probably couldn’t endure it. Because earth that doesn’t see light withers.
Embracing such a him, Abrisius was falling into the underworld. Did he know this was poison to him? He probably knew. Even so, he was willingly dropping Seianes into the underworld.
“This is the only way we can be together.”
Because of his own desire.
“Please, let me go. Don’t do this, Abrisius. I can’t go to the underworld. I can’t live there. If you truly love me, release me.”
Seianes shouted desperately.
The child he loved more than anything, Abrisius. He too loved him more than life, but he didn’t want this kind of love. Abrisius’s way of loving was wrong.
Seianes loved the surface. The bluish sky, the twinkling starlight at night, and the flowers sprouting on the surface, and Abrisius holding his hand and smiling beside them.
Everything that had happened while staying on the surface with Abrisius passed by like a panorama. The surface with Abrisius was happiness and memories for him.
Abrisius’s birth didn’t matter in the face of love. Every moment with him was love.
“Even if you’re from the underworld… that’s not a reason you can’t be here.”
Looking at Abrisius with a desperate face, Seianes pleaded.
“Can’t you just stay on the surface with me? I can’t live there. I don’t care what you are. Put everything back in its place even now.”
At innocent Seianes’s wish, Abrisius made a sorrowful expression.
Having already awakened to the power of the underworld and opened the gate to the underworld with that power, there was no way he could return to how he was before.
“Seianes, since I was born in the underworld, this was already destined to happen.”
It was meant to be this way from the start. The beginning was just a little early. Abrisius continued in a firm tone.
“It can’t be. You swore you would willingly accept all of me. You said you loved me, so we’re destined to never be separated.”
With those final words, Seianes and Abrisius disappeared into the deep abyss of darkness.
