Azekiel still hated himself for running away since he felt that he had abandoned his mother by running away. Unfortunately, even if he stayed behind, he couldn't do anything but to watch her die since the beast was too strong for him, as a human to defeat.
"It's so ironic... The beasts that were like God to me... The beasts that were so strong that I couldn't do anything but run away... The beasts that were strong enough to destroy the entire human civilization! Those beasts are nothing before me now."
"Once, the beasts that made me run away, today they can't even make me flinch. But what use is this strength now?"
He weakly gazed at the lifeless body of his mother, feeling like laughing at his weakness. He was so happy that he was getting stronger, forgetting at what cost this strength came. In his hunger for power, he forgot his last... He forgot that feeling of weakness... He forgot that fear which made him run away in the past.
Azekiel picked up the body of her mother in his arms.
Carrying his mother, he left the house. Lia cast her Illusion again without being asked as she followed Azekiel. She wondered just where he was going.
As she watched Azekiel enter a graveyard that wasn't too far from his home, she finally understood where he was going.
"Our house was so close to the graveyard, yet it took three years to bring my mother here to give her a burial," Azekiel commented as he placed his mother on the grass.
He picked up a nearby shovel and started digging the ground in the middle of the graveyard. At the same time, he commanded Lia to bring a coffin to him.
Lia found a coffin in the distance that was unused. Since the city was attacked during the apocalypse, everything was left as it was.
Lia cast a spell, making the coffin float. The coffin flew right beside her, landing near Azekiel.
After digging a big enough hole in the ground, Azekiel jumped out. He opened the coffin and respectfully kept his mother's remnants inside the coffin.
Before closing the coffin, he gazed at her body, remembering all the past moments he had spent with her.
"Mother, thank you for everything... Thank you for giving me a life... Thank you for making me understand just what it felt like to be loved... Thank you for giving an orphan like me a family." As he spoke, a tear droplet fell out of his eyes, falling on the body.
Taking a deep breath, Azekiel closed the coffin. He picked up the coffin alone and placed it inside the ground.
"Rest in peace, mother. And don't worry. I will make everyone who led to your death pay! You won't be leaving this world alone! I'll make sure the ones that led to your death accompany you to the afterlife themselves!"
He picked up a fistful of dirt and placed it on the coffin before he started burying the coffin entirely.
Within five minutes, the entire coffin was buried. Azekiel picked up the biggest stone that he could find and placed it on the grave of his mother.
"Are you alright?" Seeing Azekiel stare at the grave, Lia placed her hand on his shoulder. She didn't want to see him broken.
"I am fine."
Azekiel clenched his fist before turning his back on the grave. He left the graveyard and went back to his house. He looked at the blood marks that were all around the floor. There were some portraits on the wall, belonging to him and his mother. Most other portraits had already fallen to the ground, cracked.
He picked up one of the portraits that were the oldest in the house. He kept the cracked portrait in his storage ring.
"You looked really cute when you were younger," Lia commented, observing the many pics.
"Who didn't look cute when they were little?" Azekiel asked, shaking his head. "Babies are supposed to be cute. All of them are."
Azekiel walked up the stairs. It was a house that appeared like something that could come crashing down at any moment since most of the support was destroyed, but Azekiel didn't care. Even if the house came crashing down, he had ways to protect himself.
He reached the first floor where his room used to be. Since Raphael was taking a long time to return, he decided to explore his past a bit, that he had forgotten with everything that went on inside the tower.
His room looked exactly like he had left before. It seemed as if the monsters hadn't checked the room.
He entered his room, observing all the posters on the wall of superheroes from movies. In his younger days, he used to be a massive fan of superheroes.
Unfortunately, when the world needed a superhero, there was none. If there was anything close to a superhero in this world, they were the Kings. But even those kings were less like heroes and more like villains. There were no heroes in this world... not even him
He walked to his table, which had a small dairy on top. On top of the dairy, there were only a few words written. There was written, "Top Secret! Don't read!"
Azekiel picked up the diary which used to belong to him. It was his personal diary in which he wrote about his every single day. He summarized his days in a few lines.
He went through the diary, amazed at just how much useless things he needed to write.
Near the last few entries, he noticed a line that made him smile.
"She asked me to go to the Prom with her! I can't believe it! Am I finally becoming popular?"
Seeing the entry, Azekiel laughed. "I was such an idiot."
The next entry was also about this, about how he was left standing and he was fooled. He became a laughingstock for people at the prom.
"Don't worry, little one. Now no one dares to laugh at you. So don't worry about anything," Azekiel commented as if talking to his past self.
