"I... I can't let this continue.
That green-eyed bastard… He got me good."
In the dimly lit underground hall, Reva Rain cursed the flashbacks in her head and the reason for their existence.
Eren had become her biggest psychological barrier preventing her from functioning normally – her version of normal, of course. She had managed to escape Edinburgh's clutches, thanks to Demonmir's prior arrangements. It was given that Layos would welcome her.
Reva clenched her fists and remembered Eren's face. She felt like the butcher's emerald green eyes stared at her from some angle – creating a tingling sensation at the back of her neck. "I need to get rid of that man," she muttered under her breath.
This was the first time in her life that the Paladin of Pain struggled to inflict pain. She had been given the taste of her own medicine and she couldn't say she liked it.
Paladin of Pain? What a joke! She felt like she was not deserving of her title because of her current condition. The most terrible thing about her current situation was her nightmares.
In these recurring nightmares, Reva's organs would be yanked out of her body by the butcher while he operated on her the same way she operated on her victims. She felt that the butcher could do her job gracefully. As if his actions were an art form.
The only problem for Reva in witnessing this art form was that she had to be at the receiving end of Eren's torture. She felt she would have been inspired by these nightmares had she been summoned inside them as a third-person witness to these torture scenes.
Eren's soul sense and Sedating Gaze left a lasting mark on Reva because of being affected by them so many times during their clash. Her nightmares always brought her inside the flesh and blood world. Red skies, fleshy flowers, and bloody ground defined this world. It was the same world she had witnessed after suffering from Eren's Ability so many times.
One could say that from getting traumatized to traumatizing others, Eren had made stupendous progress in such a short time. His added badge of honor was the fact that he traumatized Reva Rain – completely derailing the demonic ranker of her caliber from her demonic path.
What's more? Eren scarred her mentally and physically. She carried a distinct scar on her neck. It wouldn't heal no matter what she did. This was the same flesh wound Eren had given her just before she disappeared from the scene. Eren's attack almost claimed her life.
Reva wanted to forget her helplessness against him at that time by getting rid of the neck scar. But it wouldn't fade away despite her use of expensive potions and other means available at her disposal.
Reva was a healer herself. So eventually she realized what was causing her problems. The clash between her and Eren was short but intense. Eren had fought with her with such conviction that his Way of the Elements and intentions seeped into her flesh and bones.
Eren's elemental attainments were so complex that she couldn't cast them out of herself completely. They affected her very soul and the scar on her neck was the physical manifestation of their presence inside her body.
Reva managed to remove the scar in a few trials. But after some time, it would tear her flesh and come back on its own, hurting her with even more intensity than before. A scar that had the power to haunt. It was as persistent as the one who had inflicted it.
Reva stopped trying to heal the scar after many tries. She accepted it as a bitter battle souvenir. She had no other choice.
Reva wondered if there was an easy way to fix her trauma. She hated looking at her shaky hands as she raised them in front of her with her palms open. She hated looking at the scar on her neck that kept haunting her. And she was afraid to close her eyes for more than a second or two.
"Maybe... it'll get better... with time. I need patience."
Reva let out a long, weary sigh, feeling the weight of the world bearing down on her. Perhaps, with time, things would get better. But for now, all she could do was muster up the patience to weather the storm.
She raised her hands, and the arrays within the hall sprang to life, instantly disintegrating the tortured bodies of mortals and rankers. The stench of death and suffering still lingered, but at least there was no visible evidence of the horrors that had occurred there.
"Some wounds require outside help to heal," Reva murmured to herself, her eyes scanning the clean, empty space before her. She needed to talk to someone, to find a way to move on from the trauma that Eren had inflicted upon her.
But who could she turn to? Demonmir was out of the question. He was too busy with his own affairs, and he had never shown any real concern for her well-being. No, Reva needed to find someone else, someone who understood what it meant to be a traitor.
As she made her way out of the underground facility, her mind raced, considering her options. She felt a surge of anger as she thought of the plans she and Demonmir had made, all of them destroyed in an instant by Sansara World's detonation. She had made a terrible mistake by betraying Edinburgh and leaving behind all the resources and connections she had built up there.
But there was no going back now. Reva had to make the best of her situation, even if it meant seeking help from another traitor. And she knew just the person to turn to.
"Isen Osan," she muttered under her breath, her eyes flickering with determination. "I need to find him. Perhaps he can help me."
With a new sense of purpose, Reva set off to find Isen Osan, ready to forge an alliance with another like-minded traitor.
