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Heinkel held onto his abdomen with his left hand. His efforts were meaningless. He could try to cover the wound as much as he wanted, but it wouldn't stop the blood from seeping out.
"What truly—"
He bit his busted lips and coughed, still on the ground, back against the wall. With every second that passed, more and more of his uniform stained red.
"—beautiful bowels you have!"
If Heinkel had any strength left, he would have spat in the Bowel Hunter’s face. His fogged blue eyes glared at her silhouette. Between the fire, smoke and loss of blood, her figure became more and more of a blur. "No..."
His gaze shifted past her, towards the hall's stairway—or what was left of it. Much more important than the woman about to take his life, the fire she had started had already consumed most of the second floor in which Louanna had been sleeping.
It was only a miracle the ceiling above Heinkel hadn’t given up yet. Not that he cared about whether it crushed him or not, because a life without Louanna was a life without meaning. And if she died...
He tried to reach for his sword, a meter away from him. The wound on his abdomen made it hard to move, and the smoke in his lungs made it difficult to breathe—but he couldn’t give up just yet. Not when there was still a chance—even if small—that Louanna was alive. Everything was worth it if it was for her.
And—his mother sacrificed her dreams to save his.
He stretched his fingers and lunged forward, just enough to reach the edge of his sword’s pommel and shut the whore’s mouth once and—
Piercing pain erupted from his hand as the curved dagger that slit his stomach punctured his palm.
"Oh my… How splendid. Even after showing your wonderful bowels, you are still so full of life to continue fighting." The creepy bitch licked her lips and chuckled—the most disgusting and frustrating sound Heinkel had ever heard. "How I would love to continue playing, but Su—I mean, Dear Pride assigned me some other tasks too, and you know how it goes."
Su? Despite the cocktail of guts and blood dripping out of his body, the name rang loud in his ears. The shadow of his executioner got closer and closer until it was only inches away from him, taking back her thrown weapon—
—and stepping on top of his treasured blade Astrea with her heels .
"Goodbye, vi~ce~ Captain."
Su. The name of the person behind Louanna's death—the name of the Archbishop his son currently faced. Pride . A white glint caught his eye, and a quiet, punched-out whine left his mouth at the sudden cold biting his chest.
He hit the floor, the soft carpet cushioning his fall. Then one, two seconds ticked by while he braced for the pain from the Bowel Hunter’s attack to surge through his body.
But, to his surprise—it never came, and now that he thought about it, hadn’t he already been lying on the ground when the Bowel Hunter stabbed him, so how did he fall? Where did she and the fire go?
Adrenaline fueled his momentum as he rose up, grabbing the curtains so as to not fall to the floor again. Heinkel couldn’t waste any time—if he was still breathing, then Louanna could be alive too. And even if he didn’t know what game the disgusting bitch was playing, letting him live after slashing his abdomen open from one side to the other, he knew he needed to get his wife the fuck out of the manor.
Except, once standing, Heinkel’s brain stuttered to a halt as he realized he shouldn't actually have been able to stand up with his wounds, especially so quickly.
Heinkel stretched his legs—first his right, then his left. They were trembling, but otherwise perfectly functional. And the uniform he was wearing was spotless too—unlike the one he was clad in only seconds before. With careful consideration, he patted his stomach again. Akin to the fire no longer surrounding him, the slash through his abdomen had simply disappeared.
"...my office?" Heinkel's face screwed up in a mix of bewilderment and fear. The room he was in looked exactly like his office. Which shouldn’t be possible, considering he had seen it turn into a bonfire only minutes before. The acknowledgment didn't stop him from softly caressing the familiar red velvet curtain behind him—the one Louanna had chosen shortly after they married. The silky texture felt smooth under his fingers.
When he lifted his head, the sight beyond his window was just as impossible. He let out a sharp breath while still holding his chest with his left hand.
Lugunica was intact. There were no fires roaming around the Capital, only dim sunlight. Shaking, he loosened his hold on the curtain until he could no longer see the city.
His gaze shifted towards the interior of the room: old books, a familiar armchair, a huge fireplace, and the Astrea sigil that decorated his desk. Despite going against everything his common sense told him, it indeed looked like he was standing in his office.
A knock on the door interrupted his inner turmoil. Heinkel’s hand latched to his sword’s pommel.
Biting his lips, he considered the possibility of jumping out of the window. Who was behind that door? Was it the Hunter again? Or maybe the aforementioned Pride . His odds of surviving a three meter fall were much higher than his odds of surviving either encounter, that's for sure—and if they were to jump right behind him, he would have even less chances of defeating them with a broken leg.
Not that he could actually leave the manor. He would never abandon Louanna like that.
While Heinkel considered his options, the door opened.
But it wasn't a Witch Cultist who crossed the doorframe—Reinhard's face leaned out of it instead. "Uhm... I prepared a cup of tea for Father—it's his favorite... " He carried a teacup and a teapot on a white plate. Shy, and small, he looked—so, so young Heinkel couldn't believe his eyes.
He rubbed them. The hallucination was still there. An eight year old Reinhard.
Heinkel stared at his son for yet another second—several seconds. His son's timid smile began to falter.
And then it clicked and Heinkel snorted—he truly was dense as fuck.
Of course he was in his office, of course Lugunica wasn't burning, of course the Gustekan bitch and the Archbishop weren't here. Heinkel was dead, and this was nothing but some sort of dream—a nightmare of what was and will no longer be—because of not only the Witch Cult but his own damn mistakes too.
No, this wasn't a nightmare—for he wasn't sleeping. He was dead, thus this was simply Od Laguna being Od Laguna, showing him his former life before sending him to… wherever souls go after dying. One last gift before parting, perhaps, merely a mirage—but a welcome one.
How ridiculous. He spent his entire life being terrified of Death. And why? Why had he been so afraid of dying? As for now, it looked like the afterlife was exactly like his everyday-life, except better, because no deranged man was attacking the city, and his son remained untainted by the evils of the world. Untainted by him and his hurtful words.
The child before him was a ghost of a memory from a time he still hadn’t betrayed Reinhard’s trust. His real son remained in Lugunica, fighting an Archbishop of Sin—or maybe grieving after finding Heinkel and Louanna’s corpses, if they hadn’t been turned to ashes yet.
Dead, gone with the wind, yet hurting his son one last time by leaving him an orphan after finally getting his shit together and promising he would be better.
He chuckled, and only stopped after not-Reinhard spoke.
"...is Father alright?" The copy, just like his real son had been at the age of eight, had yet to learn how to mask his discomfort.
"Oh? Yes, yes..." he said, finally letting go of his chest. He is too bodiless to bleed out now, anyway. "You got it wrong, though." His tone turned serious.
Reinhard's eyes widened—and Heinkel knew his son well enough to realize the ghost created by Od Laguna was now panicking. Only three years ago, he wouldn't have been able to recognize the signs. But now, after spending so much time together, he knew. He noticed the way his figure stiffened and his lips parted exactly one inch.
....It had been the blonde street urchin his son picked from prison who taught him—after yet another ugly fight with his son—how to recognize those things.
Heinkel's relaxed smile fell, and if Reinhard's startled expression was any indication, his blessings took notice of it.
Heinkel had tried to ignore all thoughts about Lady Felt after his fight with the assassin started, but now that it was over, his worry came back full force. He had asked Carol to run away and take the brat with her, but back then—and even now—he didn't know whether the Archbishop sent more than one assassin. He just hoped he had given them enough time to escape from the Bowel Hunter, and that Carol managed to defeat whoever was next in line, if there was anyone.
Then maybe his death—his life, wouldn't have been a total waste. Only mostly.
Heinkel’s mouth shifted into a bitter smile. He was way too sober for this, but he had told Reinhard he wouldn't drink anymore, and he couldn’t break his promise just because he did something as nonsensical as dying.
"—you only brought one teacup, where is the one for you?"
Reinhard perked up in surprise, with a hopeful glint shining in his young eyes. His son had been only five when Heinkel started drinking, and seven when he decided to distance himself from his child. It made sense he was startled, even if it stung.
Heinkel moved to the door, clapping. "C'mom, go fetch a cup for you, too. And let's have afternoon tea together in the winter garden." Was this facade a trial? A judgment hall in the form of a memory—a glimpse of the past to see whether he had truly changed or not? He had stopped drinking. He had started paying attention to the family domain. He had gotten better. He had even started answering to Marcos.
Reinhard beamed. It was the purest thing Heinkel had seen in many, many years. "Yes! Of course. I'll be on it.”
Heinkel took the teapot from his small hands so he could dash down the stairs towards the kitchen and fetch himself a cup. Heat spread through his skin just as his eyes took notice of the steam rising from its sprout. The temperature was a bit off—hotter than it should. Boiled by Carol, then—or a very accurate, equally sour copy of her.
Fine. If Od Laguna was giving him an opportunity to say goodbye, he would make the best of it.
He walked to the garden alone, having told his son they would meet there. Portraits that would now only exist in the memory of a selected few casted their judgment from above as he passed through the Astrea Manor’s main hall. All the previous Sword Saints, from the first to the last—with the exception of Reinhard.
The garden looked just as he remembered. Citrus trees shaded the seating area, and shrubs with red poppies and yellow marigolds provided privacy. One thing his mother hadn't held back on when redesigning the park was planting flowers—colorful flowers, small flowers, big flowers.
Just a ridiculous amount of them, from all sizes and colors. Heinkel never told her, but he thought she loved her plants a tad too much. They were pretty, but herbs nonetheless.
Reinhard ran to the table. "Mrs. Carol gave me scones!"
"So I see," he said after taking a sip of his tea. Now that he thought about it, Carol hadn't put any scones on his plate. She wasn't even bothering to hide her favoritism. The nerve of that woman.
After eating his scone, Reinhard drank from his own cup. With fire-red hair and delicate features, he was the spitting image of his mother but with Heinkel’s colours.
The child tilted his head, and not for the first time in his life—or afterlife he supposed, Heinkel wondered how much Reinhard was truly seeing. Did he know what Heinkel was thinking? Was he acting all innocent just because that was what Heinkel wanted? Those were some of the many questions that plagued his mind years ago, when Reinhard was truly eight. And they had never really left him, it just took him ten years to realize they simply didn't matter.
Heinkel didn't know how much longer Od Laguna planned to keep him in this dream-like world, where Reinhard's eyes weren't full of regrets and no Archbishop of Pride was in a murderous spree, so he needed to talk fast.
He just didn't know how to start.
"Is Father okay?" Reinhard asked, wearing a troubled expression.
Heinkel put down his cup and sighed. He couldn't bear to look the ghost of his son in the eye. "Yes, I'm just thinking—" he began, waving his hand off, but stopped mid sentence.
"No… actually, nothing is okay," he started, slowly. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. "Nothing has been okay for a lot of time, and we both know it." Heinkel didn't raise his sight from his teacup, for he didn't think he would be able to continue talking if he did. "And it's my fault things are this way. The proof is in my office with the unholy amount of bottles you can find."
He had gotten rid of those years ago, but he was facing baby Reinhard now, right? Not the adult version he left alone. It probably was Od Laguna's way to make sure he voiced all his mistakes. They both knew he had made many of those. "I'm always blaming everyone for my problems—what happened to Louanna and your grandmother. I fight and push people away, that's what I do."
He thought of his mother. Of Carol and Grimm. Of Louanna. Many faces from his younger days flashed through his eyes, but above them all—Reinhard. The one he had failed the most. "I'm sorry, son. I'm sorry I have always been so absent. I just want you to know that it isn't your fault—it has always been my fault. My insecurities. My fears. It has never been you."
Reinhard's eyes opened wide, he didn't know what to say. His dad’s words had caught him completely off-guard.
"And I just want to say that I'm so, so proud of you. You are the best son I could have hoped to have. Your mother would be proud of you, too, if she were awake."
Heinkel shut his eyes, then sighed. Had he said enough? With this, he was ready to go and face his mother or—whatever came after death. Seconds ticked by as he waited.
—until they turned into a full minute, but he was still sitting in the garden and in the company of Reinhard.
"Why is Father saying this?" the child asked, a hysterical edge on his tone. He sniffled, then relaxed the muscles in his face again. “Did anything happen?” Any other child would have broken up crying already—Reinhard didn’t though. He never cried, not since he was a baby.
Heinkel took a sharp breath. Had he misinterpreted the reason he was talking to a younger version of his son? Apologizing was important—it shaped Reinhard for a future in which he loved himself more. What had he missed?
"Well...because you deserve to know," he resumed, heart beating faster in his chest. "There are several ways to say that you— care about someone, but I, as your father, should have been more direct—especially because... well, I failed in all of them."
Reinhard turned even paler.
"What I mean to say…" Heinkel had trouble finding his words. Fine, no more beating around the bush. "Is that—I—I love you, son. I always have and always will. The biggest achievement of my life was being your father, and it has nothing to do with your divine protections, no… but everything to do with the fact you are the kindest, nicest person I know.” He paused. Only in death did he feel comfortable enough to tell his son that he loved him. Dad of the year he had been. "I'm glad you are my son?" he finished, unsure.
Reinhard stood up and flashed to his side in a blur of red. " Was ?" he asked, a hint of dread in his voice. Heinkel had no idea what he meant by that question. Unless—no, Heinkel had used past tense to refer to his relationship. Did Reinhard pick up on that? The blue in his eyes was a shade too opaque. "Is dad going anywhere? Father is not allowed to go away!" he cried out, lunging forward to latch onto his arm.
Heinkel yelped in surprise at the violent reaction of his son. Reinhard’s childish attempt at a calm expression had vanished, and now his panic showed openly on his face. Maybe Od Laguna was expecting something better, different than words. "I—" he couldn't lie, "No, I don't want to go anywhere," he amended. That wasn't a lie, was it?
The door to the garden opened. Carol—a fifty year old Carol—made her way to the winter garden.
"Sir," she began, "dinner has been served." Her face was completely blank. No expressions. Zero. Was he the only one that could see the tears forming in Reinhard's eyes? Actual, real tears?
Heinkel looked from Reinhard to Carol in alarm.
He was beginning to suspect he had misjudged the situation.
