Vengeance of The Broken Lycan Prince [BL]-Chapter 438: Blood, Fire, Ashes… A Mad King’s Vengeance [10]
[ZAFFUTO]
Slowly Gabriel was realizing why everyone was sure the mad king of Kawai was way more powerful than the moon goddess herself.
King Zaffuto Hinata terrified the realms for good reason, and his father just had to act all brave and fuck up the lives of the innocents.
It was not alright.
"I... I understand," Gabe forced out, scared that his lack of a response would have the king twisting his spine like his father, and they would never be able to get out of this cursed kingdom.
"Do remember, kid. Where suffering is owed, death is too good a mercy. And mercy is something I never give, especially to those who hurt my child," Zaffuto said lethally and protectively.
It was as if the thought of mercy was an insult to the pain his son had endured since he had been born.
And Gabe stiffened for what felt like the hundredth time in the field they were in. This was his greatest punishment, and he couldn’t even let himself fight for his father or anyone anymore.
He had lost.
It was obvious in many ways.
He really had lost a battle he had started himself. What a joke.
The mad king straightened himself and turned to his son, before looking at Gabe again. His was a lethal look, one that scared the living nights out of Gabriel. There wasn’t anything that Gabe would be able to do against the king.
He was done for, truly.
Tamiko’s eyes met his father’s, and instead of the cruel look the king had been giving the Grealor, he stared at his son with soft, tender eyes.
Eyes that told Tamiko that Zaffuto was never going to leave.
Eyes that told his child that everything would be alright. That they would get their justice too.
Eyes that told his son that he would never be alone again, regardless of what fate threw at them.
Oh, but Tamiko saw the promise behind those eyes, and he relaxed.
His father was always going to be with him. That was what he was seeing, the promise of unconditional love, a promise that would never be broken because the king may have been a mad king, but he was a devoted father.
He had proven it to his son over and over again.
And Tamiko watched his father talk to Gabe again.
"I will be there when my son tears what’s left of you. Piece by piece, wall by wall. When he rips you apart, limb by limb, until everything you love is gone. Until your precious home, the place you hurt my son the most, is nothing but ash on his boots.
"I will be there and I will make sure you live long enough to see every corner of Grealor fall. I will be there when my son ruins you. And I’ll cheer for him like a proud father, because that is what a father does.
"...Stands by his son when he rights wrongs. And you will all die screaming. I’ll be there, young Grealor," Zaffuto promised like a butcher who had found his next target.
He was happy to be of support to his son, but he had to remind the Grealors that something worse was coming.
Something that the king had forged.
Something that the Grealors had hurt and bent and broken. Not that Tamiko was no longer the broken boy anymore.
He was someone else.
Someone who wasn’t alone.
"You can go home now. And when you’re ready to die properly... come back. I will be waiting; My Tamiko will be waiting. You had better prepare well because if you’re not prepared;
"...we will have to do this again and send you back to your home to prepare," King Zaffuto laughed mockingly.
Gabe felt the air leave his lungs again.
He wasn’t even sure if this was the afterlife, and he was just another unfortunate pebble in the mad realm. Maybe he would figure out a way, but what was the point when the ending that was coming was the same for him?
When did his punishment seem to carry the worst of the worst? What use was that when life itself didn’t mean much at the moment, given the evident targets on his back thanks to his father’s sins and his sins too?
"We’re leaving now," Gabe struggled to voice as he grabbed his father and dragged him away. They had only four hours in this hellhole, and that was not enough, judging by the condition his father was in.
And as if the world was not already hating Gabriel, Tamiko stood in Gabe’s path, blocking the man from leaving.
The young prince had a cold smirk on his face, one that was so new to Gabriel that the young alpha faltered, almost loosening his grip on his father. He had never seen Tamiko like this.
It was all so new to him; it hurt to even watch him.
Tamiko didn’t even say a word to him.
Instead, he just held Gabe’s eyes casually like this was his reminder to the man, a reiteration of what his father had just spoken. This was a mockery of the highest order, and there wasn’t enough air for Gabe to breathe anymore.
His lungs seemed to freeze on him, and his eyes teared up, letting Tamiko see what he had been reduced to. Even then, Tamiko didn’t say anything; he just stood there, his arms folded together like he wanted to study the mess that his father had made.
The prettiest kind of mess that his father and his brother had done to the Grealors.
This was what Tamiko would consider a successful mission and thwart the demon invaders. He was staring at Gabe as if to remind Gabe of what he had walked into with too much pride.
As if he was telling him that numbers would never matter in Kawai. One Kawai Lycan had murdered the entire battlefield and their survivors. This was a game for them; Tamiko’s smirk was showing him all of that.
Like a predator who was satisfied with what he had seen and done, Tamiko stepped aside, just enough for everyone to see the shocked face Gabriel was wearing.
When Tamiko smiled at him, Gabe knew that Tamiko had won.
He knew there and then that the tides had changed and not for the better of Grealor, no. The bested Grealor alpha saw it all.
The army that was standing behind Tamiko.
The royals and their unhinged stances.
The omega barbarian he had come to break, and yet he had failed to break.
He saw Tamiko, the prince of Kawai.
The prince who had an entire empire behind him, and one who didn’t even see Gabriel as a threat anymore. He saw the swords of the Lycan army, ready to strike him and his father down if the mad king commanded them.
Worst of all, Gabe saw the king behind his son. Behind Tamiko. The mad king, Zaffuto Shuten Hinata. A name that he would never forget in all his lifetimes.
And he knew that he would never have Tamiko, not in this lifetime, and not even in the next. The boy he had broken as a slave in Grealor was not a slave. He never was.
He was instead the most important person in Kawai, something that Gabe had witnessed too. He was a prince who had always been and was too proud of it all. As if it wasn’t bad enough, the boy was going to come after him like a promise to their destiny.
"Fuck," Gabe groaned in defeat as Kosta smirked at him like a barbarian who already won.
It was true, though.
They had won.
The king who commanded death had led the army, and the prince who would never be a slave had been there to remind Gabriel of the doom he was ordered to wait for.
Tamiko would come after him.
Kawai would come after him.
Gabe would never belong to Tamiko, and the prince would never be his either.
It didn’t matter how strong he was; he would lose, and he knew it like the back of his mind, even as he dragged his father away from the battlefield, hoping to the gods that by the time the four hours were over, he would be out of hell with his father.
"Good work, everyone. Let’s go home now!" Lord Sadako cheered excitedly like they were pressing u pause in their lives. Nothing had changed for the Kawai Lycans.
But for Gabe, his world had been upended.
Gabe felt his heart shatter as he turned back to see the warrior leave happily, their numbers instinct, while all he had left from the army of five thousand was just his father.
Tamiko didn’t even turn to look at him again, and the king didn’t follow him to see to the end of the battlefield. He didn’t even need to anymore because the battlefield had belonged to the mad king today.
To the mad king’s vengeance.
The ashes, the blood, the fire.
It had all been for the king, and Ashton had paid the grandest price for it as they left.
This was a day that Gabe would never forget.
And certainly not the man who had ruined him and carved his sanity into blood and ruin; the mad king Zaffuto Hinata. The man who had pointed a second target on his back.
"I won’t let them have Grealor,’ Gabe mumbled in the distance.
The Lycans laughed in mockery, their laughter merciless yet sharp, as they disappeared into the palace where the celebrations were overdue.
Justice had finally been served.
Their king was at the forefront of it all, too.
And tomorrow was already planned for.
