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Around cycle number 436,353, the cracks first started forming on his skin. He hadn't been the one to notice at first. His body lost feeling at cycle 268314 after the heat of so many accumulated coreflames burnt his nerves to a crisp. It came as a shock the first time one of the black tide creatures impaled him with its claws, and he couldn't feel the associated pain. The creature was burned to ashes not long after making contact with his molten golden blood, and good thing too. Khaslana wasn't sure he could focus on the fight through his shock.
He tried his best to vanish after the battle, tucking himself away in an abandoned bathhouse. It was probably for the best that he stayed out of sight, as much as he would've loved Hyacine's advice on what the hell to do about his wounds. She'd probably know what to do about his lack of pain. Cipher would've cracked some joke about how he'd gotten sloppy, while Castorice helped patch him up. The professor or Aglaea could've found a way to fix his current predicament.
At the minimum, he craved another person's touch. He missed Mydei's embrace, or human contact in general. It had been so long since he'd even held someone's hand. The last time he'd allowed himself to be in the same room as someone else was the first reset… He didn't like to think about that. Instead, he focused on remembering all the steps to proper wound care Hyacine taught him once upon a time. Washing the wound came first, and then that fancy antibacterial cream, right? Could his wounds even get infected with how hot the core flames inside him burned?
"What are you doing here, Deliverer?" Mydei's voice echoed against the stone walls.
Khaslana jumped out of his skin, stumbling to his feet. Fuckfuckfuck, Mydei wasn't supposed to be here. The world was spinning around him, and Mydei wasn't supposed to be standing in the door frame illuminated perfectly by sunlight. No one had ever come by this old place in all 436,353 cycles. Shame on Khaslana for thinking that he was safe anywhere, especially with that faker Phainon taking his place. No… he was the one taking Phainon's place.
"Well, out with it," Mydei demanded, leaning against the doorframe. "You said you were going home to rest after the battle."
Khaslana struggled to come up with something that would satisfy Mydei without giving too much away. Just as he began to form something resembling a thought, he doubled over from the pain of his wounds. Molten golden blood dripped down his chest, staining both his hand and the dusty tiled floor. Mydei rushed over, wrapping his arms around Khaslana's chest. Khaslana couldn't help but lean into the touch, the cold of a normal body soothing. He could fall asleep like this, wrapped in Mydei's arms.
"Hks, you're burning up." Why did Mydei sound so panicked? He'd end anyone who made Mydei feel like that. "Is this why you came out here? To try and die alone?"
"…wanted to patch myself up…" Khaslana slurred. Huh, he must've lost more blood than he thought. "…Hyacine was busy…"
"You're an idiot, Deliverer." Mydei chided, tucking his face into Khaslana's shoulder. "A self-sacrificing idiot."
Oh, how Khaslana yearned to hear Mydei call him by his real name. Not the name he gave Aglaea when he was running from his pain, and not that stupid title with its expectations he could never fulfil. Mydei helped Khaslana sit down on the floor and began peeling his blood-soaked shirt away from his chest. The metal of his gauntlets clanked against the clay pot holding the antibacterial ointment. He dumped the contents onto a spare rag Khaslana had procured from the Grove's nurse's office. The moonlight filtering through the crumbling windows made Mydei's widening eyes sparkle.
Khaslana followed Mydei's eyes and felt the room turn cold. The hole in his ribs the edges were cracking like a broken vase. The human body wasn't supposed to do that, at least human bodies that didn't contain 5,672,589 core flames. He swore they both watched pieces of his skin flake off and disintegrate. He needed to get out of here… Mydei-
"Stop moving, Deliverer, you'll only make it worse!" Mydei grabbed Khaslana's shoulders and shoved him back down.
"No, I'm fine, don't worry about me Mydei," Khaslana hissed, trying harder to stand up. He tried to cover his wound with his bare hand, but Mydei batted it away. "I should probably go talk to Hyacine about this. I'll go ahead and get out of your hair."
Khaslana sprinted through the back entrance, leaving Mydei calling that gods-forsaken name. He didn't stop running until he reached the forest, his filthy hand covering the gaping wound and cracks dripping golden blood. Once he was sure he was safely hidden under the cover of fir trees, he rested his head against the tree trunk.
"Just once, please call me Khaslana," He whispered to the air.
****
Around cycle 500,000 was when the real mutations started. Those cracks had slowly spread throughout his body. They gradually spread across his skin and spiderwebbed together. He didn't know at what point he started to feel that his body was too small for him. When did he start to feel like his soul was scraping along the edges of his vessel?
He'd stopped coming to the abandoned bathhouse after that time with Mydei about 100,000 cycles ago, and yet it felt like the safest place to be right now. He was burning up, but that heat had been his constant companion since cycle 2. Still, he stripped his jacket off, letting the glowing cracks on his forearms illuminate the blue tiles. Something pressed against the walls of his body, as if it were trying to burst through his skin. The cracks resting where the wound in his stomach once was leaked golden blood. His panting breaths echoed from the empty tiled room.
The pressure in his body localized into sharp and stabbing pain at his shoulder blades. Khaslana gritted his teeth and wrapped his arms around his chest. He wasn't supposed to feel pain, not after his nerves were burnt to a crisp. Sunlight glittered off the molten golden blood he'd spilled across the floor. He pressed his back into the wall, trying not to vomit.
"Deliverer!" Mydei's voice echoed off the tiled walls.
The Kremnoan prince seemed to have an innate sense for when Khaslana wanted to suffer alone. He walked into the room, and his golden eyes widened. Mydei sprinted over, but Khaslana tried to pull himself back. He wasn't sure why, but the thought of being touched at that moment sent chills down his spine. The pain in his back continued to sharpen, and he swore he could feel blood soaking into his black shirt.
"What do you need from me?" Mydei asked, holding his hands so they hovered over Khaslana's shoulders.
Khaslana shook his head. What did he need? He didn't want to be touched right now, but he didn't know how to stop the pain. There wasn't any record of a Chrysos Heir who took on as many coreflames as he had at this point. There wasn't a protocol for what to do when the essence of destruction tried to tear its way through your skin. A scream bubbled up from his throat, choking on the blood pouring from his mouth. The pain sharpened to a white-hot needle as his skin tore.
He shoved Mydei back as his skin lost the battle against that pain. It tore asunder in a cloud of golden blood. He coughed up a torrent of blood onto the floor, watching pieces of his skin slough off and join the coalescing puddle.
Khaslana straightened up, his breath coming in heavy pants. A dark shape entered his peripheral vision and wrapped around him in a loose embrace. Holy shit, were those wings?That's what that pain was? Had he sprouted wings? They wrapped tighter around him as Khaslana continued to silently panic. He peeked out between the feathers coated in his blood and chunks of muscle at his companion.
Mydei watched him with horror.
"Don't look at me like that!" Khaslana choked out, more blood dripping from his mouth. "Please, I can't take that look from you. From anyone but you."
"Can I touch you?" Mydei asked softly.
"Please," Khaslana confirmed. Now that these strange wings weren't bursting from his skin (holy shit, he had wings), he craved some kind of touch.
Mydei carefully brushed his fingers through Khaslana's gold and black feathers. Blood and pieces of skin dripped down as he did. The motion tickled something in his brain pleasantly and sent a shiver up Khaslana's spine. Mydei stared at the feathers contemplatively before he turned to meet Khaslana's eyes.
"How are you feeling?" He asked softly. He brushed Khaslana's wings aside and stepped into their embrace.
"…scared." Khaslana chuckled. "But who wouldn't be when they randomly sprout wings?"
"You're taking this rather well, all things considered."
"I've had a while to get used to these changes."
"I'm sorry." Mydei pressed their foreheads together. "You don't have to deal with this all alone."
But he did. With Cyrene gone, he had to bear the weight of the world on his own. He was responsible for their fate. Khaslana pulled Mydei into a tight hug, ignoring the feeling of his wings wrapping around the two of them. For tonight, he could let himself be held.
"I'm here for you, Phainon." Mydei said.
One day, when this was all over and he could finally rest, Khaslana swore he would tell Mydei his real name. Before he crumbled into ashes, he wanted to hear his real name fall from the Kremnoan Prince's lips.
****
Khaslana stood in the main bath in that abandoned bathhouse once again, watching the sun set on the eternal page. Well, he levitated above the stagnant water inside the main bath. Because no one ever came around this old place, it was the only spot where he could let his grip on his powers slip and just be without the fear of burning the skin off a civilian. His skin had long since melted off, leaving the ceramic vessel underneath visible in all its cracked and chipped glory. He stretched his wings out to their full span, watching as a couple of his feathers fell loose and landed in the water.
"Figured you were out here,' Mydei's voice echoed off the walls once again.
Khaslana turned to face the intruder while brushing some of his golden hair out of his face. The demigod of strife probably wouldn't be flayed alive by the intense heat of 436,154,368 coreflames, yet it was still habit to smother his flames. Mydei stood at the edge of the pool. He took Khaslana's claws into his hands as the latter closed the distance between them. Khaslana's wings wrapped around his partner.
"It's peaceful here." Khaslana shrugged.
"And isolated?" Mydei raised an eyebrow.
"It's not really easy to contain the full power of thirty-three million suns in your chest." Khaslana shrugged, averting his gaze. "And most can't handle being around the power of thirty-three million suns."
"Don't hold yourself back on my account. You're entitled to be comfortable."
Mydei traced the path of Khaslana's spine, eliciting a shiver from the Lord Ravager. Khaslana rested his head on Mydei's chest. The Prince's chest rumbled with his laughter.
"How'd you find this place, anyway?" Mydei asked.
"I noticed after a couple hundred cycles that no one came around here, and thought that it would be the best place to hide out." Khaslana began braiding Mydei's hair absently, "And right around the time these damned things appeared was when you started stealing my secret hideout."
"…Did it hurt?" Mydei's voice was soft, barely audible.
"Like a mother fucker. But it probably would've hurt more if I was alone."
"…I'm sorry, Deliverer," Mydei whispered. "You shouldn't have had to suffer alone."
"… May I make a request?"
"Anything." Mydei squeezed him tighter.
"Please, call me by my real name."
"Of course, Khaslana." The way Mydei whispered his name, like it was the most beautiful thing he'd heard, went straight to Khaslana's stomach, "My beautiful, strong, moronic Khaslana."
With a surge of heat and energy, Khaslana pressed a kiss to Mydei's lips. Mydei returned the kiss, tangling his hands in Khaslana's hair. The heat kept building and building as their kiss grew deeper and deeper. His tongue slipped into Mydei's mouth, his wings spreading to their full span and his knees straddling Mydei's chest. His entire body felt like it was fire incarnate, his flames growing to a fervor.
Written by a human in Ellipsus.