"Say, young one, isn't it all kind of... hilarious?" she said, mocking what Avere had just experienced, been forced to live through, not that he would be able to tell her off as that was her life, her story, her right to belittle it and mock it, her right to make fun of him for sweating through the pirate-like clothes, her right to make fun of him for having gone through the pain of burning alive in that palish white flame that he felt must hurt even more than normal flames, her right to make fun of him for suffering and screaming in this very town square where he was now within the flames, unburning, just as she had once been, oh so long ago, her right to be insensitive.
But what right did he have?
What was she asking?
How could anyone say yes in such a situation?
It was so much, it had come so quickly, he had felt not the memories, but he had lived through the end, he had experienced the solitude of a decade in prison, the pain of being whipped and burned, the humiliation of dying with others, not even given ones own death, the pain of having the last pieces of ones work burned alongside oneself, and the betrayal by every single person that had lived there, all at once, and then, of course the utter defeat and endless hate in the end, when he, or rather, she, had died, somehow ending up here.
Still, for him this had not been long, a few minutes at most, but for her, it must have been, well, a decade, at the very least, it was her life, her story, that which had brought her here, for the two to meet, he could not insult that, that just went too far, he could not bring himself to say yes, even though he knew she awaited that very, affirmative, response.
Avere was silent, he could not bear the pain of answering that question, it was that simple, and yet, he felt bad for answering nothing, it felt as if he had chosen the wrong option out of two options, both of which were wrong, as if there had been no right action in the first place.
He was really just overthinking it, but what else was the new rank even good for?
And the woman, knowing this as far as he could tell, perhaps even having reached the very same rank as him, he just couldn't remember anymore, just smiled, haughty, but not truly, as if she was mocking the arrogance of others, but also, at least slightly, affronted by his reaction, perhaps thinking of him as something like.. oh, a coward, that was the way she was looking at Avere who had needed a bit of time to realize it, now ashamed of his first reaction and also confused at the vast difference between the woman the first time he had been here and the time after he had seen her death, something that would've normally caused the exact opposite reaction as far as he understood.
Soon she continued, not even letting him devour everything he had gone through, they had gone through, she had gone through, well, everything that he had experienced and she had felt and been tortured under, it was not easy to explain when one really thought about it, after all, he had even felt how it was like to be a woman, an interesting feeling, though not all that different, her feelings of gender inequality that had indeed been in effect on her world long since having been crushed by hatred against everyone, all of which treated her horribly after she had been accused, most of them at least.
"Of course the experience itself wasn't as fun" she shrugged her shoulders, showing the palms of her hands, covered in burns and scars from both the years in prison and the years as an alchemist that often did experiments, some of which even she could not heal, despite her experience, "but I meant my life, isn't my life kind of a big joke when you look at it from far away?"
She took a break, turned in a circle, rather slowly, as if to show Avere the marks on her back once more, perhaps not even realizing that he had already seen them before.
This time they were full of blood, reddish, partially even with boiling skin and air inside, filled with glittering parts that might have come from both the salt and the glass the whip had been worsened with, adding insult to injury, and they were deep.
The wounds weren't just a bit deeper than he had expected, no, he was able to see bone, they hadn't been made easily, they had been made by someone with great force and power, especially when considering her potential rank, either the same as his or one below, perhaps even greater strength than the one he wielded right now, though technique also had something to do with it for certain.
After that, standing still, her long and relatively thick lab coat that he now knew had been put onto her as a attempt to further ridicule her and cast her aside, fluttered to an unnatural degree, showing that the coat also wasn't exactly of a great quality, simple made to look good.
She laughed slightly, and a glint of madness formed in her now greyish, mostly dead eyes that Avere had only seen on himself before, silver pupils, blurry and full of milk, behind white, no black, no warmth, just there, as if blind.
"I spent my whole life working for the sake of others, I perfected the art of helping others with magic to an unnatural degree, I helped more people than could be counted within an entire week, many hundreds of thousands, perhaps even many millions, that's for certain..."
She looked straight into his eyes, her tone growing slightly sharper.
"But for what?" she said, cutting herself of before quickly continuing, shoving her index finger onto the heavens, not the middle one, perhaps her way of giving that very finger, or her way of showing that she despised whoever was in charge of her life, it was actually kind of fun to watch.