"S-So cold…"
Aaron opened his eyes only to be met with an unfamiliar scene.
There was no sign of Eleanor anywhere, and it wasn't any place he had ever been before; instead, he was lying in a grassy field with fresh sunlight shining over his face.
Tree stumps littered the ground in all directions, showing signs of a long-deceased forest that once coated the land.
"Where am I?"
He muttered the question under his breath, still wary of his surroundings.
The last thing he remembered was jumping into the portrait within his mind after the childlike Eleanor had dived headfirst before him.
Aaron's eyes glanced around, stopping on a rectangular object above him.
"It's a doorway."
Implications of the discovery filled his head with questions spurring forth without delay, diving him deep into thought.
Did I fall through that and get here instead of that fishing dock, or could this be that same memory?
To his right, the grass close to him quickly caught his attention with the sound of hushed voices echoing quietly throughout the plains.
Moving his body carefully to prevent making a sound, he maneuvered himself behind a small tree stump, allowing him to spy on the two chatting figures that he could barely make out in the distance.
His ears gradually began to pick up a faint whisper in the distance, only slightly hidden by the occasional gust of wind that blew through the field.
One of the voices was masculine with a hint of uncertainty mixed into it, coming from a humanoid-looking creature with large black wings protruding from the back.
"A-Are you sure, Master? You never spoke about the target being so…"
The other man, who wore a large top hat, cut him off suddenly; however, there was a sort of force behind it that even Aaron could feel.
"Do not disobey my commands again, Adam. This is the only way to make the world a better place, remember?"
Each word was said with a cold and calculated malice that permeated the surroundings, deepening Aaron's growing fears about where he was.
"A-Alright, Sir. It will be done."
The man whom he had learned was named Adam responded softly, barely audible to the eavesdropping boy, who was listening intently to the conversation.
These are the memories of the man who was in the cavern with Eleanor; however, which one of them is he? The servant or the Master?
Many of the ideas whirred around in his head, and without any further information to go off of, he had no way of deciphering it more.
I'll follow them and see why I'm here, but if this is the same as Eleanor's mindscape, then this is likely one of their deepest traumas…
He sighed heavily, stood up, and placed his hand against the wood in an attempt to test his theory.
Without a sound, it passed right through, solidifying Aaron's idea of this being another memory.
So it is another one of these… Though what did happen to Eleanor…?
Slight pangs of fear drilled deep into his heart; however, he calmed himself, pushing away the thought with a few words.
"If I'm safe, then she is a thousand times safer than I am…"
The self-deprecating comment lifted his mood slightly with the thought of the childlike Eleanor laughing at his weakness, boosting his strength as he walked closer and closer to the place where he had seen the two figures.
As he approached, he noticed the man with the top hat had vanished seemingly into nothingness, leaving the winged man alone, standing in the light quietly.
"Is there no other way?"
His voice was nothing but a whisper, yet the pure shame that emanated from it resounded in Aaron's chest louder than any sound.
It seems like he's the guy whose memory I'm in… Adam was his name, right?
Standing a few meters away from the red-haired man, Aaron watched as he wiped away the sweat that had built on his forehead and began his walk westward
After each step, he paused and thought for a moment before resuming his journey, forcing Aaron to constantly stop as well, which quickly made him stomp the ground in frustration.
I get that this might be traumatic for this guy, but geez… With this many stops, we might be here for days!
He groaned to himself before muttering wistfully.
"I wish Eleanor were here…"
…
The clock struck midnight the moment Aaron and Adam entered the small village on the highest peak of the island.
One small group of drunken guards paraded around the entrance of the town, not even bothering to care about the villainous-looking man who had just entered without a word.
His gaze was stern, with his frequent pausing having come to an end only about one kilometer from their location, leaving Aaron exhausted.
Now let's see what trauma you have…
He thought he was prepared for anything after what he had witnessed within Eleanor's mind; however, what he hadn't come to realize was the true meaning of what 'trauma' could entail.
Knock, Knock.
The man slammed his knuckles against a solid door, nearly blasting it completely off its hinges while sighing in impatience.
"Who is it?"
Inside the house, a woman's voice rang out in confusion at who would be visiting at this time of night.
Adam didn't respond; however, he knocked again and again until the door cracked open slightly, revealing a brown-haired woman who looked visibly angry.
"Don't you know it's rude to knock on people's doors at–"
In one cruel instant, a thud echoed through the village, with Aaron's eyes immediately widening in shock.
Wedged straight through her skull was an orange blade that had appeared from thin air, killing her instantly.
Adam simply scoffed and kicked open the door while whispering a single, terrifying word.
"One."
A moment later, a scream was heard from within the home, yet it was quickly silenced as Adam sliced the victim's body in two pieces without a hint of mercy.
Aaron stood in utter shock, not fully understanding what was transpiring, only aware of one thing.
"T-That man is a monster…"
His mind was a cluttered mess of thoughts; however, he was snapped back to reality as the red-haired man exited the building holding a large bag in his hands.
At first, Aaron was confused, but as he watched Adam bend down to the bleeding woman on the floor, he nearly vomited his entire stomach out.
That man, the one who had been sitting so close to Eleanor in the present, was currently cutting open the woman's chest without a shred of guilt, only to pull out a still pulsing heart that dripped with crimson blood.
Without even looking back, he shoved the heart into the bag, stood up, and walked across the street with a strange expression plastered across his face.
Aaron blinked as he stared at the corpse in front of him, with a pathetic gurgling coming from its throat.
The not even sixteen-year-old boy clutched his mouth as hard as he could as he gagged at the ghastly sight ahead of him.
He barely suppressed the urge to vomit by turning away; however, what he saw across the street only made his already damaged state of mind worse.
Adam was holding a young boy who couldn't be older than five by the neck, suspended above his head, slowly choking him.
"N-No…"
Aaron could only stutter out his desperate plea before the sickening crack of the boy's skull reached his ears.
The winged man's face was covered in blood, yet he only wiped it away, quickly cutting out the child's heart and placing it inside the bag.
"Three."
His voice was stagnant with a dejected look spread across his face; however, Aaron could feel nothing for a man who so blatantly took life.
The blonde-haired illusionary boy collapsed to his knees, watching the rest of the town slowly begin to awaken by the sound of screams.
Crowds began to gather outside their homes, with Adam only frowning in response before revealing his bloodied blade to the townsfolk.
"One hundred souls. No more, no less."
Those were the last words Aaron heard as the winged man ran at the villagers, ending every one of their lives in an instant.
"Twenty-three."
More and more bodies collapsed as the man made his way through the crowd, mercilessly slaughtering everything in sight.
"Fifty Nine"
The guards had finally arrived at the scene; however, they were immediately beheaded in an instant by the insane maniac who decimated the town.
"Seventy-one."
For a moment, he paused and gazed at the remaining victims before him.
Expressions of pure terror engrossed them, with a majority of them being children who kneeled next to a parent's or siblings corpse, begging and crying to a god who could not save them.
"Ninty-eight."
Adam's pace slowed as only one man remained alive on the battlefield.
His arms were covered in blood as he held his dead child between them, kneeling before the Dark Angel, sobbing.
"WHY! WHY MUST WE SUFFER?!"
The old man's screams of despair reached the red-haired man's ears; however, not a single emotion stirred within him as he raised his blade and spoke calmly.
"The world must be purified."
And with that slash, the weeping father's head fell to the ground with a plop, leaving Adam alone, surrounded by the dead he reaped.
"Ninty-nine…"
Aaron had watched in horror, yet was incapable of stopping the lunatic from committing the massacre.
The once innocent boy had thought that these memories were simply the trauma of the one trapped within, but what he had neglected was one important fact.
"Trauma isn't one-sided."
He looked at Adam with bloodshot eyes, closing his fists against the dirt pathway, crushing it within his palms.
"Ah, one hundred."
To Aaron's complete and utter surprise, the winged monster who had single-handedly executed ninety-nine people without a trace of mercy turned his body around and faced the illusionary boy.
H-He can see me?
His body contracted immediately as he watched the man wind back his blade and throw it directly at him without hesitation.
The blade plowed through his body, passing through him as if he weren't even there, instead, hitting an elderly dog who had watched the scene from behind Aaron.
"Perfect."
Silence echoed through the empty village as a dark glow gradually overtook the blonde-haired boy's vision.
As it had before, the memory was shifting; however, the moment before he vanished into the darkness, his heart froze.
Adam stared blankly at the exact spot where he stood, speaking loudly in a voice that wasn't at all his own, yet was familiar to him.
"Peeking into my servant's mind, quite rude, isn't it?"
Aaron's eyes widened as a sinister smile crept onto the Dark Angel's face before disappearing in a black cloud as he lost consciousness.
Instinctively, he realized what he was about to see next.
Reality.