CHAPTER 103: CHAPTER 103: IT’S NOT NICE TO MEET YOU

Calithar stood frozen in the center of the council room, the fury in his eyes sharp enough to split stone. His gaze locked on the man standing proudly before the throne: his own brother. His foolish, reckless, vile brother Xavriel.

The audacity of him impersonating the king, sitting on the throne as if it belonged to him. Calithar saw red. But the longer he stared, the colder his blood became.

He truly had done it. He had pretended to be him.

Calithar’s jaw clenched. Shock was not something he experienced often, yet here he was with his breath caught in his throat, confusion colliding with disgust.

What unsettled him most wasn’t the disguise but the fact that he couldn’t sense Xavriel at all.

No scent.

No presence.

No trace of power.

Nothing but a hollow, suffocating emptiness.

Just how corrupted had Xavriel become?

"You sure are one daring fool, aren’t you?" Calithar spat, his voice low, trembling with restrained violence. Anger was never in his genes considering the fact that he was once a dignified god. Even after being stripped of his position, he still maintained as much as possible, his aura as a god.

Xavriel’s lips curved into an all-too-familiar mocking smile. He walked forward with casual arrogance, stopping just a single step away from his brother, as though he felt no fear at all.

"Shouldn’t the fool," Xavriel said lightly, tilting his head, "be the king stupid enough to leave his own kingdom unguarded?"

"Shut up, Xavriel," Calithar growled.

"Or else?" Xavriel feigned surprise and lifted his hands in mock surrender. "Oh right I forgot. You can’t do anything. Because beneath all that righteous anger, all that godly pride..."

He leaned closer.

"...you’re just a loser who still thinks he’s a god."

The words hit their mark.

The anger that had never overtaken him in all his years of existence surged powerfully through his entire being.

He lunged forward, grabbing Xavriel by the neck with one hand, lifting him clean off the floor. Power crackled under Calithar’s skin, his eyes blazing a dangerous shade of red. Xavriel’s feet dangled, but the wicked smirk on his face never left.

"You seem angry," Xavriel whispered, his voice strained but amused. "What’s the matter? Did I touch a sore spot?"

"Shut the hell up, you scheming bastard!"

Calithar slammed a fist into Xavriel’s chest with terrifying force.

The impact threw Xavriel across the council room. He crashed into the stone wall so hard that the entire side collapsed in a cloud of dust and rubble.

Gasps erupted behind Calithar.

The council members who had gathered for a routine meeting scrambled to their feet, panic spreading across the room like wildfire. None of them had ever witnessed their calm, composed king in such a state. Calithar’s fury was raw, unmasked, and powerful enough to make the air vibrate.

Their feet swept across the floor as one official after another fled toward the exit. One closed the door behind him with trembling hands, though he knew it wouldn’t muffle the chaos.

Silence fell.

A dark, echoing laugh rose from beneath the pile of stone.

Xavriel pushed aside the rubble with slow, deliberate movements, unfazed by the blow that should have caved in a normal man’s chest. He stood upright, brushing dust from his shoulder as though Calithar had merely shoved him lightly. His disguise had worn off, revealing the disgusting face his brother loathed.

His grin widened.

"Oh..." Xavriel said, cracking his neck with an audible snap. "If that is all you have after three years... then I must say, I’m disappointed."

Calithar’s eyes narrowed dangerously. "I have tried, Xavriel. I have done everything a good brother would have done and THIS!" Calithar seethed, trying to push down the traumatizing, haunting experience that bordered on his mind.

"This is how you repay me?" he said through gritted teeth.

Calithar felt a sharp sting behind his ribcage; anger, frustration, and a bitterness he had buried long ago. Xavriel always knew what strings to pull. He always knew where to poke to get a reaction.

But today...

Today there was no restraint. The wall he had put up to hold back the tears of regret and sorrow was cracking terribly.

"You ungrateful brute animal! What haven’t I sacrificed for you to have a better life?! I gave up everything for you! Every damn thing!"

Between the two, Calithar was always known to be the emotional one. He felt more than his brother, making him seem weaker despite being the elder.

Xavriel chuckled then scoffed, his expression twisting into something ugly. He didn’t even look a bit remorseful after his brother’s sudden outburst which he was never known for.

"Sacrificed?" he echoed mockingly. "You mean those pitiful scraps you tossed my way and called love?"

Calithar stiffened. He knew when and how to be cruel but beneath all that, he had the softest heart known to man or god.

Xavriel’s smile widened, venomous.

"Don’t look at me like that, brother. You claim you gave everything, but what you really did..." He tapped his temple lightly. " Keep me under your perfect little shadow."

"You ungrateful idiot! That is not true! After all these years..." Calithar snapped, voice cracking as he broke off. "I tried to protect you dammit!"

"How is that protection when it only ruined me?" Xavriel barked a humorless laugh. "Is that what you call locking me away every time my power surged? Calling me dangerous? Broken? Faulty?"

To a total stranger, it looked like Calithar was the younger brother throwing a tantrum while Xavriel was the eldest, trying to hold himself for spanking him.

"You were on the verge of madness and unleashing chaos on the entire world. What the hell did you expect me to do?"

He took a step forward, eyes burning with a darkness that had long rotted past sanity.

"YOU were the one terrified of me."

Xavriel’s voice thundered, shaking the air. "You feared what I could become. Because you knew it that one day, I would surpass you." he said, poking a finger to his chest.

Calithar’s heart clenched painfully. He took in a deep breath. Regardless of everything, he still tried to maintain his cool.

"You’re my brother—"

"And that," Xavriel spat, "was your greatest mistake."

He took another step forward, until they were only breaths apart; one trembling with bridled emotion, the other smirking with a cold, demonic satisfaction.

"You think you’ve suffered?" Xavriel hissed. "While you were the worshipped, adored , descendant of the almighty goddess where was I? Where were you when I was treated like a curse? That’s right. I was hidden away, leashed and treated like a curse."

"You WEREN’T cursed Xavriel! You cursed yourself and I had to destroy myself just to free you!"

Calithar snapped before he could stop himself. "You could barely control your sanity, Xavriel, you—"

"Enough with your senseless show of gratuity!" Xavriel growled, his voice dropping to a low, monstrous vibration. Black mists burst out of him after his angry declaration.

"You haven’t the slightest idea of what I went through because of you. And you know what I realized?"

His grin sharpened like a blade, devoid of the anger kindled a while ago.

"That I never needed your love. Or your pity. I only needed strength."

Calithar exhaled shakily, grief and fury tangling inside him. "You had a chance to redeem yourself Xavriel. But you didn’t and that’s on you."

Xavriel sneered. "For what? So you could pat my head and say ’be good, Xavriel’ like I’m a tame dog?"

Xavriel’s eyes gleamed. He spread his arms slowly, as if presenting himself like a masterpiece.

"This is power. Pure, unfiltered, beautiful power. The kind you always dreamt of but were too cowardly to embrace."

Calithar’s hands curled into fists.

"I never wanted dark power. That is not the path of a king."

"That’s why you were thrown down. You never deserved the position neither did you deserve even this pathetic throne," Xavriel snapped. "You deserve to kneel, Cal." A smirk curled up his lips." Before me."

Calithar’s breath caught.

The last thread inside him snapped violently.

"You..." His voice quivered with a fury so deep it trembled out of him.

Xavriel rolled his eyes.

"Oh please. Save me the tragic lullaby. You didn’t save me out of love, Calithar. You saved me because you needed to feel like the hero."

Calithar blinked.

Once.

Twice.

Then his voice came out hollow.

"...Is that truly what you think of me?"

Xavriel gave a cold, dismissive shrug.

"It’s what I’ve always thought."

The words hit Calithar deeper than any blade could.

His chest tightened, breath thinning, the betrayal clawing at the edges of his sanity. After everything I’ve given up for this dumb bastard.

But Xavriel’s face remained unmoved.

"You’re a lost cause, Xavriel."

"I threw away nothing," Xavriel said calmly. "I simply outgrew you."

Calithar stared at him. At the face he had once protected, defended, cherished. Now twisted into something cruel. Something wicked. Something unrecognizable.

Xavriel smiled—cold, triumphant, merciless.

"No," he said softly. "I stopped being your brother the day I realized I could be a god."

Calithar’s breath stilled.

And then

Flames erupted beneath Xavriel’s skin.

Dark power swirled around him and the entire room shuddered causing the floor to crack.

Shadows curled at his feet like living serpents.

Xavriel lifted his hand, purple-black energy crackling around his fingers.

"Now," he whispered, his smile widening viciously,

"shall we finish what should’ve been finished years ago? Cal?"