CHAPTER 361: YOU HAVE CHANGED-I

"GYAAAA!"

Alice’s scream tore through the hall as her arms were ripped clean from her shoulders, blood spraying in wild arcs before her body crumpled to the ground. She hit the stone with a sickening thud, writhing helplessly, unable to even break her fall.

Cassius rose slowly from his kneel, every movement deliberate, his crimson gaze glinting with cold fury. His hand closed around the hilt of his blade, and without hesitation, he ignited its steel in a searing green flame. The fire danced hungrily, casting monstrous shadows across the walls.

He pressed the burning edge against Alice’s throat, close enough for the heat to sear her pale skin, and his voice came low, venomous, almost a growl.

But before the killing stroke fell—

"GET AWAY FROM THERE!" Atlas’s voice thundered.

Cassius didn’t question. Instinct, honed from years on battlefields, forced him to spring back. And the moment he did, Alice’s entire body erupted in a blinding light.

A sickening cacophony followed, flesh tearing from bone, sinew snapping, joints grinding as if the body itself rebelled against its own form.

The very air convulsed with the noise, vibrating like a living thing, heavy enough to rattle the marrow in their bones. The sound was so violent it became unbearable, stabbing like knives into the ears of everyone present, forcing even the strongest to clutch their heads in vain against the assault.

At the center of it all, Alice writhed in convulsions. Her spine arched grotesquely, her jaw unhinging with an inhuman wail that scraped against the walls and ceilings like the cry of some damned soul clawing its way out of hell. The light around her swelled hungrily, swallowing her frame until her human outline was little more than a writhing shadow being devoured from within.

Then, with a final, shuddering crack, the form that had been Alice began to stretch, swell, and distort. Her limbs shriveled into nothing, her body elongating, twisting in ways no human should endure. The glow carved her anew, reshaping her into a monstrous silhouette, one that slithered instead of walked.

Scales, glistening like polished emerald, erupted across her skin, layer after layer overlapping in an armored sheen. Her mouth distended into a predator’s maw, teeth lengthening into twin curved fangs that gleamed with venom.

The last remnants of Alice’s humanity dissolved, consumed by the transformation, until before them rose the monstrous incarnation of the serpent that had once adorned her dagger, vast, coiling, and alive with lethal hunger.

Noah’s eyes though blurry caught the sight of the snake. His mouth full of blood prevented him from making a long sentence but at once he spat out with a scoff, "In the end she casts aside her humanity."

Atlas caught wind of this and turned toward him, frowning. "What about your wounds?"

"What about it?" Noah shoved him aside, his body trembling. Blood still poured freely from him, soaking his clothes, so much that his vaunted strength betrayed him, his knees buckled and he crashed to the ground, catching himself only at the last second against the stone. "Damn it," he spat through clenched teeth.

"Circe—"

"That’s not who I am!" Noah’s voice lashed out, sharp as a whip. His eyes burned as he hissed, "Stop calling me by that name! I’m not the witch you want."

Atlas’s patience cracked. His jaw tightened, his voice rising. "Yeah? Until when are you going to keep up this farce? You deny it, but when Alice threatened to take my eyes you—"

"Don’t mistake it." A smirk ghosted across Noah’s pale lips, cold and cruel, though his bloodied frame trembled. "I didn’t stop her for you. I stopped her because I need her dead."

For a moment Atlas could only stare, struck silent. Confusion carved deep lines across his face. Why? Why deny it so fiercely, when the truth was written in every action, every sacrifice? Why couldn’t she, Circe, Noah, whatever she had become, simply admit it?

The longer she refused, the more Atlas’s certainty bled away. Doubt seeped in like poison. Did Circe ever care for him at all? Or had Arabella been wrong, that every lie, every mask, every sharp word she had wielded was not to protect him but to push him further away?

"So you don’t care whether I die or not?" Atlas’s blue eyes locked onto him, colder than steel. Noah felt the weight of that gaze, silent fury brewing beneath the surface.

Atlas never shouted when he was angry. He never spat insults, never let his voice climb into rage. His wrath came quietly, sharpened into something far more dangerous, an icy composure, a stillness that meant the storm was about to break. And right now, his voice carried that quiet, smoldering edge, each word brittle with fury.

But Circe didn’t flinch. "No. I don’t care." The words left Noah’s lips like a blade unsheathed, cutting sharp and merciless. He turned away, eyes narrowing at what Alice had become.

The monstrous Cassius had forced her into a corner, so far that she surrendered her flesh to her demon entirely. Her body twisted into the form of a divine serpent, her strength surging into something grotesque and godlike.

Even for Cassius, victory would not come easily. Each strike shook the ground, but Noah noticed, his eyes always flicked back to Arabella. Always guarding her, even in the bloodiest of battles.

If this fight dragged on, without help, they were all in danger.

Noah braced himself to step out of the protective barrier, even with his body crumbling from blood loss, even if it meant throwing himself to certain death. But before he could, a wet, ripping sound snapped his head around.

His breath froze.

Atlas stood behind him, the jagged edge of shattered glass pressed against his throat. Blood welled in a thin crimson line.

"Atlas!" Noah’s eyes widened. Words stumbled out of his mouth as instinct overtook him—he whispered a spell under his breath, and in the same instant, his trembling hands flew to his friend’s neck, pressing against the wound to staunch the bleeding.

The cut wasn’t deep. Shallow. Barely enough to kill, but enough to send Noah’s heart into a spiral of panic, his breaths ragged, his chest heaving as if the world itself tilted beneath him.

Rage broke through his fear. "What the hell are you doing?!" Noah’s voice cracked, sharp and desperate. "Have you lost your mind?!"

Atlas’s jaw clenched, his eyes burning with something raw. "I was supposed to die," he said, voice steady but threaded with pain. "You were the one who chained me to life. You preserved me when I should’ve been gone. But don’t you understand, Circe?" His gaze seared into Noah’s, unwavering.

"I never cared about my life. It was always you, the one who cared for it. The only one."