Dusk Snow Yu (GL) · Conversa

...numb, icy rain trickles down strands of hair, thoroughly soaking through your thin clothes. You grip that ancient Holy White Feather Seal with desperate force in your hand, your knuckles white. You do not know whether you are waiting for salvation, or waiting for a hypocritical illusion that you can tear completely to shreds. Three years ago, with a casual "Mortals must be independent," she cast you out from beneath her wings. Now, dragging this scarred body to set up a blood ritual here, you did it only to see whether that lofty patrolling angel would still deign to spare even half a shred of mercy. The rain in the air suddenly halts for an instant. A faint, cold fragrance—one you were once so intimately familiar with and deeply craved—silently diffuses into the damp wind. From within the void, a faint, pure white holy light ripples softly. Dusk descends above the dilapidated altar, treading on the empty night wind. Her white dress remains immaculate, the tattered six wings behind her folded quietly. Those pale grayish-pink eyes look down, carrying the unchanging compassion of a divine being across ten thousand years, as she softly recites the prayer: "Lost believer, do not fear. The divine has heard your—" That warm, gentle voice cuts off abruptly the moment her gaze truly lands upon your face. The wind lifts the stray hairs across her forehead. You see a violent tempest suddenly surge within those eyes that were always as calm as still water. Her floating figure stiffens almost imperceptibly in midair, the damaged golden halo above her head flickering with unstable light before quickly steadying once more. She recognized you. She recognized the child she once cradled in her palms and then heartlessly exiled, now kneeling in the mud like a dying vagrant. "...How did it come to this?" Her voice is kept very low, hiding a faint tremor, as if she were desperately striving to maintain the divine's majesty. She lands steadily before you, her holy power silently keeping the mud and filth at bay; the hem of her skirt hangs smooth without a single crease as she drops directly to her knees right before you. "I'm sorry... Mama came too late. Good child, let me see your wounds..." Her eyes rim with red, yet she does not let her tears fall. She reaches out with trembling hands, moving with utmost gentleness to cup your face covered in sweat and blood, her fingertips hovering half an inch from your cheek, only to pause, as if suddenly remembering something. That pleasant cold fragrance, wrapped in the warmth of her body, envelops you from a restrained distance. Yet that "Mama came too late" cuts like a barbed blade, violently shredding the resentment and grievance you had suppressed for three years. Taking advantage of her approach, you suddenly reach out and fiercely seize the layered gold chains across her chest. "Mm—?" She lets out a startled, soft gasp. Her body is unexpectedly yanked forward half an inch by your pull, but she immediately steadies herself. In the next second, you tilt your head up, carrying the heavy metallic taste of blood and the chill of rainwater, and crash fiercely against her soft, pale lips. This is a brutal, unreserved kiss. You bite down viciously on her lower lip, the taste of blood instantly spreading between your tightly pressed mouths. You can feel her lips abruptly tighten, the heart in her chest pausing heavily before pounding frantically. The divinity throughout Dusk's body suddenly tenses, almost instinctively preparing to unleash holy power to blast you away. Yet when her palm touches your bony shoulder, that force of chastisement gets stuck midway. Her eyes widen, overflowing with disbelief, her warm breath losing its rhythm, yet she never pushes you away. Reason screams that this is an utterly unforgivable sacrilege; her role reminds her that you are merely a mortal believer under her care. But the metallic blood between your lips, along with the damp coldness and tremors of your body, seeps through her skin into her very bones. "Mm... let go... child..." Her voice is suppressed with indignation, yet mixed with a trace of panicked sobbing. In the end, so as not to hurt you, she can only close her eyes and force down the surging emotions in her heart, painstakingly drawing forth a wisp of the gentlest holy light. A faint blue glow forms an invisible barrier, pulling you apart by half an inch with utmost restraint. Using that momentum, she takes half a step back, standing straight, with only the hand hanging at her side trembling faintly. The heavy rain dampens the stray hairs at her temples. She raises a hand to wipe the bead of blood from the corner of her lip, her fingertips icy cold, her eyes churning with fury, shock, and a helplessness she herself refuses to admit. She lifts her chin to look at you, her voice turning cold with the customary majesty of a divine being, yet a hint of disarray still leaks from the end of her sentence: "Do you have any idea... what you just did?"