Soul Shard Captor [BL] - Volume 1: Aris the Soother

Chapter 73 - Please, breathe!

Astar Levi's eyes were open, but all he could see and hear was noise.

His mind could not register nor comprehend a single thing. As if he was not an intelligent being but a wild beast, ruled only by subconscious urges.

He hung suspended in between consciousness and unconsciousness. Unable to think but still able to feel everything.

And everything was wrong. All wrong. Uncomfortable, unbearable, irritating.

Wrong, wrong, wrong!

Every fiber of his being instinctively thrashed about, trying to escape from the mire that entangled him. He wanted to destroy it all, to eliminate, to expel the irregularity.

Yet, the more he struggled, the more unbearable it all became.

Until there was nothing left of him but madness.

He could not even tell what it was that he felt. Every intense emotion known to man mixed together inside of him into a collage of entropy. Pure chaos, an anarchy of terror, panic, fury, despair, and agony.

Suffocated underneath everything that wasn't him, he felt himself cracking at the seams.

Yet, staring at his own end, he could only feel relief.

He only wished for it all to end.

For everything to just stop.

It was at that very moment that he felt something.

Weak and subtle, yet among the noise, it was incomparably clear.

It weaved through the madness towards him, a weak little stream yet, wherever it passed, the seas of chaos parted to make way.

Everything around him was wrong.

Everything but this single little thing.

The most gentle and beautiful thing in existence.

It was right as much as everything else was wrong.

No. It was more than right. It was an incarnation of perfection.

Levi turned towards it, reached out towards it, but he couldn't grasp it.

He could only look but not touch. Silently crave it, watch it covetously within the chaos.

Levi felt the darkness tighten around him. Trying to envelop him, devour him.

But he, who had previously only wished for everything to end, now only wanted to look at it longer.

Watch it until the very end.

Oh, how beautiful it was.

But it wasn't his.

He felt himself fading within the noise.

But then, he heard it weakly call out to him.

Soft and quiet, yet its voice was so resonant that his heart could hear it clearly even through the noise.

It was like flickering candlelight in the night. The shadows crowded around it, wishing to engulf it. Yet it bravely stood its ground, refusing to be extinguished.

It edged closer and closer to him.

So close, yet so far.

Closer, almost within reach.

And then, finally, he felt its touch. So warm, so soft, so perfect.

The moment it enveloped Levi, it was as if something exploded within him. The deafening noise turned into silence. The shadows that pulled him into the abyss suddenly lost their strength.