"It's been a while since I've done this, let's hope it works," The voice trailing into Haruki's ears woke him up from a deep slumber.
Through his muddled vision, he noticed a hand extending towards him. Reaching out to this stranger, he propped himself on his feet. As his vision began to clear up, he was met with the familiar face of Moriyana Malice.
"What's happening?" He asked, perplexed by his strange whereabouts.
"In your memories," Grabbing his hand, she guided him further, "The contract disavows the mistress of lust to harm you in any way, be it physical or emotional."
"Who are you really? And why are you telling me this?" At this point in time, Haruki's patience has run dry. The constant plunging into the unknown only to be spat out without any answers, would've had that effect on anyone.
"I'm one of your kind, your true kind, Haruki, and as for your later question…" Passing through a meadow of tulips, Moriyana stopped in her tracks upon reaching a barren field. "I'm your guide through these memories since the mistress can't go against the terms of the contract."
"What does any of this even mean?!" He yelled, jerking his hand out of his grip. "The hell are you talking about?! Who the hel-"
Haruki's words strayed away as Moriyana directed him toward a grave. The head of the deceased slightly poking out, left Haruki in a horrid sense of despair.
"Remember who that is?" Moriyana mumbled.
"M-mother? No…no…nonono," The face of his late mother drove him to tears. Falling down to his knees his heartbeat began to soar. "No…she's, how?"
"The pain you feel at the moment is the reason the mistress couldn't accompany you here, but I suppose that's irrelevant to you at the moment." Snapping her fingers, Moriyana changed the scenery around them in an instant.
Realizing what had happened, Haruki looks around to find himself in a military base. The very first thing that caught his attention was a burly man with almond hair fencing with an armoured instructor.
"Where are we now?" Getting back up, he turned to Moriyana.
"Visiting the most influential memories of your life, don't worry, even if you don't want to look, I'll force feed them back into you once we're done with this hell," Somehow her reply made even less sense than he'd expected.
"Then why are we even here? Why not just do it?!" He complained growling at her.
"I can, but mistresses promised you a punishment, remember?" Her words were followed by a scream from one of the men fencing together.
Haruki looked back at them wondering what had happened. Having defeated the man on the ground, the instructor was offering him a hand to get back up.
"You've improved a lot since last time Haruki," The instructor commended.
"I'm nowhere close to you Sir Michael," The man replied, taking his hand to get off of the dirt.
Before Haruki even got a moment to process the information, Moriyana snapped her fingers to change the scenery once again. Still trying to piece together what he had heard, Haruki looked on in horror through thin air.
"Was that me? Before all this?" Slowly turning to Moriyana, he was desperate for an answer.
"It sure was, fencing with the biggest hurdle to our plans," Placing her fingers by her lips, she gestured him to shut up. "Watch what happens next."
Standing completely still in a dark forest, something passed right over their head. Haruki scanned for whatever it may have been, but it was too swift to be caught by the naked eyes.
Moriyana grabbed his hand again and started moving towards a clearing. There they ran into a rowdy bunch of bandits, drinking as they feasted their eyes on the spoils from their plunder.
A bit further back was a lit-up carriage that highlighted the presence of two people inside it. One a man, the other an unfortunate woman desperately howling for help. The instinct rooted deep inside Haruki flared up at the deplorable sight.
"We need to help her," He said through muffled breaths.
Her suffering pained his heart to the point of physical abhorrence towards the bandits.
"You did help her, but your companions had some other plans," Saying that she blinked twice and time began to pass in a rush.
As swiftly as the wind a group of imperial soldiers assassinated the drunken bandits. One of which happened to be Haruki himself. However, as the leader of the battalion went into the carriage to kill the man inside, something horrific unfolded before Haruki's eyes.
"He raped her too," Moriyana revealed as the light flickering inside the carriage painted a horrific picture.
Even as Haruki's past self tried to intervene, he was quickly shot down by the other two soldiers. When he kept trying to get them off of him to help the girl, the female mage of the battalion restrained him with vines of fire through her magic.
"What the fuck are these monsters doing?!" He screamed right before the leader's silhouette drove a sword through the unfortunate victim. "How can there be such monsters amongst the royal guards?!"
"It's quite simple really, the girl inside isn't a human. She's one of the shunned, that is to say, a demi-human girl," Moriyana' s tone had grown a bit dreamy, almost as if she was tired from the whole thing. "Do you wish to keep going? Or is that enough punishment?"
"What happens next?" Shattered by what he had witnessed, Haruki felt repulsed by whatever misery was waiting for him.
"More deaths, more lies, more corruption, more wars, and eventually having it all blamed on you simply for the convenience of clearing a noble's name," Looking down straight into Haruki's eyes, Moriyana broke into a giggling smile. "Why don't I show you something more interesting? Something that'll refuel that burning rage you once had?"
"What do you mean?" He couldn't fathom what kind of torture this monster had in store for him.
"That boy, Snow, was it? Do you know who he is? Who he really is?" Her gaze turned a grueling crimson while she stared right into Haruki's soul. "Let me show you why you can never trust royalties."
With a soul-gutting cackle, she snapped her fingers, changing the scene once again.