Chapter 29 - Did I?

"It's been a while, to me it was like a few hundreds of yous. To you, it was what? a few dozens of years?" I floated in the absolute void, Lucifer at my side. Lucifer's eyebrow raised sizing up the woman before him... he never saw anything like this.

"DC Lucifer is also with you? Well, this is a shock, I honestly was this. I'm not trying to make his father angry... so Lucifer, how about you step aside and allow me to kill this son of bitch?" She said with a relaxed smile. Lucifer was about to speak, but I stopped him, telling him to go back to the verse behind me

"With him, you had a chance to defeat me... then again, Lucifer's power is heavily tied to being under his daddy's control." She said lightly, causing Lucifer's eyes to slowly turn cold, he glared at her and the girl smirked at him, daring him to come at her.

"I will handle her," I said, my voice turning slightly harsher. Lucifer paused to look at me, before disappearing, leaving me to face off against her.

"You had a small chance to win, I mean you're barely High 1-B... you're so weak." She said mockingly, to which I said nothing while looking simply looking at her.

"Well, I don't want to waste my time with you. I have a life to get to, once you're gone I could return to it and be happy." She said lightly while appearing before me, her palm stabbing straight through my source, she tried to destroy it all... just to pause realizing that trying to destroy me was only making me stronger. But she sneered, completely destorying my source, and lapped her hands watching my body crump away.

"... I would have enjoyed giving you a slow painful death, but I don't want to give you any more power over me." She said lightly, before turning around to fly off... just to pause as my palm rested upon her shoulder.

"Can we speak?" I asked calmly. Her head snapped back towards me, not understanding how I was alive. After all, I was destroyed concept and all, I shouldn't be alive.

"Y-you overcame your own destruction?" She asked using her cosmic awareness to get that knowledge, and she was stunned as she never heard anything like that.

"Did you really think destorying my source was enough to make me die?" I asked lightly, to which She grabbed me, using her power to conclude my existence... and with that I disappeared, returning to the nothingness we all came from... but I just popped up.

"I didn't destroy you!" She screamed, her eyes turning bloodshot.

"Did you think by not destorying me, you can end me?" I asked calmly. What happened was simple, her power could be seen as destruction, just taking a new form and shape. What she was pretty much doing was destorying my future, trying to conclude my story instantly, therefor she destroyed me, and therefore I came return from my conclusion. 

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" She roared, channeling all of her power to throw me into the deepest part of the end, levels where she tried her best to ensure I couldn't come out from... but I popped up once more, so she there me back into the end once more... just for me to pop up.

This went on for hours until she gave up, relaxing she was only making me stronger. 

"What the fuck are you!" She roared, unable to comprehend what to do. How do you deal with something or someone you couldn't kill, destroy, or end?

"Your father..." I said in a soft voice... and my words pushed her over the edge. She shot towards me, raining blow after blow upon my face, her attacks landing faster than I could suffer the injuries. 

"You're not my dad, you selfish son of a bitch! You Killed her! You fucking killed her!" She roared, the rage and hatred she felt fueling every punch. In the end, she grabbed my shorts, her eyes burning with hatred since my injuries had healed in the blink of an eye.

"I see... so long as I don't destroy you, and simply have you use up all of your energy, you will die." She said seeing through my weakness. And Yup, that was the only way to kill me. Once I was out of energy, I couldn't bring myself back to life. And if one didn't destroy my source, I couldn't overcome my own destruction, therefor I shall remain dead.

So, she began beating me to death, every blow needing a hot amount of magical power to heal from, but through it all I made no attempts to fight back, simply looking at her while remembering the root of her hatred towards me.

Flash Back

In my past life, one would find a beautiful white-haired woman. A weird sight on earth, for the hair looked as if she was born with it, and she was pretty young, so the hair wasn't thanks to old age. She was waiting in line to order some Starbucks before she headed off to work... this was my wife, 

"Hey... I know this is weird and all, but I couldn't help but notice you. You're the most beautiful woman I have ever seen, and I would regret it all my life if I didn't come to at least speak to you." A young man in a suit said, trying his best to give her a charming smile.

Niente, my wife, looked at him for some time, her eyes locked on the guy's smile... and she was moved. The more she looked at him, the more she knew what she had been missing out in life. Ignoring the guy, she quickly rushed outside where her car was waiting for her.

She jumped inside, and quickly drove home, where she found my past life self working with a wooden statue. I was using a knife, skillfully chipping away at the wood, slowly bringing to life the image of a lion. In this life, I had grayish-pale hair, another thing that wasn't normal.

"What's wrong?" Without a hint of emotion, I removed my headphones. I was listening to a novel on the subject of love, something which I had gotten into as late. I looked towards my wife, wondering why she had that shy and uneasy look.

"Well... I was waiting in line to get my coffee when this guy came to me and smiled... it made me notice how I never got to see you smile at anything but yourself." She said lightly,

"... What I'm just trying to say... well, can you smile at me? It doesn't have to be real. It can be fake... I just want to see you smile for me once..." She said, leaving me stunned as I had never seen her so sigh. I couldn't help but pause as I realized this matter might be important to her. 

Remembering her family background, and the stories on the subject of love I have been reading, I understood that a male and a female needs were different. A woman needs reinsurance that they are loved, that's why gifts and such small things are so important for them... but my wife never asked for such things and never cared for them, this was her first ever request for me, and I didn't know how to react since I didn't know if I could give her what she asked for.

I tried to smile, I put all my power into it. I tried to even give her a fake smile, but my muscles just wouldn't move in the way I wished they would. She watched all of this with a look of disappointment before she forced a smile.

"It's alright, you don't need to force yourself to do something for my sake... well, I should get going to work." She said with a smile, before walking off, leaving me just standing there while touching my face. I wanted to run after her, and reassure her that I loved her... but I was ashamed. Shamed at the first that the only thing she asked from me, I failed to deliver to her.

I sat down, lost in deep thought. My mind racing with the worst possibilities that could fall from this... such as her leaving me for someone else who could smile at her. I knew my wife, but I also knew that cheating could just happen at the moment....

I didn't want to go into too much detail, but what followed was me divorcing her. It wasn't because I was scared of being cheated on... no, In fact, I was doing something I read in a book. If you love something, set it free... so I set her free. I didn't want her to be with someone who couldn't give her the one thing she wanted... but she begged me nonstop to not go through with it. My daughter, seeing the mess her mother was falling into hate tried to understand why I was doing this to her.

I handled things poorly, she was a kid at the time, so I tried to go around it, but this caused my daughter to grow to hate me... and that hatred grew into something else after her mother took her own life. She came to abhor me, and that grew with every passing day when she started to realize that she was the only one in the world who cared that her mother died.

No one came to her funeral, it was just her. At home, she never saw me show any sign of missing her, and not even a single family member on her mother's side ever reached out... so in the end, she snapped.

"Did you ever love her?" My daughter, Zoey asked coldly, standing before my office table. I looked at her for some time, before looking down, unable to look her in the eyes. I mean how could I? I thought I was doing what was for the best, but all it did was hurt those dear to me.

Did I love her? In the past, I would have said yes without a second thought, but I wasn't so sure anyone. Did I love her if I could hurt her the way I did? Why did I push her away if I loved her? If I loved her, why wasn't I crying or showing that I cared that she was gone?

"... I don't know," I said lightly, I didn't know why I said that...

"YOU'RE A JERK, SHE LOVED YOU. SHE GAVE YOU EVERYTHING, YET YOU COULDN'T GIVE A SHIT THAT YOU KILLED HER." Zoey screamed through tears. The feeling of being the only one that cared was eating her alive,

"She gave you her all, she had no life without you, and you pushed her away... why?" Zoey asked through tears.

"... I don't know anymore," I said lightly, and seeing my unchanging look... she didn't know what came over her, but she attacked me, exploding with unknown power that instantly killed me... and that's how I died.

I fully believe I deserved it, why did I divorce her? Out of fear, she would leave me? Out of love? I don't even know, I can't remember the headspace I was within that day, but one thing is for sure, I was a bad father... and for that reason, I would not fight back against her.