Aether… to be honest, he was literally taken aback by her revelations.
She crafted her children?
Really?
What’s more… She didn’t even flinch.
No remorse, no guilt for the people she had killed or tortured along the way.
It wasn’t just cruelty… she was a completely lost cause.
Aether, of course, had started to understand her—at least, to an extent. He could now grasp fragments of her twisted logic. But to put it in simple, undeniable words:
She was an insane woman!!
And if she could do all this now… what if one day she did this to his children? What if she hurt them? What if she decided they, too, were expendable for her goals? She was unpredictable, unhinged—dangerously so!
‘So all this time… it was a facade?’ Aether wondered silently, his chest tightening with disappointment.
The smile she wore, the affection she showed, the warmth she gave to Selene and to him—was all of it just an act?
So even when she held him… cared for him… it had just been a performance?
Something twisted in Aether’s heart.
They say once you know someone deeply, truly, you begin to feel the weight of their hidden truths.
You start to see the cracks.
Aether felt that now—painful, suffocating, and heavy.
‘Maybe… I need time… to think,’ he thought, his mind spinning. He couldn’t just accept a woman who might be insane.
A woman who could hurt his other women—all in the name of her research, her obsession.
It was too dangerous… too cruel.
Just as he took a step back, ready to put some distance between them…
Drip…
A tear.
No—not from him…. And not from her?
It was the tear.
Aether remembered it… that day when she left him. When she walked away, abandoning him for her family… she had shed a single tear.
Just one.
But it had been for him. Only for him.
That image burned in his memory. Even if she left, even if she chose others over him… that tear had been genuine.
A real, raw sadness… A moment where her broken mask slipped and he saw something real.
Even if everything else had been a performance, even if her love was fractured, that tear felt real.
So real that it ached inside his chest.
Aether stared at the mad woman before him—the one who looked like she expected him to turn his back and flee. Instead, he reached out telepathically to Selene. /Tell me something… your mother… what do you truly feel about her? Honestly./
/…/ Sensing the heaviness in his voice, the usual playful questions in Selene’s mind faded. She replied quietly, without hesitation, /I love her./
Aether blinked, taking in a slow, deep breath. That was all he needed to hear.
He turned his eyes back to Xara, his gaze now heavy with emotion, no longer filled with fear.
Xara, who had been grinning wildly moments ago—feeding off his dread—now blinked in confusion, clearly startled by his shift in energy.
Aether glanced around the room slowly, his voice low and grave as he muttered, “I don’t know… I really don’t understand the things happening here… or what exactly you’re trying to achieve… Maybe I never will. After all, I’m not like you.”
His eyes roamed over the blood-stained floor, the scattered instruments, then paused at the long transparent tube—his gaze lingering there for several seconds. Finally, he looked back at her and continued, “But there’s one thing I do know… no matter how twisted you’ve become… no matter how chaotic your mind is… when you were with your children… You loved them.
I could see that.”
“N-No… I-I didn’t—” Xara stammered, shaking her head violently, trying to refute his words. But he cut through her denial.
“You loved me.”
Aether stepped forward, his voice unwavering. Xara flinched, taking an unconscious step back.
With a firm, piercing gaze, Aether said, “That time… that tear… you shed it for me. I saw it. I felt it.
It was real…. You can lie to me all you want… but I know that was genuine.”
“NO, I NOT!!” Xara suddenly screamed, her voice trembling as veins popped on her forehead. She clenched her fists, shaking. Why? Why wouldn’t this man understand?
Why did he see through her?
She fucked up.
Really… she had.
And yet…
“Not? Let’s assume everything you’re saying is true…”
“IT’S TRUE!!” Xara snapped, her voice rising with desperation.
“Fine,” Aether said coolly, his eyes narrowing, “let’s say everything you’ve told me is true… then answer me this—why are you still here?”
“H-Huh?” Xara blinked in confusion.
“Why are you even trying to prove anything to me?” Aether asked, his tone laced with skepticism. “Why do you still care about your children? Weren’t they just test subjects to you? Experiments? Then why… why do you protect them?”
Her eyes trembled, visibly shaken, searching for an answer—as if digging through layers of herself, trying to come up with something, anything to say.
“Acting like a mother?” Aether offered, giving her a place to start.
Xara blinked, then smiled faintly and nodded. “Y-Yeah—”
However—
“Let’s leave your children out of this for a moment,” Aether cut her off, his voice firmer now. “What about me?”
Her lips parted slightly, confused.
“A stranger,” he continued, stepping forward, “a boy who just stumbled into your life… Why do you care about me? Why would you throw everything away—just for me? Why?”
Xara instinctively stepped back, her feet moving on their own until her back hit the blackboard with a soft thud.
She froze.
“And more than that…” Aether stepped closer, his voice lowering but intensifying, “Why are you trying to show your vulnerable side… to me? You could’ve shut me out at any moment. All you needed to do was say the word, just once, and I would have walked away from this place forever.”
He leaned in slightly, eyes sharp. “And yet… you kept showing me… piece after piece of your soul. Your twisted thoughts, your ugly truths. Like… like you wanted me to see. Like you needed someone to know the real you.
Like you wanted me to see the worst… and hate you for it.”
“!!” Xara flinched. A subtle tremble rippled through her, as if his last words had struck some deeply buried nerve.
Aether didn’t miss it. That moment—fleeting, raw. He frowned slightly, his thoughts racing.
‘Log… I need your help right now. I know you’ve seen her past. You know more than me. Just give me something—anything. One point. That’s all I need to understand her. Was she afraid? Was she spiraling? Was she broken? I just need… one thread to pull… please,’ he pleaded inwardly.
He could feel it in his gut—this was the moment. If he let it pass, if he left her now… he might lose her forever. She might never return to him.
Might never let anyone this close again.
[….]
[… When she was little… Her parents were disgusted by her secret.]
Aether stiffened.
Wait… her parents?
He had never really thought about them before.
Never asked.
Her parents… disgusted by her secret?
What did that even mean?
Xara had shown them her truth—whatever it was.
She had hoped, perhaps foolishly, to be accepted. Loved. But instead, they looked at her with revulsion?
So she hid it?
She began hiding her true self… and instead, wore masks.
The person people wanted her to be… So others would like her?
So her children would love her?
So someone… anyone… would stay?
Aether blinked, overwhelmed. So many questions, emotions—only Xara could answer them now.
“I… I would never hat—” he started to speak, his voice softer now, reaching out toward her heart.
But before he could finish—
Xara clamped her hands over her ears and screamed, “I AM NOT NORMAL!! PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE!!!”
Her body trembled violently. As if she weren’t in this room anymore. As if she were reliving something no one else could see. A memory too painful, too dark, too deep to explain.
She was breaking.
Right in front of him.