My Family in the Novel?

Chapter 221: Father and Son 3

As the tip of my sword hovered perilously close to his neck, the air crackled with tension. A few centimeters more, and I would have severed his head from his shoulders.

"What are you doing?" I demanded, my voice trembling with a mixture of anger and uncertainty.

Despite the imminent threat to his life, he remained eerily calm, his eyes closed in a serene acceptance. It was baffling; as a master swordsman, he could have easily redirected my attack with a mere flick of his wrist.

Yet, he chose not to, resigning himself to his fate.

"Adrian!" Aria's voice pierced through the silence, her shock palpable as she stood beside me, witnessing the rapid escalation of events.

A sizzling sound filled the air, and I watched in astonishment as wisps of smoke began to rise from his neck.

The radiant heat emanating from the holy sword had ignited a reaction, scorching his skin with its divine power. Just a fraction more pressure, and I could have ended his treachery then and there.

The realization of how close I had come to delivering some weird sense of pride and justice sent a shiver down my spine.

Yet, even in the face of imminent danger, he remained composed, a testament to his unwavering resolve.

But as I stood there, sword poised to strike, I couldn't help but wonder—was vengeance truly the answer?

Would it bring me the closure I so desperately sought, or would it only deepen the wounds of the past?

'I don't even know what exactly happened to the two if them in the first place... as far as I knew my mother was just a stranger... yet why am I so mad?'

"Do you hate me, Adrian?" His voice cut through the charged atmosphere, his eyes slowly opening to regard me with a sense of detachment that chilled me to the bone. It was as though the chaos unfolding around us was merely a trivial inconvenience, insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Why did he bother asking such a question?

In that moment, I felt torn. Did I hate him? The knee-jerk reaction screamed 'yes,' but upon closer inspection, I realized the truth was far more complicated.

After all, was I truly Adrian? A part of me was beginning to merge with his essence, but I was still distinct, still separate.

The feelings I harbored towards him were a maelstrom of emotions—anger, resentment, confusion—tinged with a glimmer of something else.

As I hesitated, unsure of how to respond, I felt a wave of exhaustion wash over me.

The weight of the holy sword in my hand suddenly felt burdensome, a physical manifestation of the turmoil within me.

With a resigned sigh, I sheathed the sword—or rather, watched as it dissipated into thin air, leaving me empty-handed.

"No... no, I don't," I finally answered, my voice barely above a whisper. Turning away from him, I made my way back to my seat, sinking down with a heavy heart.

I couldn't bring myself to meet his gaze, the conflict raging within me still too raw, too overwhelming to confront head-on.

In that moment, I was acutely aware of the tangled web of emotions swirling within me—both familiar and foreign, comforting and unsettling all at once.

As I grappled with the turmoil in my mind, I couldn't help but feel a sense of profound confusion creeping in, the boundaries between Adrian's past and my present blurring with each passing moment.

This was getting dangerous.

[Warning...!]

[Warning...!]

The warnings flashed relentlessly, urging me to regain control of my fraying emotions. Each notification felt like a jab, a reminder of the precarious situation I found myself in.

Fuck this assimilation...

'When are you going to let me completely devour you, Adrian'

I thought that he's soul was gone back at the academy but now it's resurfacing back...

The merging of our identities had become a relentless tug-of-war, a battle for dominance that threatened to consume us both.

I couldn't help but scoff at the irony of it all. Being emotional had never been my forte, yet here I was, drowning in a sea of conflicting feelings that I couldn't begin to untangle.

[Warning...!]

[Users persona is shaking]

[Warning...!]

'Yeah, yeah...' I muttered under my breath, swatting away the incessant warnings like pesky insects.

The blue screens that kept popping up only served to exacerbate my growing irritation.

For now, I knew I needed to calm down, to regain some semblance of control before things spiraled even further out of hand.

"Adrian, are you alright?" Aria's voice cut through the haze of my thoughts, her concern evident as she approached me cautiously. But seeing the troubled expression on my face, she halted in her tracks, choosing instead to take her seat.

"Yeah, I'm fine... sorry for scaring you," I replied, though the words felt hollow even to my own ears.

"Seriously, what should I do with you?" her exasperation was tempered by the warmth in her eyes, a testament to the love that bound us together.

"Hehehe, Aunt, you look like poop," my innocent teasing earned me a playful swat on the head, a testament to our closeness.

And then, the memory shifted, darkening like storm clouds on the horizon.

"I'm sorry," her voice trembled with emotion, tears glistening in her ashen gray eyes that mirrored my own.

"Please don't leave, Aunt Siena...!" I pleaded, my heart aching with the fear of abandonment as she slowly turned away, disappearing into the shadows of my past.

The pain of that moment was still raw, a wound that refused to heal despite the passage of time.

Memories regarding Siena seemed to resurface as heart clenched with every scene in my mind.

Tears involuntarily escaped my eyes... hahaa I really am becoming Adrian now.

"This was the last thing Siena, your aunt, left me with before she left you with me," the Duke's voice echoed with a solemnity that sent shivers down my spine.

His words hung heavy in the air, each syllable laden with a weight I couldn't fully comprehend.

As he spoke, I could feel the tendrils of destiny tightening around me, binding me to a fate I had never asked for.

"It is proof, a token that you belong to my house," he continued, his tone measured and deliberate.

"Right now, your very blood is being bound tight into this ring, binding you to the family of Tellus. I gave it to you when you were young, knowing full well you wouldn't know its meaning. And I was right, as you just chose to neglect it."

Suddenly, his hands clenched into fists, and a crackling surge of electricity danced across his palms.

My heart skipped a beat as I watched in horror, convinced that he had destroyed the ring in a fit of rage.

But to my astonishment, as he opened his hands, the ring remained unscathed, gleaming defiantly in the dim light of the room.

With a swift motion, he tossed the ring to me, and I caught it reflexively, my fingers closing around its familiar weight.

"Adrian Vulter Tellus, from this moment forth, you are no longer a Tellus," his words reverberated in the silence, final and irrevocable. "I hereby excommunicate you from the family... You are free now."

"...."

"...."

'HUH?'

Even Aria was making the same confused face as me.

As he rose from his seat, a sense of finality settled over the room like a shroud.

Then after that.

He, spoke of his plans to stay for a few more days, to discuss matters beyond the boundaries of the holy kingdom and to address my newfound role as the hero, a delegate of the empire.

As the door clicked shut behind him, leaving me alone in the suffocating silence of the room, a whirlwind of questions churned in my mind, each more bewildering than the last.

Why the hell did he just do that?

Excommunicate me?

What the actual hell?

Why the fuck would he suddenly do that?

Is he even allowed to do that?

Doesn't such a drastic action require some sort of official decree or validation?

Even if he's the duke... but still!

And what about the emperor's orders to sway me?

Wasn't I supposed to be his pawn in some grand political game?

But then, why did he wear such a satisfied expression in the end? Sure, he may have tried to hide it behind his usual stoic facade, but I could see right through him.

There was a sense of triumph in his demeanor, a smugness that irked me to no end.

Am I supposed to feel relieved?

Happy, even?

Damn it, I'm more confused now than ever before.

And why the hell is he just leaving like that? Walking out as if nothing out of the ordinary just happened, as if he didn't just sever ties with his own blood? It's infuriating!

I slammed my fist against the nearest surface, frustration boiling over in a surge of anger and confusion.