It would've saved him this headache, that's for certain.

Luce strolled into the old castle. The demons immediately shifted out of his way, the crowd parting like he was Moses and they were the Red Sea.

He wished he could drown them all, the pathetic excuse for an army.

Luce always demanded they come to him in human form, but most now stood around with their true nature exposed, their eerie ugliness displayed for all to see. How easily they forget themselves.

"My Lord," a demon said, one of the few that looked like a mortal, the lone soul brave enough to step into his path and address him. Brave, or is it stupid? The demon bowed his head out of respect. "Welcome back."

Luce pushed past the creature, not bothering with a response, as he made his way straight through to the golden throne. He plopped down on the seat, glaring, eyes taking in the sea of monsters, as he motioned toward the large double doors. "Get out."

They didn't waver, pushing and shoving to get out of the room, not wanting to face the wrath they could hear in his voice. The creature that had addressed him lingered, eyeing Luce curiously, as he took a few hesitant steps away.

"You," Lucifer said, pointing at him. "What do they call you?"

"Volac," the demon said.

"You take Lire's post while he's on sabbatical," Luce said. "Keep the others out of my hair, and inform me when Michael closes in."

"Yes, My Lord," the demon said, bowing. "Anything you wish."

Luce waved him away. "Now go."

He sat there, trying to hold everything inside, as he waited for the castle to clear out, for the creatures to take leave, before exploding. Energy purged from him in waves, the ground shaking like an earthquake struck, the sheer force of it enough to blow out what was left of the old stained glass windows. The glass shattered into millions of tiny fragments, sending them flying for miles like jagged bullets, slicing and dicing everything they struck. Blackness overtook the castle, the sky above a mass of dark clouds, lightning flashing as rain pelted the earth around it, incited by his bitter rage.

Luce's eyes stung.

He once told Serah he could cry, but that he didn't. After all, what would Satan have to cry about? Nothing.

But nobody ever said he was honest.

No matter how hard he fought it back, tears fell from his eyes, the bitter, salty wetness staining his cheeks, fueling his aggression. This was how it had to go—she was a sacrifice he had to make, collateral damage in his quest for retaliation—but this wasn't how it was supposed to end.

He wasn't supposed to lose it all.

She wasn't supposed to mean so much to him.

Luce destroyed the castle in his rampage, bringing the medieval structure to its knees, as the other towers toppled around it like dominos. Built for a king, but it was no match for the King of Hell when he unleashed the beast. It crumpled, the stone turning to dust, blown away by the hurricane-force winds his fury stirred up.

He didn't stop there.

The ground around it was annihilated as if ravished by tornado, trees uprooted, life ruined. He would bring down half the world if it meant eradicating these feelings. He hopped from place to place, destroying, desolating, and pummeling towns to nothing before moving on to the next. Over and over, it went on for hours, one day morphing into the next. He apparated back to the remote area deep in the middle of Europe around dawn, the same place his rampage started, where the castle once stood.

Or rather, where the castle still stood.

The structure was back in place, tall and sturdy, exactly as it had been before he demolished it. Even the stained glass was once more in tact. He glared at it, his tears long ago dried up, his rage waning to exhaustion.

His Father was cleaning up his messes again.

Everything he harmed, everything he killed was brought right back to life, healed and fixed as if he hadn't tainted it. As if he hadn't touched it.

Everything except for her.

The world reset, the slate wiped clean again and again, but Serah was still gone, lost to him.

"Why?" he screamed, so loud everything around him shook again. "What do you want from me?"

An orange glow swaddled the land with warmth and brightness as the sun started to rise. As Luce's voice echoed through the sky, flowers popped up through the grass around him, blooming as if to send a message. The pinkish-purple stalks blanketed the land, a peculiar unpleasant odor filling the air.

Grimacing, Luce reached down and yanked a stalk from the ground. Cleome serrulata. Spider Flower. The last time he saw one, Serah had brought it with her to the gate and held it through the barrier for him. It had been the first time he touched her, the first time he felt that tingle beneath his skin, the tightening of his chest that he knew she felt, too.

The memory of that afternoon struck him hard, worming its way through his skull no matter how hard he tried to forget it, his own words haunting him. He couldn't escape it.

“Our Father offered more freedom to it than he did us," he told her, staring at the devious plant through the gate. "This thing does what it wants with no regard, grows where flowers aren’t supposed to grow, takes over fields and smothers everything else that lives there, killing it, and yet it’s hailed as one of His magnificent creations. A fucking plant is given more leniency than me.”

“A plant doesn’t think," she said. "It doesn’t make conscious decisions.”

“And what about mortals? His beloved humans, His favorite creation. He absolves them for everything as long as they ask. Why wasn’t I shown that same mercy? I wasn’t even given the chance to apologize.”