Chapter 43: Confronting the Pain
Elian Thorne felt an illusion of scorching heat blaze through his veins—boiling blood, a heart hammering against his ribs like a war drum gone berserk. The world detonated around him in sensory overload. Whales wailed high-pitched laments that vibrated in his molars, mountains crumbled in overlapping avalanches of granite and regret, tsunamis taller than skyscrapers surged toward him. Even his own existence crackled with newfound, terrifying electricity! But the searing agony began to recede as abruptly as it struck. Though serpentine flame patterns still glowed on Elian’s and Lucian Reed’s cheeks, the air he sucked into his lungs morphed into crystalline clarity—cool, refreshing, utterly devoid of the earlier torment. Silas Locke’s voice sliced through the silence like a shiv: "Lock
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