Chapter 36: Live or Die? (2/2)?Not even a flicker of recognition crossed her features, not the slightest indication she had heard him speak.?He nudged her shoulder with one gloved finger—nothing, not a start of surprise nor a flinch of fear. The contact produced no more reaction than if he had touched a statue. ?Frowning, Lucien crouched down before her, his tall frame folding with that inhuman grace, bringing himself to her eye level. ?She only continued to stare, her gaze fixed somewhere far beyond the entrance or exit of this dungeon, or perhaps lost in the pce where he had interrogated Branks before—the past, the present, the possible futures that had been violently torn from her reach. ?All traces of hope had vanished from her expression, leaving behind only a terrible vacancy, as though whatever had made her herself had fled, leaving only an empty shell.?Looking at her situation...?Her spirit's already broken... Lucien thought. ?That meant the only thing keeping her alive must have been the desperate hope her parents still lived. ?Now—with that hope shattered—what was left? ?Should he just end it all for her? Set her free by force? ?But that's not my style, nor the reason I came to save her.?Straightening to his full height, he folded his arms across his chest, the fabric of his coat rustling softly. ?BANG!?He smmed his fist against one of the gss cylinders lining the wall, shattering it entirely. The container exploded in a shower of razor-sharp fragments and glowing liquid that hissed and steamed where it touched the stone floor. ?The phosphorescent substance spttered across nearby surfaces, illuminating everything in sickly green light that made Lucien's pale skin appear corpse-like and the half-ogre's yellow eyes shine with eerie intensity.?A loud crash echoed through the room, reverberating off stone walls and ceiling, multiplying into a cacophony that seemed to physically disturb the stagnant air. ?The sound penetrated where words could not—finally, she blinked. Just slightly, the barest flicker of movement, but it was there, the first sign that somewhere inside, something still lived.?"Is this it?" Lucien's voice was sharper than steel, cutting through the silence that followed the crash. "You're just going to let them win?"?She still said nothing, but something infinitesimal shifted in her posture—her shoulders tensing almost imperceptibly, her fingers twitching against her knees. ?He leaned closer, his towering frame casting her in shadow as the amber light from the remaining cylinders caught the edges of his silhouette. ?His crimson eyes burned with an intensity that seemed to pierce through the gloom, reflecting in the tears still clinging to her shes. ?"Listen to me," he said, "They sughtered your mother like an animal. They hung her body for all to see, a warning, a spectacle." His voice dropped even lower, intimate in its cruelty. "They burned your father alive. His screams echoed through these very halls while they took notes on how long it took him to die."?A muscle in the half-ogre's jaw twitched, almost imperceptibly, the first sign that his words were penetrating the protective fog of her despair.?"Not because of anything you did," he continued, one gloved finger tapping against the stone floor for emphasis, the sound sharp and staccato in the hushed chamber. "But because they needed to believe someone like you can't have a pce in this world." He paused, his head tilting slightly, allowing the brutal words to hang in the air like poison gas, seeping into her consciousness. ?"You think pain ends if you just disappear? That's what they want. They want you to vanish—meek, helpless, broken. Is that how you honor your parents' memory?"?Still, silence greeted him. But—her hands, which had been limp against her knees, curled ever so slightly into trembling fists, the knuckles whitening with pressure. ?A vein pulsed at her temple, visible beneath the translucent skin, pumping blood that carried both human and ogre heritage.?The remaining gss cylinders along the wall seemed to pulse in sympathy, their glow intensifying then fading in an almost heartbeat rhythm?"If you die here now," his voice roughened, "their deaths mean nothing. The experiments, the torture, the executions—just footnotes for their ledgers.?"The world keeps spinning, cruel and rotten as ever. But you?" His hand rose, hovering near her horn without touching it, tracing its spiral in the air. "You carry their blood. You embody everything they tried to destroy. You can make them remember your family's names in fear."?His lips pulled back slightly, revealing the hint of fangs beneath. "You can make every scream they forced from you come back to haunt them. Justice? Maybe." His shoulders lifted in a barely perceptible shrug. "Vengeance? Absolutely."?A single drop of blood from a cut on the half-ogre's cheek traced a path downward, thicker and darker than human tears. ?Her yellow eyes, which had been so vacant, flickered with something—a spark trying to ignite in wet tinder, struggling but present.?Lucien stood abruptly, unfolding to his full height in one fluid motion. ?"Don't you want to see them beg for mercy like you did?" The question cracked through the air like a whip, each word emphasized with razor-sharp crity. ?"Don't you want to hear their pleas echo off these same walls? Don't you want to carve your pain into their memories, so it never fades?" His hands spread wide. ?"Tears alone will never save the world—or yourself. But fury? Fury might. Revenge is life—if you have nothing left, let that be your reason to keep living."?Something flickered behind the half-ogre's eyes. ?Her breathing, which had been shallow and irregur, deepened slightly. ?With a grace that belied his size, Lucien knelt before her again. ?"Choose," he said, his voice gentler now but no less unyielding, like steel wrapped in velvet. "You can wither here, forgotten, another nameless victim in their holy crusade.?"Or you can rise with me and make the world regret what they did to you. What will you become? The grave they shoveled for you..." His eyes locked with hers, crimson meeting amber in the dim light. ?"...or the storm that breaks their world apart?"?While Lucien kept his eyes fixed on the half-ogre woman, calmly offering the devil's pn, inwardly—if he were still human—his ears would have gone red. ?Damn! That's cringe as fuck. He clicked his tongue in embarrassment, the sharp sound echoing against the damp stone walls of the underground chamber. ?His gloved fingers flexed unconsciously against his thigh as he struggled to maintain his composure. ?This time, however, he noticed that the half-ogre woman reacted just as before: she only blinked, her yellowed, reptilian eyes widening for just a heartbeat—a hint of surprise flickering and dying—before settling back into that same dazed emptiness, her single horn catching the sickly light as she swayed slightly on her feet.?Lucien's eyebrows fell, dark and heavy over his glowing red eyes, and he sighed in disappointment.?Ah, this is a waste of time… I just want another companion, he thought, watching her reaction with pupils contracting to thin needles. ?The sad truth was that the two fallen nobles in the manor were far too complicated as companions for exploring this new world. ?One was overly ambitious, and the other harbored deep-seated resentment against vampires. ?Who knew if Lyra might foolishly run to the church seeking redemption, exposing his existance? ?On the other hand, who could tell if Era was plotting behind his back—perhaps waiting to sell him out to the empire, or even devising another scheme, something deeper that would eventually ruin his experience of this new world??That was why, when he sensed the familiar weakness and hopelessness in the half-ogre woman—saw it in the slump of her powerful yet delicate shoulders, in the way her pearlescent skin seemed to absorb rather than reflect the eerie light—he also saw potential. ?Perhaps she could become a reliable companion. ?After all, she fit everything—a missing home, and a reason to live. Only the will for revenge could ignite her desire to survive. So the probability of her betraying him, or doing something like that, was low.?At least, that had been his hope. ?But now, looking at her vacant state, the way her tattered dress hung limply from her frame, it seemed impossible. His frock coat creaked softly as he shifted his weight, preparing to turn away.?Meanwhile,?…Revenge??But little did Lucien know, the thought of revenge had already taken root in the half-ogre woman's mind. ?She raised her head with a suddenness that prompting a shift in Lucien's expression.?"Revenge?" she repeated, her voice rough from disuse, the word scraping past her exposed lower fangs. She tilted her head in confusion, bck hair falling like spilled ink across her face, as if waking from a dream.