Salvation of The Scum Fifth Prince

[60 - repent; a sinning soul]

The entire world was shifting. 

Soren watched the particles disperse and rearrange themselves, felt as tickles of darkness crept up his arm. He'd turned away the minute Raphael fell, a rush of wind blowing past his cheeks and diving into the unknowns below. 

The utter surprise on that protagonist's face was somewhat satisfying, and undoubtedly worthwhile, thought Soren, in his daze as he stumbled.

He wasn't sure what to call this, a dreamscape perhaps? The reason why Raphael existed in the end of that endless pit — he could guess the reason. But if their worlds in this space was connected, there would be a part where they didn't connect.

The time when Raphael didn't exist in Soren's life, and when Soren didn't exist in Raphael's.

Rather than having that stupid hippo fall into whatever madness awaited, it was better to let that person deal with his own memories. 

And so, Soren had pushed him.

Quite easily, in fact.

A slide in the floor made him stumble, large metal gears turning around him loudly, having appeared from thin air. He grasped onto a jutting edge as he watched them turn, as if he were part of a clock being fixed. 

Time was turning.

It echoed around him in the darkness, and he thought he might go mad. The only present sounds were the click of gears, shifting with every passing second. Wherever Raphael had disappeared to, it was already too far away.

The platform he was standing on rose in the air, higher and higher before finding its place in the cluster of metal shapes. 

'Ren Suzki.'

The androgynous voice echoed, piercing his skull with a numbing chilliness that promised nothing but terror.

'It is time for you to remember.'

An ominous creak filled Soren's ears before the machine stopped turning. 

'And face all that you are.'

And suddenly, he was falling.

Was it a habit of his dreamscape to have him fall? If so, he hoped this was the last time, since the air was stifling and cold, while his body cold only helplessly tumble in the darkness. He couldn't see, couldn't hear, he was — it was almost as if he weren't living.

For Soren, that was the most terrifying thing.

Being forced to stay alive while trapped in a cage that made the curse of immortality all the more vivid.

"Ren."

Soren's breath hitched. This voice, carefree and welcoming. This had been before Raphael, before.... before Ren Suzuki had fallen into inescapable depression.

He felt a splatter of water as he was suddenly sitting on the rocky floors of the abandoned city; the edges grazing his already bruised knees that had flaked from the lack of moisture.

A hand stretched out before him, a blur of people behind waiting. And warm brown eyes that lacked the cold harshness of the apocalypse. 

"Is that your name?" 

And that smile. Soren remembered that smile, burned vividly into his deepest memories. 

"My name's Jules. Would you like to come with us? There's always room for another person, hm?"

Back then, he had accepted the hand. As he stared at the blinding figure before him, whose face had already become vague, lost in his memories, he fell into a daze.