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[ By the time Sebastian reaches out in Communion, he’s already felt the fullness of his rage and taken it out. Viciously. It’s an occasion where he’s grateful for what Ryad provides, lest he had to express it in a more troublesome way.

Sebastian’s usual affect is warm and friendly, if with a polite distance, but today, it’s ice cold. His Communion is always expressed as something dark, but there’s a secondary sensation that comes today as well. It’s the unsettling sensation of being watched that makes someone’s hair raise. After all, there’s uncountable eyes in that abyssal dark. ]

I shall be brief. Someone broke into my home a few days ago and left a “gift” most unwelcome. A Shard belonging to someone from my home. Yet, though I kept it isolated to inspect it further, that did not seem to matter. It infected the Shard that Lady Yima gave me. A Shard that is now no more, for it burst. The soul that was in that little rock is no more.

[ His voice becomes more tense at that last sentence. It’s clear he’s very intentionally holding back his temper significantly. ]

I make this announcement for my fellow Zenites’ sake that they might destroy any they come upon immediately. Also to inform them that there is a way for these Shards to be tampered with that has been exploited. But let me also be clear.

I will find whoever was unwise enough to step into my home and play with my pet. I went through great lengths to obtain that soul, and I do not take kindly to being robbed of it. But there is no need for threats beyond that, is there?

[ So he says, but it’s crystal clear—Whoever it was, they’re in grave danger if they’re discovered. ]

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[ At least a small mercy is that Sebastian doesn’t find Set’s reaction strange. He’d surely be straining in the same way if their positions were reversed. He has him thoroughly pinned, since those shadows are ethereal and weightless, but they’re every bit as strong as Sebastian himself. It’s why he rarely uses them this way, lest someone realize their true utility as one of his last resorts.

Yet, it’s almost worse when it’s in Communion, because it’s clearer when he’s not speaking to an audience just how deeply this loss and this conversation affects him. His mind is always shadows, a cool, dark abyss that Set has luxuriated in before, but it’s more chaotic now. The eyes and teeth that had appeared once when Hayame had destroyed his eye are all out to bear, but they’re not lashing out in animalistic frenzy.

The countless eyes and teeth of as many beasts are focused on Set. The eyes stare at him like they’d be able to just see a lie, and the hungry mouths drip with ichor and grin as they wait to tear him apart. Set had seen Sebastian’s true face, yes, but this feels like it just as much. It’s something chaotic and ugly that the otherwise orderly demon took great care to keep out of view.

It’s tense as he listens, and more tense still as a silence lingers. That last little comment gets Sebastian’s grip to tighten, and his fury is ice instead of fire. It seems like a push too far to turn his “lessons” back on him like a mirror.

Yet—

It’s a weighing in his mind of which wound to his pride is worse—that he would be fooled, or that someone else would point it out. Both sting in a way that’s equally worthy of retribution to a demon, but one is more rational than the other. He’d already realized the flaw in his bought loyalty the first time that Set pointed it out here. It’s from those cracks that Zenith is ebbing out of him now. Maybe Set can even feel it—the doubt that’s coiling like a blight around a purple flower.

It's only moments that feel like an eternity, but the dark calms. The eye and mouths close, and the restraining shadows retreat back to the eaves that they had sprung from. His hand quivers as he does it, but he lets go of Set’s jaw. That’s all answer enough, and it seems like Sebastian stubbornly might not say a word. But surprisingly, he does, though his voice is quiet. ]

It may well be something she regrets.

[ It’s as close to a “you’re right” or an “I believe you” as he’s going to get. ]