Chapter 2390 Forever Cherishing You, Flora Hastings_2

Arthur folded the letter, his fingertips slowly moving away from "Forever Yours, Flora Hastings."

"Agares." His voice was steadier than he expected: "You’re pleased."

The Red Devil circled from his shoulder to stand in front of him, its scarlet eyeballs almost touching his brow.

"Of course I’m pleased," the Devil chuckled softly, "my Contractor has finally shed that hypocritical facade. You see, you didn’t even need my temptation, you yourself have already come to this point."

Arthur did not retreat.

"Then..." he looked up and said, "what is it that’s surprising you?"

The Red Devil’s laughter halted for a moment.

Arthur gazed down at the hand holding the letter.

His bones were distinct, his fingertips covered with calluses from sword practice and playing the piano.

These hands, on the night of June 5, 1832, issued the order for suppression. It was also these hands that had once raised a fist for Little Adam’s fate in the Magistrates’ Court.

These hands held the quill that wrote the Hastings Case Files, and these hands diverted funds that should have gone to Young Italy.

These hands had danced with the soft hands of high-society ladies, and these hands had flirted with the hostess’s red skirt at Nightingale Mansion, accepted a teacup from Flora in the side hall of Kensington Palace, and clenched her arm backstage at the Buckingham Concert.

He slowly released his fingers.

"A devil making a pact with a mortal, is it not just to witness the humanity within this shell peel away little by little, until only the avaricious husk and soul remain?"

Arthur raised his eyes to meet those scarlet vertical pupils: "Or is it that you actually hoped I would retain those useless things?"

There was silence under the porch.

Agares tilted his head, seemingly examining some unfamiliar object.

Suddenly, the Devil laughed, not that previous skin-peeling laughter, but a lower, deeper, strange laugh that rolled out from the depths of his throat.

"Interesting."

He paced around Arthur: "I’ve seen countless people kneel before me, for power, for revenge, for immortality. They weep and curse fate, they embellish the reason for selling their souls as something so noble. But you... you just walked in quietly, as if stepping into a rain long anticipated. You took off your damned, weak, trivial conscience like an old coat, folded it neatly, and placed it at your feet."

Saying this, Agares couldn’t help but sigh: "How long have we known each other? Twenty-five years? Time flies by."

"Does it?"

"It does!" The Red Devil laughed so broadly he couldn’t keep his mouth shut, he couldn’t help but lick the sharp fangs at the corners of his lips: "For someone who once was willing to sacrifice their future to save impoverished street children..."

He deliberately paused, as if savoring the taste of that name: "Very fast!"

Arthur’s eyelashes fluttered.

He thought of that night, the gunpowder smoke, the taste of gunpowder, the orange firelight reflected on the Thames River, the sparks from the hooves stepping on gravel...

He just ran.

Just like many times after.

Just like Flora wrote in her letter.

The Devil’s voice suddenly softened, as soft as a sigh: "Arthur, did you finally kneel to me?"

Arthur did not answer.

Agares didn’t need him to answer.

He laughed again, a smile of utmost satisfaction as though he had finally tasted the sweetness at the heart of a ripe fruit.

The Red Devil closed his eyes, hugging himself tightly: "Are you kneeling to me? Or to the pure, brave, eternally beloved person in her eyes who never existed? Oh, Arthur, you clearly know... that person died long ago in the summer of 1832."

Arthur was silent for a long time.

So long that Agares’ smile shifted from satisfaction to amusement, and even seeped a trace of doubt he hadn’t even noticed himself.

Arthur raised his eyes, staring expressionlessly at the Red Devil before him, as if finally weary of this cat-and-mouse game: "Agares, you’re right."

The Red Devil’s eyes froze; he said nothing in reply.

Arthur spoke: "I can’t save anyone, I can’t even save myself, I’m destined to go to Hell. But..."

Arthur tucked Flora’s letter into his pocket, shaking his head regretfully, "But Flora doesn’t know these things. She doesn’t know what orders I gave that night, doesn’t know how many people suffered because of me, let alone what I’ve withheld or whom I’ve betrayed."

Agares’ smile stiffened at the corners of his lips.

He stared at Arthur, who had walked into his grasp step by step over twenty-five years, the man who had finally peeled off his humanity and placed his conscience neatly at his feet.

"You... you little bastard, what do you intend to do?"

Arthur calmly rebuttoned his top hat: "He is brave, selfless, innocent. He saves lives at any cost, believes in justice, believes that one person’s good deeds can change another’s destiny."

Agares widened his eyes: "He’s dead. He lay in a coffin!"

"Yes, he’s dead. Shakespeare is also dead, but that doesn’t stop his plays from being staged daily in Trulie Alley and Covent Garden," Arthur laughed easily, "God bless him, he left me a good foundation before he died, so I can impersonate his deeds and deceive the world."

Agares was stunned there.

"Deceive the world?" He repeated the words, his voice strange, like learning the language for the first time: "You call this... deceiving the world?"