[Ardyn's thought processes in the past week or so were best compared to a sheet of ice under gradually more weight. Slow cracks turning to spiderweb fissures under one problem after another; Nina's arrest, restoring Kip, meeting so many people he was sure he'd never have crossed path with again, having what he'd refused to acknowledge finally confirmed-]
['But you seemed more daemon than all else; your brother made more king than you. None would have suffered the scourge sitting on the throne.']
[-being away from home with Junpei, Yuuri, Touko, Heart all just as lost--Noctis, ten years younger and rightfully furious, and now-]
['He said you're the most dear person in the world to him. He loved you...didn't you know that?']
[The cracks grew wider, faster, louder like the single herald to a sudden disaster, and all at once the sheet of ice broke to the danger lying beneath.]
[Ardyn was in front of his brother in a flash of red, right hand curled into a fist and flying at his jaw much as he'd done to Xander not too long ago.]
no subject
['But you seemed more daemon than all else; your brother made more king than you. None would have suffered the scourge sitting on the throne.']
[-being away from home with Junpei, Yuuri, Touko, Heart all just as lost--Noctis, ten years younger and rightfully furious, and now-]
['He said you're the most dear person in the world to him. He loved you...didn't you know that?']
[The cracks grew wider, faster, louder like the single herald to a sudden disaster, and all at once the sheet of ice broke to the danger lying beneath.]
[Ardyn was in front of his brother in a flash of red, right hand curled into a fist and flying at his jaw much as he'd done to Xander not too long ago.]