Genesis had hoped to persuade her that the man’s life hardly mattered. That this wasn’t the type of person he either cared about or wanted revenge on. But he could immediately see from how her expression soured that he must have said the wrong thing.

Do you believe the common man would not look upon you as monster the same way those trained for war are?

That hit a bit too close to home, and Genesis scowled as he glanced down at the man on the ground. “Of course they would.” And they had, from what he recalled. Particularly in Banora when he had settled in there. “But it’s the people in power who matter. Not the masses. They’ll always hate what they don’t understand. It’s predictable.” After he’d betrayed Shinra, he’d never had eyes for the average person in Midgar beyond what havoc he could cause for Shinra by disrupting them. His quarrel had been with Shinra and anyone who supported them.

The woman prowled closer to him, and Genesis instinctively reached for his sword again, but she stopped by the man on the ground instead and raked one of her talons over the man’s face. Genesis didn’t bat much of an eye at the blood, despite his initial reaction of ’But why are your feet talons though?’ until she turned to him and made what was clearly a veiled threat.

Tensing, he stared at her, meeting her bright yellow gaze, though her eyes were currently narrowed in disdain. He had probably miscalculated. It certainly wasn’t his goal to make an enemy out of some ageless being with power over time, but before he could say so, she seemed to dismiss him instead of attacking.

I'll be watching and awaiting your decision.

He found his voice at that. “Wait, what? Watching?” She vanished from view with a harsh laugh, and he regripped his sword as he spun in a slow circle to see if she was still there. “You can’t just say that and not explain anything! Are we really leaving off of there?” She was nowhere to be found, but the more he looked for her, the more he noticed that everyone still in the valley who hadn’t scattered was staring at him in horror, like they were afraid that he might be associated with her. The man on the ground was still groaning feebly, and he suddenly couldn’t take it anymore.

“What? Something to see here?!” He yelled at the crowd, unfurling his wing through the slit in his coat as as he threw himself into the sky and rose towards the top of the valley. He heard a few screams from down below, and that infuriated him. Calling a fire spell to his fingertips, he threw the magic into the crowd below. The yells grew louder, and he started flying in whatever random direction he was facing before he could see if he had seriously hurt anyone or not. What did it matter? At the end of the day, perhaps she’d been right. He was nothing but a monster to them.

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