Witchbound Villain: Infinite Loop
201 – Loyalty

Everyone could likely guess what happened afterward.

The reports came in waves, like the tide washing ashore bits of wreckage. Men stationed across the counties began intercepting deserters fleeing the battlefield—broken shells of soldiers, haunted and trembling, their eyes hollowed by what they had seen.

They were all from the rebellion’s army, every last one of them, and their stories painted a picture that no one wanted to believe.

It began as soon as Burn arrived.

When interrogated, these deserters couldn’t stop shaking, couldn’t stop repeating the same thing: terror had a voice, and it belonged to the king.

Burn had stepped onto the battlefield alone. His deep, dark voice, weighted with mana, struck not just their ears but their very bones. It vibrated in their middle ear ossicles, as though the air itself was conspiring with him.

"If you return Duke Leodegrance’s body," he had said, the words low and measured, "I will spare your lives."

But their first prince seemingly refused, prompting that dark voice to ring through the ranks—even to the person standing at the very back of the line, who shook in horror.

“So be it, then.”

At that moment, the front liners of the rebellion army’s vision were halved. Steel spears, heavy shields, horses, flags, limbs, intestines—but mainly brains—were cracked open, the tops of skulls toppled from their heads to the ground.

The second liners froze. Then the third liners. Then the fourth. Doubt. Silence. Realization. Screams of terror. People falling to their backs, bolting away, deserting, leaving their weapons behind.

The fifth liners saw the carnage and did the same. The sixth, the seventh, the eighth. Everyone screamed.

Then it happened again.

Brain soup. Red. The ground. Eyeballs. The smell—the wind carried it to the back of the line. Failed bladders, uncontrollable bowels, soiled pants. The red. The thick, red.

The man at the horizon was just alone.

***

At some point, Morgan had settled into a chair, leaning forward with a full mug of warm chocolate in her hands, listening intently as Burn finished his story. The man sat across from her, legs crossed, leaning back with one hand massaging his temple like he was trying to rub the guilt out of his skull.

He had killed innocents that day. Countless soldiers who had done nothing more than obey the orders of their rebellious commanders.

From anyone else’s perspective, Burn would undoubtedly be cast as the monster of the battlefield, his actions spoken of in hushed tones and with accusatory glares. But Morgan didn’t just hear the story—she saw it. Burn had allowed her to look directly into his memories, to relive it all from his point of view.

It wasn’t just the story of a monster. It was the perspective of one.

“It’s getting cold,” Burn reminded, his voice cutting through the silence.

Morgan raised her eyebrows and gave him a small smile, then silently sipped her chocolate.

“Is it good?” he asked, watching her carefully.

Instead of answering, she stood, approached him, and settled herself on his lap. She handed him the mug. He took it without protest, tasting it with a thoughtful nod before handing it back to her. She didn’t drink it. Instead, she placed it neatly on the table.

“It’s late,” she said softly. “We can continue the story tomorrow.”

Something flickered across Burn’s face—something unguarded and fleeting—but he smoothed it over with a practiced smile. “You already know it’s not finished.”

Morgan tilted her head, a wry smirk tugging at her lips. “Killing thousands of enemy soldiers might debatably be worse than eating two sentient beings, but I don’t think that’s what you’re calling worse than eating two sentient beings.”

Burn caught her wrist when she started to rise from his lap, pulling her back down into his arms. The width of his palm easily spanned the small of her back, holding her still.

“We couldn’t find Aroche’s body at first.”

After finishing Clarent—ignoring the man’s last, desperate revelation that Burn wasn’t Arthur’s real son—he turned his focus to finding Aroche. He interrogated Clarent’s closest men, anyone who might know where the Duke’s body was. But most refused to speak.

It wasn’t clear at first whether they genuinely didn’t know or if the truth was so horrific that they feared Burn’s wrath would seal their fate if they spoke it aloud.

It was the second.

Burn had them gathered—Clarent’s loyalists, their families, anyone who might have answers. Placed them all in the same room, where their loved ones could see everything. He gave them a simple ultimatum: talk, or watch as I torture you—and make your families witness it until the end. Eventually, one of them broke.

Aroche’s body had been hacked into pieces.

And fed to the pigs.

At first, Burn refused to believe it, thinking it was just another lie, a spiteful story crafted from their hatred for him. Or maybe it was true.

Again, it was the second.

They even identified the exact pigpen where they had discarded Aroche’s body, and the two pigs that had feasted on him. Those same pigs—brought to the battlefield as living rations—had been pillaged from a nearby village.

Burn had eaten living beings before. One shaped like a fish. One shaped like a horse. Both had spoken to him. Both had begged him not to slaughter or consume them.

But this was somehow worse.

The weight of it made him lightheaded. Nausea churned in his stomach until he reached out blindly for Galahad, steadying himself on the knight’s unwavering form.

That night, Burn was convinced sleep would never come for him again.

And by morning, he had made up his mind.

He gathered the two pigs in question, taking them to a locked room. Inside, he prepared himself: a sturdy table, a butcher knife, a long, slender blade, and a pristine leather apron.

No one followed. No one dared.

***

Outside the locked room, the atmosphere was something no one had ever experienced before—and none of them ever wanted to again.

The knights stood vigil in a grim silence, their faces pale and eyes distant, statues of eternal regret. Galahad, ever the paragon of steadfastness, stood straight, his jaw clenched so tight it might crack, hands clasped behind his back like he was gripping the hilt of an invisible sword.

Bedivere, usually the picture of unshakable confidence, sat slumped on a wooden stool, his massive frame caved in like a felled tree. Elbows on his knees, head hanging low, his fingers clawed through his hair as though trying to dig out a reason, any reason, for why they were enduring this nightmare.

The first sound from inside shattered the silence, and with it, their fragile composure.

A low, guttural squeal—distinctly pig-like, but somehow worse. High-pitched, piercing, primal terror encapsulated in sound. The men flinched as though struck, and Galahad’s fists tightened until his knuckles turned the same shade as his soul—pale and beaten.

Then came the butcher knife. Heavy, deliberate thuds followed by the unmistakable wet squelch of flesh yielding to steel. The sound reverberated down the corridor, each strike like a grim metronome keeping time with their collective dread. The pigs screamed, and the men standing outside wished they could.

As quickly as it began, the sounds changed.

The squeals stopped, mercifully—or perhaps not. In their place came the slow, deliberate movements of someone methodically tearing through what remained.

Metallic scraping, soft thuds, and the occasional shift of a blade cutting through silence so thick it could choke. Whatever was happening in that room was the stuff of nightmares.

Outside, the knights looked as though they had aged decades in mere moments. Tension gave way to something worse: resignation. No one dared voice what they were thinking, but their eyes betrayed it. This is what it takes to stay loyal?

No. This was what their king did for loyalty. Both Aroche’s loyalty and his own.

Galahad, the unshakable, wore cracks in his stoic facade. The dark circles under his eyes whispered of sleepless nights long before this, but this? This was new. His rigid posture remained, a soldier’s discipline drilled into him, but his hollow gaze spoke of a man haunted not by what he’d done, but by what he was hearing now.

Days passed—or maybe years; it felt the same. Silence stretched from inside the room, thick and oppressive. It was as though the air itself conspired to remind them that something unspeakable was happening just a few feet away. The room had become a tomb, and the man inside its ghost.

The knights waited. They didn’t speak. They didn’t dare. Their prayers—when whispered—were confused. Some begged for Burn to emerge whole, others feared what “whole” even meant anymore.

Then, finally, a sound: the faint scrape of a chair, the soft shifting of a blade. It was subtle, almost unnoticeable, but it clawed at their attention like an unwelcome memory. Relief wasn’t the word—whatever lay beyond that door wasn’t relief.

Burn would walk out eventually. That much they knew. But what would remain of the man? That was anyone’s guess.

And still, they stood there. Silent. Steadfast. No matter how long it took.

Because he was their king.

And to say they had followed him through hell wouldn’t be a lie anymore.

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