Reborn As A Doomsday Villainess-Chapter 184: Making me feel wrong

Ivan expression darkened, he suddenly appeared in front of Ray grabbing his chin roughly.

"You’ve been getting awfully daring these days Ray, don’t forget who your master is..you’re to follow me, no questions. If you can’t do that, then I’ll find another person."

Ray chucked, blood running down his nose "Find another person? Don’t be so naive Ivan, it’s the apocalypse, everyone is trying to survive, no one is truly loyal..I’m the only one who can handle you and you know that. I don’t like you sacrificing innocent people, can’t I say that? Yet I still follow you blindly, but you’re just a bastard in and out."

Bam!

Ray felt a punch connect to his guts, he felt as though his insides had been crushed.

"Ah Ivan..that hurts but I know you wouldn’t care, you only think about yourself." He closed his eyes slightly, he was hurting so bad, he found it hard to breathe.

"All I ever did was support you, despite all the killing you’ve done, or the women you’ve hit...what about you? When have you ever supported me? You left me to clean my wounds but you want me to lick yours, Ivan how can you be so cruel to me, you hate me that much huh."

Ivan’s fist hovered, trembling slightly, before he let it drop from Ray’s abdomen. His knuckles were white. His face, carefully schooled into arrogance moments ago, now twisted not in guilt, but something far more dangerous.

A flicker of hesitation. Something brittle and raw flashing through the depths of his dark eyes.

"You think I hate you?" he said, voice low and nearly soundless. The throne room swallowed the words, but they still rang like thunder in Ray’s ears.

"If I hated you, Ray Luna, you wouldn’t be breathing."

He turned his back, like he couldn’t bear to look at him or perhaps couldn’t bear what he felt when he did. His stride was slower this time. Heavy. Less like a god pacing his temple, more like a man trying not to bleed.

"I don’t hate you" he muttered, as if the words betrayed him. "I hate that I care. That you still think your defiance means anything to me."

Ray remained kneeling, hunched over, his breath uneven. "You say that, but you still flinch when I call you out. You want to be god, Ivan, but you still act like a broken boy begging for power."

Ivan stopped walking.

His shoulders stiffened. One hand clenched at his side. The air grew dense charged with that volatile static that always came before his domain cracked open.

"Don’t talk like you know me."

"I do" Ray spat, blood on his tongue. "I’ve watched you rip through people like they were weeds. But I also watched you hesitate when that little girl tried to give you her candy. You were going to kill her family, but you didn’t. You backed off."

"Enough."

"Why? Because she reminded you of someone? Or because—"

"Enough!" Ivan’s voice shattered the silence, echoing like a blade unsheathed too fast.

He turned back around and there it was, the slip in his mask. His lips were pressed tight, jaw flexing. Fury, confusion, something else all roiling behind that gaze of pitch and fire.

"You think I haven’t made sacrifices? It’s been a few days since this damn apocalypse began and already, already the weak cling to false hopes. I am the only one willing to become what this world needs."

He pointed to himself, teeth bared. "I didn’t choose to be cruel. Cruelty chose me."

Ray laugh was breathless and wet with blood. "That’s bullshit and you know it."

For a long moment, Ivan said nothing.

Then "You’ve always been like this," he murmured. "Making me feel... wrong. As if I owe something to people who wouldn’t piss on me if I were burning."

His tone softened unexpectedly, quiet and cold as the grave. "But you... you stayed. Even when you hated me. You followed me."

Ray met his gaze, slow and weary. "Because I thought maybe there was something left in you worth saving."

Ivan didn’t reply. Just stared. Then turned again, slower this time, dragging a hand over his face like he was trying to wipe something off...emotion, maybe.

"Gu Qingran won’t be like you," he said, almost to himself. "She won’t talk back. She’ll understand. Her system chose her for a reason. She has purpose. Fire. Perfection."

"And you want to destroy it.." Ray said hoarsely.

"No..." Ivan said, voice hushed now. "I want to possess it."

Then, after a beat, more quietly:

"...Before it disappears."

Ray managed to stand up, wiping the blood off his nose. He sighed "You have no respect for women. If she disobeys you once, you’ll make her life a living hell, you know a woman like her won’t bow to you easily."

"..."

"Go tend to your wounds Ray, I don’t tempt me into giving you another one."

Ray chuckled and turned around "I wonder when you’ll realize, how wicked you truly are. Maybe it’s when you finally kill me."

Ivan didn’t move.

His silhouette stood like a monument carved from shadow, tall and unmoving beneath the flickering lights of the broken chandelier above.

The silence between them stretched, thin as wire and sharp as glass.

Ray took slow, limping steps toward the door. Every inhale hurt. Every heartbeat felt like it might be his last. But he didn’t look back.

"I won’t stop you," he said, glancing over his shoulder just once, his voice rough but steady. "Go ahead, chase Qingran. Pretend it’s about purpose, or fire, or fate. But deep down, you and I both know what this really is."

Ivan’s fingers twitched.

"You want her light because you’ve lost your own."

The door creaked as it opened, the echo jarring against the quiet tension in the air. Ray paused one last time at the threshold.

"You think she’ll save you," he said quietly. "But you’ll end up destroying her instead."