Power Thief's Revenge [BL]-Chapter 169: View From Above

Chapter 169: View From Above
Hermes didn’t flinch at Raphael’s question. He didn’t even hesitate.
"I’m not a beetle," Hermes muttered. "I’m a mosquito."
For a moment, the world was silent. Then Raphael chuckled. A low, amused sound, curling at the edges like smoke.
"A mosquito?" He tilted his head, golden hair catching the light. "How delightfully humble."
Hermes scowled. "I wasn’t joking."
"Oh, I know." Raphael’s eyes glimmered, unreadable, as though the answer had amused him for reasons Hermes couldn’t see. "But perhaps that is why I enjoy you, my Lord. You’re painfully... honest."
Hermes turned away. His eyes fixed on the wall, on the lifeless quiet of the house behind them. Samuel was alive again, but the weight of it all clung to his chest.
Raphael broke the silence first. "Your mission is done, is it not?"
Hermes frowned. "And?"
"And..." Raphael stretched his arms out, shrugging lazily, "why don’t we go somewhere for a while?"
Hermes’s eyes narrowed. "Somewhere?"
"What do you have in mind?"
Raphael smiled. That sly, easy smile that always felt one step ahead. He raised a finger and pointed upward.
Hermes blinked. "...You can’t be serious."
"Come now." Raphael’s wings unfurled, black feathers gleaming with streaks of light. "You’ve never flown with me in the morning, have you?"
Hermes hesitated, then released a quiet sigh. His own wings flared open, thin and membranous, buzzing faintly in the daylight. "Fine."
And with that, they soared.
***
The wind rushed past him, cool and sharp against his face. The world opened beneath his feet, the whole of Haven City sprawling like a painted map.
It stunned him.
He had flown countless times in the dark, in the silence of night. But morning... morning was something else.
The city wasn’t asleep. It wasn’t quiet. It was alive.
Districts spread out in every direction, each one a different shade of purpose. Factories with smoke curling from their chimneys. Markets bursting with color, tents spread like sails. Rows of houses, roofs gleaming under the sun. Schools with children spilling in through the gates. Trains rumbling along the tracks like veins pulsing through a body.
Humans, thousands of them, no... millions, crawling below like ants. Ants who thought themselves kings of the hill.
Hermes’s eyes narrowed. With his X-ray sight, the surface peeled away.
He saw inside.
Cross-sections of buildings, layer after layer stacked with lives. Offices buzzing with paperwork and chatter. Classrooms full of restless energy. Kitchens clattering with breakfast. Bedrooms with secrets hidden under blankets. In every corner, someone was speaking, moving, breathing, living.
So many voices. So many tiny, fragile lives.
Hermes reeled back, clutching his head. "It’s... too much."
Raphael was floating beside him, arms crossed, expression calm.
"You see it, don’t you?" Raphael asked softly.
Hermes glared at him. "How do you live with this view every day? Seeing... all of this? Watching everything?"
Raphael’s smile deepened. "Live with it? My Lord, I am blessed by it. I am blessed by the ability to witness the human condition in all its colors. To be the eyes that has seen it all."
"You sound like a god," Hermes muttered.
Raphael shook his head, chuckling. "No. I see all, yes. But I do not know all. There’s a difference."
His gaze wandered down to the city, soft with something Hermes couldn’t read. "I have never felt like a god. Only a servant."
Hermes frowned. "A servant?"
Raphael nodded. "Always meant to serve, never to be above."
Hermes’s breath hitched. His mind flashed to Yorktown. To the empty house. The barren barn. The supposed childhood Raphael had spoken of, the one Hermes had chased only to find... nothing.
The words slipped out before he could stop them. "That house and that farm. What was that?"
Raphael’s eyes flicked toward him. Hermes’s voice sharpened. "Was it all a lie? Was the farm boy story just some trick?"
For a moment, Raphael only looked at him. The city glimmered below, but Hermes felt like the only thing that existed was the silence between them.
Then Raphael laughed.
A warm, easy laugh, as though Hermes had asked something charming rather than cutting. "A lie? No, no. If I ever lied, my Lord... it was only by omission."
Hermes’s stomach twisted. His instincts flared. He couldn’t tell if Raphael was playing with him, or if that was the closest he’d ever get to honesty.
"I don’t know what to make of you," Hermes said flatly.
Raphael only smiled. "That’s precisely why I enjoy your company. You always say it as it is. You never try to act smarter than how you are. That kind of honesty can be disarming, you know. I find it addictive."
Hermes gritted his teeth, looking away.
They soared higher.
The wind howled, colder now, biting against their skin. Clouds broke around them, light scattering like shards of glass. And in the distance, towering above all else, stood the tallest satellite tower in Haven.
They descended.
The tower hummed with energy, the air tingling with radiofrequency. Hermes landed first, boots scraping against the steel. Raphael landed beside him with effortless grace, wings folding behind his back.
They stood there, side by side, the whole city stretching endlessly before them.
"If they’re listening," Raphael murmured, "the tower’s frequency will disrupt it."
Hermes lowered himself onto the ledge, sitting with his elbows on his knees. His eyes flicked to Raphael.
"Then talk," Hermes said. "Tell me everything."
Raphael’s brow arched.
Hermes’s jaw tightened. "If you won’t tell me everything, how can I trust you?"
Raphael studied him for a long moment. Then, slowly, he smiled.
"I agree."
Hermes blinked. "...You do?"
"Of course." Raphael sat beside him, folding one knee up as he rested his arm lazily over it. His golden eyes glimmered like firelight. "Trust is an exchange, is it not?"
Hermes said nothing.
Raphael leaned closer, voice soft but sharp. "So let’s make it fair. You tell me everything about your love life..."
Hermes froze.
Raphael’s smile widened. "...And I’ll tell you everything about my past."
The words cut the air, sudden and disarming, lingering like bait on a hook.
Hermes turned his head, caught between shock and disbelief, his mouth parting—
"Of all things, that’s what you want to know about me!?"