Can’t Win Me Back

Jasper felt a pain unlike any he had ever known.

It wasn't a physical agony like having flesh torn away, but a slow, excruciating torture akin to being slowly sliced by a blunt blade.

It was a hundred times worse than dying instantly.

His mind raced through a chaotic sequence of images, like a black- and-white movie playing backward.

He saw people retreating and leaving —Javier, Anne, Newton, Landon, Lauren, Jonah, Axel...

He reached out desperately, trying to grasp any of them, but they were slipping away, one by one.

Finally, the image settled on Alyssa's radiant face.

"Lyse...

Don't go..." Tears streaming down his face, he lunged forward, wrapping his arms around her.

But she dissolved into golden dust, vanishing into the frigid air.

"No! iy A beep sounded in his ear as if everything had been reset.

him, and

was

stood motionless, staring at the fallen

if he was dead, but deep down, he was

heard footsteps approaching from

turned to see Remy emerging from the underground

an emotionless look on his face, Remy picked Alyssa up ina princess

island." Without even a glance at

leaving you to clean

sure you have no objections,

Jameson stood motionless,

a man who had been thoroughly used and

had been drained of all his worth—now

opening in the statue of the goddess

laughing at

your life has

exists..." Before he could finish, the deafening roar of

its shadow over the

with that, the seemingly indestructible glass

cutting Jameson's