Ludwig rushed forward, again, for the umpteenth time.
He knew he wouldn't win.
His boots struck the marble with a hard rhythm that echoed through the golden hall, every step carrying him toward the same impossible opponent, the same polished face, the same suffocating authority that had killed him in more ways than he cared to count.
He knows he can't beat him, but he has to try something, anything, to break not the body, but the façade that is Pride.
The body was a wall. The power was a mountain. The authority was a law that had decided Ludwig was an error to be corrected. But the façade, that perfect, golden, untouchable image Pride carried around himself, that was something different. A façade only needed one crack before it stopped being perfect.
The world began pressing against him like always.
