"Excuse me? What did you just say?" She fumed, knitting her brows in agitation.
"You heard me," he replied in a deadpan manner. "You're a spoiled, self-centered, entitled brat," he finished, causing the woman before him to clench her fists in rage...
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Lysandre stood at the entryway of the lab, his eyes fixed on the dormant Xerneas. He was certain that-just a few hours ago-it had been as lifeless as ever without any visible signs of life. Why it had begun to look healthier was puzzling to say the least. According to what he'd researched, Xerneas wouldn't awaken for the next week or so which meant that it shouldn't show any signs of revival until that time. He could see that the tree was now emitting a faint glow, signifying that it was starting to regain its power. Knowing what it could mean if that were to happen, Lysandre had no choice. He had to speed up his plans.
Walking farther into the lab, Lysandre stopped to address a now exhausted Allie. Her eyes were as a sullen sunless sky, devoid of the light they once carried. Despair had crawled into her heart and latched onto her like a parasite, infecting her with cripling doubt and hopelessness. Her body ached due to the position she was locked into. The sound of footsteps caused her to raise her head. Anger flared in her rose-colored eyes as she looked upon the man responsible for her misery.
"I'm going to be perfectly honest with you princess... your idea to find the ideal candidate to be your husband wasn't such a bad idea after all. Finding the perfect person is a lot more trouble than it's worth and yet somehow, you managed to find a way to gather up men who are worth their weight in gold so you could vet them according to the standards you had set in place and based on their performance," Lysandre mused.
Allie pursed her lips at his remark and elected to remain silent.
"Truth be told, I really didn't see the point of it until I realized how much your plan and mine had in common. I desire the perfect world and you wish for the perfect husband. I sought out those who shared my ideals and you recruited those who longed for the same. We're both selfish-you and I-and we both were willing to do whatever it took to reach our goals regardless of the obstacles we might face, even if it meant destroying the dreams of others who didn't fit into our grand design..." Lysandre finished with a smirk.
As much as she wanted to tell him he was wrong, Allie couldn't completely refute what he was saying. In the beginning, she had proposed the contest and pursuaded her parents to go along with her idea. She had posted it in nearly every academy and university all over Kalos as well as anywhere else that allowed advertizing. To her delight, her plan spawned forty participants willing to battle it out for her selfish desires.
You heard me... you're a spoiled, self-centered, entitled brat...
Besides, he's made it perfectly clear that he's not after you at all...
...what does he have to pursue?
The words that both Seth and her own mother had said to her pierced her heart like a knife. To make matters worse, they were completely right. That fact alone made her feel as though someone had taken the figurative knife by the handle and twisted it. It hurt, possibly more than anything that she would face from here on out. Every mean-spirited remark she'd ever heard over the course of the past several months assaulted her mind relentlessly. Was she stupid for wanting this? Tears stung her eyes as they rolled down her cheeks.
