Ludwig let the silence hang for a breath longer, allowing the question to settle, then tilted his head very slightly. Not arrogance. Not challenge. Just measured thought. His voice came out low, matter-of-fact, but with an edge of grim understanding beneath it.
"There's nothing that burns like envy," he said. "Nothing that clings so deep it reshapes the soul. It's never satisfied. Not with taking. It has to ruin." He tapped his gloved knuckle lightly against the table. "Been there after all, you've seen my memories right?"
"I suppose, I saw how others, your peers, were quite envious of you, but that does not answer the fact you came to a perfect deduction of my… nemesis…"
"Didn't get there yet, but I understand it. What you're suffering… it reeks of that. Not grief. Not wrath. Something deliberate. Something that isolates, corrupts, deforms… out of spite."
