He had been prepared for the worst, for her gloats, her show of power, anything and everything she could to rile him up in his current battered form. Rex had prepared himself but still took the bait, hook, line, and sinker. His knees buckled beneath the pressure of Persephone's power, yet his stubbornness would not let him kneel to this one.
"Must you humans always play these games?" He spat, his disgust aided by the sensation of her cold, clammy hands touching him,
"Trying to save face as if you had been the very mastermind behind my triumphs. As if you hold some meaningful part in my destiny. Even in death, you are as naive as you were back when I slaughtered you and your people."
Pushed back, Rex found himself stumbling towards the railing, yet he fought to remain upright if only to spite them all.
"It was by my arrogance that I would suffer the setback of death! Yet I still live, you mummified parasite! It is my own will that I will survive as I always have. I will thrive no matter what you throw at me, for I am the STRONGEST! I. AM..."
It was as if something had struck him, as Rex fell to his knees. Looking to his hands, or rather hand, as the maimed stump of his right arm mimed the movement of the other, he seemed confused by it all.
"I am..."
---------
Signs of Life: Something Else
---------
"I am Charco."
Like the introduction of a missing cog, the knowledge of a "name" had aligned mind, body, and soul. Rex, the invading spirit had made ill preparations in the off chance he were to be invaded, yet even if he were, he would have been overwhelmed by the presence that flooded through his body. It bore the name and essence of Charco, but it was not the boy he knew. This "Charco" was something less and yet more.
Rising to his feet, Rex, no... whomever this being was, seemed unaffected by Persephone. The ruined stump, decayed by Vortigern's void, stirred, as new bone jutted from the wound, followed by nerves, muscles, and veins. Skin would soon envelop it all, but instead of scaley flesh, it was human skin, pale and tinged lightly with green.
"Whole" once more, this vessel of power would extend outward, the very chambers beginning to shake from his presence.