Hi, Indianroads. It is out-of-context but I think I follow what you're trying to achieve through this 'purchased with' phrase. However, for me at least, this 'writerly' metaphor is not quite hitting the mark.
Have you tried synonyms for 'purchased' to see if there is another pairing? I may be wrong, but assume this 'purchased' covers attrocities committed over a fair period of time, like an investment. Have you considered the sowing and reaping approach? Ploughed their own funereal furrow....type of thing.
Just thoughts. Good luck.
Thank you for this - but it's written in a way that the POV character would think/phrase it. His personality is rather distant analytic - and his arc has taken him from being a pacifist to slaughtering thousands.
This scene occurs at the climax near the end of the book, so there's a lot of backstory that would be hard to relate here. But:
1. He lives with and loves his partner.
2. A type of racism (it's SciFi) and intolerance drives them apart.
3. There's a violent religious cult that's running around burning people as a test of faith. The cult leaders think he is a demon.
4. She (his partner) takes up with another guy, gets pregnant, has a baby.
5. MC misses her and struggles with her betrayal.
6. His (former) partner is captured by the cult. They use her as bait to draw him out.
7. The cult sets his partner on fire. He kills her to end her suffering (tipping point that drives him away from being pacifist).
8. He flies into a rage, and kills everyone in the cult.
During that act though, a part of his mind disengages, so he sees it sort of like a third person watching everything unfold.
Later, he'll grapple with,
how could I do that? and other such questions.
A bit more from the story for context:
Liam continued to fire on the advancing lines of the Scarred Faithful. Their black-clad bodies vanished, instantly converted into pale clouds of superheated gas. His hatred of them refused to loosen its grip, and his heart grew lighter with each of their deaths. He smiled as he cut down their advancing lines, killing so many that a soft white cloud began to form over the battlefield.
It was a bloodless war. The heat of his laser instantly cauterized wounds, and those that took a direct hit simply disappeared. But their deaths were too easy, and he wished for a more lingering and painful end for those that attacked Steamboat, killed his friends, and murdered the woman he loved.
Her betrayal had created an itching torment deep within his soul, and he thought that nothing could ever be worse, but he was wrong. Even though he was left alone, the world had been a better place with her in it. But death was final, all that was Denise was gone forever. Any contribution she might make to the lives of others, including her son, would never be.
Without thought, he continued to use his weapon to slaughter the enemy and destroy their homes. Everything was on fire, even the stones had been reduced to bubbling magma that ran and flickered with orange flames. The people he shot usually vanished, but occasionally an arm, leg, or a head would separate and fly high into the air then fall back to earth with a dull wet sounding smack. None of that bothered him; the enemy had purchased their hideous deaths with the atrocities they had committed.