章 11: moment of acceptance
I looked at Liana as she sat on the tip of the bed, her innocent eyes piercing me with a strange look, like she knew what was going to happen before I thought about him. Her last words still echoed in my head: "Everything in this palace is mine. And you're the best among her."
I felt a heat rising in my head, anger I didn't know how to turn it off. But she was right... Terrifyingly right. I was something among her things. But not anymore.
"Now," I said in a low voice, like I'm addressing myself, "Either prove that I'm nothing... Or accept that I will only be that forever."
She stepped towards her, fear not appearing on her features even for a moment. She wasn't afraid. She was waiting.
She held her hand firmly, she felt her pulse, with her heartbeat that was beating with the rhythm of a life... A life I knew I would stop. "Liana..." She whispered, but didn't answer. There was no reason for words.
I pushed my hand towards her chest quickly, I felt the heat of her body, and then the cold of death that began to spread as I took her heart out of place. Blood flowed rapidly, staining my hands and the silk clothes she was wearing.
A moment of silence. A moment of stalemate. Her heart is in my hands, beating for the last time. I looked at her body that quietly collapsed in front of me. Her face still held that childish smile.
I didn't let myself feel. It wasn't a good time.
I threw her heart to the ground in front of me,The eye of the mirror wolf was laying next to him, looking like she was watching me, watching a date, or maybe... Curiosity? As for the black-robed old man's mushroom, it was a piece of nothingness itself, slowly beating like he was holding a sinister secret.
I rolled my eyes towards the room around me. The stone walls were cold, shadows dancing like they were waiting for the moment they crossed their limits. The air was heavy... So heavy it made me feel like I was breathing dust itself.
"Time now. Either I do it, or I waste everything."
She first started with the black old man's mushroom. I held him carefully, but his touch was horrified, as if I caught the skin of something alive. I crushed it in the palm of my hand, feeling a sticky liquid seeping through my fingers. The smell was suffocating, a combination between mold and death, but I forced myself to continue. I put the rest of it in the small fire in front of me, and I felt the air increase heavy.
Then the eye of the mirror wolf. I picked it up with a hesitant hand, it felt like trying to move, like it was looking straight at me. She put it over the hot ash, and soon began to make a whisper-like sound, or something very old resonated. Something that doesn't belong to this world.
And finally... heart.
I looked at him. Am I actually the one who did this Can I continue "You've chosen this path. I won't be weakened now."
I tore him in half, and the red liquid flowing out of him flooded the fire. But the fire did not turn off. I was caught in a black colour, a thick smoke that almost suffocated me. I felt something move in the shadows, like the whole room became conscious.
Then the pain came.
The pain engulfed me, as if devouring me from the inside. I felt something in my body change, my bones, my skin, even my blood... Everything seemed to reshape itself.
I shouted, but my voice was distorted, not like a human's voice. The shadows around me came closer, like they wrap around me, enter me, fuse with me.
Then, suddenly, everything stopped.
I looked at my hand. It wasn't my hand that I knew. My skin was pale, surrounded by a web of glowing veins with a faint red color. I felt strong, but it was a strange, heavy force, as if I had become something else altogether.
The shadows around me pulled out, as if they had undergone me. I knew I changed. I'm no longer a human. I didn't promise anything I believed in.
I looked at Liana's body, at the blood that stained the ground, and I felt the silence of the room enveloping me.
However, the voice inside me kept whispering: "Was this worth "
I swallowed the doubt, taking the first step forward. Strength has a price, and I have paid it completely.
I stood in the middle of the room, feeling my chest crumble with every breath I breathe. But something else started thrusting into me, more like a cold fire, strange and frightening, burning me without hurting me. I looked at my hands, those hands that I thought would one day be extended to help or to sympathize, but now I see them differently: tools.
"That's who I am," I whispered to myself, voice I barely recognize. "I can't escape this fact. I can't escape what I have to be."
I started to move slowly, as if every step was an announcement of my surrender to what I had become. She approached the window, and looked at the dark garden outside the palace. I was seeing it in a new way: not just trees and shadows, but a war arena. A place full of opportunities and dangers. Aesthetics no longer meant something, everything only had value as much as I could use it.
I placed my hand on the window glass, my fingerprints clearly showing on it. I felt like this glass was the last barrier between me and what I had become.
Then, slowly, I clenched my hand. In me, I could feel like every part of my humanity is fading, replaced by something solid, unbreakable. I looked at my reflection in the glass. My eyes were weird, dark, like they lost the luster of life. But inside them there was certainty... "I accepted."
I'm not shaking anymore. I no longer resist. I looked at my reflection, like I was addressing my new self, and said, "Pain is the beginning. Getting rid of the inconveniences is the means. Control is the point."
Then, without thinking, I raised my other hand and hit the glass hard. The glass shattered into fragments, falling to the ground as I had fallen one day. But I didn't look at the mess I had left behind. I looked outside, to the world waiting for me.
I smiled, a smile that wasn't warm, but rather cold and abstract from every feeling.
"There is no good or evil, just desire! All my mistakes will be erased as soon as I become stronger than her"
I stepped away from the window, and it seemed like I was bigger, heavier, but also stronger. My steps are no longer hesitant, and I am no longer looking for answers. I knew the truth, and I accepted it.
"Tools are used. Values are crushed. And the strong alone stay."
There was no time to hesitate. I opened the book of the dissident guardian...then fate came mocking me!
"FUCK THIS FUCKING BOOK IS STILL EMPTY!!"
The pages of the book were white without any writing or change.
In case of dispersion and anger, I received a notification from the system.
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White Magician Event
New announcement! The white wizard event has begun!
Event Summary:
Cursed or blessed!... You alone decide!
The great souls have a will; the weak souls have wishes. The reward is given to those who take the first step and secrets unfold to those who have the audacity to look beyond the horizon. Only those who defy fate are entitled to transcendence above the rest.
Do you have the courage to challenge fate and change your destiny
Congratulations! You have completed the second task. Here's a special award Grade C: Additional opportunities in opening the Magic House.
Task Three:
Complete your transformation for a magician by opening the magic house
Your prizes: 200 points
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"Fuck you System... Why don't you love me? "
週次パワーステータス
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