Chapter 124: The Truth
It’s my soul...
Ash thought, as his gaze lingered on the swirling fragments of memory he had long tried to bury.
They hovered there in silence, like fragile glass shards spinning through the void, each one a moment he had wanted to forget.
But now, he couldn’t look away. And with every passing second, they dug deeper into his chest, sharp and merciless.
He saw himself as a child, far too young to understand the weight of loss, yet old enough to feel the world collapsing around him.
When his parents died, it wasn’t just their lives that vanished.
Everything they had left behind—the house, the savings, even their warmth—was taken away by his own relatives without a second thought.
And back then, he was just a kid who couldn’t do anything about it, no matter how much it hurt.
Every day after that felt like a nightmare.
No one listened.
No one helped.
The ones with the power to lift him up chose instead to look away.
He faced bullying from those around him, again and again.
Every bruise on his skin, every insult hurled at his back, reminded him that he was alone.
No one stood with him. There were no hands reaching out. Just him—only him, always alone.
He would return to an empty room in the orphanage each evening, sit in the corner, knees tucked against his chest, and whisper to the silence.
Sometimes he cried.
Sometimes he didn’t.
But every time, it was just him.
Just him and the darkness.
And then, when the silence had almost swallowed him whole, then like a gentle light cutting through the darkness, Nancy appeared in his life.
She didn’t fix everything.
She didn’t make the pain disappear.
Every time he felt like breaking, she was there.
Every time the world turned cruel, she faced it with him.
Whenever someone tried to hurt him, she stepped in, even when it meant getting hurt herself.
She wasn’t strong, but she never backed down.
And she never asked for anything in return.
As those memories shimmered in front of his eyes, a soft smile pulled at his lips.
A bitter one.
She hasn’t changed at all. She’s still the same. Still so kind. And that kindness... that’s the one thing I’ve always liked about her more than anything else.
He had grown up seeing how twisted people could be. How easily they turned on each other. How fake smiles covered greedy intentions.
How kindness was offered only when it served a purpose.
He had lived through betrayal, through hunger, through watching people smile while stealing from him.
In that world, Nancy felt unreal.
A flicker of something pure in a place where purity had no place.
He knew she was still just a child. He knew life might change her.
He knew time had a way of turning even the brightest stars cold.
And one day she might become like the rest of the world.
But even with that fear, a voice rose from deep inside his heart. A voice that felt more honest than anything he had ever known.
Protect her.
Protect that kindness.
Never let the world touch her with the same cruelty that shattered him.
Never let her cry the way he once did.
Never let her feel alone, like he did.
Never let her become what this world made of him.
At that time, he truly fell for Nancy.
"Right... I will protect her," Ash murmured quietly, almost as if he were making a promise to himself rather than saying it out loud.
His eyes softened with a warm gaze, and a small, peaceful smile appeared on his lips.
But just as that moment settled, a voice echoed through the still and silent space around him.
"I don’t agree with you at all."
The voice was sharp, dripping with mockery and layered with a strange, unsettling contempt that made Ash’s spine stiffen.
Startled, Ash instinctively jumped back, his feet skidding slightly over the reflective water-like surface.
Standing a short distance in front of him, not too far, but not too close either—was himself.
Ash’s breath caught in his throat as he stared at the figure. Every detail was familiar, yet the aura he gave off felt entirely wrong.
This version of Ash had features that were the exact opposite of his. His skin was pitch black, darker than even the shadow of the solitary tree behind him.
His eyes, though the same pale blue, looked empty and hollow, as if all the light inside them had long since died.
His hair was a wild, burning red, completely unnatural, and it flared slightly as if alive.
He wore the same clothes as Ash, but they looked twisted on him, almost like a mockery of Ash’s real self.
Most unsettling of all was the expression on his face—a wide, twisted smile that stretched too far, revealing bloodied teeth, while his bloodshot eyes stared unblinking, filled with a sick sort of amusement.
"Who... who are you?" Ash asked carefully, his voice low but firm, taking a step back as he watched his twisted reflection closely, trying to stay ready for anything.
"What? You seriously think I’m just a doppelganger?" the black-skinned version of Ash responded, laughing lightly, but there was no real humor in his voice—only ridicule and venom.
Ash’s mind spun.
Can he really read my thoughts...? But how...?
"Don’t waste time overthinking it," the other Ash said, interrupting Ash’s thoughts as if he could hear them word for word.
"You’re standing inside my body right now, after all. Reading your thoughts isn’t even a challenge. It’s like breathing."
The moment those words reached him, Ash froze completely. His body went still, and his thoughts stopped swirling, now trying to piece together what this could mean.
He thought carefully, going through every possibility.
And then the pieces clicked.
His eyes slowly widened with the weight of the realization.
"Are you... the real owner of this body?" Ash asked slowly, his voice almost trembling.
A cruel grin spread wider on the Dark Ash’s face, his bloodstained teeth gleaming in the soft light of that strange, skyless world.
"You finally guessed right."
Then that means...
"Yes, you are thinking correctly," the Dark Ash spoke calmly, his voice carrying a weight of bitter truth as he began to explain.
"I died during my awakening process, but somehow, even after death, my soul did not leave this dead body. I was confused and perplexed, unable to understand why I remained trapped like this."
"But when you woke up in my body, I lost consciousness completely. And when I finally awoke, do you know what I discovered? As I tried to take back control of my body, something was stopping me. I sensed it was connected to you, and when I read your memories, I came to a painful realization."
"The Rune of Stability trapped me, binding me within all your negative and Dark thoughts—every shred of hatred, every piece of vengeance, all the depression, guilt, and sadness."
"I was overwhelmed by nothing but those feelings, left alone for who knows how long."
"You might think it was a short amount of time, but time flows differently here. One day in this place is just one minute in the outside world."
"You transmigrated around five months ago. Do you realize what that means? I was trapped within those memories, drowning in those dark, suffocating emotions for two hundred and nineteen thousand days"
"For FUCKING 600 years."
"And not once did the pain lessen."
"And even after all that time, your negative emotions didn’t stop. They just kept pouring in, endlessly, like a relentless storm, until one day there was a tiny crack in that cruel prison."
"I escaped through that crack. But do you know what my reaction was when I learned what caused it? It was utter disbelief."
"For 600 years, I was forced to live through your memories like a broken radio stuck repeating the same painful song again and again. At first, I cried. I felt sympathy for you."
"But as those memories kept looping without end, do you know what I truly felt?"
The Dark Ash moved towards Ash.
As he moved forward, the bright sky inside the soul space slowly darkened, fading into a quiet night.
The clear water beneath them began to rise and fall gently like large waves, turning pitch black.
Everything felt heavy and still, except for the tree—it stood firm and untouched, maybe already scarred before the darkness came.
Dark Ash came dangerously close to Ash, leaving only a thin, shaky space between them. The surrounding air seemed to tremble, like the soul space itself was holding its breath.
Even in the midst of this shadow, Ash did not retreat. His eyes, though heavy with a trace of guilt, remained locked on the cold, bloodshot eyes of the Dark Ash.
It was as if he silently wanted to say that he was listening to every word—that there was no need to feel alone.
Perhaps this was his quiet way of expressing understanding.
But the Dark Ash didn’t care about any of that. Mercy was a stranger to him.
No one knew Ash better than he did. After all, he had lived as Ash for hundreds of years.
Not even Elysia could understand Ash as deeply as the Dark Ash.
"I felt disgust," the Dark Ash confessed with venom lacing his voice. "I wondered what the hell you were even doing."
"After deciding to protect her, you changed—and that was the only part of you I actually liked."
"You became violent, didn’t you? And I liked that. That was what should have been the real you—not this ."
"So why did you change again? Because she said so, right?"
"Why did you forget the rage that made you real?"
"Shut up," Ash muttered softly.
The Dark Ash laughed—a cruel, harsh sound that echoed sharply between them.
"HAHAHAHAHA... and who is going to stop me from saying all this... you?" he shouted, his eyes burning blood red as he pointed an accusing finger right at Ash.
"YOU, WHO BECAME AS DOCILE AS A CAT THE MOMENT YOU HEAR HER VOICE."
"ARE YOU HUMAN, OR ARE YOU JUST AN ANIMAL?"
"EVEN CALLING YOU AN ANIMAL FEELS LIKE AN INSULT TO ANIMALS."
"AND DON’T YOU DARE FEEL SYMPATHY FOR ME. I CAN READ YOUR THOUGHTS LOUD AND CLEAR."
"I DO NOT NEED YOUR SYMPATHY. NOT NOW. NOT EVER."
***