The silence was a heavy, almost suffocating weight pressing in on Jian, trapping her within Viola’s fractured memories. But the atmosphere felt different now, darker more oppressive. The shadows in the void twisted, reaching out, as though they were alive, feeding off the pain and guilt saturating the very air. Jian clenched her fists, her teeth grinding together as an uninvited hint of regret filled her, a feeling she couldn’t ignore. She behaved like a child who was angry and hasn't forgiven, she didn't know Viola has also suffered just like Diana. She’d entered Viola’s mind with resentment, but each revelation chipped away at the hardened shell she’d built around her anger.

Jian had believed, stubbornly, that she held the right to despise Viola. Yet here, immersed in this broken world of fractured scenes and hidden wounds, she saw the parts of Viola that had also been torn apart, rejected by even her own family. Viola had a family, yet even that slight connection was tainted by loneliness and abandonment. Jian found herself caught in a whirlwind of her own turmoil, she hadn’t come here to pity Viola. But seeing the scars Viola bore from her own battles, a strange realization crept in. The weight of un-forgiveness she carried suddenly felt like a burden too heavy to keep shouldering.

Vroom!

The shadows shifted, and a rush of cold air swallowed Jian whole, hurtling her forward until she landed, unsteady, breath catching within a new memory.

..........

Jian stood at the back of a bustling classroom, the noisy chatter of students filling the air, their laughter twisting into something sharp and cruel. Viola sat alone, isolated at the back, her head lowered as she gripped her desk with such force her knuckles turned bone-white. The moment stretched, uncomfortable, until a group of students loomed around her, their sneering expressions lit with sadistic delight.

“Look at her,” one of them scoffed, voice dripping with mockery. “Who’d ever want someone like her around?”

Their words lashed out like knives, each one landing ruthlessly. Jian’s throat tightened, her pulse pounding. There was something sickeningly familiar in the scene, a reflection, faint but unmistakable of what Diana had endured. A sense of helplessness washed over Jian, her own mind clouded...

She was also bullied in her previous school before coming to ours..... The thought clawed its way into Jian's mind, twisting her expression into something torn.

The memory shifted again, flickering as if the scene itself was struggling to hold together. Darkness closed in, then receded, plunging Jian into another layer of Viola’s suffering. Viola was older now, in high school, her expression hardened. She wore a forced mask of indifference, but her hollow gaze betrayed the truth of someone who’d endured far more than any young soul should.

............

Jian felt an overwhelming tension radiate from Viola’s ghostly figure, a silent rage simmering just beneath her carefully constructed mask. Viola’s life had become a relentless cycle of bitterness and cruelty, methods of survival formed by the suffering she’d been forced to endure. Jian watched in tense silence as Viola cornered a younger girl, her voice cutting through the memory like a shard of glass.

You’re weak..... Viola sneered Inwardly, a harsh, hollow expression twisting her features......Pathetic. Just like I was back then......

A scar marred the left side of the bullied girl face, a visible reminder of her pain. Jian’s breath caught in her throat as she saw the terrified face of the girl, the innocent eyes, wide with fear. It was Diana.

Jian’s heart pounded, her hands trembling as she watched Viola’s cruelty carve into her sister’s spirit, shattering whatever resolve Diana might have clung to in that moment. Jian’s stomach churned, nausea clawing at her, but her body remained frozen, paralyzed by the revelation. Viola’s face twisted, but for a fleeting moment, Jian caught sight of something raw, something painfully human, a brief flicker of regret, quickly swallowed by a mask of disdain. Viola’s cruelty wasn’t born of malice, it was a shield, a desperate act to keep her own shattered soul hidden from the world’s prying eyes.

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The room fell silent, the shadows thickening around them as Viola’s own words echoed hollowed.

" I don’t deserve forgiveness ".

.......

The weight of the admission hung in the air, echoing, piercing deeper into Jian’s guarded heart. She could feel Viola’s inner wounds, open, raw, and festering. Jian had wanted to hate her, needed to hate her, but the twisted reality of Viola’s existence blurred those lines, challenging everything she’d come to believe.

The familiar weight of guilt settled onto Jian’s shoulders, the same burden she’d carried since the day she found Diana on that rooftop. Jian’s heart twisted painfully as she looked at Viola’s broken, defeated form, her emotions a whirlwind of anger, regret, and sympathy. She wanted... no, she needed to despise Viola. But the scars etched into Viola’s soul, scars that mirrored her own in ways she’d never imagined, made it impossible to turn away.

“This… this is what you went through, huh?” Jian’s voice was barely a whisper, her words raw with bitterness. She struggled, her throat tight as she tried to force out the question that had haunted her since the beginning. “Why didn’t you…?” Her voice faltered, unable to finish the thought. She had no words to explain the turmoil swirling within her.

Viola’s figure turned toward her, ghostly and fragile, her eyes bloodshot and raw, tears of crimson streaming down her cheeks. Each drop felt like a piece of her broken soul, bleeding out in a silent confession.

“I… I didn’t have a choice,” Viola’s voice trembled, cracking under the weight of her pain. “I wanted them to see me… anyone to see me… But I made the wrong choices. And now, I can’t take them back.”

Her words were stabbing , unearthing buried memories she had fought to forget. Jian’s own unhealed wounds surfaced, merging with Viola’s, reflecting back an unspoken, painful truth. Viola’s broken voice, the tortured admission that slipped past her defenses, chipped away at the wall Jian had constructed around herself.

............

In the darkness, a strange presence stirred, a shadow within a shadow, something ancient and unfathomable. The air grew colder, the temperature dropping to a numbing chill. Jian shivered, her breath fogging in front of her as the thickening darkness pulled them both back into the empty space. It was the same densely quiet void, only now it was alive with whispers, faint and indistinct, that seemed to come from all around them, their words twisting and merging into an otherworldly hum.

The shadows began to twist, coiling, morphing into shapes that weren’t quite human yet held a terrifying familiarity. Jian’s pulse quickened as an enormous eye materialized above them, its gaze unblinking, watching. Its pupil dilated, focusing intently, the dark void within it reflecting their shared suffering, a silent, oppressive judgment that seemed to strip away every layer of their being.

Viola’s form began to shift, her image fracturing as shadows enveloped her body. Her skin took on an unnatural pallor, her eyes hollow and lifeless as her body twisted, contorting in unnatural ways. Jian’s breath hitched as she watched Viola’s transformation, her limbs bending at strange angles, her face elongated, distorted, becoming something monstrous. Viola’s humanity melted away, replaced by a hollow, tortured shell.

Jian took a step forward, her voice calm and resolute.

" I… I always needed someone to blame for what happened to Diana, "Jian confessed, her voice laced with bitterness. She hesitated, feeling her own mask slip. " I blamed you. I blamed myself. I blamed everyone… But deep down, the person I hated most…" Her voice cracked, and she closed the distance between them, lifting Viola’s chin gently with her fingers. " Was me. I never hated you, never hated anyone.... I just couldn't express my deep hatred for myself, everyone I ever cared about always get hurt because of me or so I choose to think. Diana's life could have been much better if I wasn't there "..

A bitter smile played on Jian’s lips, her yellow eyes dulling, the weight of her own unspoken guilt sapping the light from within her. She glanced at Viola’s monstrous form, her heart aching in ways she couldn’t quite explain.

“I’m sorry,” Jian whispered, her words barely audible. “I’m sorry for making you feel like a monster.”

Viola’s broken gaze met hers, but before she could respond, the shadows surged, engulfing them both in a cold, suffocating darkness. A low, sinister whisper slithered through the void, its words chilling the empty space to the core.

" Only the Broken can understand the Broken ".

The world around them crumbled, dissolving into a void of endless night as silent fell into the darkness, and the universe folded into itself, leaving only emptiness.

But as the world collapsed.....

The Eye Cried......