"...... why."

The General's voice calls out, darker than the midnight skies, colder than the midwinter chill. Colder than I've ever heard him before, he asks, whilst clutching his neck, a stern face set upon his face, as blood flow down between his fingers.

".... no reason."

"I see." He turns. "Lock him up."

As my fellow soldier force me to my feet, I sway, my hands bound together. As I turn.... it may have been my imagination.

The General doesn't cry, ever.

Neither do I, it just gets blurry sometimes.

----------------------------------------

 To my imaginary audience, the representative of my madness, my illness, I greet once more. Hello, denizens of another world. Does it satisfy your heart? Does it warm the cockles of your wizened, shriveled soul? To see my sufferings, to see my trauma resolved, to see my mentality become better?

No. The outside may have been healed, but the inner rots deep.

As long as one tells no one about their hurts, their pains, their struggles; as long as it stays trivial, casual, lighthearted, the warmth of another person will never reach. 

Tell me. Do you have a person who is there for you? Who knows you as intimately as you know yourself? Doesn't have to be family, or a lover. Do you have someone who knows the mold you are made from, as to be able to pick up your pieces and put it back, in accordance to your blueprint?

We have so many stories, each of us, but the stories are never told, to be locked up, hidden away. Maybe it's for the best.

But as an internal wound casually bound over rots into pus and ooze, so too my soul cries out. And thus, to this imaginary audience, I shall speak my case, my secrets, before I pass into the abyss, to my rightful place.

----------------------------------------

You know, I never felt... love, I think.

What is love? What does it mean? What kinds of love are there? Which is the best?

Maybe it all started when I first came into this world, to my twisted family, with its twisted love, to twist my life. Heh. 

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I was born into a lower-ranking noble family of this kingdom. We never really had any merits, no particularly exclusive skillset, no rewards, but no demerits. 

At least, in the surface.

Born into a family that dabbles within the dark of the society, I was born, as the youngest of an empire, not an aboveground empire; an empire borne of secrets, betrayals, and assassinations.When I was born, I was immediately categorized as an inferior product; something about being unable to wield mana and nor having the aptitude for the darkness attribute. Thus, I was sidelined into the servant track: to support the future head of the family, I was molded into a tool.

By age of 4, I killed my first human being.

By age of 6, I learned my mother did not love me; calling me a dull, wooden block, only to be carved into the family's desires.

By age of 7, I had all the bones of my body, except for the crucial bits like the cranium, broken at least once.

By age of 13, I was the perfect tool.

By age of 15, the tool became defective.

When I was discarded by the family, I was human, yes, but something less. It took me 5 years to relearn my emotions; how it felt to feel injustice, how it feels to be angry, to be sad, to be happy.

But I don't know what it means to love.

You see, friends require a certain casual form of love, in my opinion. To love a women, one only needs to feel desire. 

.... No that's wrong.

I learned that friends have each other's backs, annoy one another yet in the crucial moments will be there to hold them up.

Lovers unite, not only in body, but also in soul; to become one being, to love them, to sacrifice oneself for the other.

But. Family? The only family I know used me, demeaned my existence. The ways I know to love another is... awkward. Unrefined. Like a child that had never been taught how to walk, trying to hobble along.

Yet they need me now. Maybe they've always needed me. There was a reason they enrolled me in the Academy, after all. 

To be frank, I was given a letter 3 days ago. Informing me that if I complete a certain mission, that I'll be accepted back into the family with open arms.

What was the mission? Come on, you guys are smart, aren't you?

It was to kill the General. 

Why, I have no idea. Maybe he was hindering their plans of some sort. Maybe it was a contract. Who knows.

Of course, I could've chosen to refuse. I thought I could. I thought that I could break off my lingering desire for familial affection, like they've broken me off. But it didn't end up being that way.

Am I loved? I like to think so. Is love unconditional? I would love for that to be true.

But single events can be written off as coincidences; a lifetime of experience is hard to be swayed with a couple moments. 

......

I don't know where to go anymore. 

I don't know what to do.

It feels as if I'm empty; by chosing to seek familial love that I've never tasted, I've sacrificed everything else.

......

You know, there exists a grayness.

Many people are afraid of the darkness, yet they do not recognize that the grayness is equally as dangerous.

Draining you of strength.

Draining you of will.

Draining you of passion.

Until nothing exists.

Just a shell.

.......

....

..

.