It was a rainy day in the Mithra household. Siola, 14 years old, staring at a trophy under the name of Rosa Mithra. It’s bright silver and it is housed behind a protective glass. But glancing to the side, she can see the many gold and platinum trophies under her name filling up the entire room, not her sister’s. It doesn’t make her smile, nor does it make her express anything.

Looking at a small doll of a panda she holds, she pats its head lightly. She squishes both of its cheeks before pressing its head to her forehead. Brushing them together gently. She continued to stare at Rosa’s trophy before leaving the room. Right by the door, an old maid awaits her, and it was then that Siola’s lifeless expression turns naturally bright.

“Ehehe,” the brightest smile she can ever forms. She took out the panda doll and cheerfully yelled, “Found it!”

The old maid smiles.

Walking on the carpet in the corridor, she caught a glance at a barbeque from the glass window and it was her family. Her grandfather, her father, and her mother. Alongside them also stands a bright young man being patted by his father.

Siola turns her attention away and walks further to the hallway. There she sees her sister and her aunt enjoying their cup of tea while cheerfully talking to a young girl. Siola pays attention to her in particular, how beautiful her expression is. It's different than how Siola usually has and the one she is making right now.

"Lady Hashiri is as bright as ever. You have a good friend, Siola."

"..." she smiles, “Sadrin, may I ask you something?”

“There is not a question I will not answer you, my dear. And I will always listen.”

Warmth oozed out of her, “...”, holding Siola’s question for a moment, “Don’t you find things adequate the way it is? To be blunt, in the past 10 years, how has life treated you so far? The life with us Mithra, the life with me.”

The maid, Sadrin, gaze into Siola’s eyes for a moment before a smile formed. She hugs the young lady warmly as she whispers into her ear, “It has been the most wonderful journey of my life, dear.”

Her small fists clenched, she hugs Sadrin’s back, accepting her warm and comforting breeze. Rosa then caught a glance at the two just before the stairs, she raised her brows, wondering.

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***

Three Transcendental beings gazing upon the weakling that is me. Judging whether to kick me out of their palace or worse. I asked one of them, the one that resembles my mother, I asks her, “You send me to my death knowing that I have [Immortality]?”

“Death can be more than your limited knowledge of it is.”

“Was that a test?” asked earnestly, “You send me out there knowing how weak I was and am, you wish for me to suffer. Experiencing this death, all for what? To test my courage?”

Stepping to the stairs, “You wanted to become one of us. I want a reason for you to be it.”

“Does that make sense to you?”

She narrows her eyes down.

“Just look at me.”

“Overcoming adversaries is necessary for you to—”

“WHAT THE HELL WHERE YOU EVEN EXPECTING?!” the room went even more silent after my scream, “What, you think I’m gonna pull a legendary weapon out of my behind? Activating a hidden power long slumbering inside me or overpowering that giant worm with the power of friendship within my memories? Well, I have none of that.”

The memories of my sweet family who has turned on me, “I don’t have them,” the memories of my friends in the future, “I don’t have anyone.”

Glancing at Replica who kept her head held high, “But then I was brought here. I was told to serve someone who I don’t even know. I had to bow my head because apparently, I have no pride. I’m worth nothing and I can be killed at any time by any one of you.”

Keeping a forced smile, “I'm dancing at every opportunity to be in your favor. I can never defy you. I can never oppose you, all of you."

Her arrogant expression lessened.

“Rob me out of my purity, kicked around like a dirtbag, or being told to die in the middle of nowhere. Although it saddens me, I never had any resentment toward any of you for that. I'll do anything you ask me to do, but...”

The inner part of her brows tilts up as the edge of her outer eyes relaxes.

“Just look at me, what things am I capable of doing? I’m not even a quarter level to a hundred and you’re already expecting me to kill a rock eater. If it eases your mind, why don't you just turn me into a skeleton? Maybe then you’ll see a tiny portion of me that can be useful to you, or at least, a thing that won't even bother you in the least.”

People can be amusing at times. How they expect you to respond in a specific way when they are interacting with you. By meeting their expectation in a way, you would make them happy but something odd happens when you go above and beyond it. Something even you yourself cannot imagine happening. This unpredictability is what fuels me.

Replica wants me to feel fear of getting kicked out, so I’ll show her even more than that. Hopelessness. Will she find it delightful, or will she find it pitiful? But what I ended up seeing is something different. Her brows frowned, her teeth gritted, eyes narrowed but it cast reflection brighter than usual.

Why is she feeling remorse?

But it was then that the image of the past came back to me, overlapping my vision. The face of Replica wearing the same expression as my mother at the time she managed to kick me out of the house. Their face overlaps with one another, and they are the exact same.

[Ignition]

Flame engulfs that image as I spend every last mana to blow everything away. Burning every single one of those memories as I don’t want to be haunted by the past. No matter what.