The projection continued, flickering through days of Alice’s life after she met that disgusting man.

  She kept returning to him. Fear chained her, dragging her back to that restaurant that felt less like a place of comfort and more like a pen. Fear that if she didn’t, Sieg would turn his malice toward her mother.

  The projection showed how he sometimes took her away. He taught her how to hunt, how to track prey, kill it, and eat it while it was still fresh. It will strengthen you, he kept saying.

  When they finally spotted their prey, he always made her pull the trigger. He pressed the rifle into her hands, guided her finger, steadied her when she froze. After the shot, he forced her through the skinning, sometimes cutting off a chunk of raw meat and making Alice eat it.

  He ordered her to practice her aim whenever she was free, forcing her to shoot from a distance. The targets were always small animals such as rabbits, dogs, and cats. When she missed, the punishment was always the same: another mouthful of raw meat.

  In a twisted way, it made Alice a good hunter. At night she studied the craft, not out of passion but out of fear, knowing that each mistake meant more flesh torn from some creature and shoved between her teeth. Even studying, the one thing she had once loved, was not spared from his perversion and cruelty.

  What had once been a joy, a quiet escape into books and practice, became something rancid. Every page she turned tasted of blood, every lesson reeked of him. Hunting, learning, striving, things that should have been hers, were stolen and reshaped into tools of shame.

  And always, when he was finished with her, he pressed a purse of gold into her hands. Something for home, he said. Each time, Alice slipped a few shingles into her mother’s purse, a quiet ritual of atonement.

  She endured it all in silence, unwilling to place another weight on her already weary mother.

  In the past months, distant was an understatement, it was outright neglect. The fragments Alice glimpsed in the projection showed it clearly: her mother always tired, always avoiding her.

  Even when Alice tried to massage her shoulders, something which she usually asked after a long day of work, Sylvaria pulled away with excuses—she needed more sleep, she had work, she couldn’t play with her. Like a fire smothered by ash, her warmth dwindled, her attention strangled by the grind of survival. She could saw the eyes however, a hint of shame and anger was there all the time like a ghost following her everywhere.

  Alice told herself it was only because her mother was busy. Or because the phantom flared up through her fault—an excuse she accepted without protest. So she let her mother be.

  Even a glance became rare. When Alice returned in the afternoons, just as any schoolgirl her age might, Sylvaria was already asleep, drained from her ordeals. Alice never woke her; afraid that she would disturb her mother’s rest.

  At night, she waited by the stairs. On one midnight, she dozed off against the railing. She woke to faint wailing from her mother’s chamber, but Sylvaria left her where she was.

  And in the mornings, on her way to “school,” she would catch a glimpse at last—her mother hollow-eyed, drawn, dim with fatigue. Alice’s words shriveled in her throat. Better silence, she thought, than adding one more burden.

  The only companion she has was Wan at this point. Playing with him after she was ‘played’ by the bear and ignored by her Sun. Trying to scrap just a bit of happiness from the gilded cage she was placed.

  One day, the monotony broke. Her mother was awake when she prepared for school.

  Sylvaria slumped at the stair’s edge, shadows carved deep beneath her eyes. Her skin, once smooth as polished ceramic, had turned pale and brittle under the weight of living. Strands of hair hung in loose tangles, as if even lifting a comb had become too heavy. And Alice saw what she hadn’t noticed before—her mother’s once-black, lustrous hair was now marred with spreading streaks of white, not yet fully turned but already claiming her.

  Alice watched her in silence. Her mother never spoke when she returned from work anymore. She only collapsed, sleeping straight through the hours that might have belonged to them. No warmth, no stories, no questions. Just the rhythm of breath that wasn’t quite restful.

  Each day carved more out of her. Each night left her thinner, not in body but in spirit. And though Alice wanted to call to her, to ask for a glance, a word—anything—she couldn’t.

  Living with her had become one more burden. She knew it. She felt it. And in that silence, Alice shrank smaller, convinced she had stolen away the last fragments of her mother’s soul.

  “Alice,” she said flatly. “The boy you pushed… he died. His mother came yesterday to tell me.”

  Alice was shocked by this revelation, guilt and the fact she make a boy lost her life only because of some few insults and attempted kiss was something she hadn’t expected.

  “He never woke up after you pushed him.” Sylvaria continued. “And now finally, the doctor said there was nothing to be done anymore.”

  Guilt struck her still. She had never thought it could reach that far. But it had. The weight settled heavy: she had killed a boy. Two lives now.

  Murderer.

  The word rang in her head like a chant, whispering she was good at killing—so good that even without trying, she did it anyway.

  Just how many have to die before you realize you’re not meant for this world? the voice asked. Why don’t you turn your talent on yourself?

  She wanted to shut her ears, to beg her mother for forgiveness—but what was the point? Apology resolved nothing.

  “Now, we must pay them the settlement, or we’ll both end up in jail,” Sylvaria said coldly.

  “Mom, I’am sor—”

  “WHY, ALICE? WHY?” Her scream struck like a hammer nailing shut Alice’s coffin. She had expected hatred from others, even from herself—but from her Sun? It was too much, far too much to bear.

  “I’m sorry, Mom, I’m sorry.” She repeated the words as though they could erase the deed.

  “Saying sorry is useless! I also got notice from your teacher—you haven’t gone to school these last few months! Why, Alice? I sold my body for you, danced for strangers, and you skipped the school I broke myself to pay for?”

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” She kept saying it, over and over, as if repetition could make it true.

  “I don’t know where I failed in teaching you,” Sylvaria said at last. “But no matter. Now come with me. Take that shovel.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Alice didn’t ask why. She simply obeyed.

  They walked toward the familiar Ek tree, where her father lay buried.

  “Dear, I’m so sorry,” Sylvaria said, her voice carrying that solemn tone Alice knew so well—the kind that could sound like either a lament or a sonata, depending on where she spoke it.

  “TAKE THE DAMN MURDER FLOWER AND DIG!” she suddenly shouted, the command striking her trembling child.

  “Mom…”

  “THIS IS YOUR FAULT, ALICE!” she snapped.

  “Please, Mom, ple—”

  “NOW, ALICE!”

  Her hands trembled with guilt and shame as she dug into the grave. Each stroke of the shovel came with another whispered apology, muttered again and again as she tore apart her father’s final resting place.

  The earth itself seemed to beg her to stop, to let the dead rest in peace. But the iniquity and shame crept deeper, crawling beneath her skin, forcing their way into every pore, mixing with her blood until they ravaged her body and soul from within.

  Every swing felt like a barbed whip striking her skin, mangling it as she carried on with the deed. The poison of it seeped through her veins, as if her insides were liquefying—hollowing her out, making her a vessel fit only for a murderer.

  White and pure on the outside, her silver hair veiling a beauty she could never claim—yet inside, only emptiness, a gaping void. Killing her father had not been enough. Now she had to desecrate him too.

  The projection blurred into pure darkness, a void even the runic light could not pierce.

  Lina and Halwen covered their mouths as they watched old Vierna unravel—tearing herself apart, carving a wound so deep her own mind decided it was better to forget.

  Leopold wove an even more complex spell. Vierna’s body thrashed in rebellion, flailing uncontrollably. If not for the cast clamped around her head, her brain might have spilled out already.

  Seeing how long it was taking Alice to dig, Sylvaria took the shovel herself. Together they unearthed the coffin—Sylvaria with the shovel, Alice with her hands—the final barrier between their world and her father’s rest.

  With telekinesis, Sylvaria lifted it from the earth. Alice watched her mother’s face twist with strain, sweat streaming down her brow. The coffin was no light burden.

  They dragged it inside the house. Sylvaria conjured a crowbar into her hand and tore the lid open. Then she went away somewhere.

  Alice froze. Her father’s body lay headless, parts of it transmuted into solid gold—the very thing they needed to pay the blood price.

  After a while, her mother returned, carrying a chisel and hammer in her hands.

  “Mom, please,” Alice whispered. “I have some money. Please… let him rest.”

  “Shut up! This is your fault, Alice! You just had to kill that stupid boy!” Sylvaria snapped. She thrust a chisel into her daughter’s trembling hands. “Now take the gold.”

  As she spoke, the projection room bloomed with a myriad of colors. Gray—unassuming, yet choking—spread across everything. That command was something Alice had not expected.

  “Mom, please don’t make me do it. Please, Mom—this is Dad. Please…” Alice wailed, pouring out her soul as if the sound alone could stop her mother from turning him into nothing but a gold sculpture.

  “Alice,” her mother cupped her face. For one fleeting moment, Alice thought her mother had returned, thought the warm, loving Sun had come back to her.

  Then Sylvaria’s eyes hardened. “The. Gold. NOW.”

  “Mom, I have money, please—Mom, stop—”

  “You think a child’s savings can save us from the bullshit you put us through? Do you think my body was so cheap—that a few shingles could pay what I couldn’t?”

  The slap cracked against her cheek.

  “DO AS I SAID, YOU DAMN DEFECT!”

  The slap stung hot against her cheek. Alice’s breath caught, her chest caving in on itself. She knelt beside her father’s body. Though it was cold, rigid, and mangled with gold, Alice could still feel warmth from it—perhaps only the warmth of memory. This was the body that used to hold her whenever she came home disappointed, ignored once again by the world around her.

  Sylvaria shoved the hammer into her hands, her grip iron, her eyes burning with fury and exhaustion.

  She looked at her mother for a while, hoping she would change her mind — hoping she wouldn’t make her do it. But her mother’s eyes remained unmoved. Knowing that resisting any further would lead nowhere, Alice finally steeled herself to do the unimaginable, no matter how much it tore at her soul.

  Her first blow rang out dull, the chisel sliding against bone before catching on a vein of gold. Flesh tore with a wet sound. The stench of rot surged up, and she gagged, bile burning her throat. Her hands shook so violently she nearly dropped the tool.

  The first chunk of gold Alice pried loose still carried strips of her father’s flesh. Her stomach lurched. The metal felt heavier than it should, as if it had stolen the weight of her guilt. Heat rose behind her eyes. She wanted to press the piece back into him and whisper an apology, to undo what she’d done. The smell of metal and old skin clung to her fingers.

  Her mother snatched it from her hands without hesitation. With a small knife, she pared the meat away from the gleaming surface, her face set in grim determination. The discarded flesh landed with a dull slap on the floor.

  Then, with steady hands, she dropped the cleaned gold into a bucket of hot water, letting the steam rise as though to wash the stain of death away.

  She looked at her mother. The woman’s gaze was wild now, raving, but Alice’s chest twisted because deep down she believed it really was her fault.

  She thought the money she had taken from Sieg—money pressed into her palm like filth, money that felt like whoring herself out—might be enough to pay for the sin she had committed. But that was absurd. How could coins tainted by him ever balance the weight of a life?

  Worse still, offering it felt like an insult to her mother’s sacrifice. Sylvaria broke her spine every night, selling dignity for survival, while Alice dared to think her stained pocket change could compare.

  She hadn’t meant it that way. She hadn’t meant to.

  Tears blurred her vision as she carved, whispering apologies with every stroke. “I’m sorry, Dad… I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” Each word vanished beneath the hammer’s rhythm.

  This was the man who had comforted her all her life, who had carried honor and dignity on his shoulders to give her a decent home, shielding her from the stinging gazes of prejudice and falsehood.

  And how did she repay him? By desecrating the very body that once embraced her—scraping it apart so she could sell it, all to pay for her own wretched mistake.

  The thought cut deeper than the chisel. Maybe she should have just stayed silent when the boy called her every insult he could think of. Maybe she should have let him kiss her. Her body was worthless anyway. What was a little kiss compared to a life? If she had endured it, maybe he would still be alive.

  The sound filled the house—hammer on gold, knife through flesh, bone splintering, metal clattering into a waiting pan.

  Finally, she couldn’t take it anymore. She vomited, retching until her stomach turned inside out.

  “YOU JUST HAD TO DO THAT, HUH? CLEAN THAT SHIT UP!” Sylvaria shouted at her.

  “Mom… why?”

  “Because you’ve become nothing but a bother to me lately! You never listen anymore. And now look at you—wasting it. Do you know how hard money is now? Do you know what I’ve had to do just to keep food on the table?” Her voice cracked into fury. “I sell my body for coin, Alice. And you throw it away like this. Now clean it—it stinks!”

  Alice obeyed. She didn’t know what else to do. If anything, the vomit felt like proof of her uselessness. Her mother’s words drilled into her: every coin mattered, every scrap had to be kept, and here she was, wasting it by heaving her guts out like a child.

  On the floor lay a pile of gold, faintly gleaming in the lamplight.

  “Now, collect those scraps of flesh and put them back in the coffin.”

  “…”

  “You mute or something?”

  “N–no. Yes, Mom… I’m sorry, Mom.”

  She bent down and gathered the pieces of her father’s remains, cradling them delicately—like fragments of heaven broken and scattered, forced into her hands only because money demanded it. Every time she picked the flesh, a part of her own body was discarded in return. When she finished, she could felt it, both her body and soul was now riddled with holes, a payment for what she had done to her father.

  They buried the casket again, her mother gathered the gold and left. Alice didn’t dare to ask where. She only watched in silence as Sylvaria stepped out of the house—and out of her life.

  But Alice couldn’t stay idle. There was still another matter she had to face. If she skipped the meeting, something even worse would happen to her mother. The weight of it pressed so heavily on her that, for a fleeting moment, she wished she could simply vanish. But she knew disappearing would only bring Sieg’s retribution crashing down on her mother—and after all the hardship she had already caused, she couldn’t allow that.

  So she bathed, using the last of the good soap, and pulled on the cleanest uniform she could find—because the bear liked it that way. He loved when his prey wore school clothes.

  She stood before the mirror. Her reflection wavered, blurred, as though even the glass refused to hold her shape. She retched again, remembering what those hands had touched—what they had done. Fragments of her father. Remnants of the love that once coddled her.

  And worst of all, she hadn’t even borne it alone. Too weak, too useless, she had forced her mother to carry a punishment meant for her.

  She wiped at her cheeks, and something dark slid from her eyes—thick, crimson, heavy. She didn’t linger on it. She carried on. A murderer had no right to cry.

  Then she left her sanctuary. Left to be played again.