Fate

I don’t remember the last time I breathed.
Maybe it was when my third rib snapped against the stone. Or maybe when my back was pierced by a metal root jutting out like a spear, tearing through a chunk of flesh and leaving my life dangling by a thread. I don’t know. When you fall dozens of meters into absolute darkness, your body stops feeling. And all that remains is silence.
But the pain—
It was nothing compared to the frozen void in my chest.
Everything was dark...
There was nothing—only an endless, breathing darkness, like a living creature waiting to swallow me whole.
I couldn’t even feel my body.
There was only a voice—a voice that flowed like poisonous honey inside my fractured mind.
A woman’s voice.
Soft as death.
Beautiful as sin.
[Do you want to live?]
The question hung in the air like a glinting knife.
All the defining moments of my life flashed through my mind—like burning photo slides, each one vanishing in the flames of memory.
“Yes…” I whispered, my voice like dying wind. “I still want to live.”
There are still things I need to do. I haven’t reached it yet, I haven’t achieved it yet. I will… create a Happy Ending in this cursed tale.
A soft laugh echoed in the darkness.
A laugh like silver bells ringing at a funeral—beautiful, yet laced with the sweet promise of death.
[Are you sure?] Her voice flowed like warm blood over snow. [The life I give… is not the life you’ve ever known.]
The darkness around me began to stir, swirling like a hungry black mist. I felt something strange—like delicate hands brushing over my soul, exploring every corner of my heart with terrifying gentleness.
A touch that stole breath.
A touch that gave both life and death.
[You will be mine,] she whispered, [just as I will be the sweet poison in your blood.]
“What do you mean?” I asked, though my heart already knew the answer would break everything.
[You will live on the boundary between life and death. You will feel a love deeper than the ocean, and a pain sharper than glass dancing in your heart. You will be perfect in your destruction.]
Suddenly, I felt something warm brush against lips I couldn’t feel.
A kiss.
Soft, yet searing like hellfire.
As if someone poured intoxicating poison into me through a forbidden touch. A kiss that was both a promise and a threat.
[This is our pact,] her voice was now at my ear. [You will live, and I will love you in this cursed beauty.]
The darkness began to crack like drying skin.
Light seeped in—but not warm, white light. It was red, glinting like blood mixed with ruby gems.
Like a sunset over a battlefield.
I began to feel my body again.
But it wasn’t the same body. Something was different—stronger, yet more fragile. As if I had become a porcelain doll: beautiful but breakable—a work of art made to shatter gracefully.
[Now open your eyes, my cursed beloved.]
Slowly, I opened my eyes.
What I saw wasn’t the world I had known.
I saw a woman standing before me—beautiful in a terrifying way, like an angel who had fallen too far to be saved.
Eyes that held thousands of dark secrets.
A smile that could kill and heal in a single breath.
She reached out her hand to me, and I saw that her wrist bore a scar shaped like a blooming rose—beautiful in its death.
“Welcome to your new life,” she whispered with the same voice I had heard in the dark. A voice that now felt like both home and prison.
“Welcome to a love that will drive you mad… and heal wounds you never knew you had.”
I took her hand.
And in that moment, I felt something strange flow through my blood. Something dark, yet intoxicating—like poisoned wine that tastes like heaven on the tongue.
Like drinking death and tasting life for the first time.
“Who are you?” I asked, though my heart already knew the answer would change everything.
She smiled—a beautiful smile that held the sorrow of a thousand years.
“I am your prison and your protector. I am your sin and your salvation. I am yours… and you are mine,” she whispered, her fingers brushing my face like burning snow. “I am the love that will make you live forever—and the one that will make you suffer in ways even angels dare not imagine.”
I swallowed, bitter blood in my throat.
But my heart—
—my frozen heart—
—felt something unfamiliar.
Warmth.
And beauty.
She leaned closer, her breath like winter wind on skin.
“I am your future.”
And in that moment, I realized that the choice to live wasn’t about a second chance.
It was about stepping into a world where love and darkness danced together in terrifying harmony—a waltz played over the graves of hope.
And yes...
I still want to live.
I will create a Happy Ending in this cursed tale, even if I must fall in love with the darkness itself to do so.
Even if I must become a monster to protect what is beautiful.
Even if this love burns me from the inside out.