Lucius's perspective
The stares pierced me like pins. Not hostile, but not harmless either. Gareth. Leonard. Every student. All eyes on me, as if my name were scrawled across my forehead in black ink.
I hadn't anticipated this. In hindsight, I should have. I assumed this world would operate under rules similar to those I knew, though I was well aware that was a convenient illusion. A false anchor. Reality, instead, is like a bottomless ocean: what you can't predict swallows you whole.
I sat for three seconds. Three real seconds, measured with the precision of a metronome, but they stretched internally into hours. An extended lapse where a thousand versions of me debated what to say, how not to fail, how to pretend everything was under control.
It wasn't.
Nothing was.
My body felt rigid, as if caught in a paralysis spell. I searched the rubble of my memory for a useful phrase, a forgotten speech, some lesson from another life that could save me. But all I found was a wall: blank, cold, deaf. An empty mind at the exact moment it needed to shine.
Then Isolde stood. The shadow in the corner of my eye vanished, and her figure rose with resolve. I followed. It was my turn. Our turn. I walked to the platform like a condemned man to the gallows, each step accompanied by a stab in my gut, a sense of exposure that felt terrifyingly familiar.
I was never good at this. Not even in my other life.
Not that I didn't try. I tried once, and it cost me more than I was willing to pay.
I was 17, and for some reason—those that only make sense to adults—I was chosen to open the school sports event. Me. The guy no one looked at without sneering. The one who hid behind messy hair as if it could shield him from being torn apart.
I was weird. I accepted it. I was then, and in a way, I still am.
But it wasn't my appearance that sank me. It was someone else's stupidity. As I climbed the platform, someone stuck out their foot. I fell. And where I landed, fate—or its crudest version—had left a gift: fresh, warm, insultingly real dog shit. The laughter erupted instantly. I got up, ignored the stench, and started the speech.
That was a mistake.
They threw food. Shoes. Laughter turned into projectiles. And when I thought it couldn't get worse, a student climbed up and punched me in the face. I didn't react. Not out of courage. It was something else. Something like existential exhaustion. As if even that wasn't worth the effort of responding.
I never tried again. I closed that door, sealed it, and threw the key into the deepest corners of my mind.
And yet, here I am. Another life. Another body. Another stage. But the same fear. Clinging to my throat like a knot of dried blood. Pressing my chest, reminding me that memory doesn't erase with reincarnation. It only slumbers, like a snake in the sun.
And now it's waking.
We stood at the center of the platform. A symbolic space, not for its design, but for how it concentrated collective judgment. We were exposed. Isolde and I. Two children—at least in appearance—pretending to occupy a space that demanded poise, clarity… and a false calm.
The murmurs swarmed around us like bees. I couldn't make out words, just fragments of syllables that broke before becoming ideas. As if the world conspired to make their opinions indecipherable. Maybe out of pity. Maybe cruelty. Or, most likely, because my mind couldn't bear more judgment.
I told myself I didn't care what they thought. A self-induced mantra. But the truth was different: the echo of my past life clung to me like a shadow that doesn't understand reincarnation.
"What am I supposed to say?" Isolde asked. Her voice was a trembling whisper, heavy with honesty.
The question hung in the air for a suspended moment. Because in that instant, I wasn't the recycled Lucius from another existence. I was just a twelve-year-old boy facing something bigger than him. No mental armor, no strategy. Just a visceral reaction: fear.
I looked at Alicia. She watched me with an unreadable expression: surprise, slight concern… curiosity? As if she could sense something was off, that my composure had cracked.
And it had.
I had to hold myself together. I had to be the twin with the older soul. The one carrying time's scars. The one who doesn't yield.
"Just be yourself," I told Isolde, forcing a smile that probably fooled everyone but her. "I trust your words will be enough. You go first. I'll follow, okay?"
She nodded. Took two steps forward. And suddenly, the scared girl became someone else.
"My name is Isolde Equidna D'Arques, and today I'm here to give a short but meaningful closing speech for the ceremony!"
Her voice was firm. Startlingly firm. As if, for a moment, all her fear had lined up behind her instead of in front. It made me happy. Not for her confidence, but for the contrast it drew with my own state.
Barely a week had passed since the entrance exam. Yet Isolde's words floated with a maturity that clashed—in a good way—with the brevity of time.
She spoke of fear. Of those who didn't make it. Of effort. Of a past argument between us that, at the time, seemed trivial but now felt like the prelude to something greater. The usual irony of memory: what seems unimportant ends up being all that matters.
And then came the line that undid me.
"Thanks to him, I made it into this academy…"
I didn't know how to take that. Not in that moment.
She ended with a plea disguised as encouragement. An honest exhortation. Applause. A bow. A perfect mask, though I knew her hands still trembled behind that steady voice.
She came back to me. Touched my shoulder.
"Can we grab some bread and eggs later? I'm terrified," she whispered.
Her fingers kept shaking. That was the signal.
"Of course," I replied with a smile that was no longer a mask but a longing for stability. I took two steps forward. The same two steps that, in another time, meant the public humiliation of a teenager covered in mud and contempt.
Alicia was there, now beside Beatrice and the others. She looked at me. Smiled. There was something… peculiar in her expression. A mix of playfulness, complicity, and veiled provocation. I didn't understand her intentions, but her gaze pushed me. Forced me to move forward.
And then I felt it.
The sweat. The void. The racing pulse.
I was scared. Panicked. And I had nothing prepared. Not a line. Not a phrase.
Isolde noticed immediately. She knows me. Reads me. Always has.
I walked to her.
"What's wrong?"
"I…" I tried to lie. Couldn't.
There was something in my throat. An ancient pressure, as if I were about to regurgitate centuries of repressed emotions. "I… I'm really scared…"
The confession didn't bring relief. It brought vertigo. I felt like a house of cards held up by a single misspoken word.
"What? Lucy, calm down, you're shaking."
"Issy… I don't know if I can do this. This feels… too oppressive. Like certain events from my past life," I whispered, gripping her hand like a man clinging to reality just before drowning.
My body wouldn't obey. My mind found no escape. Everything was there: the fear, the shame, the rage… old, rusted, but terribly alive emotions.
For the first time in this new existence, I was having a panic attack. And I couldn't hide it.
"You know something, kid?" Father was in his usual armchair, exhaling smoke as if his words needed a fog to mask their authority.
I was trembling. The cigarette still smoldered in his hand, but the real pain was already embedded in my skin. It burned, yes, but the predictability hurt more. I knew what was coming. I always did.
"Answer me, you piece of shit!" he roared, his fist cutting through the air with a violence that seemed rehearsed. "Goddamn it… What a fucking nuisance you turned out to be. I said it before: your mother should've taken the pill after that night."
I fell to the floor. Not from the blow, but from habit. Gravity always seemed to be on his side.
I curled up, trying to disappear into the floor. I wanted to cry, but I knew tears would only make him keep going. Crying was admitting vulnerability. And in that house, that was an invitation to hell.
"I don't want to admit it was my mistake for not letting your mother abort, but it is… Damn it. I don't get why you're still here. Are you even my son? You're a coward. In the war, we jumped with knives between our teeth. And you can't even stand up."
"Sorry… sorry…" The word repeated, mechanical, as if my mouth refused to think for itself. I felt panic throbbing in my temples, sadness tightening my chest like a noose.
Then the image warped. Like a stone dropped in a pond, the memory blurred with the ripples.
"See that?" I turned my head. Beside me was him… Ha-Neul. Or rather, myself, at twelve. Blurry, as if he didn't want to be fully remembered. "This moment… this was the start. What forged your true nature. Why do you keep fighting what you know you are?"
"I don't want to be you anymore. For once… I have someone who holds me up. Someone who reminds me why it's worth keeping breathing."
I wasn't lying. Lying to oneself was even more dangerous than facing the truth.
"Isolde?" He laughed with a roughness that sounded like spoiled oxygen. "What nonsense. You said the same about the other girls. That they'd save you. That you'd stop killing. But didn't you drive the drill into their skulls? Bite their thighs like you were seeking some primal comfort? Is that an anchor to you?"
I sighed. "Why are you showing me this?"
"Sorry. Even I don't find it pleasant. I think it was the first time he hit you like that. Before it became routine. But I have to thank him. That pain was the fertilizer for my existence. Others' suffering… it became sweetness."
"You disgust me. Can I leave now? I don't want to see you."
"Leave?" He laughed again, that hollow laugh. "You've forgotten something important. I have no power here. This is your conscience. The panic attack knocked you out, and now you're trapped in this crack of time."
"That's why you're blurry? I can't fully make you out…"
"Exactly. You're not dead. Just unconscious. And while you are, your mind's trying to process what's happening out there. Though only two seconds pass out there, here time unravels. Sometimes I wonder if it wasn't simpler when we just got paid to kill, without having to earn a place in this farce of a new world."
I sat, my body still tense. The silence wrapped me like an old, rough, but familiar blanket. If I'd died on that platform, maybe this conversation would be eternal.
"Was it fun working for Jace?" I asked, my voice muffled by resignation.
"I guess. They paid us to kill. Let us play with the bodies. The work wasn't steady, but there was always a new victim every so often. And tell me, isn't that what everyone wants? To get paid for doing what they love?"
"Repulsive. Even though you're me… I can't help feeling visceral disgust hearing you."
"Why did I show up now?" he continued, without waiting for my reply. "Maybe because you can't keep pretending. You want to be better, don't you? But to do that, you have to face me. And understand this: you can't erase me. I was you, and you were me. That doesn't go away. No matter how hard you try to forget."
I stayed silent.
It wasn't a confession. It was an acceptance. And in that moment, I realized talking to myself wasn't as terrifying as before. Maybe because I could now distinguish what I was from what I'm trying to be. Or because, after all, even hell feels more bearable when you know someone doesn't run when they see you in flames.
"I hate you, Ha-Neul."
"Haha… idiot," he laughed, turning with that sickening nonchalance of his. "Well, time to vanish for a while. But before I go… remember this: no matter how much you try to bury me, I'm still there, in the cracks. I feel your fire. That pain that never stops burning."
I didn't respond. No point arguing with a cynical reflection.
He kicked me. My body fell, and as it hit the ground, the world shattered.
I came back to reality.
Isolde was in front of me, exactly as I'd left her when I passed out.
I was… calmer. Not at peace, but balanced. As if I'd accepted the shadow exists but doesn't have to rule.
"Lucy… I…" she murmured, her voice barely audible, as if the words were heavier than her lips could bear.
I didn't say anything. I just took her hand and pressed it to my cheek. That simple gesture… it felt like a line drawn between two realities. She was tangible. She existed. And her warmth was the only constant in the chaos.
She, my world, shone brighter than any star. Brighter than any promise. Brighter than any lie I'd told myself to survive.
"Sorry, Issy."
Isolde smiled softly. Then, with her fingertips, she traced small circles on my skin.
"You don't have to be afraid, Lucy. I don't know what happened in your other life, or what scars turned you into that person. But I know you're stronger than all that. I know you. I can see in your eyes that you're fighting. And I trust you. Because you're analytical, methodical, brave. Because you're… my brother. The most important person in my life. So don't run. Let the emotions out. I'll be here."
I nodded, closing my eyes. Peace… wasn't real. But for a moment, it felt within reach.
I straightened and returned to the center of the platform. I took a breath. This time, not to escape something. But to hold onto who I am.
The pain wasn't a burden anymore. It had transformed. It was energy. Resolve. Isolde had given me that. And that… that was enough to keep me standing.
"My name is Lucius Van D'Arques, and I'm the twin of the strongest girl I know, Isolde Equidna D'Arques!" I shouted, with a voice I didn't know I had, with a strength I didn't know was left in me. I didn't do it for attention. I did it because it was true. And in a world like this, truth had to be shouted before silence buried it.
Because she'd saved me. Because, thanks to her, I could leave Ha-Neul behind.
"This speech won't be the most polished," I continued, calmer now but with the same pulse of sincerity. "Some parts might sound incoherent. The academy didn't prepare us for this. And I don't blame them. I blame myself for not being the one who should give these words."
I hadn't rehearsed anything. But something in me needed to come out. And it did.
"For a long time, I've carried an invisible weight. You know our last names. We're the children of Erika and Elias D'Arques. Heroes, they say, who fought the dragon of Eldrathorn's mountains…"
I was improvising, yes. But each word came from a sincere corner of me. I didn't want to be remembered for who I was, but for who I'm trying to be.
"I was afraid. Afraid of not meeting their expectations. And I know I'm not the only one. Maybe many of you feel the same. But let me tell you something: Don't live to replicate your parents' legacy. Don't chain yourself to someone else's pride. Forge your own. Falling is allowed. Giving up is not. Get up. Find your way."
I was hiding a past life. Yes. But I did it with the hope that, in this new life, there was still room for someone like me. Not for redemption, but for construction. I wanted to prove I could change. Not out of obligation, but by choice.
"And finally, I want to thank the most important person in my existence. Thanks to her… I'm still here. Because she's my anchor. My strength. The reason I keep fighting. If it weren't for her, I'd probably be locked away at home, running, giving in to the pressure, doomed to repeat myself until I vanished… Thank you for listening. I wish all the new students luck and joy."
I bowed. Not as a sign of submission, but as closure. I stepped back, returning to her side.
Isolde was waiting, with that smile that seemed to mock fate itself. She took my hand without a word.
I was still trembling. So I let go of her hand and instead wrapped my arm around her.
She rested her head on my shoulder. We walked.
That simple. That human.