I am the Villain

Tangled Threads

Days passed in silence. Shen Liang didn't speak to Luo Zelin once. In the mornings, they trained in the same temple courtyard, Liang with his sword, precise and graceful; Zelin with his sluggish movements and half-hearted swings, often slinking away early with a smirk and some lazy excuse.

In the library, Zelin still doodled, still asked stupid questions, but Shen Liang never looked up. Not once. It was almost worse than being yelled at. Zelin pretended not to care. He wandered the Huiling grounds with his hands in his sleeves and that same cocky grin on his lips. But behind the smirk, something tightened. He couldn't kill him. The man who tore his old body apart. The man who had ended his name, his legend, his story. If Zelin even thought about revenge now, it would be suicide. Worse. It would give Shen Liang the satisfaction of taking his life twice.

Zelin hated that. So instead, he took to the rooftops at night, when the temple was quiet and the wind soft. He sat with his legs dangling over the tiles, a stolen clay jar of alcohol pressed to his lips, the moon staring down like a silent judge.

The stars above him blinked indifferently. His chest ached, not from wounds, but from the conflict twisting inside him. What now? What's the point of a second life if I can't even choose how it ends? He drank deeply. The alcohol burned, sharp, bitter. He hoped it would numb something.

Far below in another part of the temple, Shen Liang sat awake, legs crossed, his eyes closed in meditation, but the peace wouldn't come. His brows were furrowed. His chest was tight. He couldn't sleep. Every time Zelin drank, Liang felt it. A heavy sadness. A pulse of regret. A ghost of despair.

It wasn't his. And yet it lived inside him now. Shared pain. Shared weight. Liang hated it. He hated him. He didn't want to feel Zelin's guilt. Or sorrow. Or longing. Or that bitter sting of loneliness that came with every gulp of wine. Why does he feel like this? Why does it matter? Why should I care? And yet... he couldn't push it away.

He clenched his fists in the dark and whispered: "This entire situation is stupid." But no matter how far he walked, no matter how deep he meditated or how hard he trained... He couldn't shake the ache in his chest that didn't belong to him.