From a shadow that wears no crown…
But one day, he'll burn the crown itself.
And me?
I've lived long enough to learn that justice never comes.
In the lower city, years aren't counted in numbers…
They're counted by how many nights you survived hunger, betrayal, and yourself.
I don't know how old I am anymore.
I'm not sure if I'm in my twenties or thirties.
But I do know how many scars run down my back,
How many graves I've dug with my own hands,
And how many times I've swallowed rage instead of food.
They say age is measured in years.
I say
It's measured by how many times the world broke you… and you didn't die.
I grew up stealing glances at happiness through the glass of windows.
I grew up training my heart not to beat,
Teaching my eyes not to cry so the wolves wouldn't smell my weakness.
In the upper city, they celebrate a child's birthday with five layers of cake.
But down here?
We blow out our years with tongues of flame.
When you walk these streets, don't ask what time it is.
Time here isn't "3 PM," it's "after the massacre," "before the burial,"
"when the mother collapsed in tears," or "when the father screamed but no one heard."
I'm… not sad.
I've passed sadness the way fire passes through coal.
Now I'm just ember
Waiting for the right wind to explode.
And if you ask me who I am now?
I'm the one who learned not to trust passersby, not to trust friends, not even my own voice.
The one who sleeps with one eye open and a hand on the hilt of a knife.
The one who burned the notebooks of childhood
And rewrote them in ink and blood.
If someone asks my name today, I'll smile.
Not because I've forgotten it,
But because my true name… is no longer meant to be spoken.
My name became a curse, and my creed became a tattoo carved into the walls of fear.
They say I'm a rebel.
But they don't know how many times I tried to be just a normal citizen.
To work, to love, to laugh.
But here… purity is punished.
Yes, I wanted to live.
But they wouldn't let me.
And now
Now I want them to taste what they did to me.
You want to know what's waiting for the city?
A prophecy? Maybe.
But I don't believe in prophecies only consequences.
The upper city will fall…
Not by a sorcerer's hand, not by an army,
But by the first child from the lower city who says: "Enough."
Because when you raise a child on injustice,
You don't create a slave
You forge an enemy…
One who smiles as he breaks the chains.
And suddenly, I lost control.
My feet stopped in the middle of the alley, my fists ignited, and my mother's voice returned
As if calling me from the grave.
My chest tightened, and the rage became heavier than the air, heavier than pain, heavier than my name.
I lifted my head toward the grey sky, and I screamed…
I screamed with all the blood in my heart, with all the wounds hidden in my silence:
"I'll kill them!"
"I'll kill those cursed nobles!!"
"I'll kill them one by one… and tear off those wretched masks that turned a happy child… into a broken one!"
"I'll kill them for every moment I cried from hunger, for every slap that landed on my mother's face, for every kiss buried beneath the dirt!"
I screamed until the walls of the district trembled, until the crows flew from their nests, until the beggars in the corners shuddered.
I wasn't screaming for attention.
I screamed because my heart could no longer stay silent.
Because every tear buried in my chest erupted now as venom.
"They will see my face!"
The face they created with their own hands
A face that never knew warmth, never knew holidays, never heard bedtime stories.
Imagine a child, with innocent eyes, holding a broken toy…
Then take from him his mother, his safety, his name, his childhood
What remains?
A shadow.
Angry.
Shattered.
Alone.
But still standing… still breathing.
I am that shadow.
I won't forgive them.
I won't excuse them.
And I won't forget them.
I'm not asking for justice.
I'm bringing vengeance.
And if I must walk over all their corpses to hear my mother's voice again, I will.
And if they say I'm a criminal?
Let them.
But someone must write this down:
"The child made of tears… returned with a sword."
Then silence fell.
My voice faded, but the fire inside me didn't.
The wind carried my cry through the alleys, into the locked windows, into the chests of those who forgot
That a shadow in this city still lives.
I stood there, between a crumbling wall and a broken streetlamp, breathing like I was trying to swallow the whole world in one breath.
A skinny cat passed by, looking at me as if it understood everything I'd just said.
And in the darkness, I heard it… a faint cry.
A child, weeping behind a wooden box.
I approached.
He was shivering, hugging himself, his eyes drowning in fear, in hunger, in the remnants of a childhood that resembled nothing of this world.
He looked at me.
Said nothing.
And I didn't speak.
But between us… something broke.
Something cracked just like I once did.
Was I once that child?
Did I once reach out like he is now?
Did he see something in me that reminded him of his future face?
I don't know.
All I know is I looked at him… and I smiled.
A smile that meant nothing.
No warmth.
Just emptiness like this city, like the grey sky, like life after my mother.
Then I turned and walked away.
I didn't know where to.
Maybe to the home of the first noble.
Maybe to the fire.
Maybe to the depth of my silence again.
But what I did know
Something started tonight.
And it won't end easily.
I walked.
Each step heavy, like the street itself was swallowing my footprints.
The air thickened. The sky choked on its own color. The wind stopped
As if the city was waiting for something… or fearing it.
Then I saw him.
A black cat, sitting in the middle of the road.
Still.
His eyes glowed with a color unlike anything alive.
As if darkness itself breathed through them.
I froze.
My heart didn't warn me.
But something deep in my bones whispered: "Don't get close."
I tried to change direction, to turn away
To ignore him like I've ignored everything for so long.
But when I took one step away…
The cat spoke.
Not with a human voice.
Not with an animal's.
With something else. Something unclassifiable.
Its sound… I can't describe it.
I can't put it into words.
And when it spoke
A shiver crawled from the base of my spine to the tips of my fingers.
I froze in place.
My face didn't show fear.
Only astonishment.
Not the astonishment of survival, or horror
But the kind you feel when you see a monster…
"How amusing you are…"
The cat said as it licked its paw slowly its body casting no shadow.
"You humans… how very amusing."
Then he looked at me.
Didn't move.
Didn't blink.
"You seek revenge… you kill… you swear you're chasing justice
Yet in the end, you just devour one another."
Its voice was warm… somehow.
His first blink stabbed cold through my chest.
His claws looked longer than they should be.
And his language… wasn't understood by the mind
But felt in flesh and bone.
I wanted to speak.
But my tongue shrank
As if my entire body had become a newborn again, unable to form words.
The cat laughed.
A laugh too human… for a mouth that was not.
"Do you think you're different?"
He asked as he stood, his back curving like a broken bow under midnight.
"You think revenge will fill the hollow in your heart?"
"You'll kill them, and then what? Will your mother return? Will you find the other child inside you?"
He took a single step.
Just one.
But the ground beneath him shattered
Like glass beneath the weight of time.
I didn't move.
The air thickened like smoke.
The city vanished.
It was no longer a street
We were somewhere white. Somewhere… else.
He stared at me for a long while.
His eyes held all the world's chaos.
Then he whispered:
"If you truly are the shadow… be warned
Even shadows get trampled… when they walk too close to the light."
Then he walked away.
Simply…
As if nothing had happened.
He left me standing there,
Between my shivers and my silence, realizing I had just seen something…
The air began to move again.
But I did not.
The cat walked away slowly, swaying like nothing had happened.
As if I hadn't just screamed, vowed revenge, and sworn blood.
As if… nothing mattered.
Suddenly my voice erupted.
"Who are you?!"
I screamed it with a choking breath, like someone trying to tear his soul from his throat.
"Who the hell are you?!"
I ran after him a few steps like a madman chasing his own shadow.
My eyes lost.
My body trembling.
My heart pounding at the gates of madness.
"Who are you?! Answer me! WHO ARE YOU?!"
I shouted it once,
Twice,
A third time
Until I felt like the whole city could hear me… and chose not to answer.
The cat stopped.
Turned halfway.
Lifted his head slowly his eyes holding a depth beyond all measure.
And then…
He spoke.
"I am…"