Every day, every night, they crowd me. Stare at me like one would to a pebble stuck in one's shoe. That feeling of contempt, superiority and downright disgust. Those who once thought of me as their own have long been drown out, succumbing to the same mentality or feigning lack of association to rid themselves of any ties.
There is no hope. The only branch ahead of me is but that of ignorance. Ignorance against this hatred, the cruelty and unrestrained mockery - ignorance against this world.
Let this world burn to ashes beneath my eyes. Let it all be purged into sweet nothingness.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Memory 1: The Beginning.
"BZZZZT, BZZZZT."
"BZZZZT, BZZZZT."
"BZZZZT, BZZZZT."
"BZZZT, BZZ- tick." The metallic screeching whirs to an immediate stop, the usually never broken monotonous calling brought to a halt by a fist smashing down on it.
[Six thirty already?] I mumble in my woken stupor. The alarm clock smashes to the floor, sending what could only be described as a jolt flicking up my body as I jump at the unexpected noise. [Guess I'm getting another alarm clock.] A slight grin wandered onto my face, soon replaced by the everpresent neutrality.
Blurriness fades away as the surroundings settle into that of pure clarity. Walls lay at either side of me, an ocean of gray only disturbed by massive scratches or indents on them. I look up, just as the sun breaks the horizon and covers the stars in the white substance of sunlight.
I yawn, unphased by the serenity the scene had to offer and instead deciding to wash my face of its impurities. I can feel all the mud, grass and water staining and suffocating my skin. No reaction, as if every emotion was stripped away from me.
Up off the grass, down the tunnel, to the right, past the burning barrel. Ah, there.
A mirror. Shattered, yet still completely different from the hideout I find myself traversing. [It'll have to do,] I think to myself.
As my arms reach forth to grasp it, I take in my own face. A face I have not had the privilege to see in ages.
Greyish hair, whitened so deeply that anyone would name it as such at first glance, overflowing in length that much that it inevitably touched my shoulders. Teal eyes, contrasting with the remains of what once could be named a shirt. An odd colour, unbefitting of this nigh greyscale world. Yet, nothing was more striking than the deep slashes wrought upon my neck. Wounds laced every visible corner in what my rags couldn't seal away but none were more uncanny than the singular scratch present at the nape.
[More trophies to collect, it seems.] A pained, exasperated emotion sliced through my eyes for just a moment, then no more.
I remember now.
Every insult, injury, mockery thrown my way. Every attempt at my life, every belonging stolen, every cherished one stolen away from me, every damned glance. Every. Moment.
I remember my name, Xera.
Xera, bound to me by birth. It once stood for something mighty, powerful and heroic. Once stood for a legend of a nameless hero who severed a dying world into two and made it rise as something greater. Now, even the pitiful legend it was associated with has been left forgotten by the passage of time.
It is now a curse. One which I will never forget for as long as it plagues me.
Ah, that has brought me onto my mother, hasn't it? Poor thing, giving me this name. Even through all the suffering endowed onto her shoulders she never once let it phase her while I was looking. She should've never associated herself with me, she paid the exact same price as my sister. How ironic, though, a hero's name given to an accursed monster.
Water splashes my face as I rinse off the grime that encumbered me. Just outside of my periphery, I spot something.
"What the hell..." I mutter in a disgruntled voice. My body lerches forward in an attempt to satiate my curiosity, the only thing that won't leave my soul. "Is this... a joke?"
What lied before me was the same exact mirror I used once before. But, this time?
There was static embedded into the glass.