The girl contemplated staying until the black fires of her home burned out, but figured it wouldn't burn out any time soon, so she decided to leave. What was the point in staying anyway? It's not like staying would do anything to help her. It would just waste precious time that could be used to figure out why her now sworn enemy would kill her old friend. She would never forgive either. Her enemy for killing her friend, and the boy who was her friend for dying on her. The girl had loved the boy. And to make things worse, there was a shadow that followed her and claimed to be the boy.
The shadow followed her everywhere. She had given the boy the nickname of "The Ruined One," after the incident, and was almost tempted to call the shadow that as well. But she wouldn't call the shadow that until she had some sort of proof that the shadow really was the boy. She thought the shadow was either a hallucination or some manifestation of her power born of desire to see the boy again, but the way the shadow spoke and acted was so similar to the boy that she was actually starting to believe the shadow. After all, why shouldn't she? The girl's power has been greater ever since the shadow started helping her. And the shadow had tried to comfort her at first, but then went silent as she ignored it. The boy did the same thing when she ignored him. He understood that if the girl was ignoring him, it was best to be silent. The silence helped her think clearer. Both back then and now. And she really needed to be able to think now.
She and the boy had made a mistake trusting the Other One. The Other One seemed as if he were good at first, but he proved the girl and the boy wrong. The Other One had gained their trust, and then stabbed the boy in the back. The boy's last words to the Other One were "I forgive you." The boy was too kind. Too forgiving. Too quick to trust. But so was the girl before that had happened. Now, she had changed.
Not long after the first incident, the Other One had killed everyone else too. Her mentor and his wife. Her family. After she watched it happen, she ran. She hated herself for not doing something. But then again, they didn't trust her. They were tricked into thinking she was the villain, so she decided to make good on the false accusations. A week after the second incident, she set fire to her old home. She burnt down the whole empire. What did it matter? The innocent people were hardly innocent. And they did nothing to depose the Tyrant that killed their former leader. Instead, they blamed the girl for all the deaths the Tyrant, the Other One, had caused.
And after two days of watching, the fire was still burning. The girl snapped back to reality quickly as she realized she was lost in her thoughts. She stood up from the ledge she was sitting on and brushed the dust off of her uniform. She looked back at the shadow before quickly ignoring its existence again.
Very soon, she was interrupted. Soldiers from an ally of her old home recognized the girl from the report the Tyrant had made on who killed the boy, which was of course a lie. The soldiers were strong, and the girl's powers were weakened because of her unstable emotions and genuine fear. The soldiers were an elite squad that were feared throughout the land. Sure, the girl was strong as well, but she knew that even if her powers were stable, she would most likely lose to the soldiers. Yet, she could not escape. She had to either fight or surrender, and surrendering was not an option. The girl tried to use her fire, but like before, her normal fire just wouldn't come. She would have to use her much more exhausting shadow flames to fight them. That was the main reason she had sat there watching the flames consume her old home. Because her shadow flames exhausted her. Even before the boy's death her shadow flames took more energy, but now it was even worse. Sure, it was more powerful, but it takes so much energy now. As the girl was driven back by the soldiers, she felt the shadow's presence in her mind. The shadow then broke free and the girl suddenly felt rejuvenated. It was as if she had caught a second wind. She felt a connection to the shadow, and felt as if she were using her powers through it, rather than herself, which made it hardly use any of her energy to fight. The shadow also fought on its own as well. The best part was, the shadow fought in a way that seemed so familiar to her that it felt natural to fight alongside the shadow. The shadow fought exactly like the boy. They made quick work of the soldiers and made sure not to kill them. They had once been kind to each other after all.
The girl left her old home behind without looking back again. There was no point in regretting it now. And even then, why should she? She was the villain that they wanted her to be. And now she had found some peace. She knew that the boy was really with her. That the shadow wasn't just some hallucination or a manifestation of her power that was out of control. This brought her more peace than she thought she'd be getting any time soon. But this was no time to let her guard down. She was the villain now, which meant she had no time to rest.