The mirror reflected nothing new.
A girl stood there, still and quiet, her figure barely filling the frame. Dark, tangled strands of hair clung to her cheeks. Her face, pale and gaunt, bore the wear of countless sleepless nights, shadows painted beneath her hazel colour eyes like bruises that never healed. She wore a loose t-shirt that hung off her shoulders and a pair of shorts that made her look smaller than she was. Her arms were thin, her posture tired, but she stood—not collapsed, not broken. Not yet.
Her name was Kurai Virelle, a name no one said with fondness anymore.
"Kurai!"
Her mother's voice cut through the early silence, not with worry—but with exhaustion.
Kurai didn't answer.
Maybe it was because she didn't have the energy to. Maybe it was because she didn't see the point. Or maybe, she just didn't care.
"Kurai!" Her mother's voice came again, sharper this time. "Don't tell me you're skipping again!"
She exhaled slowly, like dragging air into her lungs was a favor to the world.
With heavy steps, she turned from the mirror, pulled out her wrinkled school uniform from a drawer, and walked to the bathroom. The water from the tap was cold against her skin as she washed her face. The moment her fingertips touched her cheeks, she paused—gazing at her reflection again, as if asking it what she was even doing anymore.
She changed wordlessly. Her body didn't protest, but it didn't cooperate either. It simply obeyed out of habit.
Downstairs, the sound of bitter voices reached her ears before she even stepped off the last stair. Her parents were at it again, like always. Sitting across the table, their anger folded between slices of bread and an untouched breakfast.
"I swear, she's doing this to punish us," her father snapped.
"She's your daughter too, you know," her mother retorted.
The breakfast was hers—placed on the table like an afterthought. Eggs are going cold. Toast softening from the steam.
But she walked past it.
"Kurai! Eat the breakfast!" her mother called out.
Kurai stopped for a moment, her fingers tightening slightly around the strap of her school bag. She turned her head, surprised—just a little—that her mother had bothered. Their eyes met briefly. But nothing passed between them. No warmth. No care. Only obligation.
She opened the door and slipped on her shoes.
"Look at this child you gave me. Nothing but problems," her father grumbled behind her.
She didn't flinch. She didn't respond.
Because words like those stopped hurting a long time ago.
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Outside, the sky was a strange kind of gray, the kind that didn't promise rain but carried the weight of it anyway. The sun hadn't broken through yet, caught behind the heavy ceiling of clouds. Still, light seeped slowly across the rooftops, crawling over the city like it was afraid to wake it.
This was Nuvion, a world that always looked like it had just barely survived something—smoke trailing in the distance from faraway factories, streets stained with yesterday's dust, wires hanging low like forgotten threads in the sky. Even morning, here felt tired.
Kurai walked down the cracked sidewalk, past empty bus stops and flickering streetlights that hadn't shut off yet. The silence was louder than any noise. And in that silence, her thoughts stirred.
She hated this world.
Not in the poetic, misunderstood way people wrote about in journals. She hated it with a cold, unwavering certainty. She hated how fake everything felt—how the streets were full of people pretending, how every building looked like a cage with prettier paint, how nothing ever really changed.
She hated the school the most.
It wasn't a place of learning. Not for her. It was a place where laughter turned into whispers the second she passed, where eyes narrowed, and backs turned. She was always too quiet, too strange, too easy to blame for the wrong kind of silence.
She stepped through the school gates, eyes down, not to avoid them—but because she already knew what she'd see.
"Watch it."
A shoulder collided with hers. A boy's laughter followed. She didn't look up. It didn't matter who. It was always someone.
People like her didn't belong. She was a shadow walking beside those who lived in the light, and they hated her for not trying to join them.
But she didn't want to.
She didn't want their smiles, their pity, or their carefully worded lies. She didn't want to be seen, heard, or helped. And if this whole building went up in flames one day, she wouldn't move to save a single one of them.
That much, she knew.
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First period came and went. Then the second. Words on the board, questions in the air, but none of it meant anything. She scribbled down answers, not out of care—but because she had nothing better to do.
Halfway through the third class, a knock came at the door.
"Kurai Virelle?" the teacher called.
Heads turned.
Of course they did.
She stood up, collected her things, and walked to the door, feeling their eyes press into her back like pins.
She was taken to a side hallway, where a younger teacher—one of the few who didn't openly insult her—stood holding a paper.
"Miss Tirein," her name badge read. A gentle face. Soft voice. But Kurai knew better.
"I just wanted to hand you this before lunch," Miss Tenjou said, holding out a test paper.
Kurai took it.
86%.
"Nice work," the teacher smiled, a little surprised. "You've improved."
Kurai nodded. But inside, nothing stirred.
There was no pride, no flicker of satisfaction.
Because even in that praise, she saw it—the same look the others gave her. That quiet, pitiful gaze. That thought lingering behind the compliment:
Poor girl. She's not completely useless after all.
She returned to class without a word
She returned to her seat, dropped her bag beside her desk, and sat down like nothing had happened. The teacher resumed the lesson, but Kurai barely heard it. The words were nothing more than static in her ears—just another sound in a world that never said anything worth listening to.
She glanced at the test paper once more before folding it and shoving it into the back of her notebook.
86%.
What did it even mean?
A number scrawled in red, circling a moment of so-called achievement, but for whom? No one cared if she passed. No one would care if she failed, either. This wasn't about her. It was about maintaining the illusion that the system still worked. That students were still learning. That teachers were still teaching. That the school was still something more than a decaying shell with rules painted over the cracks.
What a joke.
Outside, the gray sky had softened. The sun was finally bleeding through, staining the white tiles with strips of gold. The classroom buzzed with low chatter, the occasional laugh, shifting papers and chairs—everything feeling alive in a way she was not part of.
She stared out the window, watching how the light danced between the buildings, and something dark began to coil inside her chest.
It happened often—this low, creeping feeling. Like smoke slithering beneath her ribs. It came whenever she stood still for too long. Whenever she looked at this world and tried to understand it.
She hated it.
She hated everything.
The people who pretended. The classmates who smiled at others and sneered at her. The teachers who praised her but watched her with eyes soaked in pity. The parents who argued and said her name like it were an accusation. This fake city with its blinking signs and dead air. This entire rotting world of Nuvion, stitched together by wires and lies, pretending to be alive.
If it all ended tomorrow, she wouldn't care.
No—she wanted it to end.
Let it fall. Let it burn. Let the skies open and swallow this place whole.
Sometimes, she'd close her eyes and imagine it.
The buildings are crumbling like sandcastles. The sky is tearing open into black. Screams echoing down the streets. People running, begging, crying.
And she'd stand there, untouched.
Watching.
Silent.
Not lifting a single finger to save anyone.
Not the boys who shoved her in the hallways.Not the girls who whispered behind her back.Not the teachers who forced smiles that never reached their eyes.Not even the ones who'd cry out her name in panic.
Because what was the point?
No one ever saved her.
No one even tried.
So if this world turned to ash, Kurai Hisakawa would be the only one who wouldn't scream.
She wouldn't even blink.
If the gods decided this world had lived long enough, she'd whisper finally.
If destruction swept through Nuvion, it would feel like justice.
Sometimes… she didn't just hope for the end.
She longed for it.
Not because she was weak.
But because she was done.
Done pretending.
Done hoping.
Done existing in a place that never made room for her.