A few days passed.
No grand celebration marked the occasion.
No music, no gathered crowds, no long tables overflowing with food.
Just a small cake, carefully divided into thin slices, shared among the three of us beside the soft glow of the evening fire.
Even the sweetness of it felt fragile, as though it had taken days of saving to make.
Still… there was something in the air.
Something warm.
Happiness.
I could feel it in the way my mother moved around the room, humming softly beneath her breath.
In the way my father's usually heavy expression seemed lighter, almost proud.
And yet…
there was another feeling sitting quietly against my chest.
One I couldn't shake.
A weight.
A shadow.
Something that felt like the approach of the inevitable.
Birthdays had never meant celebration to me.
Not really.
In my old life, they had only ever meant one thing.
Another year gone.
Another step closer to the end.
And in my case… the end had always seemed much closer than it should have been.
Even now, that thought lingered.
As though joy and dread had learned to live side by side inside me.
The celebration remained small.
Simple.
No gifts.
Not that I had expected any.
Still… there was something in the way my parents kept glancing at each other.
A quiet secret.
A patience in their smiles.
As if they were waiting for the right moment.
That moment came later that night.
The fire had burned low, the room wrapped in amber light and long shadows cast across the wooden walls.
My father reached beside him and handed me a small pouch.
It was oddly shaped, wrapped poorly, unevenly tied with old cloth strips.
Humble.
Messy.
And yet… I could feel the care in every fold.
The kind of care that made the packaging itself feel precious.
My mother smiled.
"We've been waiting a long time to give this to you."
Her voice was soft, almost trembling.
I slowly opened it.
The cloth was rough beneath my fingers, worn and mended in places.
Poor in material.
Rich in love.
A kind of love that still felt distant to me.
Still difficult to accept.
Inside… was a dagger.
Small.
Simple.
Beautiful.
The blade caught the firelight and reflected it in soft silver lines.
Its hilt was dark and worn smooth, as if shaped by years rather than craft.
"It was found inside a monster," my father said quietly.
"The day you were born."
I looked down at it in silence.
It wasn't large.
Not practical.
Not compared to the spears and hunting knives I had seen around the village.
Maybe that was because I had never been used to weapons.
And yet… it fit.
The moment I wrapped my fingers around it, it settled into my hand as if it had always belonged there.
Light.
Balanced.
Almost too perfectly.
As if it had been made for me alone.
I looked up.
My parents were watching me.
My mother's eyes glistened with tears.
My father stood quietly beside her, trying to keep his expression steady, but the pride in his gaze betrayed him.
Joy.
That had to be what this was.
They were waiting for something from me.
A reaction.
A response.
I couldn't stay dull. I couldn't stay empty.
Not now.
Not in this moment.
But what was I supposed to say?
The words caught in my throat, foreign, unpracticed.
Then, finally, I whispered, "Thank you."
The words came out broken, small, but real.
Before I could second-guess myself, my mother wrapped her arms around me, holding me tight, tears damp against my hair.
I took a breath, then dared to look up at her again.
She was beautiful, silky white-blond hair cascading over her shoulders, her blue eyes bright in the firelight, a smile so gentle it seemed to fill the room. My father stood there, too, patient, his eyes soft with pride.
In a village this small, futures were simple, farmer or hunter.
But a hunter… that carried weight.
Out there, in a world like this, strength was survival.
They slept that night, content, and I stayed by the window.
The moon hung impossibly large above, full and silver, casting its glow over the roofs and the dark stretch of jungle.
I kept my gaze on the dagger they gave me, turning it slowly in my fingers.
I had never been excited about a gift before—never really given one.
But this wasn't simple joy.
This was something heavier.
The dagger didn't just fit my hand; it felt like it had always belonged there.
Light in weight, but somehow it held a power I couldn't explain.
It wasn't ready to speak to me yet, but I could feel it waiting.
Morning came, bright and sharp, sunlight spilling through the shutters.
Then a sound... horses.
The whole village stirred, voices rising in excitement.
I followed the crowd, curiosity pulling me, climbing up to the top of a nearby house, something I'd just learned how to do.
From there, I could see everything—the royal trading cart, gleaming in the sun.
They had made it this far.
The merchant who stepped down was like a figure from a dream—fat, bloated with riches, dressed in fine fabrics that looked out of place here.
He smiled wide, his voice booming as he claimed his ancestors had once been rich, and that his visit was a blessing.
I sat calmly, perched on the roof, watching the village gather around.
They gave him everything, dried meat, stored crops, monster cores, even mammoth teeth, things they had worked so hard to gather.
All of it offered up to his cart.
He unrolled a scroll, gold-tipped at the top, and his voice rang out:
"By the authority granted to me by the king, I am here to collect the fifty percent tax you owe the kingdom."
Fifty percent. Half?
The word sank into me like a stone.
Tax for what?
For surviving?
For building our own homes, for fighting off monsters each night, for scraping by with barely anything.
Are we sacrificing, risking the villagers' lives for this?
Where was this blessing he spoke of?
He continued, his voice steady, as he threw scraps to the ground, old cloth, baby food, dull weapons, useless even to us, leftover from soldiers who no longer had need.
And suddenly, everything clicked.
Greed.
That was it.
We were weak, too weak to fight back.
And somehow, they smiled.
They waved as the cart rolled away, as if this theft was some kind of favor.
When we got home, my parents surprised me again.
They folded new clothes carefully for me, simple, practical, but fresh.
They smiled as if this were the greatest gift they could offer.
I looked
I looked at them, and their own clothes were still old, still worn thin, patched in places. So why?
Why was I given this?
Was this their happiness, their pride, that even in poverty, they could give me something, a chance I never had?
I still couldn't shake that image, the merchant, throwing scraps at our feet as if we were grateful for his leftovers.
But I couldn't show much concern as I figured I would make it just harder for my parents.
I kept the dagger close. I ran my fingers along the hilt as the village settled back into its quiet rhythm.
That was when it hit me.
The feeling.
It hadn't come this strongly in years.
No… that wasn't true.
It had always been there.
Lurking.
Watching.
A quiet pressure at the edge of every hopeful thought.
But never like this.
Never this clearly.
The world around me faded.
The wooden walls.
The moonlight.
The quiet breaths of my sleeping parents.
All of it dissolved into darkness.
And suddenly
I was there again.
That place.
The eerie dark space that had followed me since this life began.
Endless black stretched in every direction, swallowing sound and distance alike. No walls. No ceiling. No floor I could truly make sense of.
Only the chair beneath me.
Cold.
Still.
Familiar.
I sat in it once more.
As always, I couldn't turn my head.
Couldn't look behind me.
But this time…
the shadow spoke.
Its voice did not echo.
It simply existed.
Low.
Calm.
Far too familiar.
"Haven't you figured it out yet?"
The words cut through the dark like a blade.
For a moment, I said nothing.
Then, quietly
"What is there more to figure out?"
Silence.
Then the shadow answered.
"You stand no chance at happiness… while you are weak."
The words settled into me slowly.
Heavy.
Merciless.
Then it continued.
"Just like we were before."
We.
The word struck harder than anything else.
Not *you*.
Not *"me*
We.
As if it knew.
As if it had lived it with me.
The hunger.
The cold.
The slow death.
The helplessness.
The feeling of watching everything slip away because I had never been strong enough to stop it.
And that was when it truly hit me.
Not as surprise.
Not as fear.
But as realization.
A truth I had been circling without ever daring to name.
If I did nothing…
this life would end the same way.
Another future lost because I lacked the strength to protect it.
The darkness around me seemed to press closer.
Not threatening.
Not cruel.
Only honest.
The shadow fell silent.
As if it had delivered what it came to say.
Its purpose complete.
But the words remained.
Etched somewhere deeper than thought.
And in that moment, I understood.
If I live to see tomorrow.
I will become stronger.
I have no other choice.
Strength is the only thing that can protect me in a world this unforgiving.
Not hope.
Not kindness.
Strength.
This time…
I refuse to disappear.