The Stranger in the Mirror
Returning to the dormitory with a sticky, heavy fatigue clinging to my skin, I loosened the tie constricting my throat the moment I stepped inside. I shrugged off my outer coat and walked toward the bathroom.
“I’ll wash up and come out. Prepare some pajamas for me, Rachel.”
Rachel, who had taken my coat, tilted her head. “It’s still early… Are you going to bed already?”
“Yeah… I’m a little tired.”
“Understood.”
“……Thank you. As always.”
“Hehe, you don’t have to say that!”
I offered the hardworking girl my sincere gratitude and stepped into the pure white bathroom. The first thing I saw when I opened the door was a large mirror. And beyond it stood a boy.
Jet-black hair steeped in gloom. Eyes of an equally dark hue, sunk so deep they sent a chill down the spine. An awkward smile, patched together like rags, clung to his lips. He wasn’t dead. But calling him alive felt equally false. The boy was someone I didn’t know.
Click. Shaaaaah…
I pulled the lever connected to the magic tool, and a cold torrent poured down from above. I closed my eyes and simply let myself feel the weight of the falling water.
The icy streams lashed at my body. The cold burrowed into my skin like malicious thoughts, devouring every trace of warmth. It felt exactly like the voices that had once driven nails into my heart.
Hey, honestly, doesn’t it piss you off that he made the national team?
What can you do? He’s the association president’s son.
This is such bullshit… Must be nice to ride on bloodline.
The hallucinations swirled inside my dizzy head. The daggers thrown at me in my previous life rolled down my ears like droplets.
I’m sorry, Naru… Please don’t talk to me anymore.
Get lost…! Because of you, Changho hyung…!!
How many lives have been ruined just for being nice to that guy…?
Inside the skin-stinging rain, I scrubbed myself raw. I rubbed the towel against my body as if trying to peel off a layer of skin. Yet the bubbles that bloomed softly still wrapped around me with gentle warmth. I swam inside that false cloud.
Move faster! More! More!
To be exhausted already… How utterly disappointing.
What trash.
The voices that scraped at my eardrums faded, replaced by the ones I had heard at the academy today.
Hiiik…!
Hey, hey, hurry…! Let’s get past him quickly…!
Don’t make eye contact…!
The familiar lines took on form and glared at me. Crushed beneath their heavy gazes, I fell to my knees. With trembling lips, I stammered out the question.
“What… did I even do…?”
What sin had I committed that made them hate me so much? Was it wrong for someone born under a cursed fate of misfortune to dare wish for love? Was I truly a person who should never dream of happiness?
The towel moved with the fury of someone trying to flay me alive. My skin had already turned bright red. Still, I didn’t stop. I pressed harder, scraping at my own flesh. If I could just wash myself clean like this, maybe I could strip away all the misfortune stuck to me.
After I had spent a long time killing myself like that, a young boy’s voice suddenly rang in my ear.
“How ridiculous.”
The owner of that sneer was me, standing inside the mirror. Or perhaps it was me, standing outside of it.
“Everything that happened was your own doing.”
I was staring at myself with the expression I hated most in the world. A wave of nausea surged up, forcing me to lower my head.
“Everyone says it… You’re a child who should never have been born.”
“No, no… no…!!”
“You think so too, don’t you?”
“I said no…!!”
“Hahahahaha!! Really!?”
I tore the corners of my mouth wide and let out a sickening laugh. The humiliation of it made the boiling murderous intent inside me impossible to contain. I struck the me inside the mirror, climbed on top of him, and began choking that detestable throat.
“What would you… what would you know…!!”
“I know very well~”
Even as I squeezed with all my strength, the other me smiled leisurely. A pitch-black sentence pierced straight through my heart.
“You.”
“I.”
“Hate me, don’t you?”
“Hate you, don’t you?”
In the next instant, our positions reversed. I was sprawled on the bathroom floor while I sat atop myself, brutally choking my own neck. The black eyes drenched in madness seemed to be enjoying the situation.
“Die. Just die like this.”
“Kk, khk… N-no…”
“Die!! I told you to die!!!”
“H-help… please… khk…”
“Die!! Don’t you dare keep living so shamelessly!!! Anyone… save… khk… me… Die! Die, die, die!! Stop… I can’t… breathe… anymore…”
Just before my neck bone snapped, what stopped me was—
Iron Mind has nullified the status ailments (auditory hallucinations, visual hallucinations, trauma, suicidal impulses, depression… and five others).
“Khk! Haah… haah…”
I tore my own hands away from my throat and gasped for air. When I spat out the water filling my mouth, red droplets splattered across the bathroom tiles. My lip must have split; blood was dripping steadily. I wiped it away and staggered to my feet.
With the hallucinations gone, only echoes I couldn’t erase remained inside my hollow head.
Click…
I closed the water lever, dried myself with a towel, and carefully wiped away every trace of blood from my mouth. While I was busily cleaning up, my eyes met the mirror once again.
“……”
A boy was still standing inside the mirror. And he was still someone I didn’t know.
.
.
.
After finishing my bath and changing into pajamas, I threw myself onto the bed. With a soft thud, the mattress sank beneath my weight. I savored the plush sensation and pulled the blanket close. I didn’t want to think about anything. I just wanted to fall into quiet sleep.
I tossed and turned, burrowing deeper into the covers as if trying to hide from something. Desperately. Curled up in the center of the bed like a shrimp, I wrapped my arms around my knees. Inside the empty room, only the steady ticking of the clock echoed.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock…
Every time the second hand crossed a number, I reminded myself that time still flowed even in this gray world. As I gradually sank beneath the faint noise, a single emotion bloomed across my chest like a flower.
It hurt. Even with the blanket over my head, the cold was unbearable. My mind grew hazy, my breathing slowed. My idle hand fumbled around as if searching for something, eventually clutching only a meaningless fold of the blanket.
I knew the name of this feeling well. It was the emotion I had encountered most often in my previous life.
It was loneliness.
Loneliness accompanied by a terrible sense of helplessness. I had thought it had disappeared cleanly after coming to this world. But it hadn’t vanished; it had simply been hiding its face. The loneliness that appeared after so long slowly melted into me. My soul absorbed it like a sponge, and I became drenched in cold, blue emotion.
I wanted to scream. To beg anyone to help me, to not leave me alone. That this silence hurt too much. That I didn’t want to experience it again. I wanted to wail loud enough for Rachel, who was outside the room, to hear my despair. But my mouth wouldn’t move. My body, already drowned in helplessness, had forgotten how to move on its own.
Together with a scream no one could hear, I sank beneath the waves of solitude. Deeper. Even deeper. So deep there was no longer any bottom to reach.
Just as my body was about to touch the ocean floor—
Knock. Knock…
Someone rapped on my door.
“Young Master, are you asleep?”
It was Rachel’s voice. I wanted to answer, but my lips refused to part.
“Mmm… I’m coming in, okay?”
With a soft creak, the door opened and Rachel entered. Only after she approached my side did my body remember how to move again. I pulled off the blanket covering my head and opened my eyes.
What I saw when I lifted my eyelids was Rachel, who had changed out of her maid uniform into pajamas. The light, flowing fabric carried her usual bright and refreshing aura. Though slightly loose, the garment still hinted at her graceful curves. Her brown eyes met mine and she flinched.
“Were you sleeping…?”
“……No, I was awake.”
“Phew! That’s a relief!”
Rachel smiled brightly at my answer. She came closer and casually sat on the edge of the bed. I pushed myself up to sit as well.
“What’s the matter all of a sudden?”
“What do you mean, what’s the matter! Young Master, how can you sleep with your hair still wet!”
Rachel puffed out her cheeks and pointed at my head. When I ran a hand through my hair, I realized it was still damp. I must not have dried it properly earlier. I shook my head roughly.
“W-wait! You need a towel!”
“……It’s troublesome.”
“Stay still! I’ll dry it for you!”
“Mmm……”
Rachel fetched a fluffy towel from the living room, sat me down, and began drying my hair. The dry cloth gently brushed against my wet strands, patting away the moisture. I stayed silent, simply receiving the touch of her gentle hands.
The girl’s affectionate pats traveled through the towel into my hair, from my hair into my skin, and from my skin into my heart. It felt as though the loneliness and helplessness that had been devouring me were being washed away, little by little. Within the warm body heat I felt against my back, I sensed comfort.
And at the same time, anxiety.
I still remembered the eyes that had looked at me today. They had feared me, loathed me, hated me. Maybe… Rachel was the same? She had always been kind to me, but perhaps deep down she despised me too?
There was more than enough reason for Rachel to hate me. After Raiden had become a tyrant, the person he had treated the most harshly was her. She was the one who had endured his cruelest torment, right until the very end, never turning her back on him.
The moment that thought crossed my mind, I bit my lip. Rachel was the person closest to me since I had come to this world. The girl who always smiled brightly and took care of me—if she had actually hated me from the bottom of her heart…
……Could I endure it and stay sane?
“You have to dry your hair properly before sleeping~ The pillow will smell like water otherwise.”
Her soft, gentle voice rang out. I hesitated for a moment, then finally spoke.
“……Rachel.”
“So, your hair… Oh, yes?”
The movement above my head stopped at my call. Even that small pause made my heart sink with nervousness. Forcing myself to sound calm, I asked quietly.
“Do you… hate me too…?”
“Pardon…?”
“Do you… hate me?”
“……Why would you think that?”
Rachel’s voice grew heavier as she asked in return. The lively, cheerful tone from before had vanished, replaced by a low, serious one. I struggled with my stiff tongue to form the words and told her what had been weighing on me.
“Before I disappeared… back when I was still a complete tyrant, the person I tormented the most viciously was you…”
“And?”
“People who have never even seen my face already hate me. So if it’s you, who suffered direct abuse from me……”
“I would despise Young Master tremendously?”
“Y-yeah…”
When I nodded, Rachel looked at me with a slightly darkened expression. The usual playful smile was gone from her face, and the sight felt somehow frightening.
Gulp…
As I swallowed dryly, tension stretched to its limit, Rachel let out a small laugh and relaxed her expression.
“Young Master.”
“……Yes.”
“How could I possibly hate you?”
Young Master is—
“The person who saved me from a life of despair.”
Rachel smiled radiantly as she spoke. It was the same clear, pure smile as always, without a single cloud. She gently stroked my now-dry hair and asked in a soft, steady voice.
“Do you remember? How we first met, a long time ago?”