Chapter 125: Reflection

​"Wait. You are me?" Mirabella asked, staring intensely at her own distorted reflection before her. The figure had her sharp features, her exact height, but its skin was pallid, and its eyes were pools of absolute, void-like black.​"What do you think?" The darkness replied, its voice a chilling echo of Mirabella’s own.

​"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!"

​The dead silence of the island was abruptly shattered. Mirabella burst out laughing. The sound wasn’t manic or fearful; it was genuine, deep belly laughter. She held her stomach, laughing so hard that actual tears rolled down her eyes, wiping away the tension that had built up since she entered the Soul Sea.

​The darkness before her frowned deeply, clearly unsettled, staring at her in silent judgment as the laughter echoed off the dead trees.

​"What is so funny?!" she asked coldly, her aura flaring with indignation.

​"Sorry, sorry..." Mirabella forced herself to stop laughing, wiping a tear from her eye. She straightened her posture and stared directly at the figure before her, which was undoubtedly the physical manifestation of her inner darkness, born from the trauma of her past life.

​"So you are the darkness inside me, right?" she asked, her tone shifting to one of absolute calm.

​"You can put it like that. I am the culmination of your ruthlessness, your pragmatism, and your suppressed guilt."

​"Ok, now, assuming you will continue with your yapping, laying all my secret plans out bare for dramatic effect... Let me ask you something," she stared at herself, her eyes turning cold and sharp as obsidian.

​"Do I look like I care?" she asked, her voice devoid of any apology.

​The darkness stared at her, its frown deepening. "You do care, Mirabella... That is exactly why you joined forces with the Dragon Empire. You are desperately trying to build a fortress because you are terrified."

​"You should know better than me why I joined the Empire," Mirabella raised Sunder, the massive spirit sword humming in her grip. She stared at the polished blade, seeing her true, uncorrupted reflection on its surface.

​"There is someone out there in reality that is very powerful and incredibly dangerous... A witch who reset my entire existence," she looked up from the blade, locking eyes with her darkness.

​"Instead of you acting like a proper skill and helping me gain the power to kill her, you are standing here lecturing me and trying your absolute best to guilt-trip me with basic morality... Among the two of us, who is truly more foolish?" she asked, tilting her head.

​The darkness frowned, seemingly struggling to compute her lack of remorse. "Your reasoning is strangely terrifying... So to you, everything you have done up to now is the right thing? You don’t feel anything? No guilt for manipulating these people?"

​Mirabella closed her eyes, taking a slow breath, and opened them. "You were right about everything... Yes, I helped Yakima under the pretense of saving her reputation, but in truth, I just want her to owe me a life debt favor... And because of this calculated move, I successfully gained two precious things from Lord Hayatobi... Well, one usable item, as the second is currently standing right in front of me acting like a therapist." She moved her gaze deliberately over the shadowy lady before her.

​"About Carl... Yes, I took him in as a loyal, high-potential pawn, someone which I can use in the future wars... But now, he is more than just a pawn; he is also a highly valuable partner."

​"Partner? Why not friends—"

​"—I don’t need such fragile relationships," Mirabella cut her off sharply. "Yes, he considers me as an older sister, but I don’t consider him as a brother... I will continue helping him grow and acquire skills, because as I said, he is a tactical partner, and my partner absolutely mustn’t be weak."

​"You don’t need friends?" The darkness chuckled, a dry, rasping sound, staring at her with pity.

​"Your emotions aren’t stable yet, Mirabella. You confidently say you don’t need friends, but you take the beast Cupcake and the maid Elizabeth as your friends. You protect them."

​"You are fundamentally mistaken. Cupcake isn’t my friend; she is my contracted beast and my only true family in this timeline. And for Elizabeth, there is just a strict Madam and servant bond between us," Mirabella corrected flatly, categorizing them in safe, manageable boxes.

​"So tell me, why are you so scared of these genuine emotions? You are afraid of attachment."

​Mirabella exhaled, lowering Sunder slightly, staring at her reflection. "You have access to my memories; you know exactly how I feel, and I won’t lie to myself. Yes, I am indeed scared of these bonds. That’s exactly why I try my best to stay away from them... With all my past life’s brutal experience, I came to discover one absolute truth..." She stepped closer to the darkness.

​"If you get yourself wrapped around these emotional bonds, you become mentally weak, and your enemies will surely use them against you as hostages or leverage... For now, I have enough raw strength to defeat almost any enemy, and I have not one single exploitable disadvantage... If I accept these bonds, I will instantly have a weakness, which is a fatal disadvantage in this world... So I make sure to keep my emotional distance."

​"So you want to be alone forever?" the darkness asked again, staring at her with a flat, judgmental expression.

​"I am not alone... Don’t get me wrong. I don’t need these bonds, but that doesn’t mean I will actively stop others from forming fantasy bonds with me."

​"Fantasy bonds? What does that mean?" The darkness was now genuinely confused by the psychological gymnastics.

​"I won’t get emotionally close to them, but I won’t stop them from having illusions, creating strong bonds in their own hearts towards me... This one-sided fantasy bond will always make them want to stay beside me and fight for me, so I won’t be physically alone... In short, I don’t consider them a friend, but they wholeheartedly consider me as one. It’s the perfect, safe loyalty."

​"It seems you’re already completely heartless... Filled with so much darkness, and your trauma has completely changed your perspective on basic human emotions."

​"No." Mirabella shook her head, her voice softening just a fraction.

​"When you have experienced true pain... A pain far greater than anything imaginable, watching everything you love burn to ash, you will understand my feelings." She held her hand over her chest, right over her heart.

​"With my past experience, the endless pain, the suffering, the ultimate heartbreak... All these crushing emotions I felt, I absolutely don’t want to experience any of them in this second life..." She looked up at the Darkness, her eyes shining with absolute resolve.

​"But I am still human. I still feel others’ pain, I feel gratitude when helped, and I also feel joy in victory... No matter how you try to suppress what you feel, you can never shut all your humanity down completely. That is what I have come to believe. Now, are you going to become my skill, or are we going to stand here analyzing my psyche all day?"