Chapter 398: Buried Memories (3)

The scenery around Ash changed once more, shifting so naturally that he barely registered the transition until his senses settled.Now, Ash was standing on the rooftop of a building, an under construction building to be precise, where unfinished concrete, scattered metal rods, and stacks of raw materials surrounded him, giving the place an abandoned and hollow atmosphere.

The rooftop of the unfinished building was quiet, except for the restless wind sliding through exposed pillars and loose scaffolding. Dust drifted across the concrete floor in thin, uneven layers, disturbed only by the careless movements of two small figures sitting near the corner of the rooftop, basking in the moonlight and watching the streets and buildings at the distance.

Both boys sat with their backs against a half built safety wall that barely reached their shoulders. Between them lay a crumpled packet and a thin cigarette clumsily held between trembling fingers, the smoke curling upward in uneven streams.

They coughed occasionally, their young lungs clearly unaccustomed to what they were forcing themselves to imitate, yet their faces carried forced arrogance as if they were proud of copying the street thugs they admired.

"Those guys said if we learn early, we will look tough," one of them muttered, exhaling smoke that scattered immediately in the wind.

"Tch... it tastes horrible," the other complained, though he still took another drag, trying to suppress his coughing. "But they said real men don’t complain."

They laughed quietly, their voices mixing with the hollow whistle of air passing through the skeletal structure around them. Their legs dangled lazily near the edge, boots occasionally scraping loose gravel that fell silently into the empty space below.

From a distance, Ash watched.

He stood near one of the unfinished pillars, his expression neutral.

The wind moved past the skeletal structure of the building, carrying faint dust through the open space, yet none of it seemed to reach him.

He knew how it would unfold, he knew what was going to happen now, because these memories were carved too deeply into him to ever fade. But he was not afraid of these things. No, what he was afraid of was something that could deny his whole feelings and emotions towards someone he had once held as his only warmth in a freezing world, something that could shatter the fragile justification he had built around his actions for years.

Suddenly, A second figure appeared by the doorway of the roof top.

The black haired kid, young Ash.

His small frame blended easily with the dimming light, his footsteps almost soundless against the dusty concrete. His breathing was shallow, his fingers trembling slightly as he approached them from behind.

Fear was present in his eyes, raw and unmistakable, but beneath that fear was something heavier, something desperate and suffocating that pushed him forward despite his shaking limbs.

The two boys continued talking, unaware.

"You think Nancy will still protect him if we hurt him worse?" one of them asked, flicking ash carelessly onto the floor.

"Who cares," the other replied with a careless shrug. "Once the old man is gone, everything changes anyway."

Young Ash’s hands slowly lifted, his movements hesitant for a brief second as doubt flickered across his face.

The wind rushed past him, carrying faint echoes of laughter from distant streets below, mixing strangely with the pounding of his own heartbeat.

His eyes shut tightly for a fraction of a moment.

Then he pushed.

It was not forceful, not dramatic, just a sudden, desperate shove driven by panic and fear rather than strength. The unexpected movement caught both boys completely off guard. Their bodies lurched forward, their balance already unstable from sitting so close to the unfinished edge.

Confusion flashed across their faces as they instinctively tried to grab onto each other. Their hands clawed at air, boots scraping violently against loose dust and gravel that offered no support.

Their startled shouts were cut short as their small figures tipped beyond the rooftop boundary.

The wind swallowed the rest.

Silence returned almost instantly, heavy and suffocating.

Young Ash stumbled backward, his chest heaving as he stared at the empty edge, his pupils trembling as realization slowly crawled into his mind. His hands shook uncontrollably, his body frozen between horror and disbelief at what he had just done.

From the side, Ash watched without moving.

He observed the fragile eight year old version of himself standing there, broken and terrified, the weight of an irreversible choice slowly settling onto shoulders that were never meant to carry such burdens, shoulders that still carried the softness of childhood and the confusion of a boy who barely understood the world around him.

Trembling, the young boy stood up and ran as fast as he could, his uneven breaths mixing with quiet sobs that he tried to swallow, his small feet stumbling slightly as panic and guilt pushed him forward without direction or thought.

But it was just a hustle or beginning of everything that shaped Ash nature from young age, a moment that planted seeds too dark and too heavy for a child to understand, yet powerful enough to silently guide every step he would take afterwards.

Ash luckily escaped all the mess as the construction company buried this matter using money and connection, as they did not want to get a stain on their company just because of some slack of security, especially when the building was still under development and attracting attention from investors and officials.

And with those two boys being just an orphan, the whole matter was buried like that, handled quietly with documents altered and reports rewritten so that the incident appeared like an unfortunate accident caused by reckless children wandering into an unsafe area.

Young Ash just escaped getting caught because of hidden politics between upper society, where reputation and profit always spoke louder than truth or justice.

But Ash did not stop there. Between the next few months, accidents just continued to happen, each incident appearing unrelated on the surface, yet connected through silent intention.

One time a boy fell into a manhole and died of suffocation after the loose cover slipped beneath his weight during a careless game near the roadside.

One time a boy died while sleeping and many more, with whispers spreading that he simply never woke up, his breath fading quietly in the middle of the night without any visible cause.

The atmosphere in the orphanage rather continued to get worse and worse because of the continued deaths of kids at regular intervals of time, filling the halls with tension and unspoken fear, as laughter slowly became rare and silence started occupying spaces where children once played freely.

Those who did not know much about the orphanage thought that the orphanage was cursed or something, as rumors grew stronger with each passing incident.

Or maybe an evil spirit was eye those kids, people outside would whisper while making signs to ward off bad luck, refusing to let their own children come close to the building after sunset.

But those who knew about the orphanage, like the Old Care taker, noticed a pattern forming behind these tragedies. He quietly observed that only the 8 trouble maker kids were continuously dying, each one disappearing in strange yet believable accidents while the rest of the children remained untouched.

No one else noticed it because most of them were kids without actual exposure to the real world, their understanding shaped by fear and imagination rather than logic.

After all, there was no smartphone at that time, nothing that could expose them early to the reality of the world or allow information to spread quickly enough for suspicions to grow.

So all the kids thought some sort of ghost or evil spirit was angry with them and making kids disappear, their nights filled with whispered prayers, frightened glances toward dark corridors, and the growing belief that something unseen was watching them from the shadows.

The most scared of all the kids was only the group of those 8 kids, still... no matter what they did, the deaths did not stop, and their fear slowly grew into something that clung to them day and night, making them flinch at every sudden noise and whisper among themselves with trembling voices, unsure of who would be next.

Ash was like a boy possessed, continuing his killing spree without truly understanding what he was turning into, his young mind drowning in resentment and a twisted sense of justice that he believed he was fulfilling.

He moved forward with silent determination, convincing himself that he was only giving them the fear they once made him feel, not knowing that the Old Caretaker had already informed the police about these unusual deaths after quietly observing the pattern for months and struggling with the painful decision to report it, hoping to stop whatever was happening before more children lost their lives.

Thus, when he was just about to kill the last boy, who was also the leader of that group of kids and the one who had always stood behind the others while giving orders, he got caught by the authorities.

But not before a deep investigation had already begun behind the scenes.

The police carefully learned about those street thugs and how they were influencing the kids, manipulating them into bullying and violent behavior by offering them a false sense of protection and authority, which slowly corrupted the orphanage environment and pushed the children toward cruelty they barely understood.

Because of this discovery, those thugs were arrested after enough evidence connected them to the chain of influence and exploitation, while Ash was sent to a rehabilitation center along with the leader of the group of kids, both being treated as children who were shaped and damaged by their surroundings rather than being seen as monsters beyond saving.

Ash got separated from Nancy at that time, she did not understand the true significance of what he did, only knowing that he had done something terrible, something that made adults whisper in hushed voices and made her suddenly unable to meet him again without anyone explaining the truth to her young mind.

Time passed and years slipped by quietly, blending into each other as Ash was pushed through many therapies, long hours of counselling, behavioral correction programs, and monitored social interactions where professionals carefully observed his responses to emotions and memories.

He was made to attend group discussions where children were encouraged to speak about their fears and regrets, he was given medication that was meant to calm his thoughts, and he was placed in controlled environments designed to teach empathy and emotional regulation.

Doctors often sat across from him with patient smiles, asking him to draw his feelings, narrate his memories, and describe what he thought about right and wrong, while specialists studied his reactions and wrote endless notes about his progress and setbacks.

But Ash’s nature became more and more twisted beneath the surface, growing into something deeper and darker that no therapy session could truly reach.

He behaved completely normal in front of those adults, answering questions politely, maintaining eye contact, and showing carefully practiced emotional responses that satisfied the expectations of the rehabilitation staff.

However, when he was alone,, he became completely different, his expressions turning hollow as his thoughts drifted back to the past, replaying moments with unsettling calmness while slowly convincing himself that he had simply corrected something that the world refused to fix.

And this change did not go unnoticed by the people of the rehabilitation center, especially the senior psychologists who had years of experience dealing with children hiding trauma behind perfect behavior.

They began noticing the unnatural precision in his responses, the way he sometimes paused slightly longer before answering emotional questions, and how his improvement felt memorized rather than genuine.

Thus, after several internal discussions and careful psychological evaluations, they decided to try a new approach, believing that reconnecting him with someone from his past might stir suppressed emotions and reveal his true mental state, and thus they brought Nancy into that center too.