THE FINAL DEATH

By Jessica Cheng

I needed to kill her. The emperor had left me no choice; his orders were as clear as the blue sky hanging over me. I was to find her, kill her, and then scatter her ashes so that her soul would never find its way back to this world. So, like the coward I was, I obeyed. I extinguished my only source of light, my other half; I killed a part of my own soul. Now she was gone, and gone too was the dignity and pride I once held in the palms of my hands. Slicing my cheeks, the wind picked up the last remaining ashes dusted across my fingers and took away the last physical trace I had of her.

My eyes snap open. The gut-wrenching reencounter of my greatest mistake still haunts me. Even whilst I’m dead, I cannot escape the constant, unceasing regret, no matter how hard I try. Until every ounce of hope runs dry, I will have to remain in this deep, dark, dead cavern - designed to imprison the Lost Souls It was filled to the brink with fallen ghouls outstretching their translucent, frail hands, desperately trying to redeem themselves from their past sins. They were desperate for another chance at life, desperate to erase the unforgettable memories of the past.

I look up at the cracked ceiling hovering above me as I once again take in my familiar surroundings. The marks of ancient drawings - over hundreds of years old - still linger on the cracked walls: illustrations of marriage and happiness and love, depicting couples holding their eternal partner’s hand and people who have successfully accomplished the impossible: being together forever. These engravings dangle in front of my eyes, always mocking me, from dawn to dusk and over and over again, reminding me of what could have been, of what my past could have looked like. If only I hadn’t been so egotistical and power-hungry; if only my greed did not betray my morals, tempting me into risking a life for mere clumps of metal and rocks

As soon as I suck in a breath, the dust around me immediately suffocates me. The dry, humid air chokes me; it claws at my throat like angry vipers starved of its poison. All of a sudden, I am overcome with the desperation to leave this place, this prison. The little spark of hope in my chest extinguishes, leaving behind a mere wisp of smoke. With each passing day, I feel my despair sinking deeper and deeper. I know that one approaching day, there will only be a void of remorse and sorrow left.

I peer down at my ghostly handswhich are as translucent as the crystals I once owned - in anguish. My once elegant hands, now reduced to clear, sharp glass, stare back at me in disdain, as if criticising me for all my wrongdoings. I look down at my clenched fists in hatred; these are the very hands that had destroyed her soul, her heart, and her life, and my very own essence in doing so.

My fingers are surrounded with a light, crimson aura, gleaming and glittering. It is as if they have been covered in a twinkling, scarlet beam of moonlight. However, the truth is not so pleasant - the constant shimmer of light encircling my entire body isn’t that of the gradient moon, it is of the blood of the woman I once loved.

I sob into my blood-stained hands, grieving for all that I had recklessly thrown away. All of that gone just because of my unforgiving greed for glory Now, what I want, what I need, cannot be bought, not even by the reddest of rubies and the rarest of jade and the most flawless of diamonds. If I could go back three hundred years and undo everything, I would. But the gods do not allow second chances; they do not allow mortals chances to redeem themselves The gods simply let you drown in your own regrets, with your silent cries of agony echoing across the world, slipping into the heavens above and the hells below.

Many innocent, naive people of the living say that dying is a gift, an escape to peace and tranquillity They believe that death is a void of nothing, someplace meant to make you feel nothing. I distinctly recall a time long ago when I foolishly assumed the same The truth is that death is a hideous creature, constantly wrestling with your inner mind every day to remind you of all the mistakes you have made Some may have fewer demons haunting them in the afterlife, but others are so tortured by the reminders of their crimes that their conscience starts to fill with splinters of regret and grief, until finally, their (our) souls start to break piece by piece, all the unkempt guilt gradually building up in our heads, begging for release.

When everything becomes too much, that’s when the final death begins taking place.

Each passing day is more arduous than the one before; each sundown takes another piece of my soul, another piece of my already-fragmented heart. With a bitter sigh, I begin to accept the long-awaiting fact that I will soon meet my death - again