Misunderstood Villain: Heroines Mourn My Death

***

{Outside The Projection}

No one moved.

The crowd was stunned. Speechless.

It wasn't anything new, but... the reason for it was.

Their silence was not born of either awe or horror.

At least not only either, for it was born from both.

Because no matter how many scenes had come and gone...

No matter how wild the "lessons" had gotten...

No matter how much they thought they'd already understood Malik—

This?

This "lesson" reaching its final act?

It held nothing back.

The whole crowd was slapped in the face.

The projection flickered slightly. Just a ripple of light. But no one even blinked.

Indeed, they were too deep in it now. Trapped in the past. Absolutely Hooked.

Events kept going and going without pause, not giving them time to react.

It was just too much.

One second, they saw Malik burn an entire section of the palace to the ground. The next, he flattened a Ṭāghiya like it was a Div. Next, he was walking right into a trap like he already knew he'd win. Showing no panic or doubt, just a dead stare and forward movement.

And now this.

A war camp surrounded on all sides. A dome that sucked Aether like a creature of the night. Cassim's army, many thousands deep, circling a ragged few. Women and children stacking crates filled with crap and fearing for their lives. A boy trembling at the sight of Malik and still bowing anyway. Grown warriors falling to their knees and swearing their lives to one they deemed Lord.

And what was Malik, their Lord, doing?

Sitting. Cross-legged. Ice core in his lap. Not saying a single word.

People were pledging their lives to HIM.

One by one.

Kneeling.

Swords dropped. Shields tossed aside. Even the green ones, barely old enough to grow facial hair, dropped to one knee and put their hand over their second heart.

"I will protect you, my Lord."

"I will protect you, my Lord."

"I will—"

It echoed. Echoed so loud one could feel it in their teeth.

But Malik only opened his eyes.

Gold.

Light breaking through the cracks of a dying star.

And that was where the projection left them.

No one said anything.

Not for a long, long while.

They all felt it now. That strange weight sitting behind their ribs.

It fell far from fear. It fell far from awe.

It became recognition.

Recognition of the obvious.

They had all misunderstood the unreliable narrator.

...Once again. They did what they thought they wouldn't.

Yes, those he killed weren't Corrupted. Yes, he had done it for revenge, but...

He had a reason for it. It was self-defense. Malik was attacked first.

It wasn't all about rage, even though it was a large part of it.

It was about the way people followed him.

How they trusted him even when they logically shouldn't.

When any sane person would've run the other way, they knelt.

Because he didn't scream at them.

He didn't make empty promises.

He didn't pretend.

He acted.

And that, right there, was what cracked them.

"Shit..."

One woman whispered, clutching her scarf.

"He really was the light."

That broke something.

All at once, people started murmuring.

"It's like Lady Safira again..."

"Jasmine and those kids."

It seemed that this "lesson" was of many full circles.

Earlier, it was the reveal of secret knowledge, Malik's revisit, his goodbye, the old cane, cutting off the last chain, and now, it was this. His meeting with those who freed him, and their kneeling like those who stole his freedom did.

"Second Light."

The old man stated.

"He became the Second Light."

A silence fell again, but this time it buzzed.

Because yeah, that was it.

The First Light was dead.

Everyone knew that.

A martyr, a flame that had been extinguished.

Pieces of him were stripped away until he became this...

Something more, still himself deep in his core, yet not so.

A colder man.

A quieter man.

A darker man.

And yet, he shone just the same.

Layla, expecting this outcome, remained standing, expression unreadable.

Her eyes were glassy. Yes, she had stopped crying, but barely.

She was happy that she was right but also sad, sorrowful, regretful, miserable, despairing, disconsolate, wretched, glum, dismal, mournful, crestfallen, broken-hearted, and simply inconsolable that she had realized that so damned late.

She'd married that man. Fought him. Hated him. Loved him... but never had she believed in him...

If only, huh?

If only.

Sinbad fluttered his feathers, his eyes leaving the regretful woman and scanning the crowd.

"Buffoons... Now they realize it?"

The owl wasn't mad for Malik.

He didn't need that.

Sinbad was mad for them.

For every year they spat his name. For every mouth that dared say he'd betrayed Fam Iblis. For every coward who wanted him punished without knowing even a fraction of a fraction of what he'd been through.

Once more, they saw it. The cold, painful truth of who he was.

And Sinbad hated that it took this long.

Dunya, on the other hand, had tears.

But she wasn't sobbing, not anymore.

It was just one steady stream down both cheeks.

She was smiling, too.

Because that was her Malik.

The one she knew.

And Huda?

Huda hadn't moved.

Not since the projection last resumed.

She was frozen in place. Staring at it. Eyes blank.

Because she finally understood.

She hadn't broken him.

None of them had—not entirely.

Not Mariam's betrayal.

Not Mahdi's death—done by his own two hands.

Not Sinbad's half-death.

Not her being taken away.

Not his mad quest for ascension.

Not Jasmine's death—another loved one sent to the river by his own hand.

Not that smile.

Not his time in the dungeon.

Not his fall into Depravity.

Not his war against the impossible.

Not his acceptance of a father's sacrifice.

Not his tragic farewell to the one he loved.

Not his Arba'in.

Not that conversation with—

Not his want for a "break."

Not his meeting with the one he'd "abandoned."

Not his war with a greater impossibility.

Not his sacrifice.

Not the loss of parts of his soul.

Not that one accursed second.

Not the truth.

Not his failure.

Not revisiting his old complacencies.

Not their goodbyes.

Not her poisoned love.

Not a life cut loose from its chains...

A life freed of mountainous weight,

Yet still burdened with countless more.

She, like them, like all of these "lessons," had only shown him a truth.

The world didn't want a Malik.

It couldn't handle him.

And so, he had to adapt.

Become something more.

Something larger than life.

A symbol.

A symbol better than hope.

Faith.

Faith in a better future.

And Huda...

She didn't cry, either.

Didn't have the right.

The poor girl was lost in her thoughts.

Malik had lit a path for them.

A path for the one truth.

She didn't know what that was.

No one in the crowd knew what that was.

They only knew that they were a part of Malik's grand plan.

But if they wanted to join him at the end of that plan…

They'd have to follow.

Or burn trying.