The Last Villain’s Lament

Ezra sat by his window, moonlight casting silver streaks across the cold stone floor of his dormitory. His reflection in the glass was pale, hollow-eyed, and gaunt—a stranger wearing his skin. Every breath felt heavier than the last, as if the air itself resisted his existence, smothering him with invisible hands that tugged at the edges of his sanity.

The encounter with Aurelian had left fractures in his already fragile sense of self. Those golden eyes had been too sharp, too aware, as if they could pierce through his illusion and see the anomaly beneath. Ezra clenched his fists against the desk's edge, feeling his knuckles crack under the pressure.

[WARNING: System Stability at 62%]

[Sanity: 91%]

[Cognitive Drift Detected]

I can't fall apart now. The thought repeated like a mantra, but the cracks in his mind grew wider with every passing second. The shadows seemed longer, darker, stretching toward him as if they were alive—hungry for his weakness.

A soft knock on the door pulled him back to reality. "Ezra?" Liora's voice wavered with quiet concern. "Can I come in?"

He hesitated for a moment, every instinct telling him to stay silent, to protect her from the chaos consuming him. But the tremble in her voice broke through his defenses.

"It's open," he managed to say, his voice barely more than a whisper.

The door creaked open, and Liora stepped inside, draped in a thick cloak that shielded her from the night's chill. Her emerald eyes, normally vibrant, were shadowed with worry. She closed the door behind her quietly and approached him, each step hesitant but determined.

"You disappeared after the ceremony," she said, stopping a foot away from him. "I was worried about you."

Ezra forced a weak smile, though it felt foreign on his face. "I just needed air."

Liora crossed the room and knelt beside him, her hand resting gently on his shoulder. "You're lying. You're not the same. Something's… wrong."

Ezra's shoulders tensed beneath her touch. Of course, something's wrong. Everything about this place is wrong. Everything about me is wrong.

Instead of answering her directly, he asked, "Do you ever feel like the Academy isn't what it seems?"

She blinked, caught off guard by the question. "What do you mean?"

"The walls hum like machines," Ezra whispered, staring into the void of his reflection. "The magic feels artificial, like it's scripted, programmed. Like every moment of our lives here is being… controlled."

Liora's brows knit together in confusion. "Ezra, you're scaring me."

He shook his head slowly, the pressure behind his eyes building until every thought fractured into jagged shards. "I just… I need time."

"You're not alone," she said firmly, tightening her grip on his shoulder. "Whatever this is, you don't have to fight it by yourself."

For a moment, that simple gesture of comfort was enough to keep him from slipping further into the void.

That night, Ezra dreamed.

A blood-red sky stretched endlessly overhead as shadows danced across a broken battlefield. The ground beneath him was littered with the corpses of strangers whose faces were eerily familiar—faces that morphed between those of his friends, family, and people he had never met. The wind howled like a chorus of lost souls, carrying voices that whispered his name like a curse.

From the haze emerged a figure cloaked in gold and darkness. His eyes burned like twin embers, and a cruel smile curved across his lips. His voice was soft, but it echoed with terrifying clarity.

Aurelian.

"You don't belong here," Aurelian's voice reverberated through the void, low and venomous. "You're a stain on the tapestry of fate."

Ezra tried to move, but the ground beneath him turned to ash, crumbling away with every step. His legs sank deeper into nothingness, the weight of inevitability pulling him down until only fear remained.

The system's voice intruded like an icy blade:

[CORRECTION PROTOCOL ACTIVE]

[Memory Purge Initiated]

Ezra's body convulsed as pain seared through his skull, a jagged fracture splitting his thoughts apart. Every memory—every fragment of who he was—began to unravel.

"No!" He screamed into the endless dark, but the void swallowed his voice whole.

The dream shattered like glass under pressure.

Ezra awoke with a strangled gasp, drenched in sweat, his body shaking violently. His heart pounded against his ribs like a drum of war, and the system's notifications burned into his vision like firebrands:

[Memory Fragmentation: 14%]

[Sanity: 87%]

[Objective: Survive]

The following day, whispers filled the Academy's grand halls like a poisonous fog. Students huddled together in tight circles, their conversations reduced to frantic murmurs. Eyes darted nervously from shadow to shadow, every movement loaded with fear.

Ezra walked through the courtyard, his footsteps echoing like hollow promises. Fragments of conversation reached his ears:

"Did you hear? Another student disappeared last night."

"Gone. No trace left behind. Just like the others."

Ezra's stomach twisted with sickening dread. Correction events. The system wasn't just targeting him—it was purging the anomalies, erasing anyone who noticed the cracks in the illusion of this fabricated world.

Liora found him by the fountain later that afternoon. She looked pale, her eyes rimmed with dark circles from lack of sleep. "Ezra, something's happening. Another student vanished."

He didn't respond at first, staring into the rippling water. His reflection fractured with every movement, distorting into a figure he didn't recognize—an echo of who he once was, now broken beyond repair.

Finally, he spoke, his voice barely audible. "The Academy is rewriting itself."

Liora's throat bobbed as she swallowed hard. "What are you talking about?"

"People are being erased," Ezra said, his voice low, hollow. "Anyone who realizes the truth. Anyone who doesn't belong."

Before she could respond, the ground beneath them trembled.

[REALITY SHIFT DETECTED]

Around them, the world froze. Students stopped mid-step, their faces eerily blank, as if they had been drained of all thought and purpose. The sky above darkened, and the air thickened with oppressive silence.

Ezra's system flickered violently.

[Correction Protocol Engaged]

[Subject Status: Anomaly]

A shadow stretched across the courtyard, stretching and twisting unnaturally, drawn toward him with undeniable intent.

Ezra grabbed Liora's hand. "Run."

Darkness surged around them, swallowing the air and warping the sky as the Academy's true nature bled through the cracks in reality.

The game isn't broken, Ezra thought grimly, It's evolving.

And the cost of survival was rising with every breath.

The two of them sprinted down the marble pathways, their footsteps echoing through the silent halls as the oppressive force behind them grew stronger with each passing second. Ezra's vision blurred, static crackling at the edges of his consciousness.

"Where are we going?" Liora panted, fear cracking through her voice.

"Anywhere but here," Ezra hissed, pulling her into a side corridor just as a wall of darkness surged past them like a living wave.

[Warning: Proximity to Correction Protocol - Critical]

They slid into a hidden alcove behind one of the Academy's ancient statues. Ezra's breath came in ragged gasps as the shadow pulsed just beyond their hiding place, probing the air for any trace of them.

Liora gripped his sleeve tightly. "Ezra, what is that thing?"

"A system correction," Ezra whispered, his voice strained. "It's here to erase anomalies—and right now, that means us."

Her hand trembled in his grasp, but she didn't let go. "How do we stop it?"

Ezra met her gaze, the weight of inevitability pressing down on his chest. "We don't. We run. We survive. And we find a way to break the script before it breaks us."

The shadow passed by, and the air seemed to ease its chokehold on reality. But Ezra knew the reprieve was temporary. The Academy was watching.

And it wouldn't stop until the anomaly was erased.