Anthesis of Sadness
Chapter 205: The Rain Was a Memory

Chapter 205: The Rain Was a Memory

The rain had changed. It was no longer that soft veil, those timid drops that slide without insisting. No. It no longer caressed. It stung. Not like needles — that would be too simple, too physical, too obvious. No... it stung like acidic memories, like liquefied fragments of the past, falling from the sky to blend with the skin and awaken what we thought forgotten.

Each drop, now, seemed charged with an ancient weight. And even if they remained invisible to the eye, even if they didn’t mark the flesh, they still left a burn — discreet, diffuse, but stubborn. A fine, nervous heat that seeped under the skin, like a muffled truth rising through the pores, drop by drop, until it smothered thought. The rain was no longer weather. It was a memory. A wet memory falling back down on me.

And the railings... melted. Literally. The metal seemed to ooze, deform, unravel under an absurd heat, as if the world itself were losing patience. Their curves collapsed slowly, drop by drop, without a crash, in a discreet agony, almost modest. Like arms held out too long toward another, toward a call, toward a promise, and that end up letting go. Giving up. Not out of weakness. But because they understood there would be no answer.

I was still climbing. One step after another, without rhythm, without real will. As one climbs not to reach something, but because there’s nothing else left to do. The staircase, deformed, melting in places, undulated beneath my feet like a living matter in agony, and yet I continued. Not out of strength. But because stopping would have been worse. Because each step taken held me in balance, fragile, between falling and surviving.

Each step forced me to find a new balance. Nothing was stable. Nothing repeated. As if every gradient, every irregularity, every sagging was placed there intentionally — to challenge me. The world wasn’t trying to make me fall out of cruelty. It wasn’t a punishment. It was a test. A silent trial, almost benevolent in its brutality. As if it wanted to know. If I truly wanted to continue. If I was willing to move forward even when nothing held. Even when everything wavered.

All I knew was that without my regenerative ability — that anomaly gifted by my race, that poisoned privilege grafted to my cells — I would already be dead. Not once. But a thousand. Dead for far too long, consumed, crushed, abandoned in pieces on one of the landings of this world that forgives nothing.

And what chilled me, beyond even the pain, was this certainty: he was the most terrifying enemy I had ever faced. By far. By a long, long way. A chasm between him and the others. More crushing than Anarael, despite his divine light. More devouring than Xylorath, despite his theater of omnipotence. He... was something else. A presence that could not be contained. A horror that could not be named. An end that did not announce itself.

The child in my arms stirred. Barely. A shiver. A breath of movement against my chest. He hadn’t said a word, all along. Not a cry, not a whimper. A silence of stone, or of fear — I no longer knew. But now... he was crying.

Not loudly. Not like usual, those cries of fatigue or pain we learn to ignore to survive. No. This time, it was something else. A new nuance, fine, unsettling. In each sob, one felt an expectation. A tension. A demand. As if his tears, instead of fleeing, were bringing me back to him. As if he wanted something. Not comfort. But an answer.

A discreet sob. Rhythmic. Like a pulse. Not a sharp complaint, not a tantrum. Just that broken breath, regular, painfully contained — a child’s grief too used to not being heard. Too used to crying alone, in the void, without hope that anyone would come. It was a soft sound, almost imperceptible, but that seeped everywhere. It vibrated against my skin. It knocked against my rib cage like an ancient reminder. A foreign memory. Or maybe... not so foreign after all.

I... without meaning to, without even realizing it, I was crying too. Not in response to him. Not as a tender mirror. Not even in silent solidarity. I cried without knowing why. Without precise emotion. Without a defined cause.

The tears flowed, slow, warm, absurd — as if my body, having held everything in for too long, had finally burst on its own. There was no sobbing. No moaning. Just this water falling, stubborn, impassive, from too far away to be stopped. As if a part of me, buried deep, had decided this was the moment. Without asking for my permission.

One tear. Then another. Without sound. Without jolt. They slid down my cheeks like thoughts no longer dared to be formed, like memories dissolved in salty water. All in silence. A thick, respectful, almost sacred silence.

There was nothing spectacular. Nothing dramatic. Just this slowness. This intimate trickle. As if the body, itself, remembered what I had tried to forget.

My shoulders began to tremble. Suddenly. Without warning. As if something inside had snapped. A dam. A tension held for too long. It wasn’t a shiver from cold, nor a jolt of fear. It was deeper. More organic. A nervous release, brutal, irrepressible. As if my body, despite me, was finally allowing itself to crack. To confess. To let it out.

My chest rose. Once. Then again. In jerks. As if each breath came from a well too deep, too clogged with unspoken things. It wasn’t a regular breath, nor a controlled motion. It was a jolt. A brutal, jagged wave of emotion I couldn’t control. My body was relearning how to breathe... or maybe it was collapsing.

A sob, a little too loud, caught in my throat — an uncontrolled spasm, torn from my guts, like a hiccup of memory. It wasn’t intended. Not even conscious. It was a shake, a jolt from elsewhere, from a place in me I thought long sealed. And it rose, that sob, without elegance, without modesty, raw and rough, like a repressed truth that no longer asked for permission.

I wanted to hold it back. Truly. Out of reflex, out of shame, out of habit too. I tried to swallow the sound, to contract my throat, to block my stomach. But it was too late. The body had already spoken. I had already given in, inside. Perhaps long ago. There was no dam left, no barrier. Just this open, gaping breach, through which finally escaped what I had never known how to name.

It was there. Not the memory itself — not a clear image, not a scene replayed in loops. No. It was there differently. In what it did to my body. A contraction. A dull, stubborn burn, lodged somewhere between ribs and belly. An inner surrender, as if something in me was slowly withdrawing, in layers, leaving me hollow, vulnerable, naked.

A horrible sensation, almost impossible to locate, but total. It possessed me. And this rain... this insidious, continuous, relentless rain, was no longer a simple phenomenon. It was a torment. A stretched agony. A torment that didn’t strike hard, but long. Long. Always. Until it eroded everything still standing.

I dropped to my knees. Not to beg. Not to implore some grace from elsewhere. No. Just to hold on. To not collapse entirely. My legs had given way, yes, but not as a symbolic gesture — it was mechanical, instinctive, almost animal.

The ground became a necessity. A point of support. The only one still able to contain me without crumbling. I wasn’t praying. I was resisting. On my knees, yes, but not in submission — in survival.

The pearly ground was cold. Wet. Unstable. Beneath my knees, it barely slid, like a living, hesitant substance that no longer knew whether it should support or swallow me. The moisture clung, sticky, soaking into my clothes, my skin, maybe even to the bone. And yet... it was still the only place I could hold on.

The only place real enough, tangible enough for me to cling to, even while trembling. It didn’t offer comfort. But at least, it didn’t flee.

The child, curled up against me, still said nothing. He didn’t move, didn’t even sniffle anymore. But his tears... they had stopped. Slowly. Without us noticing. As if my collapse had calmed him. As if he were listening — not to my words, there were none — but to what my body was saying in my place. My sobs. My tremors. My broken silence.

And somewhere, in the hollow of that mute fusion, I felt that my pain... reassured him. Because it resembled his. Because it spoke the same language as his. Because in me, he perhaps found the echo of what he didn’t know how to express. And that was enough. For him to stay silent. For him to remain. For him to hold on.

I rested my forehead against the hollow of his shoulder. Gently. Almost with shame. It wasn’t a thought-out gesture, even less an act of comfort. It was a surrender. An immediate need for contact, for warmth, for something that truly existed.

His small shoulder, thin, fragile, still wet with rain, was that anchor point. A derisory refuge, but real. And in that silent closeness, something in me calmed down. Just a little. Not because I was better. But because I was no longer completely alone.

Then, without even thinking about it, without deciding, I murmured:

— I’m sorry...

The words slipped between my lips like a breath too old to be held back, too heavy to remain silent. It wasn’t an apology. Not a justification. It was a fracture. A confession escaped from the heart, addressed to no one and to everyone at once — to him, to me, to those I had left behind, to that past I still carried like an open wound.

I didn’t even know what exactly I regretted. But it was there. True. And it was all I had left.

He didn’t answer. He didn’t cry either. He just stayed there, against me, motionless, silent, as if my words no longer required a reaction. As if, for once, silence was enough. He didn’t move, but I felt his breath, slow, steady, almost peaceful, pass through me like a silent reply.

He didn’t need to speak. Nor to cry. His presence said everything. And that everything... broke me a little more, but differently. More gently.

And the rain, around us, kept falling. Relentless. Acid, soft, real. A liquid contradiction, as if the sky itself no longer knew whether to punish or console.

Each drop carried something ancient, something honest. It was no longer an enemy. Nor an ally. Just a presence. A deep and steady song that enveloped us both, washing without erasing, burning without condemning.

It fell. Simply. As if it knew that was all we were capable of now: to stay there, and let the world cry with us.