Ninth Lie

4. First Blood

The world a blur, I could only vaguely recall my sentence from the Court. Destined to set foot never again in the Heaven Court, without any chance of a life after death. It seems now too long ago when I was naive enough to think that I would never reincarnation, for I would never face death. Now it is only that death is inevitable and reincarnation is impossible. Once my mortal body abandons me, the pieces of my soul will disintegrate. And the world will be ridded of such a disgrace.

One month. Thirty days more. Then I am destined to be dust. No one to mourn. No one to weep. Only as quietly as I had come I shall go.

Cast onto the dirt roads of a village, I roam endlessly, hoping to find someone who knows of DiXin. I want the truth, his explanation. The Court has its deception. Perhaps then I can love for thirty days more.

Riddled by famine and plagued by starvation, the villagers scurry away with an expression of disgust on their gaunt faces. With my hair strewn carelessly and my dress spotted with blood, I must look like a prostitute cast out from the brothel or a wife abandoned by her husband. But am I not both? If not more pitiful and wretched.

The pain in my body has long dulled, yet the aching of my heart only grows. The last light reflected before an endless death, I summon all the willpower I can muster. If I am to die, I must know the truth. So I trudge on. Day passes to night, muddy roads give way to paved streets, and plague-ridden shacks transform into lantern-lit cities.

If anything, now caked with mud, I am given even more looks of disgust. I can barely open my mouth before the person rushes away or pushes me to the side of the road. So for days I sleep on the streets along with the other poor, the stars in the skies as my blanket. Oh how they sparkle in the night sky. If only the world knew of their treachery.

"Are you awake?" The man dressed in plain clothing asks, offering a steamed bun. About forty, I decide. No, not DiXin. His voice is too cheerful. Either from starvation of food or from starvation of care and attention, I lunge for the steamed bun. Oh, how pitiful am I now.

"You have a beautiful face." His voice is too shrill. His compliment too fake. Under this layer of soot, I can barely recognize my own face, much less a stranger. But he does have a kind heart...offering food to the―

From the crowded streets, I am now in a dark and musty room, kept against my will. The medicine in the steamed buns makes me weak, weaker than I was before. Of course men are never to be trusted. Why would I ever let myself fall into one of their traps again?

"You truly do have a beautiful face," that tainted man speaks, his voice filled with glee. "You will fetch a handsome price at the brothels. But before you serve those men.... Now now, if only you aren't covered in mud. But that is all from the clothes isn't it?"

He reaches out, his filthy hands slithering onto my body. In the dim light, his face is contorted with a sly grin, and his eyes gleam with lust. I scream.

"Leave me alone...Get away from me...!"

Finally, I remember. I am an animal. My fangs dig into the sides of his neck. Blood. I have never had blood before, but the taste of revenge is a saccharine sweet. It was his time to plead.

But before I knew it, all that was left before me was the corpse of the man who had tried to deflower me. My screams never end.