...Rachel...

Classes had ended, and I quickly made my way through the college hallways. My classmates were each heading in different directions after saying goodbye. It had been a completely normal afternoon, just boring lectures on subjects I didn’t really care about. It was my first year in college, and I was still getting used to the new rhythm.

"So tedious," I said to myself as I walked down the stairs that led to the college entrance. "I just want to go home..."

Normally, my boyfriend Leonardo would be here since he was in the same class as me, and he’d give me a ride on his motorcycle. Unfortunately, he said he had an important rehearsal before tonight’s show and couldn’t come pick me up. Even though he was in college with me, he was already working as the lead singer of a small rock band that was pretty popular around town. That’s actually how I met him—I had gone to one of their gigs at a club, and when our eyes met while he sang his melodies, he became my Leo.

He was strong and intense, a man who loved adventure, and still chose to date me—even though I was the "goody-two-shoes," daddy’s little princess pretending to be a rebel, who ended up in college due to parental pressure. I was surprised when Leo decided to enroll in the same class as me, even though it didn’t seem like something he wanted... all just to be by my side.

I walked down the busy city streets, people rushing in every direction while the golden sky began to darken as it hid behind the tall buildings that looked like they were trying to touch the heavens.

I turned a corner and entered a building, heading down the stairs to the subway. The place was eerily empty. I even had to check my watch to make sure I was on time. With so many people on the streets, the subway should’ve been just as busy. But silence hung over the place. To my amazement, I was even able to sit on a bench without having to wait for the train standing.

"Ah... If only it could always be like this," I said as I fixed my blonde hair, tying it back—it had gotten messy from the strong wind while I walked through the streets.

The minutes seemed to drag on, and the silence grew stranger and stranger. That eerie stillness was suddenly broken by the sound of footsteps growing louder, heavy footsteps.

"There you are!" a voice echoed through the underground—a voice I knew all too well.

As I turned around, I saw her. She was dressed entirely in black, with a leather jacket that made her red hair stand out even more.

"Elisa?" I asked, confused to see her there. She was in my class, but we barely spoke more than necessary. I never had anything against her, but her gaze was always sharp toward me, and her tone always carried a veiled hatred. "What are you doing here?"

She hadn’t been in class earlier, and the way she was dressed definitely didn’t scream "student." Underneath the leather jacket, she wore a shirt with Leo’s band name printed on it...

"Oh... I’m going to tonight’s show," she said with a smile. "I got a VIP pass from someone in the band to be real close to Leonardo." Her smile widened, and she revealed the ticket like it was a weapon.

My blood boiled when I heard that. She was provoking me... and unfortunately, I was falling for it. Her smile was doing everything it could to drive me insane, and the way she waved the ticket was practically an invitation for me to lunge at her.

It had always been obvious to me that her terrible eyes were glued to my man, but I always let it go.

"Leo is mine!" I stood up.

Elisa just laughed, a dry, completely fake laugh that echoed horribly through the place.

"Not anymore!" Her redhead smile sharpened even further. "I’ll make sure tonight he kicks your ass and sees that I’m way better than you!"

"Over my dead body!" I screamed, consumed by fury and a bit of disgust that she could even think she could take Leo from me! There was no way. Leo was adventurous, but loyal, and his love for me was real.

I lunged at her, my hands wrapping around her neck. To defend herself, she shoved my face and tried to scratch me with her red-polished nails. She grimaced as I tightened my grip, and I screamed when she kicked me and yanked my hair.

"Bitch!" I yelled through the pain, slapping her in return. It was clear that she was physically stronger than me, which only made my blood boil more with rage.

If there had been anyone around to witness the pitiful sight of two girls attacking each other, maybe it would’ve ended quickly, with someone pulling us apart and making us go our separate ways. But fate had something else planned.

"Whore!" Elisa screamed, using all her strength to rip my hands from her neck as we rolled across the floor. At some point, we had tripped while trading slaps, kicks, and scratches. Neither of us noticed the mechanical noise growing louder and louder. Every second we spent fighting, the train got closer.

As hard as it was to admit, it was obvious I was losing that fight. My hair was completely disheveled, my face covered in cuts and the marks of her sharp nails. Still, fueled by love and a desire to end her, to prove Leo was mine, I pushed against her and threw her aside, turning over to strike again.

What I didn’t expect was that as she turned, she grabbed my shirt, dragging me with her. I felt like the ground disappeared beneath me, and I started to fall. We had fought and moved so much that we were now dangerously close to the train tracks, and I was falling off the platform.

My eyes widened as the bright light blinded me, and the deafening sound of the train drew closer with terrifying speed.

Everything went dark in a way that didn’t seem possible... My life in that world had ended like that... But that wasn’t my end. A woman like me couldn’t let it end like this. My hatred turned cold, a dark desire, a thirst for vengeance that not even death could erase. A vengeance against Elisa, who stole my life and my love...

...Rachel...

Everything was dark, completely empty... The only thing I felt was a heat in my chest, a fury I couldn’t contain myself. The most I could do was try to hold it back, even if it was in vain...

A voice in my mind said this might be happening. The memory of fighting was still fresh in my mind. I could still feel the pain and adrenaline of that moment. The feeling of everything having stopped around me was tangible.

Then this darkness... Where was I? Had I really died? It couldn’t be. I was going home. I just needed to take the subway and I would be taken straight to the station near my apartment. As if the universe were completely indifferent to me, I couldn’t feel anything, except reliving the memory of that fight.

A fight others might call petty or silly, but it was very serious to me. The face of that girl Elisa came to my mind, her terrible smile made her look sadistic... If I was dead, that meant her path to Leo was clear. With my death, he would be devastated. I could see his heart breaking... Elisa would have to pay, and if it were possible, I would make her pay myself!

"All this hatred..." a soft voice said directly in my head. "With your willpower, you can truly take everything you desire for yourself... All your ambitions can become real."

I wanted to ask who that person speaking was. No, it couldn’t be a person. The way the voice was soft but indifferent, as if it were only stating facts with no feeling behind the words. Was it an entity? A god...? Could it be death...?

"I can guarantee you a second chance," the voice continued. "All that will be necessary is for you to become powerful enough."

I couldn’t yet understand what that voice was trying to tell me. The shock of everything still surrounded me, and uncertainty clouded my mind...

"You will be reincarnated and will have your chance for revenge... And then you will be mine," the voice said the last sentence like a threatening whisper.

How do I accept? I thought. And that was all it took... The darkness quickly began to dissipate, giving way once more to the bright light that had enveloped me, but this time it didn’t mean my end. It was the light of a new beginning. My second chance.

The memories of my life began to blur, two different sets of memories from different points in my life quickly merged. I could distinguish one from the other, even when I shouldn't have. I remembered studying in a school, I remembered my father and mother, I remembered happy and sad moments, I remembered my love, how I met him at one of his band’s shows, I remembered when I passed the entrance test for college.

And even so, it felt like I had lived a whole second life. I remembered running through dirt roads of a village like the ones you'd only see in fantasy films... I remembered stealing food from tents with other children while guards in armor chased us. Memories that shouldn’t exist, that should be no more than a delusion or pure fantasy, but they felt completely real.

The memory of a fight in a muddy alley, where I held tightly onto a small bag of coins, while a brute tried to hit me and take it from me. The coins clinked with every move I made to dodge, and as much as I tried to stay on my feet in that fight, I ended up being defeated. I was just a child, and that man was basically five times my size. One punch was enough to throw me against the wall of the dirty tavern from which I had stolen the coins.

I felt like my nose had broken. My back ached, and I fell face-first into the mud. Cold rain fell over me, and I couldn’t move... Defeated, humiliated, and alone, once the man walked away with the gold I had stolen—gold that wouldn’t make any difference to the owner of such a big tavern, but for a desperate child, it would’ve been enough to survive for a week...

Another memory appeared, it seemed a long time had passed... I was older, yet things hadn’t improved. I could hear the clinking of chains connected to shackles on my wrists, ankles, and the collar placed around my neck. Everything was so cold, and even so, I was wearing tattered clothes and my bare feet sank into the snow. I felt that with every step my feet would give out, and my legs wanted to collapse and stop.

And it wasn’t just me in that state. There were other prisoners. Men and women of all ages... Some were more injured than others, but none were truly in any condition to keep walking like that.

The men in golden armor didn’t care, though. In their eyes, everyone chained up was a criminal, and we were being taken to a terrible place to pay for our crimes. It didn’t matter how severe their crimes had been; everyone was being taken to the place where they would spend the rest of their lives paying for them.

Some seemed to accept this and kept their heads down... Others, like me, tried to hold their heads high and rebel somehow. There had to be a flaw in the chains, some chance to escape. Even if the chance was small, there had to be a way out.

The truth is, at that moment there was no hope at all. Everyone there, bound by chains, was no longer human. We had become slaves... I wanted to cry, it didn’t feel right. Those memories couldn’t be mine. Was I being punished for wanting revenge? I felt like my heart was being crushed by something that wanted to destroy me.

Am I so cruel that I desire punishment!? Is this my hell!? I tried to scream in vain, my voice couldn’t leave my mouth. I still wasn’t myself... I was just a spectator of another life I couldn’t control yet.

Another blank space in my memories... And when I could see again, I was in a dark place, and a guard shouted at me! He wasn’t wearing white and gold armor like the others who had dragged me like an animal. He was dressed more normally, but he had a whip and a metal mask covering his entire face, hiding his identity completely.

"This mark you have," his voice was muffled by the metal mask. I couldn’t see his expression, but if I had to guess, he was enjoying the moment.

I was kneeling on the ground, my arms chained upwards, lifting them as high as possible, while my neck was chained to the floor in an uncomfortable way that prevented me from moving. And if the pain from the uncomfortable position wasn’t enough, he was still holding a whip and striking my back. His justification for the punishment was that I had been lazy during work, but the truth was that he had some kind of interest in me—especially in the mark he mentioned.

That mark was on my right hand. I couldn’t see it from that position, and it was completely different from anything I had seen before. It looked like a tattoo, but when he struck me, it glowed. A faint light, but still visible, especially in that dark and filthy dungeon.

"I don’t know!" I screamed through the tears streaming down my face, also dirty from the earth and dust of that place. That answer didn’t please the man, and he kept hitting me...

Whip after whip, my back burned as if I were being hit by embers, though it was just a whip and the will of a curious sadist who saw me only as a mysterious object. The tears on my face weren’t just from pain. It was a mix of hatred, frustration, confusion... And a desire to destroy that whole place. I couldn’t see the face of that monster, but it didn’t matter. The only face I could see was Elisa’s. The girl with the terrible smile, the one who wanted my Leo... I was suffering because of her, because of her desire to take my life...

One more whip from the torturer was too much for my body. Mixed with exhaustion and pain, my body gave out, and everything went dark, with me fainting and ending that memory—leaving me afraid, because I knew that the moment I woke up, I’d once again be in control of my body and it wouldn’t be just memories...

If I wanted to have my revenge, I’d have to do it myself... And that seemed impossible in the hell where I had been reincarnated...

...Rachel...

I woke up feeling my back burning, the pain was unbearable, and the position I was lying in didn’t help at all. I was sprawled on the cold, dirty floor of the cave, my strength completely drained, and I had no idea how much time had passed since that memory of being tortured.

At least now I had a little control, unlike before when I could only watch myself as if I were watching a series... My mouth was completely dry, I just wanted a drop of water, the minimum a person deserved, but my voice was too weak to be heard.

"Ah, you’re awake..." I heard an unfamiliar voice, and I felt a momentary relief that it wasn’t the muffled voice of the masked man. The voice was hoarse and somewhat tired. "Stay still... You need to save as much energy as possible so your wounds can heal."

Even though the man said that, I disobeyed and turned a little. Everything hurt, and I wished none of it was real. As I turned slightly, I saw him. He was an old man, wearing dirty, tattered rags, and his neck was collared with a thick metal collar. Like me, he was just a prisoner.

As horrible as the situation in that place was, he still had a smile on his face, and I think from my expression, which made me look like I was on the brink of death, he picked up a wooden cup with some water in it and gave it to me to drink... I drank like a desperate animal and then devoured the bread he also offered. The bread was hard, and the taste was terrible, probably moldy, yet I didn’t complain—I needed to satisfy my hunger somehow.

Part of me felt guilty... That food and water were his, and other prisoners didn’t share anything willingly. He could have left me there to die, and that would have been better for him since it would be one less mouth to feed. Still, he was treating my wounds, applying bandages and cleaning them as best as he could so I wouldn’t get infected.

"You’re a strong girl, you know that?" the man said, looking at me while I groaned in pain. I felt like the most miserable person in the world, and still, he was telling me I was strong? That couldn’t be possible.

"I should die... At least I’d escape this place." That thought slipped from my lips. I didn’t really want that... But the whole situation felt hopeless. I was just an ordinary girl, I... Not just me—no one in that place deserved to be there.

The place seemed hellish. There was constantly the sound of pounding on the walls, made by other prisoners using pickaxes to dig more tunnels through the stone. In my memories, before I had been punished, I was also forced to mine, using a pickaxe to break stones, and when a crystal was found, it had to be handed over to one of the guards, and you’d receive a little water and food in return.

It wasn’t just the sound of pickaxes hitting the rocks that made the place a true nightmare—the screams of those being punished echoed endlessly through the dark corridors. Each corridor was held up by old wooden beams that barely supported the constant weight of the enormous rocks above them... The fear that at any moment you could be crushed by a collapsing rock due to the vibrations was palpable.

"I don’t want to die here..." My voice came out weak, uncertain, with tears on my face mixing with the dirt that covered me. "I can’t die here!" I clenched my hand tightly, making me see that cursed mark that had caused all of this. The mark glowed brightly this time, and even the old man was startled and stepped back a little.

"You’re not going to die here." He said with his hoarse but resolute voice.

"How can you say that?" I clenched my hand tighter, noticing the tears falling on it.

"Have you ever heard of the legend of the ‘Cursed One’?"

I shook my head in denial.

He sat down near me and stroked the mark on my hand, following its contours. It was a bit uncomfortable that he was touching me, but I ignored it. He was helping me, and this legend interested me... Because even though I didn’t know it, somewhere in my new memories, it felt familiar.

"They say one day a merciless queen will rise to rule the world, punishing the unjust and saving the truly needy..." He basically whispered it, as if telling the story was an even worse crime than whatever he had already been accused of. "There were others who tried to revolt, calling themselves the true cursed one... But none had anything special about them."

I understood what he meant about having something special... That mark on my hand, a mark no one else had, glowing as if it were magical, as if somehow it held hidden power.

"Do you think I could be that queen?" I spoke softly, in a tone no one nearby could hear. The old man nodded slightly and ran his hand through his white beard.

So that was it—this was his interest in saving me... He believed I could bring justice... No, I recognized the look on his face. It wasn’t just justice he wanted. His eyes burned with a fiery flame—it was the same sharp, cruel look I had every time I thought about the girl who had caused my death... He wanted revenge.

It was hard to know whether it was day or night since there was no way to see outside those cold caves... Time seemed not to exist. Things always happened the same way—slaves worked day and night until they collapsed from exhaustion and were replaced by others, and then it repeated... Guards came and went, dragging prisoners and applying punishments as needed, and sometimes just to show power when it was completely unnecessary.

When my wounds had healed and I was no longer as weak as before, the guards took me. They were led by the man with the metal mask. He was the jailer... The boss who ruled that place. They forced me to walk, my hands and legs chained in a way that kept me from walking fast, and even so, those men forced me to keep up with their pace.

We passed other prisoners who were mining, going deeper into the excavation. We had arrived at an entrance where the mines met a natural cave, where rats and bats lived and where the entrance to the pit was...

The pit was the place where slaves went and never returned. It was a deep, narrow hole where only one person could walk through at a time...

"No... Please..." I begged, only to be kicked to the ground, and then they threw a small pickaxe at me. I couldn’t even use it as a weapon—if I tried to rebel, I’d be executed right there by the guards’ bright and sharp swords... My only option was to obey.

I started walking deeper into that hole. The place was so narrow, so tight that I could barely move. I really had to use the pickaxe to dig my way through. The deeper I went, the tighter my chest felt... It was obvious those men wanted me to die there... I took a deep breath, not wanting any of it to be real. Everything was so terrible.

As I dug, my eyes filled with tears, overwhelmed by the longing for my old life. "This is unfair," I thought... "I don’t deserve this!" my inner voice screamed, crying out for help.

"You really don’t deserve this." That voice... I recognized it. It was the same voice that had spoken to me while I was receiving my new memories. "Keep going. You want power, and I’ll give you your power."

I wiped the tears from my face and held on tightly. I had to keep going, and so I did. The stones shattered, and sparks flew with each blow from the iron pickaxe. It was wearing down quickly, throwing fragments to the sides. Finally, the tip of the tool hit something harder than the stones, releasing a brighter spark like a flicker of fire.

"Touch the crystal." The voice said in my mind. It was instinctive—I dropped the pickaxe and touched the crystal with my right hand, the one with the tattoo... It glowed intensely, the same color as the orange crystal. "You feel the power, don’t you? You want to release it, don’t you?"

My heart burned, and I nodded, feeling my skin start to heat up, like something was bubbling inside me, reacting to the hot crystal in front of me. The mark that had only been on my hand began to spread with more lines and symbols I didn’t understand. It spread across my arms, up my torso, and around my neck.

"Focus on your hatred." The voice whispered seductively—there was no way to refuse... So I closed my eyes. Focus my hatred... I hated everyone who had imprisoned me in that place, every one of those guards, and especially that masked executioner—he deserved to suffer! "That’s it... Now let your fury flow!"

The voice commanded me once more. The intense heat from the hatred flowed through me in a way I couldn’t contain. Not that I wanted to contain it. When I finally opened my eyes, everything exploded... Flames violently engulfed me, burning everything around me, and since there was only one exit, the flames quickly rose through the pit. I smiled, hearing the guards scream... This was my chance to get my revenge and leave that place behind.