Inside My Shell I Wait And Bleed Mga Nobela at Kwento

The garden isn’t a garden anymore. It’s a wound. A jagged, bleeding tear in reality where the roses scream and the sky peels back like burned skin. I stand in the center of it, my hands slick with something that isn’t blood—black-gold code, writhing, alive—and the original stares at me like I’ve just set the world on fire. Maybe I have. Behind her, Jeff is shouting, but the sound is muffled, distant. The only thing I hear clearly is the hum in my veins, the whisper of the system unraveling around us.

The high-pressure steam pipes in the private lab hissed, a sound that usually signalled stability but now felt like a countdown. My heart felt heavy, a physical weight dragging against my ribs. I looked at the dark maroon blood in the vial; it was thickening, becoming viscous as the iron particulate claimed more space within the fluid. ​"The anchor is sinking," I whispered, the words of the ledger echoing in the sterile room. "The virus isn't just a shield. It’s a replacement. It’s turning me into a statue from the inside out."

The waiting was worse than the bleeding. I lay on the stone floor, the cold seeping through my uniform, settling into my marrow. My muscles vibrated—a low, constant hum of tension that wanted to snap something. Anything. Three minutes, Wolfy’s voice pushed into my skull. It wasn't sound; it was a cold pressure behind my eyes, precise as a scalpel. Do not engage early. Wait for the cycle.

I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to. Nytherion was quiet too, which was somehow worse. It wasn’t absence—it was waiting. When he finally spoke, it was like he’d been standing right behind me. You saw how easily we ended them. You felt it. “I did.” And you know it will take more than one breach to finish this war. You’ll need me again. Soon. He wasn’t wrong. That was the problem. I lay back, staring at the ceiling until my eyes burned. Somewhere beyond the keep’s walls, the breach was still moving, reshaping the world one tear at a time. And I couldn’t tell if the thing inside me was my greatest weapon—or the breach’s most patient blade.

He shrugged off, thinking he’d talk to Abel later and headed out of the bathroom to grab the new syringe and a tiny glass bottle from under his pillow before marching back to the bathroom. He entered the empty stall, closed the toilet lid before sitting on it. He didn’t bother to lock the stall because he knew everyone would be busy eating. He filled the syringe with the bluish liquid and injected it inside his bloodstream. Veins popped out like they did every time as he grunted in pain, arching his back and lolling back his head. He was taking shallow breaths as his heartbeat decreased. It was so slow that he could pass for dead. He was sweating like crazy and his whole body started burning

Kill! Kill! Kill! There’s nothing I can’t do now. All I can think of is causing him pain, as much pain as I can possibly give. It’s at this point that I hope for more that I know he’s close. There’s only so much a body can take before it starts to fall apart. It hasn’t bled enough, it hasn’t cried enough, it hasn’t despaired enough. I lean down as tears leak from his eyes. The small weakness is enough to make me smile.

I am not defined by what is on my body, only what’s on the inside and right now that’s hate. He turns away like I’m no threat and begins prepping his equipment. I take a quick breath and climb onto the bed. Comply, is my silent mantra. I wiggle a bit and pull the blanket up and over my back. I will not lie here with my back bare before he begins. I settle into the bed and close my eyes while listening to the sounds. The dread returns when the small noises stop.

Not anything human. It was like glass shattering inside my skull, sharp and cold, words not made for my tongue. You called. He heard. But he isn’t yours anymore. I pressed my forehead to the stone, biting down on the inside of my cheek until blood filled my mouth. The taste was copper and salt, grounding. I’d always bled to stay alive. Always fought with nothing but scraps. I wasn’t giving him up. Not now. Not after everything.

"I built a god, and now it refuses to let me die." I stare at the monitor in my bedroom, the code scrolling past in a rhythmic, mocking blur. It is my own architecture. I wrote the subroutines for the company’s internal tracking, the very logic that now knows my heartbeat, my location, and every keystroke I dare to make. I am a prisoner of my own brilliance. I slam my fist onto the desk, the sound hollow in the vast, empty room.

My eyes were open, but I couldn’t focus. I looked dead. But deep inside, one thing was still alive. My hatred. And it was waiting.