Sonia and Niya

Rank.

Murky.

Nauseating.

Soaking in an ocean formed of Black Blood, even her hair matted with the monsters' flesh and gore, with a dense fog before her so thick she could not see her own hand, Sonia did not know why she was here. But she knew she had to swim forward, and she had to follow the monsters' corpses. Not only was it safe, it would let her catch up to that hateful Little Speaker and settle the grudge between them.

...Who was that Little Speaker?

But the moment her thoughts probed even slightly deeper into the abyss of memory, she was drowned by resentment and hatred like an avalanche and a tsunami. That resentment was like glaciers on the far northern tundra, piling higher and higher with the passage of time, higher and higher, until it could no longer bear its own weight. Like a mad dog unleashed, it could not wait to destroy every spring with despairing, bone-deep cold.

Yet as Sonia sank into those thoughts, she felt not the slightest discomfort. Instead, it was like soaking in a hot spring, warm and cozy. Her body felt so light it was as if she had cast off shackles and burdens, and some unimaginable joy rose in her heart—happier than standing beneath the eyes of the world, more pleasurable than towering above all living beings. So resentment and happiness were not opposites after all.

Because all her unease, all her worries, all her melancholy, the answer to every problem she encountered, could be answered with resentment.

Why bother thinking?

Why bother choosing?

Those nobles did not respect me? Then slaughter them all. Those men coveted me? Then dig out their eyes. Those strangers hated me? Then go to their doors one by one and hack them into pieces.