What put the Princess in a tower?

Who created the trials that will determine which knight would take the fair maiden’s hand?

Once you find the answers to these questions, the story is already over.

I crashed through a ceiling of memories, rushing to the center of this broken fairytale world.

Alone in her tower, the Princess begged the world for a saviour. She begged for somebody to take her hand and lead her back to the light.

She wished to be longed for. She wanted someone to fight on her behalf. She yearned for a miracle that would never come.

What rampaged on the stage of reality was the end result of those desires.

The tower was all the Princess knew. It was her prison, a cage for a miserable songstress, a place where she could feel safe and yearn for a better tomorrow.

There is refuge in helplessness. That was her origin, the root of her existence — her mind had been made slave to the external forces beyond her control.

When people are driven into a corner, their desires and will can distort and twist beyond recognition. In this lonely world, wishing for salvation became her very last hope.

This was her story, that of a maiden trapped in a tower.

As soon as I reached the top of the tower, an invisible force blew me straight through a stone wall and flung me to the ground.

The hero defeats the villain and rescues the Princess. This was the only way the story could progress.

This was the rule of this world.

If I was a real person like Knight or Lyra, I would’ve been forced to obey. My instincts would push me to become her knight and save her, to fulfill my role in her story.

Like the 155 knights that came before our trio, we would die by her hands. Nobody besides the perfect hero would be strong enough to save her — Only the best heroes could reach the top of her obsidian tower. Those that could reach the top had to overcome her — an impossible challenge for any mortal human.

Unfortunately for the Princess, she picked a fight with another monster.

Using my winds, I landed on my feet. The little black knife of survival wouldn’t do for a fight like this. I knew the full scope of what I was fighting for; it wasn’t only my own life on the line anymore.

The silver blade with cobalt veins whispered painful truths as I drew it, spewing words that illuminated the cracks in my existence.

I was a fake. Incomplete. Fighting a fight that I didn’t understand.

Blue thorns erupted from my arms as my hands clenched the grip. But this was simply the price I had to pay to move forward.

I couldn’t be the hero she needed, but this story was missing its villain.

If she desired a knight in shining armor, then I would become the nightmare that would tear down her tower and break her heart into a thousand pieces.

Focusing my mind into my blade, I ran forward and struck at the tower itself.

A storm cares not for what lies in its path. Be it time, natural disasters, or the changing zeitgeists of society, innumerable factors can ruin a story before it comes to fruition.

This was the reality that a fairy tale denies; a reality where countless tragedies fall like raindrops in a monsoon; a reality where happily ever is merely a fleeting illusion against the setting sun.

Let me illuminate your greatest fears with my blade, my dear Princess.

The door was right there. You could’ve left at any time.

This tower, this wall, these monsters and traps, they were of your creation.

A good story has to make sense. They must be more real than reality — everything has to have a satisfying explanation.

Stories can be a tool that can make sense of the real world. If a fairy tale was how the Princess shielded herself, then she needed a little reckoning.

An earthquake crushes two lovers before they can meet one last time.

A wave washes away a family and their home into the unforgiving sea.

The body of a young girl is left in a dumpster, defiled and broken. An innocent is burnt at the stake by accusations borne of jealousy.

It may not have been intentional, but the Princess built this story to shield herself from the thorns of such a cruel reality.

—It’s not wrong to hope for a better tomorrow.

The tower animated, the opening of her counterattack. I could hear her voice as she fought back against my denial of her world.

I can’t survive out there on my own. I need help.

Cloth tendrils came from the walls to constrict me. Following her voice, I cut them down with my cobalt blade, but every strike hurt me more than it hurt her.

The sky out there looks so ominous… if I keep waiting, this storm will pass.

A future must be claimed with your own hands. No one will ever give it to you.

A flower in the desert only needs a single person to thrive. I’ll wait for you, my hero.

The Princess’s true body lay in a bed of golden flowers, an ethereal woman covered in scars dressed in a simple white robe. Countless strips of grey fabric surrounded her body and pulled her into the walls.

By the time I reached her, she was half absorbed by her prison.

Against my better judgement, I lunged forward and grabbed her wrist.

“Stop it!” I cut at the threads tying her down, desperately trying to pull her away. “Get a hold of yourself and look at what you’re doing!”

I understood her, which is precisely why I wanted to save her.

We were cut from the same cloth, her and I.

Her madness was borne from isolation. Just like me, she spent an untold eternity by her lonesome surrounded by death and horror. If it weren’t for the intervention of Samson and that damned woman, I wouldn’t have turned out any different.

She had grown strong, but her mind was trapped in the very cage that granted her strength. I hacked away at it with my blade, hoping that she would open her eyes.

No matter what your appearance may be, the heart ultimately decides the way forward.

The you of yesterday doesn’t need to become the you of today or tomorrow. People can change.

So trust me. Trust in the tomorrow we can bring with our own hands — trust in this path I opened for you.

The Princess opened her eyes and gave me a sad, pathetic smile.

“—I can’t do it.”

Her hand slipped from mine and melted into the walls of the tower.

I stared at my empty fingers, barely processing what was happening.

I didn’t want to believe it. At the same time, I understood why.

Perfect conclusions only exist in fairy tales. Leaving your only home for a mere chance at escape requires a sacrifice of stability and security, to leave your former self behind and become somebody new.

She simply wasn’t strong enough to take that risk. Nobody was there for her when she needed help.

The Princess had long lost herself in this dream. She no longer had the ability to change and move forward; the only thing that was left here was a mangled ball of murderous intent and a wish that could never be fulfilled.

Whatever humanity was once here was gone. No matter what I did, I couldn’t change that fact.

“Whatever you’re doing,” Knight screamed, “It’s not working! Ffff—”

Back on the surface, the Princess went berserk. No longer was it singing; its song had warped into an inhumane shriek that ruptured my companions’ eardrums and flayed his scales and crushed Lyra’s ribs into her organs. They couldn’t even hear me anymore — they were blindly fighting to the last breath, looking for any opportunity for victory.

But these were the rules of this forsaken world. When two stories meet, only the strongest will survive and move forward.

The thinnest thread of circumstance turns friends into enemies, comrades into betrayers, and lovers into vendettas. This was the weapon I fought with, a cobalt blade forged from the burdens of wasted lives, the meaningless suffering wrought by forces beyond our control. Such a weapon could never save a single life; it could only destroy and devastate.

This was self-defense. We were fighting for our lives. Yet, my soul grew heavier with each step.

Finding her again was a trivial matter. She had wrapped herself in a cocoon of grey fabric, completely closing herself off from the world.

Could there have been another way? As I closed the distance, I realized I was too scared to think about the possibilities.

This was the path I chose. This was the weapon I chose.

This was the fate I chose.

I couldn’t look away from this. No matter what, I couldn’t look away.

—Better to ask for forgiveness than pray for salvation.

With regret burning in my veins, I plunged the cobalt sword into her heart.

In reality, the Princess faltered for a moment. Knight, with a broken arm and shattered leg, reinforced his limbs with Ether and forced himself through the pain, running up the cloth tendril. He leapt into the air and smashed the Princess towards the ground.

Lyra broke free from the impaling tendrils, now in freefall herself. With the help of my winds, she landed on her feet and pushed through the pain to deliver a rising emerald slash. Yet the Princess’s body proved unnaturally resistant to damage; she began to scream after taking the blow, writhing on the ground in pure physical and mental agony. I kept her impaled, making sure she couldn’t escape.

Forgive me, please.

Quietly, I prayed a single wish as Knight and Lyra forced their broken bodies to move and beat the Princess to death.