I have no doubt that this is not a war.
This is a master's game of chess.
And I am juz a pawn.
And in order for a pawn to survive, he must play a double game.
On one hand, he must let himself be used in order for the game to progress, and this will not blow through if the game does not end.
On the other hand, he mustn't allow himself to be manipulated to the extent of getting sacrificed for something that has no meaning to his life.

And to do that, the pawn will need to know where the game is headed.
This is where it gets mentally taxing.

I never approved of all the secrecy in this double-life.
But at least it was necessary.
In school life, I am befuddled at how people are openly being secretive.
You don't know who I really am.
Only my few close friends know.
I can openly let you know that this is juz a facade while I smile at you.
You dunno if I actually think you're a goddamn bastard
That I'm juz appearing to be nice
All I let you know is this is not a genuine smile.
I have a secret blog that only my clique can read.
Only they know what I've been through, the rest of you can go f* off.

Unless I'm interested in you...
Ah then I'll lament at how you don't understand me
How you don't notice me for who I am.
How you don't know that I'm actually like this and like that.

Guys act tough and charming on the exterior, girls act girly and caring.
We all pass this 2 years like this
And at the end of it, we have no idea who everybody is.
Even ourselves.

And me?
What do I care?
I am about to transcend into oblivion.


But I do care..

Vspominai

"Vspominai" means remember in russian. One of the slightly more complicated vocabulary that I vspominai-ed. Quite fitting.

After all that I've experienced and seen of the world, I can hardly be considered naive.
But I choose to believe in the best of people.
I regard them in relation to only how they've been to me.
I'm not s'posed to know so much, I give people the benefit of the doubt.
Rampant rumours abound, my own sense of perception nagging at the back of my head.
There might not be much reason to trust.
But I believe.

But he walked.

Damn he did. Just like how everybody's tales of him indicated that he would.
Just like how I kept instinctively bracing for him to.
And he owes me. He knows he does.
Now it feels like I knowingly got betrayed.
And that is a venom that wriggles very painfully and insistently right to the core of my being.

Its not easy to trust these days.
Its not always their morals, I don't have that many people owing me a life-debt.
It could juz be their fickle hearts.
They could have forgotten about you, about how they used to care.
They've moved on to more endearing people and matters.
Or perhaps they never cared.
They were like moths to a light due to the intrigue you aroused in them.
When the light is gone, so are they.
All that's left is a hollow shell for show.

And believing in a shell is juz plain foolish.

This is a lesson learnt in a time of peril.
I will not forget.
But.. what am I s'posed to do about it now?
I cannot stop believing..

Can I?

Its not easy to trust these days.

"Theatrics and deception are powerful weapons."

I don't deny that. They have been.. useful teachings, if not exactly good. And it is a slight pity that I was never proficient at either of them.

Lying, pretending and acting is as intrinsic to me as wielding a slim, elegant masamune blade in the left hand and a bloodthirstily sharp muramasa in the right (particularly since my right arm is stronger and less clumsy..)
Wielding two such conflicted legends together will probably cause the practitioner to hurt himself.
As would I if I try to pull off crafting out anything other than what naturally is.

In any case for a person who can hardly ignore his guilt, this can't possibly be my path.

But when your opponents seem to make use of these pretty well, you can't help but wonder if all you're doing is to disadvantage yourself in the face of what already looks like seemingly impossible odds.

And all in all, its not a certainty that people appreciate someone who is unable to deceive, lie or scam anyway. More would see him a fool.

Tsk..

Heiress of the evening sings in silence

The city has changed all these years as I walk the nights, somehow without me realising it until now.
Everywhere is brighter.
Its getting harder to disappear.
To be one with the shadows.

How could I not have noticed? Perhaps because it was always me who melded with the semi-darkness.
Who believed the most formidable entity in the dark was myself.
When that is not the case, it brings everything to a whole new level.

In a way, its much more scary now when everybody turns to hiding in plain view instead.

I doubt I can step into a place and declare 'something's wrong' as I did so many years ago.
Admittedly the clarity afforded me has diminished.
But the important thing is everything could be wrong now.
And usually not everything is.
Perhaps nothing is.

But it gets more terrifying.

And you mustn't mean so much to this wanderer. You simply mustn't.

Just pretend. How am I s'posed to do that?

"Your compassion is a weakness your enemies will not share."

"That's why its so important. It separates me from them."

I have a knack for remembering such stuff. They fascinate me. They make me constantly wonder if all manifestations of fights and conflicts arise basically from a difference in morals.

And if I actually possess a good set of them.

What in the world is that anyway? And what does it matter?

Hmm..