Misunderstood Villain: Heroines Mourn My Death

***

{Outside The Projection}

"...It all came full circle, huh?"

A voice in the crowd said it first—softly—but it echoed, rippling through the hall.

They remembered it like it was just a breath ago. Like they had blinked and time hadn't passed at all.

That first moment.

That first reveal. When the truth began.

Back when they learned Malik—the one in chains, the supposed Butcher, the Once Stranger, the Cursed King... Sultan—was once just a beggar boy, a Misunderstood "Villain." A fatherless child, scraping by with nothing but bones, bruises, and a wooden stick that looked like it had been chewed up by the streets themselves. Beaten, cracked, barely holding together. But he held onto it, even if it barely carried his weight.

They remembered.

That stick was this very cane before them…

By God, it was that same cane…

The realization made hearts drop.

Just what had he gone through in the time they hadn't seen him for this cane to have gotten like... that?

Because even though he had grown, even though he had become a man who could split mountains, it seemed like he never really let go of that cane. That pain. That past.

Oh, the tragedy. Oh, the pain…

Again, they had hoped—no, prayed—that maybe, just maybe, the sorrow might stop. That now that he was powerful, now that he was respected, feared even, the pain would pause. Let the man breathe.

But this?

This wasn't pain that could be healed.

This was a boy learning how to die before he even learned how to live.

What a life that was, eh?

A life of tortured luxury…

A father's quiet hate…

A mother's regret.

A damned mistake that haunted him more than it ever did her.

There was no need to know the father's name. They all knew him as a role in this tragedy. An iron-hearted bastard who never once looked at the boy without shame.

Yes, there was a reason for that shame—scarring reasons.

A reminder of his failure at choosing a wife, or perhaps, and most likely, Malik's face sparked feelings of inadequacy in him, greatly damaging his pride, perhaps even making him feel like he could not satisfy his wife, like he was less of a man.

These were all very valid reasons for brewing a deep-seated hatred, but... what did the innocent have to do with this? Malik had nothing to do with this. He was a damned bystander in his own tragedy.

He was simply dealt a bad hand.

The mother… oh, that mother, Mariam... she was the one to blame.

"She could've rejected his demand."

The scarred woman spat, angry.

"She should've fought for him."

"...No."

The silver-bearded man reluctantly disagreed.

"You can't expect that from her. She was shackled, traumatized. That house… that world… that title… she was drowning in it, but she knew nothing else besides it. Between the devil and the deep, remember?"

He was reminding them of Malik's first-ever real choice, his sacrifice.

This was similar to that, but was it really comparable, as he claimed?

No. Of course it wasn't.

"Ironic as it is... It's still no excuse."

The scarred woman seemed to disagree.

"Ain't saying it is. Just… It's real, isn't it? She didn't do it because she was insane or irrational. You saw her face. That wasn't fake."

The crowd murmured in agreement.

Because as much as they hated her, despised her even, and wanted her dead, which she probably already was, they couldn't quite damn her to Hell.

They didn't exactly know what happened; it was all vague. She called it a mistake, but how? What was her mistake exactly? Had she been raped? Drugged? Perhaps seduced by a charm spell?

They couldn't say... so they couldn't exactly judge as such.

Her pain was too raw. It wasn't rehearsed.

That wasn't a monster. That was a woman who broke.

Mariam had indeed sacrificed her son to end her nightmare.

She did it to keep her noble status and her husband, for that was all she knew.

And Malik, the boy born out of a "mistake," was forced to carry the nightmare forward.

He was forced to be branded as a bastard for the rest of his life.

He was forced to watch his one real father die.

"Sir Mahdi…"

A young Magi whispered the name, clutching his robe.

"He loved him."

"He loved him too much... and paid the price."

"He taught him about how dangerous his kindness could be, but... heh, he never learned."

A small chuckle rose from the back of the crowd. Dry. Bitter.

Even way back then, Malik learned that he was too kind for his own good.

Even way back then, Malik was taught to fix that habit...

"It's... incredible how things play out."

They saw it as clear as day.

The first two memories showed Malik's compassionate instincts.

Both involved trust being betrayed or manipulated, though one was playful and the other was tragic, teaching Malik the emotional consequences of failure.

These were lessons that shouldn't have been taught to any child, especially not one of that age, but he was taught them anyway, a nightmare that took everything away from him.

And what a nightmare it was...

The crowd all stared, most of them quiet now. Still shaken from what they'd seen.

It was a twisted mirror... They first saw Mahdi fake a collapse just to see if Malik cared, to see if the boy really would've given his soul just to protect someone, but the last one it...

"He really c-collapsed..."

"And Malik had to kill him…"

Gasps. A few sobs.

"O God…"

Many clutched their hands in prayer.

"No child should ever be forced to hold a blade to the one who raised them. No child."

"But it was mercy, wasn't it?"

"Maybe. But mercy doesn't soften the blow. Especially not when you're the one dealing it."

That image stuck in their minds—small Malik, shaking, crying, alone in some random alleyway in Zawaya.

But then… the older Malik appeared.

Everyone realized it the moment it happened.

That wasn't Malik going back in time, no, that was a metaphor.

That moment didn't just break the boy; it forged the man.

Indeed, that was the day he grew up.

And they all fell quiet again, this time in reverence.

Compassion... That was what cursed him. That was what saved him.

It was truly and utterly unfortunate.

He learned too early.

Learned to hurt when he should've been learning to play.

Learned betrayal when he should've learned trust.

Learned how to bury family before he knew how to build one.

They all stood there, humbled, humbled in a way that burned in the bones.

If they could go back in time, they'd beat the shit out of themselves before they could call him any of those titles again or brand him in any way.

Sure, nothing they said could hurt him, but still...

They could not bear this.

A mistake.

Essentially, that was what his own mother had called him.

What words could they use to even come close to that?

There was nothing, absolutely nothing.

And yet, he still cared.

Still forgave.

Still.

...How?

The word echoed like an ache through the hall.

And nothing came after it, for there was no answer.

At the front, Layla almost knelt again.

She couldn't help it.

Her body was collapsing under the weight of it.

The story. The memories. The truth.

The echo of that little boy's sobs still ringing in her ears.

The same women in her camp were forced to hold her up as she cried a river.

She didn't know what to do herself, so she lost herself in the pain, letting it take over.

Watching that, Noor remained unfazed, on the literal opposite end of the spectrum.

Joining Roya, she too had grown annoyed.

The rest might have forgotten this mystery, but she didn't.

That random was right; it all had come full circle; now she knew that no one had wiped Malik's memories, and there was no big conspiracy.

A mystery had brewed early on, one that was quickly forgotten, but finally, it was solved.

Mahdi wasn't some incredible hidden master that was Hell-bent on ending her life, pushing Malik to complete his revenge on his behalf as he fell into an early grave.

No, he was just some old man who worked in her manor some time ago and was sent down into Al-Ayan's branch family, Al-Zayni, as a promotion, where he'd live out the rest of his life.

His sword knowledge likely came from the glimpses he took of their soldiers while they trained, or perhaps, and most likely, he was taught by one directly.

It wasn't exactly rare for a soldier to go against orders like that and reveal confidential techniques, skills, or even abilities.

Though... it was rare for it to go unnoticed.

Mahdi was an old man, but he was a smart one.

So yes, Malik's memories of him weren't not shown because they were wiped by an outside party; they weren't shown because he hid them deep in his subconscious, in his attempts to move on, in his attempts to forget what traumatized him completely.

But, unfortunately for him, he could not hide from it forever.

This Well forced him to remember.

It forced him to revisit what he kept shut under lock and key.

It forced him to confront what made him a man.

What. A. Tragedy.

"Houffff..."

Safira's lip quivered, but she didn't cry.

She promised to fight, and she would not cry before then.

Still, she felt it. Every second of it. That projection had cracked something open in all of them, and now they were bleeding together.

Huda…

She just stood.

Watching. Listening.

She wasn't smiling, her happiness gone.

But she wasn't frowning either.

She looked… proud.

Proud of her brother. Proud that the world had seen him. Truly seen him.

And honestly, at this point, she didn't know what to think of his revenge.

He killed Cyrus for Sinbad, all the power to him, she didn't care about that anymore, but why her other uncle?

Why the thousands and thousands of men under him? His circle of Jinn?

Why kill them all?

Like Layla, she was starting to believe...

Every tragedy involving her older brother was misunderstood in some way.

Malik was never once the villain in this story. Even in her tragedy...

There was a truth hidden from her.

She was sure of it now.

He was never the monster, the butcher, or the Stranger.

He was the sacrifice.

The Cursed child.

The forsaken.

And yet…

Still… still... still...

He chose kindness.

Even when it broke him.

Even when it burned him.

Even when it killed him.

He still chose to love.

That's what made him dangerous.

That's what made him Malik.

And that's why—now, today, in this very hall—he was no longer alone.