Prologue

I was alone, starved of love. The world had abandoned me. The only thing left for me was darkness. My parents killed in front of my eyes. Just because I was born different?

Humans would never understand the feeling of having your cheeks covered in their own tears, as they simply cannot produce the amount of sadness my kind can feel.

Though the years have passed since then, the feeling had only been strengthened. The scars have never truly healed. They have only faded as time has gone on, just enough for my tears to cease, and my eyes to finally have some peace. As of now, my cheeks remain dry. Though my life has taken a turn, I have learned to be accepted by those who share the same curse of sadness that I have been burdened with.

Just because we are inverse. No, because we are Terbalik's! We are born with both a blessing and a curse. We are misunderstood by those who do not share our kind's burden.

Though my pain never left, it has been dulled by the ones that accepted me and loved me. They were and are my family! I love them as much as I could understand such concepts, but even then... My pain still never left.

The curse of sadness was always with me. A part of my soul, a scar which will never fade. Though I know the scars can never heal, and the pain is permanent, there is hope for those that suffer as I have. They are young and bright. They have emotions that can guide them on a path to a better tomorrow.

But I do not have such a luxury. I've lived many lives of those who are Terbalik. With so many scars and pain I had built up, I could never have hope. I am filled with the poison given by this realm of existence. The sadness within me has poisoned me with despair. The hope they have is a hope that can be taken. A hope that can only grow in a healthy heart and soul. But to one as poisoned as me..? I can no longer hope. I have given up on my own happiness. For what can a Terbalik who can never feel happiness ever hope to find?

Well, that's what I thought until I met her…

A young girl with eyes like the sky's above, and hair white as a rabbit's fur. At first, I was suspicious, as any Terbalik should be. Especially towards a human, but her innocence was unlike anyone I have ever seen. A light unlike anyone I have ever come across in any of my lifetimes. Though she is a human now, I can feel the spirit of light in her body. She will surely become a spiritualist, and no longer be that of a human.

I was intrigued by her, for I had no other emotions to feel. Though the poison would have kept me from feeling happiness, she was too pure.

Her smile.. It's unlike anything I had ever seen before. She had a smile so bright that I could not help but feel at peace, even if it was only a little. She made me feel. She gave me.. Something I thought I would never feel, not in all my lifetimes. I am still unsure what that emotion was called, but that was nearly a decade ago, and even now, I am still unsure..

The only thing I've felt is despair for as long as I can remember. Even when I found others like me, I was filled with nothing. But with her... she made me feel something. Something I had never felt before..

Is this happiness? Is this... what happiness feels like? Though I am unsure, I had hope…

For the first time in many, many lifetimes... I had hoped that maybe.. Just maybe…

Sigh.

Looking up into the deep red sky, I sighed. A gentle breeze flowing through the sky. In the distance, I can hear waves gently brushing against the leaves. Looking down, my eyes gaze upon the beach. An ocean of a crimson red. The leaves fall upon it, only to sink to the bottom. Turning my head, my eyes fall upon the leaves themselves. They are purple, yet as they fall, they lose their colour.

Gazing into the depths of the crimson sea, memories of my master's tales from three centuries past resurfaced. The agony they endured during that ancient war seemed to cast a shadow darker than my own existence. Trying to fathom a world steeped in even deeper despair felt beyond my capacity.

The malevolent deity, who bridged the realms into the "Other Side" where we Terbalik found ourselves, birthed nefarious entities known as evil spirits. These malevolent beings possessed the ominous ability to taint the soul and body of any living being, be it human or beast. Succumbing to the corruption of an evil spirit meant descending into madness.

Humans gave rise to spiritualists, while beasts birthed spirit beasts, all to combat these malevolent forces. As for us Terbalik, our origins lay in the union of an evil spirit beast and a malevolent spiritualist.

Hatred had long saturated the world. Even before the war erupted, humans were already engaged in a ceaseless cycle of killing one another for land, power, and wealth. Despite the war's end and my kind's precarious reintegration into human society, a lingering malevolence clung to the world. It's the kind of darkness that leaves me unsettled, sensing an ominous undercurrent persisting despite the passage of time.

I just.. hope that girl is fine.