Chapter 363

The lake was a place that no one talked about. Some people said it had always been there, hidden away in the thick woods, shrouded in mist that seemed to cling to the trees even on the hottest days. It wasn't on any maps.

No one would have found it unless they were looking for something. Or someone. And that was the trick. The lake didn't reveal itself to just anybody.

Maya had been searching for it for a long time. She had heard stories. Some were vague, whispered, like things better left unsaid. People spoke of the lake in the same breath as regret, as if the mere mention of it could drag a person into something deeper, something they wouldn't be able to escape.

She didn't care about the stories. Her life was nothing but pain, and she had reached a point where the only way out seemed to be through it.

Her legs burned from walking. The thorns caught on her clothes, tearing them open in jagged lines, but she didn't stop. There was something pulling her. She couldn't explain it. But she had heard enough to know what she had to do.

Maya had been suffering for years. She'd lost a mother to a disease that seemed to suck the life out of someone before it even had time to destroy them. She'd watched the woman, once full of life, crumble into something unrecognizable.

Maya had to bury her, and then her pain doubled. No one could understand the ache that burned in her chest every night. People tried. They tried to help, but nothing worked. Pain, both physical and emotional, sat heavy in her like a weight she couldn't get rid of.

She stumbled over a root, falling to her hands and knees. She caught her breath, fighting the sharp pang in her ribs. It didn't matter. None of it mattered. She had come this far. She had to see this through.

By the time the sun began to fall behind the trees, the light barely touching the ground, she reached the edge of the lake. The water was still, silent, reflecting nothing but its own surface. The air smelled of damp moss and decaying leaves, and a strange sense of wrongness clung to the space, heavy like it was alive and waiting.

Maya knelt at the edge of the water. The surface didn't ripple as she touched it, and for a moment, she just stared at the smooth mirror in front of her. Her reflection stared back, hollow-eyed and thin, the years of grief carved into her skin.

"I'm here," she whispered to no one in particular, her voice barely audible. "Please."

She didn't expect anything. Not really. But she had to try. The stories told of people who had dipped their hands into the lake and been relieved of their suffering. Some claimed it took away all pain, erased the ache in the heart, the memories that never stopped playing over and over again. But there was a price. Everyone knew that. A price you couldn't escape once you agreed.

Maya slid her fingers into the water. The coolness spread over her skin like ice, sending a shock through her body. It was a sharp contrast to the heat of her muscles, aching from exhaustion, her mind clouded by the stress that had built up over the years. But then something changed. A warmth, gentle at first, spread out from where her hand rested on the surface. The pain in her chest that had gnawed at her for so long began to fade, slipping away like smoke.

She felt it, a sort of release, as though the lake were sucking all of her torment into its depths, taking it away and leaving her… lighter. Her breath came easier, and her heart felt less heavy.

But that warmth soon turned to something else. The sensation grew deeper, and she felt herself sinking into it, her skin prickling with something darker. The water tugged at her as if it had a will of its own.

The lightness turned to a weightlessness, and a strange dizziness overtook her mind. Her head spun, and she fought to pull away, but the lake wouldn't let her. She wanted to scream, but there was no sound.

She pulled her hand from the water, gasping. For a moment, the world around her seemed to shift, like she wasn't sure which direction was up. But the pain—the pain she had lived with for so long—it was gone.

She glanced down at her hand. It looked unchanged, just a hand like any other. No glowing marks or signs of magic, nothing. But something inside her, deep in her core, had shifted.

A voice, though not a sound she could hear, seemed to wrap around her. You know the price, it said. Nothing comes without sacrifice.

Maya's fingers trembled. She couldn't be sure what that meant. She didn't care. The pain—the years of suffering, loss, the agony of grief—it was gone. She could breathe again. She stood up, swaying a little on her feet, and took a deep breath, filling her lungs with the damp, cool air. She felt… lighter. More alive.

But something felt wrong. Something wasn't right. She had taken the lake's gift, and yet, there was an emptiness growing inside her that had nothing to do with the pain she had once known. A gnawing emptiness that settled into the pit of her stomach, into her chest.

She backed away from the edge of the lake. The sun had almost completely set now, and the moon hung heavy and bright in the sky above her, casting a cold, unforgiving light over the water.

As Maya turned to leave, something caught her eye. Her reflection was there, just beneath the surface, watching her. But it was… different. The eyes in the reflection were hollow. Lifeless. And her own eyes, she realized, were just as dead.

Her breath caught in her throat as the realization hit her. She wasn't just free from pain. She had lost something else. Time. The price had been her future.

Her heart thudded in her chest as she stumbled back. The lake had taken her years, her time. She hadn't just escaped the agony of the past; it had drained the life from her, quietly, slowly. The relief she had felt, it wasn't freedom. It was the beginning of something much worse.

The voice in her mind returned, colder this time. It is never truly gone. The lake always takes more.

Maya felt her knees buckle beneath her. The ground rushed up to meet her, and she crashed to the earth. Her vision blurred. The emptiness inside her was growing, and she could feel it pulling away the life she had left.

Her skin began to burn, not from the cold, but from something deeper, something inside that was withering. Her heart beat slower, each thud a little weaker than the last.

She clawed at the dirt beneath her, gasping for air that seemed to grow thinner by the second. Her body was shutting down, piece by piece, consumed by the price of what she had done. The lake had not only taken her pain—it had taken her years. And now, it was taking her life.

Her breath rattled in her chest, her hands growing numb as she reached for the water again, her last desperate hope. But she didn't get the chance to touch it again. The darkness spread, and the cold took over.

She was alone. And the lake had taken everything from her. Every single moment. Every memory. Every chance to make things right.

The last thing she saw before the world went black was the moon, reflecting off the surface of the water, and her own empty, hollow eyes staring back at her.