Chapter 164: I Am Leo

[Leo’s POV]

Do you ever fight with yourself?

Not the normal kind. The "should I do this or that" kind. I mean real fighting. The kind where you look in the mirror and the person staring back doesn’t feel like you.

I’ve been fighting myself my whole life.

The old me, from Earth, was a coward.

A runner.

A guy who couldn’t face his parents, his failures, or anything except a screen and a bottle. He ran from expectations, ran from responsibilities, ran from every person who ever believed in him. He told himself he was being realistic, that he was just protecting himself from disappointment.

But the truth?

He was scared of trying and failing, of being seen, of mattering to anyone.

The other one — the original Leo, was a failure too.

A noble born with a B-rank core in a family of monsters. The disappointment of the Celestial house. The one who couldn’t live up to the name. So he drowned himself in wine and bitterness. He pushed everyone away before they could push him.

He became the scumbag who tried to kiss a princess at her own birthday party and got slapped for it in front of the whole court.

He died alone in his trial, forgotten by everyone who ever knew him.

...And now here I am.

Stuck between both of them. Wearing their face, carrying their name, living their failures, and trying to make something of it.

Fate is a bitch.

Everyone talks about fate like it’s some grand design. Like the universe has a plan and you just have to shut up and follow it. But that’s not true. Fate doesn’t care about you. It doesn’t care about anyone.

It’s just a word people use when they don’t want to admit they have no control.

I have no control either.

But at least I don’t pretend.

The figure standing in front of me has my face. My hair. My eyes. But it’s not me. It’s everything I’m afraid of becoming.

The coward who runs.

The failure who gives up.

The monster who burns everyone he loves.

I’ve been running from this face my whole life. From Earth to this world. From one life to another.

But I’m done running.

The figure tilted its head. Those ocean-blue eyes, were hollow, empty, like someone had scooped out everything inside and left nothing but darkness. The purple mist curled around his feet, and the stone beneath him seemed darker, colder, as if the ground itself rejected his presence.

"So," I said, forcing a rough, tired laugh as I tried to shake off the headache pounding in my skull. "...You finally decided to show your ugly face."

"Yo," the other Leo said, his voice a perfect, haunting copy of my own. He looked me up and down, his eyes stopping on my white hair. "Hey, you really enjoy living your life while wearing someone else’s face, don’t you? First the noble brat’s body. Now this washed-up sorcerer’s white hair. When are you going to get your own skin?"

"Why do you care? You’re not even real."

"So?" The figure grinned. It was my grin, but wrong. Twisted like a mask that didn’t fit the face beneath it. "Who cares if I’m real or not? You made me. I’m your fear. I’m every doubt you’ve ever had. I’m the voice that tells you you’re not good enough. The one that whispers you’ll fail. That you’ll always fail."

He stepped closer, and the air around him grew heavier. The whispers in my head suddenly grew loud, a jumble of voices — my voice, all speaking at once, all saying the same thing.

You’re not good enough.

You never were.

Everyone leaves eventually.

You know that better than anyone.

My heart pounded hard in my chest. Without waiting, I reached deep inside and pulled on the Tear of the Drowned King. A cold, familiar chill washed over my mind, quickly shutting down the rising fear and steadying my thoughts for a short moment.

The whispers didn’t disappear, but they became distant and manageable.

"...So," I said, my voice steadier now. "Tell me, am I right? Isn’t that what you’re here to do? List all my failures? Remind me of every time I screwed up?"

The figure stepped closer still, its hollow eyes never leaving mine. "You’ve been running from me your whole life. From Earth to this world. From one failure to the next. You think changing bodies changes who you are?"

"Shut up, bastard! I’ve changed..."

"Have you?" The figure laughed. It was cold and empty, echoing off the stone walls like a dying animal’s last breath.

"You still can’t control the flames. You still flinch every time someone gets close to you. You still push people away before they can leave you first. You’re the same scared kid who ran from his parents’ house and never looked back."

My jaw tightened. My hands curled into fists.

"You want to talk about my parents?" The other Leo’s grin widened.

"Let’s talk about them. Your mother’s texts — hundreds of them. ’Are you okay?’ ’We miss you.’ ’Please just call.’ And what did you do? Nothing. You read them in bed at 2 AM, felt sorry for yourself, and then went back to your game like they didn’t exist."

Stop it.

"Your father. He never yelled at you. Never hit you. He just sat there at the dinner table, looking at your empty chair, wondering where he went wrong. And you? You couldn’t even face him. You moved to a different city. Changed your number. Pretended they didn’t exist."

I said stop.

"Aw, did I hit a nerve?" The other Leo tilted his head, those hollow eyes gleaming with pleasure. "I am right, aren’t I? You are still the same guy. Nothing changed. You are still scared of everything. Scared of failing. Scared of being seen. Scared of being left... alone."

The word hung in the air like a blade.

...Alone.

I gripped Tempest’s hilt tightly, my knuckles turning white. Without giving him any moment to think, I moved.

Volt Step.

Black lightning exploded from my boots, tearing through the grey ash as I lunged forward. Tempest cleared its scabbard in a blinding, lethal blur, aiming straight for his neck.

Clang!

The impact rang out like a thunderclap. My eyes stretched wide.

My blade had stopped dead in the air. Blocking my strike was a perfect, dark replica of Tempest — same curve, same edge, same deadly gleam. The other Leo held it effortlessly, his grin widening as he met my gaze.

"What...?" I stared at the figure’s hand, at the impossible weapon he held.

"What, you bastard? You think I couldn’t use anything?" The replica Leo mocked, his voice echoing inside my ears. "What’s that face for? I can use everything. After all... I am you. Every technique you’ve learned. Every skill you’ve bled for. Every trick you’ve hidden up your sleeve. I know them all. I am them."

Before the words could even fully register, a deep, terrifying instinct screamed inside my chest.

"...!"

A dark light flared on his blade. In a split second, a wave of black soul flames burst from his weapon, hints of purple flickering inside, roaring hungrily as they rushed toward my face.

I couldn’t believe it.

He can actually use the soul flames.

I barely dodged. The flames grazed my shoulder, and I felt the heat — not burning, but hungry. They wanted to consume. They wanted to kill. They wanted me to let them.

My own fire answered.

The moment those black flames appeared, the fire deep inside my own body went completely crazy. The hungry, tempting whispers of the flame broke through the cold wall of the Drowned King’s power, singing a beautiful, maddening song that begged to be set free.

Let us out.

Let us burn.

Let us consume everything.

I forced them down, but barely.

"What’s the matter? You can’t use the flames?" The other Leo taunted, stepping effortlessly through the fire as if it was nothing more than morning mist. The flames parted around him, bowing to his presence.

"Running again, are we? You are so scared of the flames. So scared of losing control. So scared of what you might become if you let them out."

He raised his hand, and the fire danced lazily across his fingers, reflecting the absolute void in his blank eyes. My Flash Instinct was screaming warnings, telling me every direction around me was a death zone.

"Don’t you hear them?" he whispered. "The flames are calling for you. They’ve been calling for months. Begging and pleading. Why not pick up the call? Why not use them? Are you really that afraid of a little fire?"

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. Because he was right.

I was afraid.

I pulled the freezing energy of the Tear of the Drowned King deeper into my veins, forcing my body to move through the heavy pressure. The cold spread through my chest, my arms, my fingers. It didn’t silence the flames — nothing could, but it gave me enough room to think.

We both looked at each other. The air between us grew still.

Then we moved.

First Form: Fractured Eclipse.

The air fractured. Space folded aggressively as we both disappeared into the purple mist, leaving a dozen flickering afterimages behind. The walls of the sanctum blurred past me, but I couldn’t focus on them. I could only focus on him.

Clang! Clang! Crash!

It was a brutal exchange. Every single strike was perfectly mirrored. He used the exact same sword techniques, parrying my black lightning with his own copied movements. Every feint, every shift in weight, every subtle change in grip — he anticipated it all.

"Fucking bastard... you even know my art!" I snarled, as our blades locked in a screeching hiss of metal.

It wasn’t a perfect imitation, the illusion lacked real, human intent, but the sheer amount of raw power the figure was forcing into each strike made every blow strong enough to break stone. My arms ached. My lungs burned.

...And the voices in my head were increasing, a deafening roar drowning out everything else.

You can’t win.

He knows everything you know.

He’s stronger.

He’s better.

He’s you.

"Second Form — Heaven’s Divide!" I shouted.

Space folded. My blade cut through the distance, aimed at the figure’s chest.

The figure did the same.

Clang!

Our swords met in the middle. Sparks flew. The impact sent a shockwave through the chamber. The voices in my head were increasing, a deafening roar drowning out everything else.

And then — my left eye twitched.

Not from pain or exhaustion, but from a feeling. A presence, like someone had just whispered my name from inside my own skull.

Leo...

I froze.

It was my mother’s voice from Earth.

Leo, are you there? It’s been years. We just want to know if you’re alive.

The other Leo grinned.

We miss you.

Please. Just call once.

Just let us know you’re okay.

The distraction hit me instantly. My blade line slipped by a fraction of an inch. The other Leo took advantage of the opening, his replica sword sweeping upward with a violent surge of force. His blade slipped past my guard — not cutting me, but slamming into the flat of my sword with brutal precision.

The impact vibrated through my bones. Tempest flew from my hand, spinning through the air before embedding itself into a distant pillar with a sickeningCrack!

A boot slammed into my chest. I hit the ground hard, ash exploding around me in a grey cloud. I gasped for air, my lungs burning, my vision swimming, and then I felt the cold tip of his replica blade settle right against my throat.

"That wasn’t me," he said quietly, looking down at me with those hollow, empty eyes. There was no triumph in his voice. No joy. Just... certainty. "That was you. Your guilt. Your regret. The statue just pulled the strings. You froze because deep down, you still think you failed them. You still think you’re a bad son."

I didn’t answer.

"The same way you failed the people in this world. The same way you’re going to fail them again." He pressed the blade slightly, just enough for me to feel its edge.

"Nothing changes, Leo. Look at you. On the ground. Like you were on Earth. In the Celestial courtyard when your father told you that you were a disappointment. In Frosthollow when Kael put you on your knees. "

My head hung low. My white hair shadowed my face. The weight of my failures pressed down on me like a mountain.

"You think training harder will fix you? You think getting a new sword, a new technique, a new affinity will make you a different person?" He laughed, that same cold, empty sound. "It won’t. Because the problem isn’t your core. It isn’t your rank. It isn’t your sword."

He knelt down, bringing his face level with mine.

"The problem is you. The problem has always been you. The coward who runs. The failure who gives up. The monster who burns everyone he loves."

He extended his left hand toward me, palm open.

"Give up. Join me. Let’s stop pretending to be the hero. Let’s let the darkness take everything. Why protect a world that only ever called you a scumbag? Why fight for people who would turn on you the moment you stopped being useful?"

His voice softened, almost gentle.

"Take my hand. Let’s destroy it all. Let’s burn it all down. No more expectations. No more failures. No more guilt. Just... nothing. Wouldn’t that be easier?"

The silence of the temple hung heavy. The purple mist swirled around us, waiting. The trap was fully set, ready to break me completely.

Slowly, my hand crawled through the grey ash. My fingers reached up and wrapped firmly around his open palm.

"...You’re right," I murmured, my voice low.

The other Leo’s grin began to widen. A look of triumph flared in his hollow eyes as the purple mist began to crawl up my arms, cold and hungry.

"I am a failure...," I said, slowly lifting my head.

But as my face came into the light, his grin froze.

There was no despair in my eyes. No defeat or surrender. Instead, a wide, sharp, and completely mocking grin was carved across my lips.

"I am the delinquent who drank too much," I said, my grip on his hand tightening until the bones in his fake wrist began to crack under my physical strength. "I am the scumbag who got slapped at the princess’s birthday party. I am the guy who ran away from his failures on Earth."

The other Leo’s face began to violently twist and stutter, the illusion fracturing as my mana surged wildly.

"I am also the anomaly who survived a trial that was supposed to kill me. The guy who walked out of that nightmare when everyone expected me to die." I pulled myself up, forcing him down with me.

"...I am the one who learned how to use swords from a broken drunk and made them my own. I am the one who faced that monster in the jungle and lived. I am the one who’s still standing."

The other Leo’s expression flickered. The confidence wavered.

"For months, I’ve been telling myself that the old Leo died in that trial. I thought I had to kill that part of myself to be strong. I thought I had to bury him, forget him, pretend he never existed."

I shook my head slowly. "But... that’s not how healing works."

A massive, radiant torrent of black soul flames suddenly erupted from my own chest, but they didn’t burn me. They didn’t whisper of madness. The fire grew perfectly calm, wrapping around my arms like a silk cloak, seamlessly merging with my black lightning and space affinity.

"The boy who failed was still me. The boy who made a mess of everything was still me. Every single bit of it... is Leo von Celestial."

I looked directly into his fracturing face, my ocean-blue eyes burning with absolute clarity.

"Even you... even this fear... it’s all just a part of me."

The war in my head simply stopped.

The whispers faded. The voices went silent. The self-hatred that the soul flame had been feeding on for months was wiped out in an instant — not by force, but by acceptance. By the simple, terrifying act of looking at myself and saying:

I forgive you.

The black flames on the other Leo’s body violently rebelled. They tore away from his control, gathering onto my own form, recognizing their true master. The purple mist screamed as it dissolved.

"So, thanks for the reminder," I grinned. "But... I’m done running."

With my affinities perfectly aligned for the first time in my life, a massive, concentrated surge of mana and black fire rippled outward through my arm, directly into the coordinate where his soul structure sat.

The space around his form completely shattered, folding inward into a single point under the weight of the accepted power.

The distortion simply collapsed, erasing his existence from reality so fast that the universe didn’t even leave behind smoke.

Crack!

The endless sea of purple fog shuddered and began to dissolve. The illusion broke apart like glass hit by a stone — cracks spreading through the air, through the walls, through the weight that had been pressing down on my skull for what felt like hours.

The whispers stopped. The faces faded.

The cold stone of the real sanctum pressed against my boots. The heavy air of the inner chamber wrapped around me, not the suffocating mist of the illusion, but the real weight of the temple, ancient and waiting.

...And there, at the far end of the chamber, was the source of it all.

The Statue of Unforgotten Sorrow knelt in the center of the chamber, its black stone body cracked but still whole.

Its head was bowed, its empty helmet hiding whatever face, if any, lay beneath. From the dark slits of its visor, black tears dripped endlessly, pooling at its knees and spreading across the stone floor. Its hands were clasped around the hilt of a massive greatsword driven into the rock, as if it had been praying to a god that never answered.

Its chest still glowed. A purple heart, pulsing weakly beneath the cracked stone.

It wasn’t dead. I hadn’t killed it.

I had only survived it.

I stood there in the silence, breathing hard, my chest heaving and my hands shaking. Sweat dripped down my face, my arms felt like lead, and my core ached from pushing my limits.

But I was standing.

...And for the first time in a long time, I felt... light.

The weight on my shoulders — the one I’d been carrying since the moment I woke up in that cold Celestial bed, the constant dread of stolen skin, borrowed names, and the fear of being found out, had finally lifted.

I looked down at my hands. They were scarred, calloused, and covered in the ash of a thousand failures. But they were mine. All of it was mine.

The good and the bad.

The coward who ran from his parents on Earth. The scumbag who drank himself stupid. The disappointment who couldn’t live up to the Celestial name. The anomaly who survived the trial. The friend who couldn’t save Mia Rayner. The killer who burned Roran’s memory into his soul.

All of it. Every mistake. Every regret. Every moment of weakness.

It was all me.

...And I didn’t want to run from it anymore.

I took a long, slow breath and let it out. The air tasted different — cleaner. Like the fog had finally let go of my lungs.

I stretched my arm out. With a small twist of my space affinity, Tempest vanished from the distant pillar and reappeared perfectly in my hand. The blade hummed softly, as if it understood.

I looked at the statue, really looked at it, and felt something settle deep in my chest.

Not anger. Not fear.

Just absolute certainty.

"...You’ve been in my head long enough," I said, my voice low and steady. "You showed me my regrets, my grief, and my fear. You tried to break me. Tried to make me give up."

I gripped Tempest tighter. "But I’m still standing."

I looked toward the statue, toward the pulsing purple heart in its chest.

"Now... time to end this."