Second Female Leads' Playbook

"Am I a joke to you? A past time? One of your many pranks to entertain you?" I spitted out the words like venom. 

He had given me hints. Quite a few. I just refused to think about that or to believe that. I was shaking in anger. All those times I struggled and then died tragically were all a joke to him. I really experienced all of them. The deaths, the tortures. The hope and then failed again. 

"I was killed in your first life," he suddenly said. "After you death. When Rachelle and her gang came to take the final piece of the jewel shard from my temple. I was killed. And then of course I revived myself. I am the high priest of darkness, I had several dark spells under my sleeves."

"You didn't even know me in your first life! Why did you revive me?"

"The spell drained my power. I needed to rest for a long period of time before I can act again," he said coldly. It's like a knife piercing through my heart. 

"So you needed entertainment. I am the entertainment." I laughed. "And I thought you were really helping me. I am a clown all along!" I cried.

He looked at me without any emotions. That's when I realized he was really a heartless monster. The man without any emotion was the real him. He was wearing a mask all along. I hugged the cloak closer to me. I felt cold. 

"I won't deny that. That's my initial intention. But I genuinely enjoyed your company. The first time in five hundred years. After the death of my parents." 

I refused to look at him. 

"If you have read the registry, you will have realized that the god of darkness doesn't have many followers. The Ardens being the only family serving the god. So the god blessed us Ardens. We can have long lives. Difficult to be injured. Immortality. If you can handle the long imprisonment in the temple." His lips finally quirked up in a sardonic smile. "You can end your life only when you have groomed the next high priest. My Father passed me his position as soon as I reached twenty five. He could no longer handle the imprisonment, the immortality. He had lived in this temple for six hundred long years. Now it's my turn." 

"I thought you'd come find me once you're reborn in your third life, but you ran away to the continent across the sea. I was angry." He sighed. "You knew I was a selfish tyrant."

"In all those lives, you never once came and try to save me!"

"You said you're not Rachelle. You told me you didn't need knights in shining armors to save you."

"So you're saying the faults are mine?"

"I told you to call me when you needed me, did you?" he asked without any emotions on his face. "You know I could not leave the temple without reasons. I was weakened after the spell to revive both you and me, I fell into deep sleep every now and then to recover. I need you to call me to wake me up." 

I opened my mouth and then closed again. He had told me to call him when I needed him. But I did not trust him nor his promise. He had said it again and again that I had woken him up from his sleep and I thought it was a joke. 

 "Then what about now? You can now sneak out of your temple! I don't see you hibernating!"

"The spell weakened me, after three lifetimes, I recovered."

"You said you'd be hibernating, then you didn't need entertainment! Why did you involve me? Do you understand the pain of being tormented and then opening your eyes to find I have to repeat everything again? Only to be tormented again? I just want to die in peace!" 

"I do. I have been living in this prison since I was born. I want this immortality to end too." He left his throne and walked towards me. He then patted me on my head. "And even if I am hibernating, I can still sense my surrounding through Blake. That's the use of a familiar." 

"Can I finally rest in peace after this life? I just want to lead a normal life and then die when it was my time. I don't want to be involved in Rachelle's mess anymore." 

"I don't know."

"It's your spell!" 

"Have you ever wondered why I revived myself if I also want to end my near immortal life?"

That's true. He said he wanted to end everything, but why did he revive himself when his wish was fulfilled?

"Because you haven't groomed the next high priest?" I hiccuped as I wiped tears away from my eyes. 

He chuckled and said, "Partly, but not the major reason. Everyone in this world is a chess piece in the game the gods are playing." 

Another cryptic sentence. 

"Aren't you tired, squatting here?" His usual smile was back on his face. 

I did not know who the real him was. This one who faced everything with a lazy smile on his face or the one as emotionless and bleak as ice. The one who was lazy, capricious, but also gentle or the one who was cruel and heartless. 

I was confused and lost. I would not say I forgave him now. I knew deep down I was still a bit angry at him. But if I was not given this chance to reborn, I would have stayed as the naive, childish, ill tempered heiress till the very end. I would not have the chance to meet Isobel or... him. I would not have the chance to try something different, to know there's a world outside of my betrothal with Henri. 

"Even though you're not tired squatting here, I am," announced the selfish high priest. 

"Wahhh... where are you carrying me," I cried in shock as I was carried by him deeper into the temple. "Let me down!"

Soon all of my internal struggles left my mind when I was focused on trying to let him release me.