Kishor nodded, memories flooding back. “We shared a tiny mountain village. Back then, no one called Madam Pudge… Her name was Alice, and was lively, bright, maybe not a great beauty, but charming enough that the elders joked we were born for each other.”
His eyes softened, as though could still see the slim girl with twin braids chasing through rice fields, laughing, “Wait for me, Kishor!”
“We entered the city together to train. My gifts blossomed, hers lagged. Fame gathered around me like storm clouds, and I saw new shadows in eyes, self-doubt, fear that no longer matched the man I was becoming. I laughed it off, told her was enough, but words can’t fight a fear that deep…”
“I never imagined she’d take such a desperate path.” Kishor’s voice thickened. “She found an ancient Demonic Cultivation. Power surged overnight, but at a monstrous cost. That art warps the body-flesh swells, bones distort…”
“By the time I learned, the change had begun. She outpaced me in strength, yet own reflection terrified her. I was shocked and furious. I demanded to know why did it, but just cried and said didn’t want to be left behind. She wanted to stay by my side, always, and didn’t want others saying wasn’t good enough for me…”
“Watching exult and suffer in the same breath was like knives carving my heart. My meteoric rise had cornered into madness, yet I couldn’t accept the price paid, nor could I deny that my ambition helped drive there.”
Kishor drew a ragged breath, fingers twisting together as though they might hide his shame. “Back then, the truth crashed over me too hard, too sudden. I had no idea how to carry it, so… I ran… I convinced myself that time would dull the pain. That one day would see the sense behind my cowardice…”
“I never imagined a single step of retreat would stretch into all these lonely years. While I hid, fought. She took the name Madam Pudge, built the Whispers Tower, grew a network vast enough to shake Swordmaster City, all for one purpose, to trace the ghost I became…”
“And I? I behaved like the faint-hearted everyone now calls me, fleeing from city to city, terrified of ruined body, terrified of the questions in eyes, and most of all terrified of the guilt inside my own…”
“I knew was here long before I reached Swordmaster City. That’s why I camped beyond the walls, too scared to take a single step closer. Fear, it seems, always finds a way to win.” His voice rasped with a fatigue that bordered on self-loathing.
Jared listened in silence, a storm of conflicting emotions swirling just beneath his calm expression. Until this moment, had never guessed that behind Alice’s fierce leer and iron-fisted rule lay a story heartbreakingly tender.
Watching now, barking orders at servants yet sneaking timid looks their way, Jared sensed that beneath the layers of flesh beat a heart both fragile and unyielding.
“Kishor…” Jared began after a thoughtful pause, “I believe Alice, Madam Pudge, cares for you more than you dare imagine. Her methods may look extreme, but every move she’s made was born from loving you too much, not too little…”
