Darkness wasn’t just in the room.
It was the room. It bled from the cracked ceiling, settled in the floor like ash, crawled up the walls like grief with claws.

The windows were shattered, glass scattered like the aftermath of a war. The air was heavy, choked with the smell of iron and something worse… something that whispered of death. Blood was everywhere. Dried. Fresh. Smudged.

And in the corner, slumped like the ruins of a god who’d dared to love,
Sat Abhimaan Raichand.

A man whose name had once commanded obedience from nations. A man whose empire had outlived threats, revolutions, bullets. The kind of man who made the world bow.

And now?

He was nothing. No....worse than nothing. He was her murderer.

The veins in his wrist pulsed sluggishly, crimson flowing in slow, deliberate patterns down his arm, dripping into a growing puddle. He didn’t flinch.

The broken whiskey bottle lay beside him, still glistening with blood. Shards were embedded in his palm, in his forearm, but he welcomed the pain like it was holy.

“Ayesha…”
Her name slipped out of his mouth like prayer and curse.

His voice was hollow. Empty. So far from humans it sounded like it belonged to a dying animal.

Her face haunted him. Not smiling. Not in love. But broken. Shattered by him. He remembered how she stood there shaking, eyes red, lips trembling as he sliced her apart with words so cruel, even the devil would’ve winced.

And still, she said nothing. She just left.

Not a look back. Not a scream. Not a single “why?”

Because she knew he didn’t deserve the dignity of her pain.

His head slammed against the wall. Once. Twice. Again.

Blood smeared the wall behind him.

“You stupid bastard!” he howled, hitting himself across the face hard enough to split his lip. “She begged you. And you—what did you do? You—monster. You fucking monster—”

“I killed her,” he muttered to the darkness, his breath ragged. “I didn’t put a bullet in her—but I killed her all the same.”

He laughed..... harsh, cold, maniacal. It echoed against the empty walls like a scream swallowed by the void.

His hands trembled violently. He grabbed another shard and dragged it across his other arm. Deeper. Slower. Until blood bubbled to the surface like guilt too long buried.

“I hate myself,” he whispered. Then louder. “I hate myself!”
He punched the floor. Once. Twice. Until the bone cracked.
Then again.

Blood smeared on the broken glass. He didn’t stop.

“I had her!” he bellowed, voice unhinged. “I had heaven in my hands and I burned it down!”

He clawed at his own chest like he could rip her name out of his heart. But it wouldn't leave. It was etched into him, like a scar that refused to fade.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered again. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry, Ayesha…”

Over and over like a litany. Like an invocation. Like madness.

He staggered to his feet, unsteady, possessed. He dipped two fingers into the pool of blood and dragged them across the wall.

AYESHA*.*

He wrote it again.

AYESHA*.*

And again.

AYESHA.

Until her name covered the walls like graffiti in a madman’s tomb.

He pressed his forehead against the wall, breath shuddering, tears mixing with sweat and blood.

“Come back,” he whispered, voice breaking like glass. “Come back. I’ll ruin myself for you. I’ll rip out my soul. I’ll drown the world if it means one second with you.”

But she was already gone. And what was left of her… He had destroyed it with his own hands.

He began laughing again..... wild, feral, empty.

A king reduced to a mad dog. A man who once ruled the world now ruled only by his torment.

AYESHA.
AYESHA.
AYESHA.

The walls bled her name.
And he whispered it until his voice gave out.

Until only silence remained.
And the echo of everything he lost.