***
{Inside The Projection}
They yanked the kid up, away from his father.
“Yusuf!”
Faqir threw himself at the thug, pulling his son back while snarling at Bashir.
“Hit me instead, you bastard! Or are you too scared to face a real man?”
Bashir laughed.
“Real man?”
He kicked Faqir in the ribs.
Another crack.
“You’re a cockroach. And cockroaches get stomped.”
The crowd quickly scattered as the bastards laid into Faqir and Yusuf.
Boots thudded on bone. Dust choked the air.
Only Malik remained.
He just stood there, lost in thought.
Malik had a choice to make.
A touch, pain-in-the-ass choice.
Killing these rebels would be easy. Stupidly, insultingly easy.
Three quick slashes, maybe four if he was feeling a little extra. A snap of the wrist. A flick of the blade. And they’d be done. He could even make it look clean, silent, slip away before anyone figured out what happened.
His cloak would have done its job. Kept him hidden. Kept him out of sight.
Except… a few days later?
Someone would come knocking.
That ‘someone’ wouldn’t be knocking to sell him dates.
Malik was the only lone traveler who had shown up recently.
The only unfamiliar face in a place where unfamiliar faces stood out like a noble in a beggar’s den.
People knew he could fight.
He had already proven it when he’d gone up against those poor Paladins.
And people liked to talk.
They’d also pick up on his connection with Faqir.
The city square wasn’t exactly a private place.
Many gazes had landed on him.
That would lead to questions.
And questions? That led to problems.
Because this wasn’t some utopia. This was a war zone.
There were no lone wolves here. No wandering vigilantes swooping in to do the right thing before riding off into the desert. If you fought, you fought for a reason. If you killed, you killed with a purpose. And if you saved someone?
…Well, you get the gist.
You’d be involved.
You’d be responsible for their lives.
Malik wasn’t trying to be involved.
Not in this war.
He had come here to relax, not to fight; he couldn’t risk it.
There were eyes on both sides. Spies that fed information to whoever paid best.
Someone had definitely already put his description on a list somewhere, scribbled a note about the quiet, dangerous stranger who wasn’t quite a mercenary but wasn’t quite a bystander either.
Saving Faqir now?
That would force his hand.
It would drag him into this mess, lock him into something he didn’t want to be locked into.
So he had to choose.
Was it worth it?
Was Faqir’s life worth throwing himself into this war?
He couldn’t say.
The smart choice?
The easy choice?
Walk away. Pretend he never saw this.
Let the ‘rebels’ have their fun; let fate take its course.
He didn’t owe them a damn thing.
Or… he could blink.
One stab. One reset. And none of this would have ever happened.
He could snatch Faqir and Yusuf away from this mess before it even started, rewrite the course, set the board anew.
It was an option.
It was always an option.
But.
“Live with your choices.”
The words felt like iron in his chest.
Because that was the promise, wasn’t it?
No more pretending the hard decisions didn’t matter.
So, back to square one.
He had to choose.
Malik’s fingers twitched at his side.
The hilt of his blade was warm under his palm.
It would take nothing—nothing—to end this.
One step forward. Just one.
He shifted his stance.
“AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
A sharp scream.
Yusuf’s.
Faqir’s gurgling laughter followed, thick with blood.
“Y-you think… this breaks us?”
A wet cough.
“We were broken… long before you…”
Malik exhaled.
The weight on his palm lifted.
His fingers uncurled.
Not his fight.
Not his war.
He turned around.
They weren’t his to save.
Malik had made his choice.
Now, he had to live with it.
***
{Outside The Projection}
Zafar smiled.
At first, it was small.
A twitch of the lips. A subtle curl.
The kind that someone might miss if they weren’t paying attention.
Then, as the projection paused, his smile widened much further.
He showed the satisfaction of a man who had been waiting years for something.
Malik, the Villain, Devil’s Spawn, Iblis’s Sultan, had finally shown his true colors.
Zafar exhaled through his nose in something close to a laugh.
Not mockery. Not derision. No, this was amusement.
“So… Even he isn’t perfect.”
The legend of Malik.
Of a man who stood tall against all odds.
Of a man who bled for others, who sacrificed for others, cried for others.
A perfect story.
Now, it finally had its first REAL blemish.
Here was the hero.
Turning his back.
Choosing himself over others.
How… deliciously human.
For all the righteousness people piled onto his shoulders, he had still done something ugly.
Something selfish.
And that delighted Zafar in ways he couldn’t quite put into words.
His chances of sitting on the Golden Throne weren’t so abysmal after all.
Behind him, the crowd continued to stir.
Their brows furrowed, they murmured to one another, their voices low.
A few just shook their heads as if trying to rid themselves of a bad taste.
“It… makes sense, doesn’t it?”
A man said hesitantly, scratching his beard.
“He couldn’t just throw himself into, well, that.”
“A man’s gotta think about his own life, too.”
“Would you have stepped in? Fighting a war that isn’t yours?”
The scarred woman clicked her tongue.
“It still sits wrong. He could’ve done something. Anything.”
“And possibly get himself involved?”
Someone snorted.
“That’s what they’d want. A fight. A reason. He’s not an idiot.”
“No.”
She admitted.
“But it don’t make it right.”
The silver-bearded man scoffed.
“You’re acting like you wouldn’t have done the same. Like if someone put a knife to your throat, you’d still try and play hero.”
“Not about that.”
Another countered, rubbing the back of his neck.
“It’s the fact that it’s him. The Sultan. He, of all people, is not supposed to walk away.”
A younger girl, barely past her teens, sighed.
“Because he’s supposed to be perfect?”
“Not perfect.”
The man muttered.
“Just… more.”
Someone else clicked their tongue.
“That’s the problem, isn’t it? People think he’s something bigger than life. A story, not a man. But he bleeds like the rest of us. And now? Now you see him as he really is.”
A silence fell over the group, just long enough for the weight of all that happened to settle.
Listening to them, Zafar’s grin hadn’t faded.
If anything, it had grown.
Oh, how he waited for this moment.
Finally, a crack in Malik’s once-impenetrable armor.
And now? Everyone saw it too.
He wasn’t just right—he was damn right.
All that soul-searching over the past few days? Out the window.
He was back to square one, just like before the projection showed up.
And in his half-dead mind, only one thought remained:
‘The crown is mine!’