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Nezha pours another glass of sorghum wine, and tips it back into his throat.
Shit.
It tastes like shit. He takes another shot.
It still tastes like shit
A frown creeps onto his face.
He can’t let his alcohol tolerance get stronger, though his weekly “get drunk till he can barely remember his name” routine probably contributes thoroughly.
Yin Nezha isn’t getting drunk fast enough.
Another shot. This time, the glass abandoned. Straight from the bottle. Vile rises up, but he closes his eyes and breathes.
The first few weeks, he threw up so bad that he wasted a whole day nursing his hangover and guilt ate him alive in the insides till all was left was his bare skin, scarred and shamed.
He can judge the pacing a bit better, now.
Yin Nezha’s selfish soul allows himself one day per week where he can let alcohol claim his thoughts; not everyday, no. He found that the constant headache throbbing his brain as he attempted to put the broken pieces of the country together was definitely far from helpful, and not worth the brief escape of nonchalance.
No, the stinging guilt is much stronger.
So the day has come where he allows himself one night where he can pretend he doesn't have the responsibility of a whole country, its fate and life and future and its millions of people on his shoulders.
One night. Surely, that much is warranted.
But tonight's a bit different.
Another shot, down the throat. It no longer tastes like anything, only burning harshly.
It's his birthday tomorrow.
In less than an hour, Nezha turns twenty two.
The sun sunk down a long ago; he's been sitting here facing the window, watching it slowly capture all remaining light of the world and disappear.
The last time he had his birthday when there was no war raging across the country, he was eighteen. Eighteen, where war was a textbook feature and he was merely the participant, where he thought he conquered it all just because he memorized all the words written and built and created by someone else.
At eighteen, he knew everything. After the war settles down, his father would embark on the journey of settling the Republic of Nikan. Nezha would serve him and his brother as one of their most trusted generals, guide Nikan toward its glorious future, and make a better life for everyone in this land.
Their odds were so fucking good. He had every bit of confidence. He had every bit of certainty.
His world was so small. Now, his odds seem less than a speckle of dust in this vast land.
How can a person know everything at eighteen, but nothing at twenty two?
Nezha doesn't feel a day older than the day he killed Rin.
Strange how his world stopped and ended and burned a while ago and the rest of the world keeps spinning on.
Would you still want me, Rin? Even though I'm still stuck in the past, pathetic and unmoving? Even though I have no shiny new safe country to offer you?
Even if I'm nothing new?
His ghosts stay silent, as mercy or torture, he doesn't know.
Maybe they’re screaming, but Nezha has created a wall made out of wine tonight. He, for once, is invincible. Not against any harm or maim, but from his past.
The invincible wall however, slowly crumbles as his time slips and falls.
The sound breaks through his haze of alcohol, along with his ghosts. The clock strikes twelve, signaling midnight sharp. Nezha turns twenty two.