UGB Chapter 438: The Visitor
Chapter 438: The Visitor
Electra’s POV
I barely slept.
It wasn’t even proper sleep, not the kind where your body rests and your mind shuts off for a while. It felt more like I had been stuck in between being awake and unconscious, trapped in a place where my thoughts wouldn’t stop moving no matter how tired I was. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her, not Seraphina, who somehow helped me feel a little peaceful when I tried to think of her, not Jella, who I knew I still had to decide what to do with, and not even the man who was supposed to be my father.
I saw myself, or at least, the version of me that claimed to be my human side. Her face kept appearing like it had been burned into my mind, her eyes looking at me like she knew something I didn’t, like she understood something about me that I was refusing to accept. It was frustrating in a way that made it impossible for me to fully relax, no matter how hard I tried to force myself to sleep.
Her words wouldn’t leave me either. They replayed over and over again, like some kind of cruel reminder that I was not as in control as I liked to believe. Every time I tried to push them away, they came back stronger, louder, and more annoying. I hated it. I hated the feeling of not being able to control my own thoughts, of not being able to shut something out when I wanted to.
That was never how I functioned. I didn’t struggle like this before, I didn’t feel things like this before, and yet, here I was, lying in bed and staring at the ceiling like a person who didn’t know what to do with themselves.
By the time the sun came up, I had already given up on trying to sleep.
I stayed in bed for a while longer, just staring at the ceiling without really seeing it, letting the silence in the room settle around me. My body felt heavy, like it hadn’t rested at all, and my mind felt even worse. There were too many thoughts, too many things happening all at once, and none of it made sense, and then, just when I thought I might be able to focus on something else that didn’t involve anyone specifically, another face pushed its way into my mind.
Seraphina.
I hadn’t seen her since she stormed out of my room the day before, and the memory of it played back clearly whether I wanted it to or not. The look on her face, the way she pulled away from me, the way she spoke to me like I had done something wrong. I didn’t understand it, and that bothered me more than I wanted to admit. I didn’t like not understanding people, especially not someone like her. She had a way of getting into my head without even trying, and I didn’t like that either.
Maybe she had answers to why I was being like this, or maybe she didn’t, but either way, I needed to see her.
With a quiet groan, I pushed myself up from the bed, my muscles protesting slightly as I moved. I swung my legs over the side and sat there for a moment, trying to gather enough energy to stand. My body felt slower than usual, heavier, like it was dragging behind me instead of moving with me. Eventually, I forced myself up, deciding that staying in bed wasn’t going to fix anything.
I headed for the bathroom without thinking much about it, my mind still distracted, still caught up in everything that had happened. It wasn’t until I stepped inside and took my first step forward that everything snapped back into focus, and I felt pain.
It shot up through my foot, forcing a reaction out of me before I could even process what was happening. I stopped immediately, my body tensing as I looked down.
Glass.
The floor was covered in it.
For a moment, I just stared, my mind blank, before the memory hit me all at once. Last night, the mirror, the anger, the frustration, and the need to make it stop. I had smashed it. I had shattered it completely until there was nothing left to reflect anything clearly.
Now the pieces were everywhere.
I shifted my weight slightly, and more glass pressed into my skin, cutting deeper into my foot. Blood began to pool slowly under me, but I didn’t move back. I didn’t even try to avoid it. Instead, I took another step forward, letting the shards dig into me again, the pain there but distant in a way that didn’t bother me as much as it should have.
My gaze moved to the sink, where more pieces of the broken mirror still rested. Some of them caught the light in strange ways, reflecting fragments of the room, fragments of me, but there was no clear image anymore. That had been the point. I didn’t want to see her again. I didn’t want to see that version of me staring back at me like she had something to say.
So I destroyed it, and now I stood in the aftermath, bleeding and tired and still just as confused as I had been before.
I walked further into the bathroom, ignoring the glass under my feet, ignoring the way it continued to cut into me. Each step left behind a trail of blood, but I didn’t care enough to stop. Pain was simple, and pain made sense. It didn’t create unnecessary questions, and it didn’t confuse me.
I stepped into the shower and turned the water on without hesitation. The cold stream hit my skin almost immediately, making me close my eyes as it washed over me. The water mixed with the blood, running down my body in thin streams, carrying some of it away while more continued to surface from the cuts.
I leaned slightly against the wall, letting the water pour over me as I tried to clear my head. I focused on the sensation, on the way the water felt against my skin, on anything that wasn’t the mess in my thoughts, but it didn’t work.
The heaviness in my chest was still there. That same uncomfortable feeling that refused to go away no matter what I did. It sat there, deep and steady, like something was pressing down on me from the inside. I let out a slow breath, my brows furrowing slightly as I tried to understand it.
Was it because of him? My father, the man I didn’t know and still don’t remember. Was his death the reason I felt like this? It didn’t make sense. I had no connection to him, no memories, no reason to care, and yet, something in me did. Something in me refused to let it go, refused to stop replaying everything I had seen and heard.
Or maybe it wasn’t just that.
Maybe it was just her tormenting me for being stronger, my human side, or maybe seeing her had changed something in me. Maybe it had unlocked something that had been buried, something I wasn’t supposed to feel. The thought made my jaw tighten in irritation.
"I don’t want this," I muttered under my breath, my voice barely audible over the sound of the water. "I don’t need this."
But wanting didn’t matter. The feelings were still there, and I had no answers.
The only person who might have answers was my grandfather. The one who had taken my memories, the one who seemed to know more about me than I knew about myself, but reaching him wasn’t something I could just decide to do. He had summoned me before, not the other way around.
How was I supposed to find him? How was I supposed to get answers when I didn’t even know where to start?
The frustration built slowly, mixing with everything else until it became something heavier, something harder to ignore. I clenched my fists slightly, my nails digging into my palms as I tried to push it all down, and then...
The air changed.
It was subtle, but I felt it instantly.
Everything around me shifted, like the space itself had become heavier, and my eyes snapped open, my entire body going alert in a way that was immediate and automatic. The water was still running, still hitting my skin, but I barely noticed it anymore.
I wasn’t alone, I could feel it, and the presence wasn’t human. That much was clear the moment I focused on it. It wasn’t overwhelming like my grandfather’s energy had been, but it wasn’t weak either. It sat somewhere in between, unfamiliar but still strong enough to demand my attention.
I straightened slowly, my gaze moving around the bathroom as I tried to locate it. "Who’s there?" I asked, my voice calm but sharp, ready for anything.
There was no answer, but the presence didn’t disappear. If anything, it felt closer.
My first thought was that maybe it was really my grandfather, regardless of the somewhat weaker aura, but I dismissed it again almost immediately. This didn’t feel like him. The energy was different, less suffocating, and less absolute.
"Whoever you are," I said again, my tone harder now, "show yourself."
For a moment, there was nothing, just the sound of the water and the tension in the air, and then I heard a voice. "Hello, Electra."
My body tensed instantly, my eyes narrowing slightly as I tried to place it. It echoed in a strange way, like it wasn’t coming from one place but from everywhere at once.
"It’s good to see you again."