Chapter 1: The End of Life
"Breaking news—A school in country B has just been bombed, resulting in multiple casualties. One reporter from Yunxing, currently unaccounted for, was said to be covering a charity event there, accompanied by popular actor Lucas Reed..."
The school lay in ruins, everything scattered and broken. Screams echoed from every direction, panic meshed with the thick, metallic smell of blood choking the air.
Underneath the collapsed debris, Willow Curling kept slapping on a concrete slab beside her, voice hoarse from yelling. "Help! Somebody help us! Is anyone out there?!"
"Willow… save your strength,” came Nathan Blackwood’s raspy voice from above her.
"I can’t!" she choked out between sobs. Her palms were torn raw from the grit and cement, but she didn’t care. “I won’t stop! I’m gonna get them to find you! Please, Nathan, don’t give up on me—just hang in there, please!”
"...Okay." Nathan wanted to reach for her face, but one of his arms had been crushed by a falling beam. It now dangled at an unnatural angle just above her head. His head had been hit by a slab of concrete, and several rusted nails had impaled his back right where it mattered most.
Anyone else would’ve been dead by now.
But he held on, just by sheer willpower.
Willow, somehow, had come out of it with only some scrapes on her hands.
"Nathan... when we get out of here, let's remarry, alright? I don’t want to be apart from you ever again."
When the ceiling collapsed, Lucas was right beside her. And in that split second, she thought he’d be the one to help. But to her shock, he shoved her aside and ran, shielding Sophia Baxter instead—her supposed best friend.
Funny how the man she had no ties to anymore, her ex-husband, had been the one to throw himself over her, shielding her with his own body.
People had told her before that Lucas and Sophia had been secretly together. That he kept their relationship under wraps, using Willow and the "Mrs. Blackwood" title to boost his own image. And she hadn’t listened.Willow Curling and Lucas Reed had grown up together—childhood besties turned something more, until everything fell apart. If Lucas hadn’t hit that rough patch, and if Nathan Blackwood hadn’t swooped in and pressured her to marry him, she and Lucas would’ve already tied the knot by now.
To Willow, Nathan was the one who ruined her perfect love story. Add Sophia Baxter’s constant meddling and scheming into the mix, and Willow just brushed off everyone’s advice and warnings like they were nonsense. She froze out almost everyone who truly cared about her.
Now looking back, she felt like a complete idiot. When Lucas chose to save Sophia over her during a crisis, didn't that just scream who he really cared about? She seriously mistook a fake gem for the real deal and believed in the wrong people. And in doing so, she’d messed up her life—and Nathan’s too.
It wasn’t until she was staring death in the face that she finally saw the truth: the one who had been truly good to her, all along, was Nathan.
Nathan’s body was wrecked with pain, his mind fuzzy. But when Willow started speaking to him, something inside his chest softened. Eyes barely open, throat torn up like coarse sandpaper grinding with every word, he forced out, “Willow… you… you really mean it?”
“I do!” Willow nodded frantically, tears running down her dirt-smeared cheeks. “Nathan Blackwood, I missed your birthday three times already. Yours is next week—I’m not missing another one. I’ll be there for each and every birthday from now on. I want to experience the world with you. I want to grow old with you.”
That picture she painted—of a life full of love and shared dreams—lit up something deep inside Nathan. He wanted badly to reply, to say something sweet back. But before he could even form the words, a mouthful of thick, warm blood gushed out.
It splattered across Willow’s face. Her voice shook as she screamed his name. “Nathan! Nathan!”
But all she got in return was his breath slowing down, heartbeat growing fainter and fainter.
Until… it finally stopped.
In that instant, it felt like someone had swung a sledgehammer straight at Willow’s chest. Her scream broke as she broke down completely, sobbing like her world had shattered.
Then, as if fate wasn’t done yet, a second explosion tore through the ruins. And in her final moments, Willow made a silent vow—if there was a next life, she wouldn't let Nathan down ever again.