He had always been drawn to the edge, to the moments when instinct overpowered reason. It was in those moments that delight became violent, crimson streaks of blood flowing unpredictably, and pleasure decayed into unthinking cruelty. He remembered the dreams he had as a child—of growing wings and soaring above the earth—but when he finally rose into the sky, trapped in an iron cage of his own making, he found himself drawn back to an invisible anchor he could not escape. His joy longed for restraint, yet his ambitions led him in circles, always returning to the boundaries he had built for himself. He feared the violent end, and yet he craved the intoxication of frenzy.
Small pleasures became ecstasy, ecstasy became madness, madness became the shards of broken glass, spilling and scattering like water. To grasp at them was to leave behind snow that fell silently in his absence. He learned that every act of indulgence came with its shadow: grief, anger, hatred. Each cycle repeated, washing him clean in the torrent of feeling, reminding him that even a life confined within boundaries occasionally needed a moment of vividness. And so he continued, knowing that the path was circular, instinct inevitable, pleasure and violence intertwined, and that the only way to live fully was to embrace the fragile, fleeting brilliance of the present—even if it burned him.