I eventually found myself back inside the room with the others, my mind still crawling behind me and trying to catch up to reality as the Marquess effectively took a large portion of my life and just... flipped it upside down.
My 'identity' was almost stripped away from me entirely, my 'purpose' in tatters beside it, while my resolve barely managed to keep them woven together...
Admittedly, that was a drastic overreaction, but it still felt like what I had once clung so desperately to to maintain the life that I had created for myself - my status quo - was suddenly wrenched away from me and left me feeling bare and unsure of everything, thrust out into the middle of a heatwave with no oasis I sight.
