In the silver glass, silence reigns. It is a solitude so absolute that not even the life beyond can penetrate its reflective sheen. He sits and gazes at his dominion, one filled with ghosts of the world he refuses to concede to. He doesn't care that he cannot feel the wind upon his skin nor hear a single utterance of a bird. He is a king encapsulated in a bubble of denial and conceit.

But it doesn't bother him. That's what he tells himself.

It is better than the alternative.

People hold words inside them, words that cut and critique and belittle. But the silence has no words. There is no life. Only the monarch--Illuso of the Mirror. He turns, only to see the reflection of his soul, The Man in the Mirror. It doesn't matter how often he asks, there is never change nor absolution. Change comes from within, doesn't it? Then why is everything stagnant?

The puddle he steps in refuses to ripple. He finds indications, echoes from the other side. The black car is no longer parked on the side of the road, instead, it glides away from the curb without a soul as pilot. He watches the ghost live its life, a life that Illuso cannot live himself. He'd made his own decisions once, decisions that led to the empty introspection projected around him.

But it doesn't matter. Let them judge. It cannot touch him here.

All lie at his feet, groveling where they belong, the imagined prostrations of his ghostly subjects. All pour out their libations to their king, but not a single sound uttered. No praise, no words of kindness. There is no dissension if you hold all the strings, and those that bind Illuso's deceptive fingers are many. But not even he has realized those cords had been cut long ago, leaving him disconnected from everything. The control is yet another illusion, the King mastered by his own element.

He is a King without question. A king inside his own mind.