Into the Apocalypse: Saving My Favorite Villain-Chapter 90: Matthew’s Story I

Rosalia — POV

If this person is Matthew...

If he is truly the same Matthew I know from the novel, then we absolutely cannot allow him to be like this.

We can’t.

No—we mustn’t.

No matter what happens, no matter the cost, we have to save him.

First... first, we have to save him from that tree.

My thoughts spiraled wildly as I stared at the twisted scene before me.

My chest felt tight, as if invisible hands were closing around my heart, squeezing harder with every second that passed.

I knew this character.

I knew his fate.

And that knowledge burned inside me like a curse.

If Cassel is my favorite character—the one I fell in love with, the one who made my heart race and ache at the same time—then Matthew is the character most like me.

He is the only secondary character whose death ever made me cry.

In the novel, Matthew didn’t truly die.

At least... not completely.

Instead, he was trapped inside that tree, sealed within living wood like a grotesque cocoon.

For months, he remained there—conscious, aware, unable to scream or escape.

It was a fate worse than death, a slow erosion of the mind, where time stretched endlessly and pain became a constant companion.

Eventually, his second supernatural ability awakened.

It allowed him to escape.

But by then, it was already too late.

His body had been irreversibly altered.

Twisted.

Deformed.

No longer human.

His flesh warped into something grotesque, something that resembled a monster more than a man—more horrifying than the zombies roaming the ruined world outside.

Society could not accept him.

It never would.

Because of that—and because of countless other unspoken wounds—Matthew chose isolation.

He lived alone, hiding from the world like a ghost that had failed to pass on.

More than once, he attempted to end his own life.

But death refused to take him.

His ability made him almost immortal.

No matter how severe the injury, his body was able to regenerate.

Limbs regrew.

Organs reformed.

Even if his heart were torn from his chest, even if his brain were destroyed, he would revive within minutes, gasping back to life like a cruel joke played by fate itself.

He couldn’t live.

But he couldn’t die either.

Much later, after enduring endless suffering, the broken Matthew reunited with his family.

And because of his psychological trauma—because of his desperate, aching yearning for familial love—he once again returned to that household.

Returned... not as a son, but as a servant.

At first, his family feared him.

Like everyone else, they recoiled at his appearance.

They whispered behind his back, calling him a monster, terrified that he might seek revenge for over twenty years of abuse, neglect, and hatred.

They were afraid he would kill them.

But revenge never came.

Instead, Matthew knelt.

He fell to his knees before his parents, clutching at their legs, sobbing like a child who had finally found his way home.

His tears soaked the floor as he begged—begged for acceptance, for forgiveness, for love that should have been his from the beginning.

No one feels guilt when trampling someone stronger than themselves.

And his family took full advantage of that truth.

They treated Matthew like a slave.

In a world where morality had collapsed and law no longer existed, their cruelty only escalated.

When they needed him, they commanded him to kill. To loot.

To commit acts so vile and shameful that even hardened survivors would avert their eyes.

They sent him to the front lines, using his immortal body as a shield.

They dirtied his hands, then blamed him for the blood.

And when they no longer needed his power...

They chained him.

Iron shackles bit into his regenerating flesh, clanking like a cruel reminder of his place.

They tied him up like an animal.

Like a dog, they could discard it whenever it suited them.

This was the life Matthew chose.

Many readers cursed him.

They called him spineless.

Pathetic.

Accused him of having no dignity whatsoever.

But how could they possibly understand?

How could anyone understand the heart of someone who had no purpose in life?

Someone who couldn’t even die.

Someone whose only obsession—whose only reason to keep breathing—was the desperate hope of being loved by his family.

Just once.

Just enough to see their smiles directed at him, not filled with disgust or fear.

Even if that love had to be bought at the cost of humiliation.

Even if it meant becoming something despicable.

As for me...

I cried every single time Matthew appeared in a Chapter.

Every mention of his name felt like a knife twisting deeper into my chest.

Because I understood.

I knew how painful it was.

I knew the pain of growing up without a loving family.

I knew the hollow ache of wishing for living parents who could hold you, protect you, choose you.

I knew the suffocating feeling of being rejected by the very people who were supposed to love you unconditionally.

Because I knew.

Because I felt it.

Matthew’s story haunted me long after I closed the book.

I couldn’t move on from it, no matter how hard I tried.

His suffering lingered in my mind like an open wound that refused to heal.

But the most devastating part of his story came at the end.

His family’s greed ultimately led them to attack Cassel’s group.

Of course, the one who fought was Matthew.

Even though his father and younger brother possessed supernatural abilities of their own, they lacked courage. They always did.

They hid behind Matthew, letting him face every danger alone.

When the battle ended and the threat was gone, they stepped forward arrogantly, claiming all the rewards and spoils as if they had earned them.

Because of Matthew’s abnormal strength, even Cassel struggled.

For the first time while reading the novel...

I didn’t cheer for Cassel.

I didn’t know who I wanted to win.

The battle was long.

Brutal.

Every strike carried the weight of desperation and despair.

Both sides were severely injured, blood staining the ruined ground beneath them.

In the end, Cassel won.

He ripped out Matthew’s heart.

He destroyed his brain.

And he shattered the crystal hidden within— the source of Matthew’s second ability, the power that had cursed him with regeneration and immortality.

As Matthew lay dying—truly dying for the first time—he didn’t curse his fate.

He didn’t hate Cassel.

He tried to crawl.

Dragging his ruined body across the ground, he reached out toward his family.

Toward the only support he had ever known, twisted and false as it was.

He wasn’t sad that he died for their sake.

He only wanted one thing.

He wanted his mother to hold him.

He wanted to see tears in his father’s and brother’s eyes.

He wanted proof that he had mattered.

But all he received was disgust.

Curses.

Blows.

Feet kicking him away like filth.

As the light faded from his eyes, he heard their voices—cold, merciless words that shattered the last remnants of his heart.

They said they would never have exchanged their beloved eldest son for this strange child.

If they had known the world would end... If they had known that money and status would become meaningless before overwhelming power...

They would never have sacrificed their own flesh and blood.

They would never have swapped their precious son with the child of a wealthy family at the hospital.

Yes.

In the end, the betrayal was revealed.

The truth behind why Matthew was hated—no matter what he did. The reason for the rejection. The cruelty. The beatings. The merciless indifference.

The reason is that the family never showed him even a fragment of love.

Because he was never their son.