I start to turn to my bedroll, as I look at Dalyva and Shankhe. They both glance at me, curious as to what I’m doing. “I’m going to bed.” I say, grabbing my pajamas, and they both nod. “Ok, night.” Says Dalyva, and Shankhe grins. “Goodnight.” I shoo them out of my tent, get out of my normal clothes, before laying in my bed.
The days pass in a swirl in my mind, and I, annoyingly, can't sleep as I lay there. As I lay there, I tried to think. What's going to happen to us? I think of the Corruption Entity, and try to think why they would be taking us here, and trapping us here. Power? For servants? What is the reason he is keeping us? And why a month.. Is. Is the Entity even going to keep its promise? I didn’t think so, but I would continue to stay strong for the others.
Eventually, as I lay there, I decided to get up to do a run or something. I look around, seeing nothing that hurt me-although I grabbed my weapons anyways-and walked around the room. I jog a bit, just warming myself up as I do so. Jogging in squares, i do get bored, but I didn’t know what to think. After all, what are we going to do if I wasn't strong enough? I’m not that strong, no matter how much they think I am strong. That’s why I almost died against the skeleton.
I sigh, looking above me as I sip some water. Suddenly, I hear some rustling, and I look to the tents, where Shankhe is looking around. “Oh, Taegan.” He says, and I smile, glad it's not a monster. “I couldn’t sleep just yet.” He comes up to me. “Same.”
I gesture for him to join me on my laps, and we run together for a bit, enjoying each other's company silently, until we get tired. I head to my bedroll, yawning. “Night.” I say to him, and he grunts in acknowledgement, tired now.
As soon as my head hits the pillow, I fall asleep. My mind becomes a plane of grass, and I look around. Slowly, things appear, changing. Me, fighting the corrupt swordsman, almost dying. I glance around. Dalyva, and her shocked expression, Shankhe and his worry, and I feel a pang of guilt for taking on the monster when I wasn't strong enough alone.
Next, my world morphs into a world of sand, and i grimace. “Please.” I mutter, not wanting to see it. But, I can't control my dreams, after all.
I see the whole thing this time, us walking around at night, all grouping at our usual spot, and I smile as we all laugh melancholy. I walk up to Garu. I try to touch him, even though I know what will happen, my hand going through him. I missed him..
I walk with them as they all joke around, sneaking out of the town, and I follow. I could’ve stayed, but I needed to see them, needed to know they weren’t just figments of my imagination.
We laugh like children, innocent and happy as we walk to our doom, and I smile, though I reckon I could’ve cried at the same time.
After the monsters show up, my breath catches. How does that happen, though, since this is in my mind? I don't know. I look at them, and try, try to remember everything about them, to never forget their faces and who they were as they each are killed, and fall down, as our Desert Band slowly becomes less and less.
I want to close my eyes, not see how I desperately cried commands to save us, but with everything happening, they don't do anything, too shocked, and die as well. But, I couldn’t close my eyes, and my nightmare twists.
Black, inky darkness surrounds me, swallowing them all up, and I only look as they disappear into the depths of my mind to where they came from originally, not moving a muscle. Whispers around me start popping up, echoing in this darkness. ‘What’s a leader without his team, terrible leadership obviously.’ One whisper. ‘Don’t trust him, he killed his team.’ Two whispers. I hold my ears, trying to shut them up, trying to desperately change the room. ‘You almost killed your new team. With your leadership.’ Another says.
“Shut up.” I say. “Shut up, shut up!”
Judging faces appeared in the darkness, the people who had laughed at me when I got back, chuckled behind my back, judged me for being a survivor as I cried at their funeral, thinking that I was pathetic, as I was ‘only their teammate.’ I stare at their gravestones with sadness. I try, still try to heal about their deaths, but why cant it?
Why can't it, why can't it just be that simple, you recover for a year, and know that you did right, by surviving you let their memories live on. ‘But they didn’t get to explore the world.’ One voice mutters, hitting home. ‘And you do. Why, why do you get to explore, while they lay dead in a grave?’ I think about that often. Why did I survive? Who was that man I saw fleetingly in the sand? What was he doing, and why did he help?
My thoughts are interrupted as I’m taken to a forest, birds chirping and the rustling of leaves in the wind, suddenly it going up in purple flames, dead animals falling from the sky, leaves burning and the wood flaring to life, the Corruption Entity descending in a swirling of purple. “Well, well. You couldn’t save them.” It says condescendingly, and I look at it confused, yet only for a second.
Images of Shankhe and Dalyva’s dead bodies appear on the floor in front of me with all the dead animals, charred and black, barely recognisable, but I know it's them. “No, they’re alive. No.” I say, stepping back in horror. Images play of how they died, trying to complete my commands. “No, no, no..” The Entity chuckles. A whisper from behind me faintly tries to touch me. I can't hear it though until it becomes overwhelming. “Taegan, Taegan, wake up!”
I jolt awake, a gasp escaping as I look up. Shankhe. “Shankhe, what?” I say, as I regain my breath. “You were having a nightmare.” He said. “You.. you should be asleep.” I say, still reeling from the visions I was shown.
“You always help us when we need it, check up and make sure we’re okay.” Shankhe says softly as he hugs me tight, making me feel reassured that he’s alive. “Yet we never think to check up on you, never suspecting that you might need it. I’m your brother, and I want to act like it. Not your sibling. I want to be your equal, so we can share burdens with each other, and share our pain together.” I listen to him, my head aching from sitting up so suddenly, and gently look up slightly. “I-.” I pause, but feeling his reassuring arms around me, I continue. “Am i, am i a good leader to you, Shankhe?” He looks at me, shocked by the question. “Yes.” He says. “What kind of question is that?!” His voice hinted at surprise, but also a tiny bit of concern in the underlyings of the tone.
“A stupid one.” I mutter, but feel happy that his answer was yes. “It’s nothing.” I shake my head, and just snuggle with him, hugging him. “Night.” I whisper, and we fall asleep together. A soft smile traces my lips as I feel his heat warming me as we hug.
As we wake up in the morning, I can smell the delacy of breakfast wafting through the air. I groan, not willing to make my poor muscles move just yet. As I feel the arm slung around my shoulder, I have even less reason to get up. Waking up could disturb the absolute hero of a brother I have sleeping over on my right. A certain cook interrupted my peaceful morning with a loud clang of a pot and pan. I groan, although a chuckle may have made its way into that said groan. I immediately note how Shankhe has woken up, and I rolled out of his grip. “Wakey wakey, eggs and bakey.” I laughingly say, though knowing full well that the only thing we would get for breakfast, was grain congee, which was basically porridge, except much healthier as it was only grains and water that was boiled together. As we didn’t have much water, it ended up all gruel like, and made us be reminded even more of the horrible rations we were put on.
Yeah, we all could not wait for the next loot box to arrive. As I get up and stretch out my muscles, I look over at Shankhe. A mess of bed hair and sleepy yawns. “Not willing to wake?” I ask, snickering at his looks. He moans and groans as we finally exit my tent. Dalyva looks mildly surprised to see us together, but she shrugs it off as merely something between us two as she waves. “Like my wake up call?” She sarcastically comments, as a slow punch heads her way. Easily blocking it, she just giggles. “Wow, you look really out of it, Shankhe.” Teasingly she says. “Did you not sleep?”
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After the food cooks, we all sit down and start to silently eat our congee. Shankhe perks up a little afterwards. “So.” He asks as he finishes his congee. “What's the plan for today?”
“Well if you want, we could continue.” I say innocently, as he balked at the mere mention of those words. He scoffed. “No way! We need at least two days here to rest and recuperate.” He looks at me knowingly. “You especially need your wounds to recover before you do anything else, just in case they were deeper than previously thought. After all, if it was deeper, the wound might get worse, and we cant have that.” Dalyva stays quiet during our interaction, before saying. “I think we should spend a couple days training. Or even a day, if that’s more suitable.”
We all think for a moment. “Let’s stay one more night.” I convince. “What was that next line? Cross a bridge and do not fall, meet a hag and do not fear…..” I trail off.
“Travel a road that none shall see, and find a sheep that none can shear.” Finished Dalyva, and I nodded in appreciation. “Yeah.” Shankhe butted in then. “I think we should stop worrying about something like that, that doesn’t matter, and just look forwards. After all the lines were ‘travel a road that none shall see’. That means, we should just survive for now, and if we get to the next part, we deal with it then.” I grin at his straightforwardness, having seen the buildup of annoyance at our planning from a mile away. You would be blind to not see it.
I shake my head. “Sure.” I agree. “Let’s stay here tonight, and move tomorrow morning.” I set a schedule, and they both nod. “Dalyva, you can be the instructor for the training at first.” I say, hoping she’ll go easy on us.
Mere minutes go by before i learn why appointing Dalyva as our instructor and trainer was a terrible mistake.
“C’mon, you can do it, just 5 more push ups till the end of this rep.” She supports us, as we all do it individually. Aching and soreness envelope me, with the desperation to just lay down and sleep. I almost cried when she said we would be doing 10 push ups in a rep, with each person having to do 3 reps with a minute break. Who knew a scholar could be such a fan of these cruelties. I had only 15 more pushups to go, including my last rest, and as I pushed through another, the numbers declined in my head. Breathing heavily, and I reckon with my face as red as ever, I finish another push up. When I go down again, I struggle, my muscles all shaking from the exertion.
Why she liked tormenting us like this, I would never know. Finally as I push up on the last one, I collapse to the ground, unable to move even if it was to drink. She just rolls her eyes at my extremities, having not done it herself yet as well, and starts to count. “60, 59, 58, 57, 56…” She continues, as I sit up and gulp down some cool refreshing water. Shankhe understands my torment, merely because he’s trained before. Clearly this monster of a trainer hasn’t, and now we were paying for it, with our lives! I pant and take deep breaths in and out trying to get air to my body so that I could function.
The final rep. One was easy, because I had just rested, and the second was quite simple. Third however was when my muscles started to remember torment from before, but I swiftly pushed through. However, the fourth, I almost failed, as my body almost slacked off, and tried to deviate from what shape I was supposed to hold. Dalyva rapped my back with her knuckles. “Ah.” She says in a warning sort of tone. I groan.
“Why.” Push down and up. “Are you,” I found the strength to struggle through another. “Being this horrifically mean?” I manage to say, even when out of breath. “Because we need to get stronger.” Dalyva says. “And I'm not being horrifically mean, I'm just being reasonable.” A cough from the audience in disbelief. The seventh was absolutely terrible, and barely making it, I am fully holding on to the idea of revenge. Deep breath, and down. As I’m down, my muscles killing me, I look at the floor, how close it is, and how easy it would be to just fall onto it. However, the torturous maiden above me wouldn’t allow such things, and would probably make me repeat the rep. Using anger to fuel my upwards, I only have two left. Shankhe on the sidelines is cheering me on, and as I look at him, I decide to push through the tiredness and do the two last push ups.
One, and two. Finally, I’m done. I lay on the floor for a couple minutes, out of breath and gulping water into my tired, abused body.
With a pitying glance to Shankhe, I get up off the floor, and dust the dirt off me. He gets up, and gets into the position of a front support. The torture had ended for me, but for him, it was just starting. The first rep was pretty easy, and he powered through it, though with some struggle on seven and above. He took a minute break, and then, with cheering from me, managed to do 7, before he looked like he could do no more. Dalyva however wasn’t kind, and forced him to do the last three with perfect form. When he ‘sat’ down again, it was much more of a collapse as he laid on the floor. Using his specialisation he just manipulated the water to make it flow into his mouth, instead of using precious rest time to get up and drink.
I respected that, and nodded at his ingenious plan. When he got up again, he stopped the water flow, and started to do the push ups again. One…. Two… three.. four. A desperate struggle with five. “You can do it!” I say, supporting him as his face relays how much of a struggle he’s in. Six. He goes down for seven, but his muscles almost collapse on him. Luckily he managed not to fall, but it was a close matter as he pushed up. “Two more. Only two.” I say with eagerness. “Then it's Dalyva’s turn.” With that encouragement, and I reckon the eagerness of wanting to watch Dalyva struggle pushed him through to the last one.
”Dalyva, your turn.” We both say, turning to her with ecstatic eagerness. She pouts, but gets down. One, two. Then she started struggling, at three. She groaned and whatever, but we watched her like a hawk. “I’m a scholar.” she puffs out. “I’m not made for this sort of thing.” Shankhe having just done his reps replies. “Too bad, we need to get stronger, and I'm being reasonable. Isn’t that what you yourself said?” She is taking deep, tired breaths, and as she finishes another push up, her whole body is shaking, trembling like a leaf from the overuse of muscles.
Neither of us have any pity however, and we watch as she finishes the rep with a break of staying in one place as a front support between every push up. Sure, we did it too, but not for as long as her. It was okay though since even if we want our revenge, we know she used to be a scholar, so it's harder for her. She immediately closes her eyes, and I can only guess that she’s using her specialisation to help her recover. We don’t mind, she needs every advantage she can get at this point.
I finish counting down, and it's time for the second rep. The second was just like the first, except she managed to do three before struggling through the next seven. On the last push up, she barely gets through it, almost her form faltering, but she managed to finish. another break, and she again cycled her specialisation. The only problem I didn’t mention that she knew as well, was it made her more tired, even if her muscles weren’t as sore.
She did four, then another, and then two more. Between each of these groups she rested in a front support for I reckon 15 seconds, maybe longer. Three left. Right now, she was in a front support, resting as she panted and tried to gather enough energy to do the last three. One. Two… and… Three. She falls to the floor.
“Finally!!” she says in excitement. Before promptly taking a nap. I chuckle as I see how she just fell asleep, and, looking at Shankhe, we both carefully lift her into the air, and carry her to her tent, where I open it, and then we both put her into her bed.
I look at her sleeping, and then to Shankhe. “So, what should we do?” I ask, looking at how bored he was. Shrugging, he says. “I don’t know.” We both walked out of her tent.
I sigh, yawn and stretch. “I’m booooored.” Shankhe complains. “Well, think of something to do.” I say, with an underlying tone of annoyance. “I have no clue what to do either.” He gets an idea, clear by the smirk on his face. “Specialisation fight!” He says eagerly, and I look at him. “Yeah!” I pop my bottle, and he does too. Sand flows out and surrounds me in a sash like position. “One, two, three, go!” On go, both of our specialisations launch at each other. They collide, making some spray to the sides for both of us, which we both direct towards each other. I click my fingers, and wave a flat hand from left to right, and my sand makes a wall that I use as defence.
Making finger guns, I fake shoot in places on the wall, and bits of sand peel off the wall, shooting at Shankhe. He is unprepared, but managed to block them, as he didn’t say “Out” as that means you’ve been hit. It’s exhilarating, doing this. The excitement, and creative ways people fight make it one of the best things to do.
Suddenly water curves around the wall, trying to get to me. Holding my open hands out palms facing towards me, I clench them into fists, before crossing my hands like a mock shield in front of me, all in a quick motion. sand rushes into a spherical shield around me, but I secretly leave sand where the wall was. Spread so thin you couldn’t see it. I hear footsteps, and as Shankhe crosses the wall line, he yelps out in surprise before saying. “Out.” I lower my makeshift shield, and see a strand of my sand circled around his waist.
“Got you!” i say. chuckling as my sand returns to my bottle. He chuckles as well. “That was smart!” He comments on it. I nod. “I have three strategies, one was that, the wall, which I could’ve gotten you with the bullets, the second was the line you just got out by, and the third… I'm not telling you.” I tease as he pouts sadly. “Why notttt~~~?” He asks. “Cause you’ll use it against me!!” I exclaimed. “I’m not stupid!”
“Why not?” He pouts. I just roll my eyes at his stupidness. Suddenly a rustling comes from the tents, and we both know that Dalyva’s awake.
“Overused your spesh.” I say, using a shortened version of specialisation, as that was just too long. She groans. “Yeah, and what’s that to you?” She asks. I just shake my head and try not to laugh, even though Shankhe is already bursting out in laughter.
Glaring at Shankhe, Dalyva tries to pat her crazy bed hair down, the point of his laughter, and also her annoyed expression. Annoyed, she walks over to us, and as I notice the signs of a dangerous woman, back away. However Shankhe is slow, and starts to get furiously lightly punched. Sure it didn’t hurt, but it sure was annoying, until she clearly started to increase the power, as he yelped out in pain. Smirking, I ask. “How does it feel to be hurt by a scholar?” Dalyva looks at me warningly though, and I put up my hands in surrender. “Don’t.” she says grumpily. “Yes ma’am.” I respond quickly.
She rolls her eyes at it, but doesn’t mention it. Shankhe looks at her a lot more warily now. “Sooo?” He asks. “The reason for my beat up?”he asks as if she needs a reason to lightly beat him. I mean, I guess she does, but I'm not fighting over it, especially with a woman with a halberd, and who can kill me in my sleep. “Cause i just discovered that even when i use my spesh to stop blood from flowing, i still get pain and cramps!” She protests and both of us realise why she’s been so irritable.
Both of us look at each other. ‘She’s scary as fuck.’ I say with my eyes. ‘Why are we stuck with her?’ Shankhe’s eyes convey with a bit of desperation. ‘It's a scary week.’ My eyes say as we turn back to her.
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