I opened my eyes and found myself in a familiar white space. Oh, great. How long has it been since last time? Well, given how things ended up, I expected some measure of chastisement. I waited silently for a moment. Nothing happened. I waited another half a minute. Still nothing.
“Hey, what’s the big idea?! If you’re going to pull me in here again, at least say something!” I shouted out into the void.
“I thought perhaps you wanted to start this time,” the voice of the Thousand Bolts resounded throughout the space.
“You say this as if I wanted to see you again. You know, I was really hoping last time was the end of it.”
“I too thought that this would not happen again.”
“You speak as if you have no control over this.”
“I have no more control than you do.”
“Bullshit! I know we only ever do this when you think I screwed up somehow! Well, you know maybe I think so, too, but that doesn’t mean you have to hammer me over the head with it!”
“Is that how you see it?”
“How else would I see it?! Have you ever talked to me about anything else?!” I took a few deep breaths and tried to calm myself. I’m better than this. Just let him say what he wants to say and I can wake up. Whatever he says is irrelevant anyways, I’m the one in charge, after all. “Well, go on. Say your piece.”
“Very well. Braith, I want to start by saying that your rate of progress and level of adaptability have been rather impressive, regardless of the circumstances.” Just had to put in that snippet about my circumstances. “As your body became more used to my power, a bit of it could even continue to empower you without any additional exertion.” I assume he was talking about that power I felt when I first woke up after my battle in Eden. “That power would have continued to grow as the upper limit of the power you could actively use also increased.” I feel as if this was something that should have been explained to me in the beginning. “However, you have ruined some of that progression.”
“What? Ruined?”
“You at least remember what happened before you fell unconscious, correct?” I shifted my gaze slightly, as if trying to look away from the phantom speaker.
“I suffered some rebound. But, it’s happened before. I just need to recover for a bit, don’t I?”
“No, this is not the same. Those times, you merely exhausted your stamina. This time, you went far past the limits of your body. Had you not been treated immediately, the damage would have been permanent, leaving you crippled, or even comatose.”
“But how was this time different? When I felt I couldn’t fight any harder, I mustered up even more power in Eden and broke out of the Druids’ pit! I was already feeling better from just eating a potion apple then.”
“As I said, you were not exceeding the limits of your body then.”
“Are you saying that I was just holding back all this time?! My life was on the line, then! Tasha’s life was on the line!”
“Perhaps the actualization of those thoughts at the time let you truly reach your limits.”
“Then why was it not the case this time?! I could have died in that battle, and I felt that very strongly during every second of that battle!” The Thousand Bolts was silent for a moment.
“It must not have been the same kind of motivation, then.”
“How?! I fought for my life both of those times! And what about against Truth? I fought with my life on the line then as well, and it didn’t leave me with such a crushing rebound either! In fact, I fought even longer that time than I did this time!”
“State of mind aside, your stamina in that battle was aided thanks to your companion’s blessing. Also, you having used the limit of my power twice in one day also played a part.” Wait, that’s what happened? Flora’s blessing that time actually did something? I didn’t even feel any different…Hold on, Braith, don’t get distracted.
“Answer my other questions! What was so different that I ended up suffering so much backlash?”
“That is something that you may wish to further reflect on.”
“You’re acting as if this doesn’t concern you.”
“It does not. As I said in the beginning, although you are my vessel, I will not directly interfere with how you live your life.”
“We wouldn’t be speaking if you didn’t care at all.”
“I never said I didn’t care. In fact, I care quite a bit.” Well, should I take this as finally being honest with me? “I want my vessel to live strongly and to make a mark on this world. That is my pride as the guardian spirit of the Thousand Bolts.”
“If that’s what you truly want, then shouldn’t you be helping me instead of just wasting my time.”
“Do you really think this is a waste of time?”
“It’s redundant. You say the same kind of things every time.”
“Very well.”
“Finally feel like telling me something useful.”
“Just this once.” I didn’t know whether to feel relieved or annoyed about his relent.
“Alright, no more roundabout sayings. What did I really do wrong? How do I become more powerful?”
“That is something you must learn for yourself. What motivates us to do anything… are unique to the individual, and rarely effectively when they are explicit.” Yeah, should have just kept feeling annoyed.
“You said you would help me.”
“And I will, but not directly.” I blinked a few times.
“You are a spirit living inside my mind. How else are you going to be able to help me?!”
“Motivation is the most important thing in driving yourself to new heights.” I was about to yell at him again, but I felt like my predictability would just give him greater satisfaction. Yeah, go ahead, ignore me anyways and say whatever you want. “Having the proper mindset and motivation allows us to achieve different and greater things.” I was obviously dissatisfied with his so-called advice. “Even if my words are lost on you for now, there may be others around you who could benefit from some guidance. Especially if they think it is coming from you.” I stared blankly ahead of me as the white space darkened. Good, I can wake up now. “Look past yourself, Braith. You are not the only one who can make yourself stronger.” I waved my hands out dismissively at his final words as the world came to an end.
**********************************************************************************************
My body shifted uncomfortably. Not because of where I lay, but because of how stiff my muscles felt. I would try to stretch out my limbs if not for both my utter lack of energy and the fear I could pull a muscle doing so. I made several mumbling sounds as I stirred away, but even my eyelids felt too heavy to move. There were sounds to my right, but I could not differentiate any of them. Everything sounded like they were being filtered through thick sheets of wool. My body writhed ever so slightly underneath the blanket that covered me and with the greatest amount of exertion, I finally opened a single eye. My vision was blurry, but I could make out two figures coming through a door on the right side of the room. One of them closed the door behind them and just as my hearing fully adjusted, I heard them lock the door.
That sound seemed to trigger something in me as my other eye immediately opened and I tried to sit up in bed. That second part was an absolute failure though. I remained on my back, shackled by my exhaustion. My vision cleared up and I saw the two figures looking directly at me. They wore black-dyed leather armour and had black cloaks with cowls on top. They also both had black cloth covering their mouth and nose and one of them had a rather large weapon on their back. Although, I could be mistaken about that detail as I could not think of a person wearing a scythe on their back.
“Did you have a pleasant rest?” the one with the scythe asked. His voice was a little bit muffled from the cloth over his mouth, but he sounded like a young man. “Lovely weather today. It is a beautiful afternoon you’ve awoken to.” He spoke while looking through the window on the left side of the room.
“Where am I?” I asked. My voice was raspy and the moment the words left my mouth, I had the strong desire to down several glasses of water.
“You are in Brennan’s royal palace,” the second man replied. “And before you get any ideas to escape through that window, know that I’ll cut you down before you ever even touch the glass.” He spoke harshly, but sounded even younger than the other man.
“Easy there, Marco. There’s no reason to think that he’s about to do anything like that.” The man with the scythe started walking over to my bedside. I had the strong urge to move away, or at the very least, sit up, but the strength was simply not there. As he neared the head of the bed, I saw that he was walking to a table by my bedside. On it was a pitcher of water, an empty glass, and a plate of berries with a spoon. “Your voice sounds quite awful. Not surprising, though, you have been asleep for nearly two days now.” He poured a glass of water. He looked at me, and even though I could only see his eyes, I knew what question he was silently asking. I nodded. “Do you need some help sitting up, too?”
The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.
“Yes,” I barely choked out. He propped me up, but I felt slight repulsion as he touched me. It wasn’t as if I felt something disgusting or evil, but it was just uncomfortable. It was especially strange because although Marco made a bad first impression, I inherently felt greater danger from this one with the scythe. He brought the glass of water to my lips, and slowly tilted it, giving me a few sips. After that, he put the glass back on the table.
“Feeling better now?”
“Yes.” My throat was still parched, but it probably wasn’t something I could hurriedly alleviate if he was telling the truth about how long I was out for.
“Want a berry as well?”
“No, that’s fine.”
“Alright. Just some more water before we continue then?”
“How long are we going to keep this up for?! We’re supposed to be interrogating him!” Marco bellowed out. Interrogation?
“Oh, it’s nothing too bad,” the man with the scythe said, reading the slight panic on my face. “It’s just you were part of something very important, and we wanted to hear your take on it as well.” I could only see his eyes, but I felt as if he was smiling at me.
“Who are you?” I asked. So, this is probably about the assassination attempt. Wait, my part as well? “Where’s Tasha?! Where’s Flora?! Did you do anything to them?!” As upset as I was, my voice was hardly capable of fully expressing that.
“We’re the ones asking the questions here!” Marco said. The other man raised up one hand and Marco seemed to recoil a bit.
“Here, some more water.” He tried to bring the glass to my lips again but I just glared at him. “Don’t worry, we have done nothing to your two traveling companions. Princess Leonora was quite adamant about that and His Majesty voiced a similar opinion after recovering.” So, everyone’s fine? He brought the glass over again and he smiled at me with his eyes. I didn’t like it, but at the same time I didn’t think he was lying. I opened my mouth and he let a bit more water flow into my mouth this time. His level of consideration was disturbing in his own right. Is he used to dealing with people in my condition? “Do you want a bit more time before we continue?” I shuddered internally.
“No, let’s talk. And when we’re done, I want to see them.” Marco made no interjection.
“Of course. Now, to be fair, I’ll start by answering your first question. I am Sir Decius, captain of the Tenth Harbinger squad. Over there is my squire, Marco, my second-in-command.”
“Harbingers?”
“You make your way to the king’s palace and you don’t even know how we are?!” Looks like he couldn’t hold himself back for long. Decius looked at me for a second longer before slowly turning around. Marco cast his gaze downwards. Then, Decius turned back to me.
“Oh, you’ve never heard of the Harbingers before?” He acted as if nothing had just happened.
“Sorry, I can’t say I’m very familiar with Brennan in general.”
“Nothing to apologize for. In fact, I don’t necessarily think it is a bad thing at all that you don’t know about us.”
“Why is that?” I asked, truly curious.
“Well, unlike the Iron Knights, we tend to keep the peace in the kingdom in different ways. We collect information and when we find out about trouble that’s brewing, we try to take care of it before it gets out of hand. So, most of our work is done outside of the public eye.”
“…I understand.” I did not want to ask for more details about that.
“Do you have any more questions?” I did, but as nice as he was acting, I knew that many of them were pointless to ask.
“Not at the moment. Just ask me what you want so that I can get out of here.”
“Excellent. Well then, first off, do you clearly remember the day you fell unconscious?”
“Are you asking me to recount the events of that day?”
“If you can.”
“Do you want me to start from the beginning?”
“Start from wherever you think is important to know.” He had an accommodating tone, but I had to wonder if this was his way of telling me to be careful with what I say. If I omit something, is it going to be used against me? Preferring to not take any risks, I told Decius everything I remembered about that day, starting from when I first entered the capital. Marco stood motionless throughout the story while Decius would occasionally nod and give me more water to drink. By the end of the story, although my body still felt like lead, my throat was no longer parched and I could eat a berry.
“I see. That does seem to agree with our other recounts. Now, I just need to clarify a few more things. You have never met the lead assailant before and you have no idea why he suddenly paused in the middle of your fight?”
“I didn’t recognize him and although I know he paused to impose some sort of re-match with me, I don’t know what motivated him to do so.”
“Well, we did some digging and we believe we have identified him.” Decius turned to Marco, who then took out a rolled-up piece of paper. Marco walked over to the other side of my bed and unfurled it, revealing a sketch of the top-half of a man holding a weapon resembling that of a giant, long-handled cleaver. “His name is Tarras, no known family name. He is supposedly descended from the Spring Clan, but as far as we know, he did not carry on their name or legacy. He was a general in a massive Outlander army in the north. Most of his kills were unconfirmed, but his total kill count supposedly exceeds seven hundred, and among them is the former King of the Moon Clan.” He paused after that bit of exposition, possibly reading my reaction. “During one of the largest battles against the Moon Clan, a bystander who witnessed it made this recount: Hundreds of battered and broken bodies lay across this bloody battle ground. However, even among this carnage, there was a veritable mountain of corpses stacked up high by a war-crazed giant. In the midst of battle, he seemed to methodically stack up the bodies of those who fell to him one by one. Soon enough, he was literally fighting atop a mountain of corpses that he had personally cleaved to death. Similar to how a bricklayer would make a wall, his weapon was the trowel that crafted this grotesque monument.”
“Really?” I asked, genuinely surprised by such a description.
“Well, I’m sure there was at least a bit of embellishment. That person apparently did sell his writings. In any case, because of that, he became known as the Mountain Cleaver by many during the war. He went missing at the end of the war and there were no activities associated with him until now.”
“Well, as interesting as all of that is, why are you telling me all of this?”
“Oh, just doing you a favour.” I cocked an eyebrow. “He was apparently keenly interested in you, so I thought you would like to know more about him.” Just how much of that was a lie? Now that I think about it, I now believe that he was just saying all that to see if my reaction would give away whether I actually knew anything about him.
“I guess I should thank you for that then. Is there anything else you want to tell me?”
“Is there something else you want to know about?”
“About Ragnarok maybe? Tarras did say that was who he was working for.”
“I cannot say.” I did not know whether he meant he couldn’t tell me or had nothing to tell me. Either way, pressing the matter was probably pointless.
“Alright.” Decius refilled my cup with water, but this time, I brought out my hand so that he could pass it to me. My grip was somewhat shaky, the cup feeling as heavy as iron, but I didn’t want him feeding me anymore.
“It would be safe to assume that everything checks out now. In that case, on behalf of the kingdom, I thank you for your heroism that day and apologize if you have felt unduly inconvenienced so far.” Decius bowed his head slightly to me and Marco followed suit.
“So, is that all?” It may have been a mistake to ask, but I could not help but think he could have been far more aggressive in his line of questioning. I knew I definitely would not have relented so easily if I really wanted to know something from someone. Did they just already have a good idea that I wouldn’t have any valuable information?
“I think what you have said has been more than satisfactory so we’ll be taking our leave now.” From outside of the room, I could hear the sounds of yelling. “Ah, just in time, too.” Decius opened the door and Tasha’s voice came through loud and clear.
“I said to get out of my-” Less than a second after her voice cut off, Tasha came storming into the room, rushing past the two Harbingers. She looked at me with fierce eyes. I smiled at her and her expression softened up as she continued running over to me. For a second, I thought she was coming in to hug me, but she seemed to stop herself midway. Instead, she awkwardly stood at my bedside as she fiddled with her hands. As I was about to speak up, Flora and Leonora entered the room in a more reserved fashion. The Harbingers bowed to the princess and then quietly exited the room.
“I am glad to see you are finally awake, Sir Braith,” Leonora said.
“And I’m glad to see all of you here,” I replied.
“I do hope the Harbingers haven’t been rough with you in any way. I thought things were made quite clear with them, but…” Her tone grew much more serious as she began to trail off.
“No, it was no issue.” I was thinking about elaborating on Decius’ actions, but decided not to.
“How are you feeling?” Leonora asked.
“Tired.” I tried lifting my arm and clenching a fist, and although it was not a very smooth motion, there was little strain. “It’s getting a lot better, though.”
“Um, do you want one of the potion apples, Mr. Braith?” Flora asked, her voice at around the average level of timidity.
“I think I can do without it. Unless…do I need to be up and about right now?” I directed my question towards Leonora.
“Oh no, you should focus on resting for as long as you need.” Leonora then looked from Flora to Tasha. “I just wanted to come here to personally thank you for all you have done for my father and I.” Leonora bowed her head towards me. Sometimes, I wonder if Flora is the most normal one out of the three of us with her panicking and fussing about when someone like Leonora does these things.
“You’re welcome.” I tried to put in a bit more kindness than usual, but my voice cracked a bit. I coughed, a bit from my sore throat and a bit from embarrassment, and then I drank some more water.
“Well, I have done what I came here to do, so I shall be taking my leave now. Rest here for as long as you need.” Leonora left the room. I turned my attention to Tasha, but she seemed to be avoiding my gaze. I looked over to Flora and although she looked a bit embarrassed, she maintained eye contact with me. Just for fun, I decided to not say anything first. Finally, she looked away for a second before speaking up.
“Um, is there something wrong?”
“That’s a good question, Flora. Is there something wrong?” I looked over at Tasha while asking the question.
“No, nothing’s wrong, no, I mean, nothing is wrong with you- wait, I mean…it’s nothing…” That was some masterful convincing.
“Well, as long as nothing’s wrong.” I tried rolling out of my bed, but my legs still felt dead tired. “Alright, I think I’ll just rest for a bit longer then.”
“Oh, I see. Well, I’ll just leave you to that, then.” Flora bowed her head to me, for no apparent reason, and walked out of the room. Tasha made ready to leave too but I grabbed her hand. If she wanted to, breaking free would have been extremely easy. Seeing as how she did not, I assumed she wanted to talk despite her initial reluctance. “Tasha…what’s wrong?”
“Nothing really…” she replied without turning around.
“Don’t give me that. Please, tell me what’s on your mind.”
“I’m sorry…” she said after finally turning around to face me directly. With that distraught look on her face, I would have instantly forgiven her, but that’s probably not what this was about.
“Sorry about what?”
“If I could have been a bigger help…you probably wouldn’t have gotten so hurt.” Those words resonated with me on a different level than usual. It made me remember the Thousand Bolts, and I hated how it made me think he was right. I was the one who turned down Tasha’s assistance and overloaded myself that time.
“No, you don’t have to apologize for something like that. I don’t blame you for what happened at all.”
“But, it seems like whenever we end up fighting, you always end up pushing yourself. You can’t keep this up! I know you can’t! That’s why I need to be stronger!” It’s been awhile since I’ve heard her sound this upset. “But, even though I want to get stronger…I just can’t do it…” she said a bit woefully.
“As I just said, that’s not something you need to feel sorry about. No one is going to blame you for lacking strength-” Shit! Tasha’s eyes turned fierce.
“That’s the problem! When it comes to the past few fights we’ve had, I’ve been weak! It makes me feel even worse if you don’t blame me!” Tasha suddenly climbed onto my bed and grabbed me by the shoulders. Due to my surprise, my cup slipped from my hand and shattered against the ground.
“C- calm down, Tasha-”
“It doesn’t make any sense! Why do we even go through all these dangerous things and risk our lives!”
“It’s not like we always choose them.”
“But sometimes we do!” Would this be a bad time to mention that it was her idea more than once? “Why? Why do I think it’s okay?!” Okay, nothing to worry about; she brought it up for me.
“We all make mistakes.”
“That’s the other problem!” She tightened her grip and began leaning into me. I could barely remain sitting up as I could feel my body begin to noticeably slant to the side. “I don’t think I was wrong.” Her voice evened out at the last statement. “A lot of people could have suffered, there were those in need, and justice needed to be done. I- we did the right thing. I know it.” She leaned into me just a bit more, and it was enough to finally knock me back down onto the bed, with Tasha lying on top of me. “And I know…that you don’t always think the same way.” Her eyes which were so fiery so early now looked like they belonged to a brooding cat.
“Tasha…” I don’t know if it was just due to confusion or a side effect of my exhaustion, but I just couldn’t process her words properly. I had no idea how to react and what to say. For as long as she remained on top of me, I kept trying to think of a proper response, but nothing good came to mind. In fact, I wasn’t even entirely sure how I felt about her words. In the end, a bit of clarity returned to her eyes, and she got off me. She stood by my bedside, her back turned to me. When she began to turn back around, I heard her step on the broken shards of my cup, which caused her to stop.
“Oh…I knocked your cup over,” she sounded almost lifeless.
“That’s okay.”
“I…didn’t make any of your injuries worse…did I?”
“N- no, I’m just fine.” I sprung back up as quickly as I could. “See! Just fine…” This was even dumber than it sounded, as she was still yet to face me again. But, I guess it still worked, because she suddenly laughed. It was a weak one at first, but it was soon followed by a few more. Anyone in the world could tell it was forced, but if she was at least willing to make that effort, she had to have recovered at least a little bit. After laughing for about five seconds, she turned around and smiled brightly at me.
“I guess I’ve been pretty stressed out lately, huh?” I had no response. “Well, Flora said it’s good to just speak up when you think you really need to, so I did.” That was not the kind of advice I would have expected from Flora. Although, maybe that does explain her bouts of assertiveness. “Well, you know how I am, dad, I just always have so much energy so sometimes I just say things without thinking about it. Like just now.”
“Is that so?”
“Yup! Well, you need to rest up, so I’ll leave now. Remember, rest is very important! Don’t waste your energy thinking about some random things I said, alright?”
“Alright.”
“Okay, good. See you later, dad!” She exited the room with that bright smile maintained on her face.” It was…an odd day today. I met with the Thousand Bolts, then the Harbingers, and then dealt with that outburst from Tasha. It was also probably a very important day as well, but how important, that was something I could not think about at that moment. Extreme levels of weariness returned to my body, and I could barely even stay awake for another minute before falling back asleep.
