"Brat, have you given up?"
A voice rang in my ear, sharp and cold. I twitched and tried to look around, but my vision was blurred. Everything shook. I could barely breathe. My chest felt tight, like something was crushing it. I was hyperventilating.
I remembered the one thing I wasn't supposed to remember.
"Forget… forget… don't remember further."
I clutched my head and screamed. My skull felt like it was splitting open. The memories, the deeper ones, the ones buried under everything else, clawed their way up. Something flashed in my mind. A knife and Blood splattering. My hands shaking.
"No, stop… stop…"
I grabbed my sword without thinking and sprinted at her. She blinked, confused by the sudden shift, but still raised her stance. I clashed with her with every ounce of strength my body could still give. It wasn't enough. My swings were wild, frantic. I didn't think, didn't breathe, didn't blink. I was looking for weak points that didn't exist. Every attack got more desperate, more unstable.
With another scream, I ignited my sword. Flames roared out hotter and brighter than I had ever conjured before. The heat warped the air around me. I dashed, flickering around her. She didn't move. She didn't flinch. She just watched me.
I saw an opening and lunged. She blocked it but with My free hand I moved before I realized it. A tiny stone cannon formed I charged it and fired. Her eyes widened. She blocked the blast, but the opening that created let my blade connect.
She hissed. Feeling the hard sword searing onto her skin
"Shit." She leapt back. Her right arm smoked, skin red and burned. The strike hadn't cut her, her touki hardened her skin too well.
But I didn't stop there. "AHH!" I poured more mana into the sword. Too much. The blade started shaking violently, the metal groaning like it was begging me to stop.
"I don't want to remember!" My voice cracked. My throat burned. Tears blurred my sight.
With one final roar, I shoved all the mana I had left into the sword and swung with everything inside me, every last shred of strength, fear, and rage.
The blades met mine snapped. And the explosion swallowed us whole.
The last thing I felt was… nothing. Like something inside me turned off.
I gasped awake.
Cold air filled my lungs as I jolted upright. I looked around frantically. Trees the forest I didn't see Reid's or Isolte anywhere.
I panicked. "What happened? Where am I?" My breaths grew sharp again.
I should've died. That explosion was big enough to level buildings. I thought about the sound that rang out before the Water God Style user approached earlier. It had been the same type of blast.
"Wait." Sylphie. She always cast barriers around me during those moments. She must've done it again. She had to have.
But then… how did I survive after that? I didn't have any mana left. I didn't even remember casting anything afterward.
I looked down at myself. My clothes were torn. My skin was bruised and cut everywhere. But I could still move.
Then I noticed it. "My… arm." My voice cracked. The arm that had been holding my sword was gone.
My right side felt lighter I froze. A cold shock crawled down my spine. My stomach twisted.
"No… no no no…" I shook, horrified. My breathing turned erratic. I had just lost a limb my sword arm. The one thing I relied on to swing a sword.
What was I supposed to do now? I didn't know any spell that could regrow it. I…
"Shit…" My legs gave out. I collapsed to the ground, trembling. I landed on something solid. When I turned to see what it was, my blood turned to ice.
"Ghislaine…?" She lay there. Unmoving and broken. "What the hell…" I scrambled toward her, panic rising like a tide.
Her arm was twisted to the point where I didn't understand how it was even attached. Her chest was caved in, like something massive stomped on her. Gashes covered her body. She looked like she had gone through hell protecting someone.
Protecting… me. I pressed my hand over her chest and channeled healing magic. A faint green glow formed… then flickered out.
"No…" I tried again it failed again. My mana sputtered out like a dying candle. "No… no no no, fuck!" My voice cracked, shaking I grabbed her shoulders.
"Ghislaine, please wake up… please. You have to. You weren't supposed to die here. You aren't supposed to die in this story. Please…"
Tears ran down my face uncontrollably. I shook her harder. Her head lolled she said nothing. I could feel it she was cold.
I choked on my own breath.This was my fault all of it.
She must've shielded me from the blast. She sacrificed herself because I was too unstable, too weak to control myself.
Something in my chest collapsed.
I stared at her sword lying beside her. I picked it up slowly. The weight felt wrong in my hand. Wrong in a way that made my stomach hurt.
I lifted it to my neck my hands shook violently.
"I… I deserve this…" I pushed until the blade broke skin. A thin stream of blood slid down. But I couldn't do it not even now. "I can't… I'm a coward… I can't…"
My voice cracked and shattered into sobs. I hated myself I should've died she shouldn't be lying here because of me.
Then I noticed something in her hand. A folded piece of paper. I took it, my fingers trembling. Her hand was so cold it made me flinch.
I unfolded the note. The handwriting was rough, messy, and rushed… dying.
"Rudeus Im dead take my sword and keep it." Nothing more just seven simple words.
My chest tightened. I crushed the paper in my fist and let out a strangled scream. I kicked a nearby tree over and over. Bark cracked. My foot bled. I didn't stop until my body collapsed.
When I woke up again, the air smelled foul. I looked around and saw the source.
Ghislaine's corpse had begun to rot. "I… I have to bury her…" My voice shook.
My magic had partially returned. I moved the earth, creating a grave. I lifted her body gently and set her inside. My hands trembled the whole time.
Tears streamed nonstop. I couldn't stop them no matter how hard I tried. They just kept falling.
"What will Eris think…?"
She would hate me. Despise me. Maybe she should. I filled the grave with earth. Then I sat there Silent and numb.
I thought about burying her sword with her… but the note echoed in my mind. It was the last thing she ever wrote.
So I strapped her sword to my side it felt wrong painfully wrong.
This sword shouldn't be at my waist. It should be in Ghislaine's hands, swinging at me in a spar, correcting my posture, laughing and calling me an idiot.
I cursed myself again. Again. Again.
I stared at the grave for a long time, unable to move. Then, finally, I turned around and walked away.
A/N: This is the ending of this arc the Darius assassination arc how did we like it. Also the choice to kill Ghislaine is simply because I was annoyed with this guy telling me to make ghislaine apart of the harem and well she's dead now. So yeah next arc will be a time skip and I'll go into what happened after he left and where he is feedback? Are yall going drop after this hope not. Also the story will get a lot darker from here if you couldn't tell.
The whole point was to have to story be your typical isekai reincarnation then drop this bomb and tone shift. Plan from the start I really like this and hope you guys can too. Any ideas for later parts of the story anything I'll take it into consideration and probably will add it.