(Erza's POV)
I didn't know what pain truly was…
Until I stood in the middle of Yuuta's stolen childhood.
Not as a warrior. Not as a queen.
But as someone who loved him.
He was just a child in this memory. His skin too pale, his voice too soft, his limbs too thin. And yet he still smiled. Still clung to that fragile thread of hope—even here, surrounded by death, in the pit where they discarded failed experiments like trash.
He shouldn't have known how to smile in a place like this.
But he did.
Because she was with him.
Sophia.
The pink-haired elf girl with burns down half her face and a twisted leg she couldn't stand on. Her magic was faint now, but her heart… it was stronger than anything I'd seen in decades of war.
She held him like he was something precious. Like he wasn't just a lab rat, or a number.
But a little boy.
Her fingers gently combed through his messy black hair as he trembled in her lap.
Watching Yuuta sleep—his small, fragile body curled beside that girl Sophia—should've brought comfort. He looked so peaceful, for once. Still. Safe. His tiny hand holding hers, like he finally found something warm to hold onto.
And then it shattered.
A strange tremble stirred the air.
Then—
A scream.
Yuuta's body jerked as a black-violet aura exploded out of him, thick like smoke, hissing with something ancient and furious. It wasn't magic. It wasn't mana. It was... wrong. Heavy. Cold.
It made my skin crawl just being near it—even through a memory.
Sophia bolted upright, panic flashing in her one good eye.
"What… what is that? That pressure—it's like... a divine being…"
She looked at Yuuta—not with fear of him, but fear for him.
He writhed on the stone floor, clutching his head, screaming like something inside was tearing him apart.
"MAKE IT STOP! MY HEAD—SOMETHING'S INSIDE ME!"
That aura—violent and uncontrollable—twisted with his cries. It wasn't power. It was pain.
I turned to my grandfather, stunned. He was pale, eyes locked on Yuuta.
"His aura is tied to his emotions," he said quietly. "The more he remembers, the more he breaks."
"But he's just a child," I whispered.
And he was.
A child who hadn't been held, who hadn't been loved, who thought pain was normal. And now, the truth was shattering him.
Still trembling, Sophia rushed forward and wrapped her arms around him.
"Yuuta! Yuuta, I'm here! Your big sister is here, okay? I'm with you—breathe—just breathe…"
Her voice was shaking now. But she didn't let go.
"Don't be scared. I've got you. I won't let anything happen to you…"
Her warmth must've reached him—because slowly, like a dying storm, the aura began to fade. His body relaxed in her arms, like a child waking from a nightmare.
He opened his eyes. Red, swollen, terrified.
"O-Onee-chan… it hurts… my head… I saw… fire… screaming… monsters… it was so dark…"
Sophia held him closer, hand gently stroking his hair.
"It's over. I promise. You're okay now."
But we weren't done.
Not even close.
A siren—high, metallic, heartless—sliced through the memory like a blade.
My heart sank.
"Aura detection," my grandfather said, face grim. "They're coming."
Voices erupted above—soldiers, shouting orders. Footsteps thundered across metal. Guns loaded. Blades drawn.
Yuuta flinched violently. He clung to Sophia, burying his face into her shoulder, trembling.
"Are they here to punish me…? Did I make them angry again…?"
He didn't understand punishment.
Only fear.
Sophia's expression twisted with horror. With rage. With helplessness.
And then… resolve.
"No one's taking you from me," she whispered. "I won't let them hurt you again. I swear."
She pulled away from him gently, placing a kiss on his forehead.
"Yuuta, listen to me. I'm going to save you. But you need to be brave."
"B-But—what about you?! We go together!"
She shook her head. "No… my legs… they're shattered, remember?"
"Then I'll carry you!" he sobbed. "I don't care! I'm not leaving you behind!"
Her hand trembled as she cupped his cheek, her voice cracking.
"If you stay… they'll take both of us. I won't let that happen."
And then—without another word—she reached for her left eye.
"No…" I whispered. "Don't…"
Yuuta screamed, "ONEE-CHAN, WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?"
But she didn't stop.
Her fingers dug into her face.
Blood spilled.
The scream that followed was not human.
She ripped her own eye out, teeth clenched so hard her jaw shook. Blood poured down her chin as she carved a jagged sigil into the stone floor with trembling hands, using only her pain and desperation.
"I offer my blood… my sight… O Earth spirit, obey me and open the path…"
The floor shook.
Cracks spread like lightning across the walls.
And then—beneath the back wall—a hole opened. A tunnel. Just wide enough for a child.
Cold wind rushed in.
Yuuta dropped to his knees beside her, sobbing.
"You're bleeding! Let me help you—we can still go!"
She pressed a silver ring into his palm, her blood staining his fingers.
"Take this. It'll protect you."
"No—I'm not going! Not without you onee-cha!"
Sophia smiled through the agony.
"You'll find someone… someone out there who'll love you like family. Someone who'll never let this happen to you again."
"I already did," Yuuta whispered. "It's you…"
My chest cracked.
Sophia leaned forward, her voice soft and wet with tears.
"Then live. That's all I want, Yuuta."
The voices were closer now—shouting from just above the well.
Yuuta hesitated.
"I promise I'll come back," he whispered.
She nodded, her smile fading. "I know Because you are my little brother."
He crawled into the tunnel.
Didn't look back.
Not even once.
I stood frozen. My hands trembled at my sides, fists clenched so tightly my nails dug into skin.
I could hardly breathe.
"They were just children," I whispered, and even my own voice felt foreign. Hollow. "They were just… eager to live."
My grandfather put a hand on my shoulder, gentle.
"I know how you feel, Erza," he said quietly.
"I felt it too—many years ago. The rage. The grief. The helplessness."
"But this… this is the reality we've inherited. These children—innocents—died without purpose. Abandoned. Experimented on. Forgotten."
"You must be the one who ensures they're remembered. The one who brings them justice."
Justice.
That word echoed in my chest like a war drum.
I tried to swallow, but my throat was dry. Tight. Like grief was pressing against it, trying to choke out the words I still couldn't say.
"I will…"
The words left me like a vow. Raw. Shaking.
"I swear, I will. I'll make them pay. Every single one. I'll make them feel what they made others feel."
But even then—
The tears came.
Hot. Silent. Unstoppable.
They blurred everything. The ground. The trees. My grandfather's face.
But I didn't wipe them away.
I didn't want to.
Because I needed to remember this pain.
Yuuta's face rose in my mind.
That same boy I laughed with. Mock with.
The boy who cooked me breakfast with that dumb apron.
Who always smiled like I was the only thing keeping his world from falling apart.
I thought I knew him.
But I didn't.
He had no one.
No parents to hold him.
No home to return to.
No freedom. No warmth. No voice of comfort when the darkness crept in.
Just needles. Cold walls. Screams behind metal doors.
And yet… he smiled.
He smiled at me.
Like I was his whole world.
Because to Yuuta—family wasn't something you were born into.
It was something you chose to protect.
Something he believed in.
Even when the world gave him nothing…
He believed in love.
He believed… if he had a family, they would have come for him.
They would have saved him.
He looked at me like I was that family.
And now… finally… I understood.
My chest ached.
Tight. Burning.
Fury. Shame. Grief. All tangled into a knot I couldn't untangle.
Yuuta never told me the weight he carried.
He never asked for pity.
He just smiled.
He laughed. Protected us. Called us family. Like it was sacred.
And now I knew why.
Now I knew what it meant.
To Yuuta, family wasn't just a word.
It was a promise, he don't want Elena to feel the same feeling he felt in his childhood thats why he jump in every situation.
As I was thinking suddenly,
The memory shifted again.
Sophia's presence faded like morning fog — the glow of her blood circle disappearing into the earth.
And just like that, she was gone.
No goodbye.
No final glance.
Only silence.
"Wait—no," I whispered, reaching out into the air, as if I could pull her back. "Don't disappear…"
But the memory didn't belong to her.
It belonged to Yuuta.
And it would only take us where he went.
Suddenly, everything was dark. Cold. Wet.
We were back underground, in a place where water trickled along the lab's sewage channels — a river choked with chemicals, blood, and black slime that clung to the walls like rot.
And there he was.
Yuuta.
So small.
So alone.
Running barefoot through the dark, stumbling over rocks and bones and rusted metal scraps.
He was crying. Not loud sobs, but tiny, broken hiccups — the kind a child makes when he's already run out of tears, but still hasn't stopped hurting.
"Onee-chan…"
"I'm sorry, Onee-chan…"
"I didn't mean to leave you…"
Over and over again.
Like it was all his fault.
Like it was a sin to survive.
His voice cracked as he gasped for breath, feet splashing through the filthy stream. The water was rising. Faster than him. And before he could react—
He slipped.
One scream.
Then a splash.
He hit the water hard, his little body thrown into the current like a leaf in a storm. He flailed, panicked — tiny hands reaching for anything — but the current was cruel and violent. Every time he tried to scream, the water filled his mouth.
He didn't know how to swim.
But his body, light and fragile, eventually floated — carried by the current as it rushed down some hidden tunnel.
He was tossed against stones, scraped along the walls, pulled and spun by the current's merciless grip.
And then — suddenly — he was spat out.
The river poured into a shallow pond under the open night sky. Forest trees stretched overhead like silent watchers.
Yuuta's head broke the surface with a gasp so desperate it shook his whole chest. He scrambled onto the muddy bank, crawling, coughing, shivering.
He was alive.
But barely.
His little hands clutched at wet grass as he collapsed beside the pond, shaking uncontrollably. Clothes torn. Skin bruised. Every breath felt like a battle.
And then… the tears came back.
He curled into himself.
Just a child in the dark.
No roof. No warmth. No arms to hold him.
"Onee-chan…" he whimpered.
"I'm scared… Onee-chan…"
Not mother. Not father.
Because he didn't know those words.
He had no one else to cry for.
That's what broke me most.
I've cried before. I've screamed. I've cursed the gods.
But I had names. Faces. Memories.
Yuuta had none of that.
Just one girl — who gave him a name.
And now even she was gone.
Suddenly—
A low growl.
From the trees.
Then another.
I turned instinctively toward the sound. My heart froze.
Dire wolves.
Three of them.
Fur like ash. Eyes like cold fire.
Big. Hungry. Ready to tear the small intruder apart.
Yuuta heard them too.
He turned slowly.
And he froze.
He didn't scream. He didn't run.
He just reached into his pocket with trembling fingers, pulling out the one thing he had left—
Sophia's ring.
His hands were shaking so badly he could barely hold it up.
The wolves paused.
They sniffed. Growled again. Confused, maybe. Or wary.
Yuuta took one step back—
And slipped.
He fell backward down a small ridge of stones.
The ring slipped from his hand.
It bounced once. Then twice.
And dropped into the pond.
Gone.
He didn't move. Didn't even try to go after it.
He just stared at the water, lip quivering.
And then—he crumbled.
Right there in the dirt.
Face down. Arms wrapped around himself.
"I'm tired…"
"I'm tired of running…"
"Just kill me…"
His voice cracked like dry leaves.
"I'm sorry… to the family I never met…"
"I'm sorry, Onee-chan…"
The wolves stepped closer, growls rising.
Yuuta didn't even flinch.
He just shut his eyes.
Waiting.
Wishing.
Welcoming the end.
And then—
To be continued...