Smoke swirled across the arena as Ann darted out of it with the swiftness of a ninja, sliding across the ground and launching another wave of shuriken at Kravos.
But Kravos was still singing:
🎵"Oh little ninja… how beautiful you are when you kill!"🎵
Ann circled him like a shadow of fire, striking and dodging, but he slipped away with an inhuman lightness—bending, twisting, crawling backward like a mad dancer. The shuriken struck the ground around him, scattering sparks.
Ann clenched her teeth and hissed under her breath:
"What is this creature…?"
Kravos suddenly pulled out a faded black guitar from inside his jacket, old and battered, like a piece of the past that refused to die. His thin fingers brushed the strings, producing a faint sound at first, then a jagged, uneven melody, like a sick man's music on the edge of collapse.
As he dodged Ann's attacks, the guitar strings produced conflicting sounds—half music, half groan.
Ann snarled as she lunged at him again:
"Stop singing and face me like a man! Is hiding behind a pathetic tune all you can do?"
Kravos's fingers paused on the strings. Her words pierced something no one had touched in years. He stared at her, breath rattling from his chest as if it were a torn-open wound. Yet he strummed again, only for Ann to interrupt:
"I wonder how your parents ever put up with all that noise!"
Kravos gasped at the words. A single tear slipped from his left eye without him realizing it. Ann froze where she stood, watching the noisy performer suddenly fall silent… as if the melody had shattered inside him, leaving only a man who no longer knew how to live without it.
He clenched his teeth, his facial muscles twitching, as though fighting himself more than his opponent. Then he raised the guitar again, striking the strings violently. This time the sound came out hoarse, distorted, each note screaming what he'd been unable to say his whole life.
His voice burst out with the music, no rhythm, no beat—only raw, unchained emotion:
🎵"You strangled my voice when I was a child… you hated me because I sang…!"🎵
🎵"And now… now I won't be silent, even if my voice burns with the last note in me!"🎵
Each word spilled like blood. His body trembled with every chord, sweat mixing with tears, but Ann couldn't make sense of this chaos.
She scoffed, slipping back behind a stone pillar with a mocking laugh:
"Is this a fight or a misery show? Sing all you want, lunatic, it won't save you from me!"
But Kravos didn't stop. He sang as though the guitar was the only thing keeping him alive, as though she was no longer his enemy—just a witness to his collapse.
Ann's voice sharpened as she lunged again:
"Stop singing and be a man for once!"
Her words struck him like a knife to the chest. Kravos froze, his eyes widening. His voice trembled, fingers faltering on the strings. Slowly, he sank to his knees. The song didn't stop, but it no longer sounded like a battle hymn.
His voice broke with ragged breaths:
🎵"I sang to my mother so she'd smile… she slapped me!"🎵
🎵"I sang to my father so he'd hear me… he cast me out!"🎵
🎵"Even my voice… even my voice, they wouldn't let me keep!"🎵
Ann lowered her weapon. The sharp edge in her gaze dissolved, replaced by a flicker of confusion and unease.
Is this man… really crying?
She stepped toward him slowly, eyes conflicted—half a fighter's vigilance, half an uncontrollable curiosity.
He's not defending himself anymore… he won't even lift his head…
Why does he sing while crying?
Has he lost his mind? Or is singing his only way to survive?
She drew closer until her shadow covered him. She gripped a single shuriken in her hand, as if trying to convince herself this was still a fight. Raising a brow, she spoke in a low, cautious voice tinged with disbelief:
"Why are you crying while you sing? What do you think you're doing?"
Kravos slowly lifted his head. His eyes were wet but burning with something fierce. His voice rasped, breaking between each word:
🎵"I sing… because if I'm silent… I'll hear the screaming in my head."🎵
Ann froze. She no longer knew if she stood before an enemy or an open wound shaped like a man.
"So that's your reason? Because you're afraid of silence?" she asked after a pause.
Kravos let out a short, broken laugh through his tears, then said:
🎵"Afraid? No… I passed fear the day they cast me out. There's nothing left to fear… except myself."🎵
Ann stared at him in silence for a heartbeat, then exhaled softly, as if trying to take in everything at once. Her tone dropped, losing its edge, almost forgetting the arena around them:
"Kravos… you don't need someone to fight you. You need someone to listen. I'm here."
He raised his head again, a strange smile forming on his face—a blend of pain and gratitude. His hoarse voice barely reached her:
🎵"At last… someone understood the melody."🎵
Ann extended her hand toward him, a steady but faintly warm gesture.
"Get up, Kravos. This fight isn't over yet."
He looked up at her, eyes caught between gratitude and disbelief that his enemy was giving him time to stand. After a moment's hesitation, he pressed a trembling hand to the ground and pushed himself upright, the guitar still hanging from his shoulder like the weight of an entire world.
With a sad, broken-toned laugh he said:
🎵"You want me to fight? Fine. Let's turn pain into one last melody."🎵
Ann arched a brow and answered with a faint, sidelong smile—half wary, half challenged:
"That's what I wanted from the start… a real fight, not a musical funeral."
Kravos tilted his head, closed his eyes, and brushed the strings lightly… a note burst out unlike any before. Sharp, fast, cutting through the air like orders to his battered body.
And his body obeyed—twisting again with eerie grace. But this time his eyes were different. No longer the distant stare of a madman singing mid-battle, but the focused gaze of a man turning his pain into a weapon.
Ann readied herself once more, smiling with a hint of excitement:
"Then show me the melody you've been hiding."
Kravos's eyes glimmered as he prepared to unleash what he'd been holding all along. Guitar notes rose through the arena, each one carrying something unspoken.
🎵"When I was born… no one clapped. No one waited for me."🎵
He sang hoarsely as he spun in the air, landing a side strike at Ann, which she barely blocked. The singing never stopped—driven more by his past than the fight itself.
In his mind, the scene changed entirely. No arena. No crowd. Just a small house in a poor village. A thin boy standing in the corner of a room, clutching a broken-string guitar, his trembling voice filling the silence. Behind him, a father buried in papers, a mother staring out a window without turning.
🎵"I sang for them… but they never heard me."🎵
In the present, his attacks blurred closer to dance than combat. His arm spun lightly as he dodged Ann's strike, twisting back with an off-balance step, breath quickening, sweat and tears mixing on his face.
🎵"They said a voice can't feed the hungry… they said a dream is foolish, like a child."🎵
The boy appeared again in memory…
One morning, his father snapped the guitar in half, tossed it at the door, and said coldly:
"Go sing to the street if you think your voice is worth anything."
In the present, his voice cracked but pressed on:
🎵"I sang for the wind, for the walls, for the wet streets… I sang until my own voice believed I was still alive."🎵
Ann, weaving around his strikes, began to notice the shift. The song's tone had changed—no longer mocking or flirtatious, but confessional. Even his eyes were no longer wild but those of a man singing because he had no other way to live.
Then, suddenly, his blows faltered. Emotion and exhaustion collided to choke him. He stopped for a few seconds, the last string quivering under his fingers.
Softly, almost to himself, he whispered:
🎵"If someone had heard me then… I wouldn't be here singing to die."🎵
Ann raised her gaze to him, her dagger still held in defense, but her heart no longer seeing him as an enemy—only as the echo of a human being denied even the right to speak.