If I had to describe my life with one word, the answer would be simple: pain. If I had to make it longer, then my life is nothing but suffering that comes and goes in endless cycles… falling, rising, then falling again. Over and over, as if it would never end.
Sometimes I wonder why I'm even alive.
Even after the reason for my existence was taken from me, I kept fighting… only to feel new wounds, new pain. Is life supposed to be like that?
Annoying.
Those dark thoughts always appear when my mind goes blank. I should probably start moving before I sink any deeper.
My ears rang. Even shifting my body felt torturous. My knees were still pinned to the ground when I forced myself to look around.
I was on a wide plain filled with tall grass swaying in the evening wind. People moved all around me, tense and desperate, all too busy trying to kill each other.
Two different groups stood out clearly based on their armor.
The first wore dark red armor marked with the emblem of a Great Stag rearing up proudly. The second wore black armor with the symbol of a Black Sun and a mountain peak in the center, flanked by two scimitars crossed over the chest.
I was on the side of the stag.
I forced myself to stand, even as my knees trembled like rusty hinges. One step… two steps… each breath sliced into my chest. When I was close enough, I swung my sword with everything I had.
Slash.
My blade swept through the air, and the man's head rolled to the ground in a slow spin. His body followed a moment later. Behind him, the man I had just saved stared at me as if I were not human, but something far more dangerous.
In the reflection of his wide eyes, I saw myself.
My black hair was messy and tangled. My brown eyes were sharp and strained. My olive skin looked pale, and my face… once, maybe, someone might have called it handsome. But the vicious scars carved across my cheek drowned all of that away.
My body was tall, strong, and solid… but in that moment, my strength vanished.
Just as the man I saved breathed in relief, I collapsed right in front of him.
Damn.
I think… I was set up.
And poisoned too.
I tried to rise… but my body refused to respond. My fingertips were numb, my chest burned like fire from the inside. All I could do was fall back again, lying among the tall grass, staring at the evening sky turning golden orange.
Beautiful.
Dying like this… wouldn't be so bad.
The evening wind brushed my face. The sun sank slowly, splitting the sky into red, purple, and gray. My vision blurred, and through that haze, a silhouette appeared.
A woman. Her long red hair flowed like gentle flames carried by the wind.
My chest tightened. My heart lurched back to life.
"…As—"
Her name nearly left my lips. But before I could say it, her face faded like mist swept away by the wind.
And was replaced by the face of a man.
The same idiot I saved earlier—shoving a potion bottle into my mouth with trembling hands, nearly breaking my teeth in his panic.
"C–Captain! Captain Bastian! Please don't die! I'm begging you! Drink this, hurry! It's an antidote! Come on, Captain, wake up! Don't leave us!"
The bitter potion flooded my throat mercilessly. He poured it like a fool, some even spilling down my cheek.
His expression was a mess of fear, worry, and… guilt.
Seeing how he immediately knew I was poisoned without me saying a word, I remembered that I did appoint him as my vice-commander. The kid was smart… though far too talkative.
Besides, it wasn't strange for the entire battalion to know I was poisoned often. Those wretched nobles never liked me, a commoner who became a war hero, rose through the ranks, led a battalion, and earned more respect than they ever could.
Of course they were jealous. Of course they wanted me gone.
And me? I often humiliated them and gave them lessons they wouldn't forget.
While my mind tried to figure out which traitor slipped the poison into my body, the man kept talking...
"I… I don't want to die, Captain!" his voice cracked. "I still want to go home! I want to marry my girlfriend! We're already engaged! I even bought her a ring, even though it's cheap, but she likes it! I promised her I'd return alive! We want to build a small house in the village… near the river… please, Captain, don't die! If you die, I die too! I can't—"
Shut up! I screamed inside my head.
Please! Just shut up!
He was practically waving a death flag over his own head.
But he kept going.
"I even picked a name for our child, Captain. If it's a girl, my fiancée will choose. But if it's a boy, I want to name him Alben after my father. I told her I'll come home with heroic stories from the battlefield, not news of my death. I even promised to stop gambling and stop drinking once we get married! Please don't die, Captain! I—"
Stop. Do you actually want to die?
I closed my eyes. This kid…
The potion finally ran out. The burning in my chest began to fade. My breathing no longer felt painfully heavy. I could start moving my fingers again, though the rest of my body hadn't fully recovered.
Before I could shove him away or yell at his endlessly running mouth, I noticed something behind him.
A dark silhouette. An enemy soldier. Approaching. Sword raised.
The man's eyes widened, not because he saw me, but because he suddenly froze. A thin white line appeared across his chest and stomach as I swung my sword.
His body split cleanly in two, sliding apart before my blade even touched him. Only the cut remained, smooth and precise.
I rose slowly, brushing dirt off my clothes as if nothing happened. The soldier in front of me stared with a face drained of color.
I looked at him and let out a long sigh.
"You're definitely going to die if you keep talking like that."
After saying that, I rolled my shoulders and stretched the muscles that had stiffened earlier. The antidote was working. The heat of the poison faded from my veins, replaced by the familiar heaviness of strength returning to my body.
I saw five enemies approaching. Their strides steady, their faces twisted in anger, like dogs that had found their prey. One of them yelled,
"Smiling Knight… you're dead!"
The others followed with insults, curses hurled like stones. I ignored all of it. Words never reached me anyway.
The only thing that mattered was the line.
In my mind, I drew a thin, straight line through their bodiesfrom shoulder to waist, waist to chest. A line of death I had already decided must be severed.
I lifted my sword.
One swing.
SHHRAAACK!
Their bodies split simultaneously, neat and clean. Their swords, their armor, their flesh and bone—sliced effortlessly like tofu. They didn't even have the chance to scream. Their bodies fell apart amid the clatter of shattered metal.
I glanced behind me. The kid stared with wide eyes, somewhere between relief and terror. But I had no time to reassure or scold him. Dozens more enemies were already charging toward me, rushing like a tidal wave ready to swallow me whole.
I moved.
My sword cut through the air.
Everything that touched my blade was severed, or even before it reached me. All I needed was to draw the line in my mind, the line that had to break. After that, my sword simply followed the path I had chosen. It didn't matter whether their armor was intact or not.
Dozens of soldiers in heavy armor rushed forward, only to be sliced apart.
A massive creature built like a monstrous bear—I beheaded it.
A man with protruding bones that formed spears across his body—I split him in two.
Suddenly, the ground beneath me writhed. Roots wrapped around my legs, holding me down. I couldn't move for a moment. At the same time, dozens of people appeared and screamed in unison.
"DIE, MAD DOG!"
"PERISH!"
"SMILING KNIGHT, GO TO HELL!"
They leaped from every direction. One swung a flaming sword, fire snapping through the air. Another thrust a radiant spear glowing with holy light. Someone else raised a massive hammer crackling with lightning. Another unleashed a dark blade that broke into three shadowy birds. And more and more—every power, every technique, every rage hurled straight at me at once.
I saw it all. A smile crept up my scarred and broken face.
This. Yes… this feeling.
I inhaled slowly. I drew the lines, one by one across all of them.
I shattered the roots around my legs with a stomp and surged forward.
SHIK! SHRAAK! KRASSH!
In the next second, all their attacks vanished—along with their bodies, cut apart along the lines I had imagined. Pieces of flesh, armor, weapons, even their techniques scattered into the air like confetti of death.
But before their blood could touch the ground, dozens more appeared to replace them.
I smiled again.
Then I began to dance.
My sword tore through the air, cutting, splitting, slicing, breaking. Every line I drew became a new fate for whatever crossed it. Blood sprayed across the tall grass. Flesh and armor flew everywhere.
Right.
Just like this.
I loved this feeling.
When they all attacked at once, when I couldn't think of anything except surviving and killing them all.
When my blade touched their bodies and I felt that clean, perfect severing… I could feel it down to my bones.
My heart pounded wildly.
My life hung on the edge every second.
And as I danced with death, all the burdens of my life disappeared.
I didn't think about the wounds all over my body.
I didn't think about what I had lost.
I didn't think about her.
Only two things remained in my mind: survive and cut them all down.