Durest:

  The prong of knight’s zweihander bites into his exposed shoulder. The black skin underneath pusses with purple blood and that same yellow fluid that might sputter out when you pop a pimple. The prong actually halts my arc with the blade—that, and my inability to wield it correctly. The sword is too damn big.

  Still, I manage to slide my knees away from a lurching grab attempt by the knight. He makes no sound of pain as I awkwardly wrench the blade free of his shoulder. And he makes no concerted effort to dodge the second arc of his own sword, now spinning with his own blood, now cutting into his own flesh and ripping away the tissue of his arm.

  A third arc and the arm hangs on by a thread of stringy flesh.

  A four arc and the arm falls to the grass, leaving behind a back and gray stump which gushes with that dark purple and yellow fluid.

  I huff and puff and admire my work for a moment. Really, it's a miracle I even got this far. He too seems frozen by the moment—staring into my eyes through that ever-black visor. I imagine, from an outside perspective, it must look as though we both agreed to a break. A time-out, if you will.

  My arms shake with the effort of raising the blade.

  But I raise it anyway.

  And once more, it comes crashing down. I always thought that blades such as this would create their own music—would whistle through the air as they cleaved their enemies. But of course, as it always is with me, I’m fucking wrong. The only sounds that come are the ones that I don’t really expect. Everything seems muted and off when I wail into his armor. His flesh. He doesn’t react like any normal human being would. Indifference is all I can chalk it up to.

  I kick him over. He falls flat on his back. It seems so easy now; almost as if he’s a completely different being from before. I press my boot against his chest and breathe in the frost of violet soulfreeze.

  Then, I raise the zweihander to stab down into the visor.

  My motion is too slow. Right before the blade presses down, the knight shrugs me off his body. It's as easy as shifting to his side—I tumble off and trip over my own leg like a sodden drunk.

  When I try standing once more, I find that the effort is a lot easier than expected, despite my fatigue. Then I realize why it's so easy: he’s picking me up by the cuff of my shirt, dangling me in front of him like a child. His other hand grasps onto my neck and begins to squeeze.

  His other hand?

  Right. Right I cut it off. But it's still there. Born anew in the blink of an eye, armored and all. As if it was never even sundered.

  The zweihander falls from my hand.

  The purple snow harries forth with a renewed fervor, turning into a veritable blizzard as the 64th knight so effortlessly wrings my neck and my body of all its air, all its life.

  “This. Continue. Forever. And. Ever. Until. You. Die. True. Death. So. Give. It. Up. Or. Leave. Continent,” he speaks. His voice no longer sounds foreign, but rather, it oscillates between lowly beggar and rich virtuoso, between merchant and king, whore and queen, pipe addict and lilting singer. Each word, each syllable, each intonation begs a question that I cannot answer—a result I cannot give.

  My legs kick and kick and kick.

  Then they stiffen under me, like a marionette going taut as the show ends.

  And the curtains fall.

  …

  Raiten:

  We put up a good fight for about thirty seconds.

  She focuses on me, so I bait her ‘round the crater while Kiren sets Meteorfang ablaze, lashing her with ball and kunai both. The ball-end bludgeons her body as she slashes at mine. Her blades score gashes of long, ribbon-skinning lines across my chest, ripping open the black of my uniform. Some tassels fall limp as I roll under her hammer hand and Kiren’s firebrand kunai leaves a scorching mark across the back of her head, opening it up to reveal a blinding purple glow within. The cramming was not all in vain, for it did weaken her metal. Each blow Kiren delivers now opens her up in new ways.

  I just don’t know when she’ll die.

  So I keep going. And she keeps chasing, landing more and more hits.

  Until eventually, she catches Meteorfang by her blades, curling them inwards to pull Kiren to her. I curse and jump on her back landing two axe-elbows to her already flayed metal.

  She rises into the air, pulling both Kiren and I up.

  Then smashes back down into the same crater.

  I break her fall. And break along with her fall.

  Kiren, meanwhile, is flung to the edge of the crater. She stalks toward him now, metal creaking with fatigue that seems all too human.

  Despite my broken body, my waning regeneration, and all the pain that lances through me, I find enough willpower and grit to stand forth and charge.

  Kiren also finds that strength, but to his detriment. For when he stands, it is only to receive the cleaving arc of her blades and her hammer hand, both coming together to smash and rake him apart.

  I won’t let her.

  I slide under the Lady’s legs and shoulder-tackle Kiren. He falls away from the blow. I stumble into it.

  Her blades slice into my right arm and leg, three cuts that connect my right side like an Adachi pot-maker molding clay. The hammer smashes into my left and breaks all that is there. I am the sword that the blacksmith throws away after cracking it with a hammer too quickly—not minding the smelt.

  Pain doesn’t even register. Rather, the visual alone of my mangled self grants me enough mercy to fall and close my eyes.

  Someone yells. Kiren probably.

  And for the first time in a long while, I don’t even feel my regeneration. So, the threshold has finally been reached. And with wounds like this…

  I feel as though I have become a spectator to all that is occurring. The world is merely a memory. Fading fast.

  Perhaps I will see Mother.

  …

  Durest:

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  Orange light pierces the blurry veil of my vision. In a single moment, the world turns horizontal and my aching neck is released. I swallow a wealth of air like the greedy bastard merchant that I am, and I cough and I spit and I get the fuck up.

  Vision returns and I see that three more fiery arrows bristle into the slightest of chinks in the knight’s armor. A fourth comes, then a fifth. All hit with expert accuracy. All driving the knight further away from me and closer to the leaf pile.

  I look back to see a limping Nimra leaning against Gareth for support. In her mouth are two arrows, notched in her bow are another two.

  “It takes me a while to find my enemy’s chinks. Their weaknesses. But once I do, I can assure you, I never miss,” she growls through the muffle of her arrows. She fires the two notched in her bow before spitting another into her hand and firing again.

  The knight can’t keep up, despite his best efforts. He tries raising his hands to block the blows, but she just finds the chinks in their plating too. And eventually, she doesn’t even need to aim for the gaps—for her precision allows for breaking points to be made in the armor.

  I watch in utter amazement as she fills him with arrows—as the knight becomes a parody of a hedgehog.

  Gareth starts laughing. I do too, more so out of sheer shock rather than his own jubilation.

  The knight flails by the edge of the pit, struggling to keep his balance. One more shot will do him in.

  Gareth’s laughter crescendoes. Then halts.

  Because the shots stop coming.

  I turn back to her, realize, when I see the look of abject horror on her face, that she’s out of arrows.

  Gareth and Nimra are both too injured to continue the fight.

  If the knight doesn’t fall here and now, we lose.

  And even if my neck is purple and bruised…

  It doesn’t really matter to me.

  After all, I can’t speak.

  With that stupid thought running through my head, laughter alleviates all. The mirth is dispelled and I feel light—free.

  I pick up the knight’s sword, and it too feels lighter now.

  Then, I bound towards him, taking leaping steps towards his swaying form. Just as the knight straightens, I jump high and, with all the strength and all the pent-up frustration I can muster, I swing the sword.

  The knight clasps both hands and catches the blade. His back foot slides against the shrub pile.

  I hear Gareth curse.

  But I’m smiling.

  Because I’ve realized something—I fight like a man who is afraid of death. That’s why I lose. That's what I've been losing. But why should I hold on to the same fears as everyone else? After all, I’m cursed.

  I might as well enjoy it while it lasts.

  So, with that same shit-eating grin, as I land in front of the knight, I let go of the sword.

  And I tackle straight into him, flinging us both into the leaf pile.

  The shrubbery falls away to the damp blackness of that hole Nimra created. And the spiked trap beneath waits hungrily for both of us as we fall together.

  …

  Raiten:

  This time, I am treated to the full flash of my life. From pathetic childhood to my years of torment in the tower. Baroth, Afrasiyab, bloody ravens, wyverns, eldritch beings, and more. Much, much more.

  But the people who stand out the most this time are not my Mother nor Hui. Not Sadai. Not Erot nor his family.

  Sorina.

  And Kai.

  Odd pair, those two in my mind. But I get good memories of both. Kai training me in the tower. Sorina letting me lay my head on her lap and weep into her shoulder.

  Then the bad of what Kai did comes to mind. The argument with Sorina at the Catolican fortress. And it sweeps all else away. For a brief, terrifying moment, I think that I’m going to die with only that wretched embarrassment replaying over and over again.

  When I wake up, I find that I’m covered in sticky, green, foul-smelling vomit. I rise to my elbows, then my knees, and nearly keel over once more.

  A hand steadies me.

  “Easy Raiten,” Zyla says. I stare at her dumbly, mouth agape. I try speaking, but find that I’m too weak to even do that. She’s not even looking at me. Rather, she’s gazing into the crater.

  So Umbarhorn pulled through.

  Relief floods my body. We’re not going to die after all.

  “Your shark threw up on you,” she continues. “Said it would help.”

  Right. Forgot that’s how Umbrahorn heals people.

  Surprised he even lended me that courtesy. I’ll have to thank him.

  I would’ve died otherwise.

  I follow Zyla’s gaze to find Saegor and Umbrahorn fighting the Lady. Well, more like the two of them beating the ever-living shit out of her. Umbrahorn pops in and out of the ground, smacking her with his tail and retreating before she can retaliate. Saegor cackles gleefully as he levies all sorts of magicks against her. Dark smoke clutches at her breaking legs and seeps into her body, eating her from the inside out while he casts small lines of blue light that go directly through her metal. Aether, I think.

  Zyla raises a lazy hand and two wind spirit hands emerge from her palm, pulling Kiren’s unconscious body towards us as well.

  I vaguely recognize the wind spirits, but thinking hurts right now and I’d rather not. Even staying awake is taking all I have.

  “I saw what you did for him. Thank you for saving my brother,” Zyla says. It doesn’t sound like a thank you, really. I can still detect all that disdain that she holds for me.

  Not that I care. I’m just glad he’s still alive.

  My vision darkens. I try staying awake through the rest of the fight. I want to see her die.

  I don’t get the chance. Nor do I get that gratifying finale I so desperately hoped for. Instead, the last image of the Lady I see is her head giving off that same-damn warble it always does right before she screams.

  Then, all goes dark as I finally get the chance to rest.

  …

  Durest:

  I close my eyes as my hands splay and scramble to clutch at the dirt wall. My nails break and bleed as I smash my fingers into the side of the pit.

  My fall slows. Slackens.

  His doesn’t.

  I hear the clang of metal.

  Then, I open my eyes.

  I stare at the enemy below me, his armor pierced by arrows, his back pierced by spikes. He writhes on the wooden stakes that Nimra set, but they are too numerous and too many. Still, I won’t take my chances.

  I climb my way out of the pit.

  I almost want him to scream at me. To swear his vengeance or to even just imitate some human pain. But all I hear is that gushing of blood and creaking of metal as he tries and fails to wrench himself free of the spikes.

  The hole is deep. Probably the only reason why I survived is because it was dug so deep—at Nimra’s insistence.

  My grip strength falters. Just as I near the end.

  However, a hand reaches down and clasps onto my arm, hoisting me out of the hole.

  Gareth dusts my frock off and smiles at me.

  “Brilliant stuff merchant. I thought we lost you for a second there.”

  I smile weakly at him but my eyes are still fixated on the knight below.

  Nimra’s eyes are too. She hands me my fallen ledger and for a moment, I stare at the journal blankly. Then, I remember my task.

  Right. I have enough innate mana for one last thing.

  I write out the equation as quickly as I can before solving for the tangent in Servanta. Then, just as I write the last number, I toss the soulfire paper into the hole. It burns like a blue ember down to the bottom of the pit.

  The wooden spikes take the flame. And soon, the very pit itself becomes a brazen azure fire. The knight is covered in that blue flame, colonized and consumed by it.

  His voice lilts up to us in one last cry.

  “I. Am. Only. One. Of. 99. Others…” There’s a pause as the flame eats into his armor, into his visor.

  “We. Will. Never. Stop.”

  That is all he says before his voice fades into that haunting children’s tune which will no doubt plague my nightmares for years to come. It distorts as he dies, pitching at all the wrong places, and ending on a low note that winks out in the dark.

  Slowly but surely, the purple snow stops falling.

  And all that remains is the distinct smell of a soul burning to ash and dust.