I believe that this is the end, and, in all truth, it is of my own doing.
The world is so blurry now, almost as if it was a memory fading from my mind due to decades of time and pressing matters. What image would come to view after my soul passes through Mayfil? Only the essence of Mayfil can decide what bliss will befall me.
I have heard that one's life passes through their eyes when they near their last breath, but I really do not see any past memories. I see the world as if there was a veil over my eyes.
The chilled wet earth feels akin to my body and my heart. The only warmth that I feel comes from the wound, my mortal wound. Even if I had the strength to try to stem the flow of the coppery liquid with my hands, I knew that the lifeblood would filter through my fingers due to watching humans try the same thing.
It is so hard to believe that this is how it ends.
I am so pathetic. How could I fall to a human's blade?
How do you feel, this voice calls to me. I have no idea who this thought could belong to nor could I even answer this puzzling question. What are they talking about?
I take it you don't feel so well?
My body has long since gone numb.
I can make you feel better.
It is too late for me.
I believed that I was in a comatose state for quite some time, but as I realize my surroundings change I feel as if Mayfil has sent its will.
Wrong, little one.
So the voice prevails.
It seems as if I am on a hill, and although I know that there is more land rolling lazily for miles attached to it, I cannot quite see it. This sight I behold is not something that I can describe, and barely am I able to believe that I can actually see it in front of my bare eyes.
On the exact center of this well-rounded hill is a tree, which is both strong and youthful in appearance. Sunlight that seems to have no source, makes the green leaves glow so very bright, and it makes everything and everyone who gaze upon it feel so pure.
Crouching before me is a child who dons a brown cloak that is the precise color of the bark of that enigmatic tree. Their eyes are like the glowing leaves. Beyond any doubt, this child is most charming.
A finger that belonged to this whelp of the tree had been pointing at my throat without myself even noticing. Immediately my hand traces over the wound that was inflicted upon me only to find that it had scarred over.
How could I deny the feeling of the thin line that should have been sticky with my blood?
"Am I dead," I found the voice to ask.
No, his word replied in my mind whilst his lips said it.
How strange.
This brought about his smile, which revealed perfect white teeth. Why am I noting this?
How do you feel?
He asked this question three times as far as I can recall. What is the point of it, and what do my feelings matter?
"Well, I believe, but my pride is wounded," I bite back at him. Where am I if I am not in the land of the dead?
He was trying to form words, and although I could see his mouth move, there was no voice in my mind like before. He turns then to face what should have been the sky, but I cannot look up to see what it was for I find myself transfixed on the roots of the tree.
Play the serpent, a multitude of voices assaulted me. Pain shoots through me as this illusionary plane breaks down from an opposing force.
It is raining.
I open an eye to find that I am not with that boy, but where I had fallen.
Life is still with me.
Once again, I trace over the wound.
"It is a scar," the rain did not respond to my strange remark.
Although my physical form felt weak, I retained enough mana to teleport back to my fortress home.
The doors, gold and majestic, that marked the entrance to Dictator Melbu's throne are easy enough to push open.
I was never this afraid to confront him before.
It was just he. No other wingly beside myself occupied the space, and although I knew that he probably was expecting me due to my absence, he seems rather startled by my presence here.
"Sir, I am ashamed to report that in-in my arrogance, I left with Lieutenant Arlan on an assault against the rebel humans. It is grim that I believe we have lost him, a fine soldier. I returned just now after I recovered from a wound I thought that would have been severe," I am surprised that my voice rarely shakes, but my legs give out.
I sob on the floor.
Melbu Frahma has always been lenient towards me, many have said. He tends to be kind to his fellow kin, but he hates failure. As a child, I could have said he was my parental figure. Now, he is my . . . leader. I will always follow his orders for he knows what is best for us.
He spoke no words as he landed in front of me, and knelt. Those eyes of his seemed to gloss over as if he were sympathizing my predicament.
Yet as soft as they were then, they seemed to be as cruel as ever. Did he know something that I did not?
Melbu put his hand on my shoulder. His throat cleared. Was he going to scold me?
"Lieutenant Shinobu Tsuda, I recommend that you refrain from military activities for awhile. Use whatever time you have to become stronger and do not perform any actions like the one you took. Due to the endangerment and death that you placed on a comrade, you will hold no power that you had from your rank until you atone, but by my will."
He nodded for me to leave. I did not disobey.
When I made it to my room, all seemed colder. All seemed dull. All seemed worthless.
I lean inside my pod-shaped bed.
"'Play the serpent'," they had said, and I fear that I know what they mean.
Serpents lied and stabbed others' backs.
I shake my head.
"I am not a serpent," my voice screams to that boy. He probably could not hear me.
Maybe he was not real?
Silence graces me as I contemplate what had just occurred.
I was bested a human in my arrogance.
I was the cause of a wingly's death.
I should have died.
Someone or something wants me to betray my race.
My leader knows something, and I believe that it involves me.
Why is it that my world feels so unstable all of a sudden?
I trace my hand over that thin scar.
I knew that I should have died.