Awakening from deep slumber, the young ten year-old boy who had been put to bed by his older sister was confused when he saw her standing over his bedside with an oil lantern held in her hand. "Mhmm…? Nghh… W-What are you doing in here?" The young boy stuttered out with a tired and confused voice, as he was suddenly pulled out of bed by the light-brown haired teenager. "Vivi, w-why did you-"
"-We need to leave, Ren; please, come," Vivi interrupted while sounding calm like usual, despite clearly having a panicked undertone that carried a sense of urgency behind her words. Pulling her younger brother by the hand without waiting for him to even get his bearings, Vivi took only her small satchel that contained the bear necessities: a folded map, a compass, one hunting knife and a small roll of wire with a basic fishing hook packed neatly beside it.
And as he was pulled out through the back entrance of their small kitchen, it was then that the boy finally recognized the distinct sound of blood-curdling shrieking, which only became more audible as they finally left their cottage. With his muscles tensing up as the color from his already pale face faded in fear, the young boy was jolted back to his senses the moment his left foot lost its balance; causing him to tumble forward, and forcing his sixteen year-old sister to turn around to help him up.
Past the oil-fed flame within her lantern's glass chamber, it was then that Vivi noticed from the corner of her vision a ghastly sight that made her eyes widen in terror. The three Qin sisters— who she had grown up with and all of which were beautiful and ran their farm independently after their parents' demise— were being dragged out of their burning cottage by their hair; bare naked, with cuts and scratches all over their defiled bodies.
Muttering a quiet apology for not being able to rescue them from the nightmarish fate that was certainly awaiting them, any sense of being stealthy came to an immediate halt the moment Vivi suddenly noticed that the goblins within the group pillaging had taken notice of her and her younger brother. "G-Get up, NOW!" Vivi shouted with her heart racing and her knees buckling, tightening her grasp on her younger brother's hand, as she dragged him behind her as she made a mad dash toward the double doors of their small run-down barn.
Stricken with horror, the young boy watched as the horde of green monsters came sprinting towards them with their bloodied weapons drawn, and vile-deprived smiles across all of their green faces. Feeling the blades of grass and patches of dirt beneath the backsides of his legs, the young boy didn't even register that his sister had thrown him into the barn until he heard her shutting the barn doors close behind them.
'How… How the hell did this even happen…? Weren't the guards supposed to keep them out? How did they get past them?' The young boy thought to himself in his panicked state of mind, as he stared up at the triangular ceiling high above him, as he laid on a thick patch of scattered hay. Hearing his sister whimpering loudly, the boy finally snapped out of his near-catatonic state before sitting up to gaze upon her.
The shoddy lock that she had been neglecting to replace due to a lack of coin had broken off almost immediately upon trying to secure the double doors, and with a small group of deprived goblins trying to crack open the double doors to their barn like a greedy safecracker trying to get into a bank's compromised vault, Vivi did the only did she could think to do. Pressing her back up against the doors while digging her heels into the loose floorboards, Vivi— regardless of the soul-crushing dread she felt washing over her very being— put on the bravest smile she could muster up on her teary-eyed face, as she locked eyes with her terrified brother.
"R-Ren… L-Listen to me- ngh…!" Vivi articulated clearly, before grunting as she pressed more of her weight against both doors that were being pried open with the weapons the goblins were carrying; their daunting laughter carried a perverse tone in their shrill voices, as some were even as bold as to squeeze their fingers between the gaps. "Agh…! G-Go under the false floorboard; w-where I keep our savings…! D-Don't come outside, okay?!" Vivi instructed with fears beginning to take over her calm demeanor, as she felt multiple dirty-fingernails claws tauntingly into her clothes and exposed skin, causing her to bleed, as the goblins showed just how eager they were to get a hold of her.
Sobbing violently while struggling to fill his lungs with enough air to speak, the boy's limbs felt heavy under his control as he clumsily scrambled up to his feet; his body feeling foreign to him, as he heard the wooden doors crack and splinter behind his sister. "V-Vivi…!" The boy stammered out, as he took a step toward his sister with one tiny hand reaching out for her. 'What do I do, what do I do, WHAT DO I DO?!' The young boy thought to himself, as he took another step toward his sister. 'The doors are breaking… They're already grabbing her… I can't stop them… I can't…'
More concerned with the preservation of her younger brother's life than hers, which she already saw as doomed, Vivi let out a horrified gasp as she watched through her brown eyes as the he began to inch closer toward her. "R-Ren?! W-What are you doing?! H-Hide already; I-I can't hold them off for much longer! P-Please; d-do it for me!" Vivi begged out desperately, before yelping as she saw from the corner of her peripheral vision as the head of a copper axe split into the door, just a few inches to the left from where the back of her head was at.
Tightening his fist into balls, the young boy's light brown bangs covered his eyes as he lowered his head toward the hay-covered floor below him. "N-No… No, I… I-I c-can't, Vivi! I-I can't!" The boy protested in a scared voice, while feeling too overwhelmed to notice the glowing rune that was beginning to form around him on the floor; it's dim and barely noticeable cyan light becoming more noticeable to his sister with each passing second, as his juvenile mind began finding a way to accept the fate before him. 'Help… Someone help… Please… Anyone… Help us… I… I don't want us to die.'
With seconds left before the goblins would come flooding into the barn, the emotional barriers that Vivi mind had placed on itself in an attempt to remain calm before her younger brother came crumbling down; leaving behind a heartbroken and damned girl, who began violently sobbing out a prayer to whatever god was merciful enough to come to their rescue. Shutting her eyes as their expected doom came closing in, all Vivi could think to herself was about how she should have just hid her younger brother inside their house while she still had time, instead of trying to hopelessly escape in the middle of a goblin raid.
In that moment as the splintered double doors finally broke apart, time seemed to come to a stand still for the young boy as he raised his face up from the barn's floor, and away from the nearby blinding light that was radiating from the circular sigil underneath his feet. The world around him became obscured in darkness, making it that much harder for the boy to see the still image of the goblins trampling over his sister. Standing before him and the frozen moment captured in time was a petite girl with long snow-white.
Most of her face was obscured by a pastel-blue mask that looked to be made of the same metal that was used in her sleek-bulky armor that covered only her upper-half; leaving her petite legs covered in only thigh-high white stockings and minimal armor that only covered the sides of her legs, and the high-heeled boots that she had. The glowing cyan-markings that she had etched over the laminated layer of her mask and armor were all similar in design to that of the rune beneath him.
Although the boy couldn't see through her mystical face-mask, there still was a small part within his terrified and confused mind that knew that she was staring at him with sympathy within her eyes. "... The memories of my past summons elude my immediate recollection, as such thoughts only remain dormant within my subconscious… But even so, I'm confident to say that I have never been summoned by a mere child before; especially one who's in such a dire situation, such as yourself," the stranger spoke in a youthful sounding voice, despite seeming mentally mature when she spoke.
The boy— awestruck by the breath-taking elegance and powerful presence that the young-looking woman before him carried with her— wanted nothing more than to speak to her; to ask her one of the many questions that were swarming around in his panicked mind. However, given the fact that the goblins had already broken into their barn and were certainly going to ravage him and his sister if time were to resume as normal, the boy felt more compelled to ask the white-haired girl for help; to beg her for salvation. However, all that the fear-stricken boy could do in that moment was tremble silently, as his body refused to cooperate with what his mind wanted it to do.
Despite having fears that the elegant and knightly girl would abandon him for his lack of words, the boy felt hope beginning to resonate within him as he watched as two highly advanced and sleek weapons appeared over her armored forearms. Duel-wielding a set of arm-swords that had large decorative-silver blades that extended past her small wrists, the young woman turned her back toward the boy so she could instead face toward the onslaught of goblins that were beginning to slowly unfreeze as time began to resume once again.
"... You're not only a human, but a naïve child at that… And though you are blinded by your youth, you'll do well to heed my orders, as it's an absolute that the weak must obey the strong," the girl said in a serious and stoic voice that was low in pitch, as she bent her knees to lower herself closer to the barn's hay-covered floor. "Your "Mana" reservoir… It is abysmally small… I won't be able to maintain his corporal form effectively… I'll have a two-meter radius to manifest myself around you, and even then I'll only be able to remain physical for extremely brief moments of time…"
"... That human over there? She's just out of my reach… Right now, your perception of time is returning to the rate that it once was," the white-haired knight explained, before turning her head toward her large-armored shoulder; so as to stare back through her glowing mask, to where the terrified youth was looking back at her with a widened gaze. "My first order to you is for you to run as fast as your legs can carry you. Go forth, and bring me to those wretched creatures, so that I may lay waste to them."
Flexing his fingers involuntarily through breaths of air that were growing more rapid and shallow with each time he exhaled, the boy's eyes focused on the twenty goblins that were slowly beginning to quicken in their movements; one half of them crowding over the broken double doors that were the only thing separating them from reaching Vivi's body, while the other half of the goblins were storming toward him with cruel lust in their vile eyes. 'Scared… I feel scared… And yet… And yet, this feeling that I have… What is it? Why do I feel like… Empowered?'
Looking away from her shoulder, the girl with white-hair returned her focus toward the incoming group of ravenous goblins that were tunnel-visioned on getting their hands on the boy. "Make no mistake, you might hold the title of "Master", but you are but a child; a child that has no experience to command me in this battle, or any battle for that matter. Do as I say, boy… That's an order," the white-haired woman said in a cold-calculating voice, as she mustered as much "Mana" from the young boy as she could; her senses christened, as she mentally mapped out her plan of attack.
'... "Master"? Where did that even… No. No, it doesn't matter right now. I… I gotta do what she says; she might be our only chance to get out of here alive, and I can't ruin that! Not for Vivi's sake, I can't,' the young boy thought to himself, as he finally felt the composure he needed to gain control of his body. 'I'm still scared out of my mind, but… Doing nothing is a whole lot scarier than doing something about it, so… Here goes nothing, I guess,' the boy thought almost sarcastically to himself, as he let out a trembling breath as he lowered himself toward the floor; just like how the mysterious woman was doing before him.
With his head lowered slightly, the boy's light-brown bangs obscured his eyes, but allowed him just enough vision to see where he needed to run toward. And as the sigil beneath his feet flickered away with its dying light fading out of existence, the boy could feel his heart racing inside of his chest as tightening his trembling fingers into defiant fists. "... That's fine," the boy muttered under his breath, before clenching his jaw as he forced his legs to sprint toward Vivi as fast as they could carry his small body.
The four goblins who saw a mere child charging toward them like a cornered animal brought a twisted smile to their crooked-mouths; sadistic amusement filling their detached heads, as none of them saw the flickering afterimage of an armored girl appearing before them. The armed goblins who had been bringing up the rear soon found themselves sharing the sudden decapitation and dismemberment that their comrades in the front had gone through. Left as nothing but dying heads that watched in their final moments as their bodies dropped toward the ground one-by-one, the group of twelve goblins had been dealt with before the young boy's foot even touched the floor.
Despite the goblins being unable to keep up with how fast the mysterious girl was able to appear in-and-out of their dimension, the feeling growing within the boy that gave him the strength to move had allowed him to catch glimpses of the white-haired knight's merciless grace. 'She's fast… Really fast… How did I even see her do half of that stuff?' The young boy thought suddenly to himself, as he watched her begin brutally slaughtering the goblins that were crowding on top of his sister with her two magical arm-swords.
Even though she possessed an almost child-like innocence on the outside, the white-haired knight's brutal demeanor in battle betrayed her appearance. Tightening her pink lips to bare her teeth at her enemies, the girl was hacking and slashing the goblins while letting out angered grunts each time her blade cleaved through their green flesh and bones. 'This won't stand! Nothing about this makes any sense! This child… He CLEARLY lacks the capacity to summon a servant… So how? How did I get here with him, in this… W-Whatever this world is supposed to be?!' The white-haired girl thought frustratingly to herself, until she had dispatched all twenty-eight goblins that had attempted to assault the boy's sister.
Knowing that her master lacked any ability or knowledge to properly control her, the white-haired girl faded back into the boy's body, so as to replenish what limited mana she had to work with, as he finally reached the splintered doors. "Vivi…! Vivi, y-you're okay…! You're okay, heh…!" The boy muttered with tears beginning to leak out from the corners of his surprised eyes, as an anxious smile softly found its way across his quivering lips.
Almost as stunned as her younger brother was, Vivi needed a moment to get a hold of her bearings before finally regaining control of her violently-shaking limbs. "W… W-What h-happened, Ren…? How did you even…?!" The older sister stuttered out, as pushed herself up from beneath the two broken doors, as her younger brother helped her by pushing each splintered door off of her scratched-up body. 'What even happened? One moment I was preparing myself for the worst, and then the next…?! Dear gods above!' Vivi thought to herself, as she suddenly let out a shocked gasp the moment she finally noticed all of the carnage that coated the floor and walls of their rustic barn.
Staring down at her quietly sobbing brother with fear and confusion in her beautiful brown eyes, Vivi had a bewildered expression on her sweat-covered face as she slowly raised her trembling finger up to point at all the spilt blood and mutilated bodies that laid around them. "R-Ren…?! W-Was this… Was this YOU?! If so, t-then… Then h-how did you actually manage to k-kill these things all by yourself…?!" Vivi asked with a cathartic feeling washing over her. 'I'm thankful to be alive, but… I just don't understand how he could have done something like this. He's just a kid, and isn't even carrying a weapon! I just- W-WHAT THE…?!' The teenager's thoughts suddenly shifted, as she let out a surprised yelp the moment she saw the white-haired knight appear in front of her brother, within a flash of cyan-light.
"In the name of the Round Table, I order you to step aside at once…!" The girl commanded with an authoritative voice that sounded stoic, as she gestured for Vivi to do as she was told by raising her right blade up to shoo her away.
"Ehh?! W-Wait, I-I don't know what's going on here…!" Vivi uttered out in a fearful and confused tone. Immediately backing away from the sharpened tip of the cyan-glowing blade that was being waved in front of her face, Vivi raised her hands up to her chest as a way to signal that she was of no threat. "W-Who are you, a-and where did you come-"
"-I have neither the time nor desire to answer your questions, human! Scurry to safety while you can!" The white-haired knight interrupted with the best noble voice she could muster, before immediately turning her back to the utterly perplexed teenager to stare back at her master's timid and stressed face. "You and I are going to have a long discussion after this… But for now, you'll do as I say, when I say… Do you understand me, child?" The girl asked, as though she were talking to a subordinate that was obligated to follow her commands.
'I can tell she doesn't respect me, and I don't even think she likes me very much; seems like she's only tolerating me for the time being… But even so, she's everything that we need to rescue as many people as we can, so…' The boy's thoughts trailed off, before he snapped back to the reality of the situation before him. "... Yes, Dame Knight; I-I understand," the boy replied while trying to sound as brave as he could; earning himself a mildly surprised yet pleased smirk from the white-haired girl.
"Hmph… I see you were raised with proper manners, child. Now christine your resolve, for I'll need you to deliver me to those who are in need of rescue," the white-haired woman said with a nod, before her body was dispersed into several large cyan-glowing orbs that were immediately absorbed into the boy's body. "Now let us make haste; for every second we waste idling, another life is taken by those vermin," the girl spoke directly to the boy's conscience, as he once again felt invigorated with strength that he had never experienced before in his short life.
"Of course, just… H-Hold on real quick… P-Please," the boy muttered in an apologetic tone to the white-haired girl taking refuge in his very soul, before stepping forward quickly to where his sister was staring back at him with her jaw agape. "Vivi, a-are you-"
"-W-What in the world was that girl, Ren…?! Is she some sort of spirit?! W-Why is she here, a-and why is she-"
"-Vivi, I-I don't know! I-I really don't know what's going on… But… B-But what I do know is that she's strong, and fast… And that she's the only hope that everyone here's got," the boy said, while trying to return the favor to his older sister by trying to be the calm one in the situation. Lowering his head to the floor, the boy narrowed his eyelids as he tightened his hands once again to ball fists by his sides. "... I… I need you to stay hidden in that crawl space… The one you tried to get me to climb into," the boy said, as he gestured over with his head toward the aforementioned hiding spot.
Feeling dread coursing through her already shaken-up body, the brown-haired teenager's eyes grew wide as she slowly shook her head at her younger brother. "R-Ren, you… Y-You aren't making sense right now… D-Didn't that knight say that she was going to save the village, I-I think…?! S-So then, w-what are you trying to insinuate…?" Vivi asked with a nervous smile growing across her face, as she heard more women screaming in the near distance, just outside the walls of their damaged barn.
"She can't go past two meters from where I'm at, so… So I'm going to circle around the barn, so she can kill all of the goblins, or whatever else is destroying our village. I'll expand outward; make a safe perimeter around you, and then go from there…?" The boy said aloud with a slightly uncertain tone in his voice, as he was merely repeating the words that the white-haired girl was speaking to him, and him alone. "Y-Yeah? Yeah, yeah… That's what I'm gonna do… That's what I have to do, so… J-Just stay here, okay…? Please?" The boy asked in a stressed and desperate tone, as he smiled anxiously at his older sister while beginning to walk past her to get through the empty door-frame.
'He… He can't be serious. It's a bloody war zone outside, and he expects me to just LET him put himself at risk, while I'm here waiting and hoping that he doesn't die out there, or WORSE?!' Vivi thought to herself, while slowly shaking her head as she watched as her younger brother brushed past her arm. Spinning around to where his back was facing her, the panicked older sister felt her protective instincts kick in as she reached out desperately with one hand to grab her younger brother by the back of his shoulder.
Even though he couldn't see it for himself, the boy did what the white-haired girl inside of him commanded him to do. Avoiding Vivi's pleading hand without needing to see where she was reaching out to grab him. Turning around quickly while walking backwards, the boy gave his stunned sister an apologetic smile before uttering out the words "I'm sorry," before turning back forward and sprinting out of the barn faster than he had ever ran in his life; leaving his sister behind in the barn, as his lungs were filled with the wretched stench of copper in the air, and scorched flesh.
Remembering the goblins who had sexually assaulted the Qin sisters next door, the boy crossed through his property and was able to use his newfound stamina and agility to catch up to the group of goblins, who were in the midst of sharing their young captives with another small group of their raiding kin. Although he was disgusted and horrified to see the vile sight of seeing his sister's friends getting pinned down and taken advantage of near a burned-down house, the unbridled rage and bloodlust he felt from the sickened girl inside of him gave him the willpower needed to willingly run towards the group of forty goblins; some of which turned their attention toward him, while letting the others breed the unwilling sisters.
Clenching his jaw shut as he watched as several of the goblins began pulling back sharpened arrows from the drawstring of their wooden longbows, the boy was reassured by the enraged servant that he wouldn't have to worry about them. With no better choice but to trust her, the boy was relentless in his advance toward the large group of goblins, and felt his heart skip a beat as he watched as the arrows came soaring toward him at high speeds.
Making good on her word, the white-haired knight repeatedly blinked in-and-out of existence, parrying each arrow with the blades of her arm-swords with ease. Sensing that some of the goblin archers had seen an extremely brief afterimage of her, the servant smiled to herself as she saw the once-cocky creatures stare at her master with confused and even nervous expressions on their disgusting faces.
The relief that the boy felt from surviving the arrows was short-lived, as he noticed that the goblins who had been ignoring him were suddenly turning their attention away from the sisters, after the goblin archers had called out to them in their own twisted tongue. 'That's right… Focus on me, not them,' the boy thought to himself, as more-and-more of his servant's righteous anger began to rub onto him.
Compared to the fear and shock he felt upon witnessing his servant slaying the goblins within his barn earlier, what the boy felt during the short time it took for the white-haired knight to chop the large group of goblins up into bloody chunks could only be described as satisfaction mixed in with righteous sadism. And with how fast his servant was able to appear in intervals between slashes and parries, all the Qin sister had seen throughout witnessing their next-door neighbor rescuing them were flashes of disorienting cyan light.
The eldest of the three sisters helped her siblings up from the ground; wrapping her arms around their bruised and bloodied bodies, and embracing them with tears in her eyes, as they all sobbed violently. Not knowing if they were coherent enough to speak, or even hear what he had to say, the boy used what time he could allot to tell them about his barn, and about how they would be safe there while he made his way throughout the rest of the village. Although the boy wanted to make sure that they got there safely on their own, since he questioned whether or not they would make it there on their own, the servant ordered him to loot a dagger from one of the many dismembered goblin bodies before reminding him how urgent it was that they secure the perimeter around his barn.
Having never left the village before in his life, and after spending countless hours with his best friend playing make-believe with her since they were four years-old, the boy was able to mentally keep track of where the barn was, as he followed the direction of where the nearest goblin group was. Although he had the best intentions of saving as many people as he could, the cruel truth of the matter for the boy was that most of the slaughtering of the men had already been done by the goblin army; meaning that all the survivors he managed to rescue were all young women and even children, who had already been assaulted several times over.
The more innocents she had seen defiled and in agony, the harder it was for the servant to restrain herself. Although she wasn't a stranger to bloodshed by any means, the white-haired knight found what the goblins within the boy's world were capable of to be unforgivable, and worthy only of death. Luckily for her, she had the insight to predict that she would eventually burn through her master's minute source of mana. However, what the servant hadn't predicted was that she would run out of the magical energy she needed to manifest her physical form when two arrows were shot at him.
"Dodge to your left!" The white-haired knight ordered, and watched from within the boy as he tried to do as he was told. Unfortunately, fatigue was beginning to creep up on the ten-year old boy, as his depleted magical source left him unable to benefit from the stamina that the servant's presence was providing him. After having had a hand in slaying nearly three-hundred goblins without being harmed, the boy's eyes went wide as a hot-searing pain shot down his left.
"AAAAGHHHH, NGHHH!" The boy wailed out in pain, as he stumbled forward with the dagger still held tightly in his right hand. Even though he was in agony, the servant's authoritative voice was enough for him to push his pain aside, in order to regain his composure and balance. Using his momentum from where he was about to fall, the boy did as the servant instructed, and dug his heel into the ground before spinning around to where the arrows had come from.
With two arrows planted into the back of his left shoulder, the boy's mind was flooded with encouraging words that gave him the resolution to sprint toward the group of goblins that had managed to successfully fire their projectiles into his body. More alert and aware of his fatigue, the boy only suffered a few cuts from the arrows he had barely managed to dodge with the help of his servant's acute battle sense.
When he finally closed the distance with the two goblin archers, he found himself struggling to fight his stronger opponents; both of which were swinging their own short-swords at him, while all he had going for him was dwindling stamina, muscles aches, and the a white-haired girl barking orders to him. Having a few close calls, including getting the left side of his cheek nicked good with the edge of a dagger, eventually the boy successfully managed to slay his first two goblins with his own hand.
Slashing open the jugular of one goblin, the boy made sure to avoid getting kicked down by the other green-skinned archer before lunging forward. Plunging the dagger deep into the other goblin's stomach until the hilt of his weapon was pressing up against the screaming creature's abdomen, the boy let go of the bedded weapon to pick up the other goblin's dagger from the ground; using his second-acquired weapon to stab the screaming creature in the crotch, before pulling it out to repeatedly plunge it into its throat.
Covered in the blood of his enemies, with his own crimson-liquid trickling down from the back of his impaled shoulder, the boy felt woozy and began to lose his balance as he gasped for air. 'I'm so tired… How many of them are left?' He wondered, as his sweaty fingers made it that much harder for him to keep a grip on the bloodied weapon in his hand.
"Remain diligent and resilient, child; you have done exceptionally well so far. You have but one more group of degenerates to slay… A hobgoblin that's waiting outside the entrance of your village. He has a group of goblins with him, and they're all waiting to get their hands on whatever refuge would dare escape from their defiling claws. Make your way there, and put an end to them," the servant instructed with uncertainty in her voice, as even she was unsure whether or not her master had it in him to accomplish such a task. "Now pick up a bow, and fill the quiver with arrows… There's work to be done."
Within the crowded barn, Vivi found herself taking on the role as a shepherd to those who her brother had managed to rescue. Surrounded by those she had called her neighbor, Vivi was doing her best to stay preoccupied in order to not succumb to the overwhelming amount of despair from the crying women and children on her property. Traveling throughout the nearby ruined cottages and farmhouses within her property's nearby vicinity, the sixteen year-old girl felt oddly both satisfied and uncomfortable from all the mutilated goblins that she encountered while scavenging for supplies to bring back to her barn.
Pulling a small wagon behind her on the dirt road, one that she had filled with healing herbs, food and blankets, Vivi stood in the middle of an eerily quiet intersection; surrounded by dying fires and macabre sights, as she stared off past the fading smoke and out toward the direction of the village's main entrance. '… I don't understand how or why that spirit is fighting for you… But then again, you made it blatantly obvious that neither did you…'
'… There's nothing more right now that I hate right now than the cruel fact that you're the one who's having to put yourself in danger like this; even just the thought of losing you shudders me to my core,' Vivi lamented, as she lowered her head down with tears softly dripping down from the corners of her watery eyes. "Ren… Wherever you are… Please… Please, just… Just don't die; p-please…"
Outside the crumbling walls of the devastated village, two of the forty goblins who were posted outside its main gate; both small creatures were screaming profanities at each other, while standing over the slaughtered sheep that they were arguing over. Pulling out their small knives and threatening to slay one another, the green humanoid creatures were moments away from lunging at one another. That's when the two of them froze in fear, as they heard the lumbering steps of their superior coming toward them.
Screeching in fear, both goblins tried abandoning the sheep for the sake of protecting their own lives, but that's when one of them was lifted up by their neck. Cowering, the surviving goblin fled the scene; leaving the other impish creature at the mercy of the annoyed and hungry hobgoblin. Standing at six feet tall, the muscular and fatty monster sneered at the screaming goblin whose throat he had in his hand. "… You annoying little shit… I'm gonna give you something to scream about, whelp," the hobgoblin said in his native tongue, before opening his vile mouth as wide as his jaw could manage.
Knowing what was to come, the goblin pleaded for its pathetic life as the larger creature shoved the top of its head into his gaping maw. Like a feral creature, the goblin could only helplessly kick and claw at the hobgoblin's massive hand, as it felt his jagged and rotting teeth crushing its forehead. Soon enough, the goblin's screams came to a sudden halt as the hobgoblin then chomped down on its forehead, biting off its entire frontal lobe, before spitting it out on the ground.
Cackling sadistically, the hobgoblin grinned a bloody smile at the seizing creature in its hand; shaking it back-and-forth like a doll before tossing it aside like a piece of trash. "Haha! Ah! There, much better! Now, now, now…! Where did that other little shit g-GUWAH?!" The hobgoblin shouted out with more surprise in his voice than pain, as he stumbled back from how hard the sudden arrow had penetrated his left eyeball.
Rolling back with the momentum, the veteran war chief instinctively got low to the ground to grab the mutilated sheep. Using the slaughtered lamb as a makeshift shield, the hobgoblin began barking out orders to his small army of three-foot pillagers; alerting them that they were under attack, and that they were to find where the archer had shot the arrow from within the burning village. Using his one good eye while taking cover behind their large wagon full of supplies and armaments, the hobgoblin managed to protect himself from where the second arrow was fired using the wool and flesh of his makeshift shield.
"Gotcha, fodder… NORTHWEST! THE ARCHER IS NORTHWEST!" The hobgoblin shouted from the top of his lungs, as he threw the dead sheep aside to begin rummaging for what he needed from their own previously gathered supplies. As his small army of reinforcements flooded through the main gate to begin searching for their hidden assailant, the war chief ripped the arrow out of his eye socket; howling furiously as his optic nerve made a loud snap, the moment his eye came out with the arrow still embedded through its obsidian tip.
"Damn humans… There's always one that tries to be a hero… No matter, they'll die just like the rest of their soft-tender kin," the hobgoblin muttered cynically to himself, as he popped the cork of a minor health potion before gulping down its red-substance. Letting out a sigh of relief as the pain from his eye socket slowly disappeared, the hobgoblin could feel his missing eye growing back slowly as he began arming himself with his own personal gear that he had brought along.
"… And here I thought we were only up against a pathetic lot of spineless farmers, ripped for the picking," the hobgoblin mused to himself, as his frustration slowly grew into excitement. Arming himself with a large rectangular shield, a durable black falchion, and makeshift suit of crimson-steel armor that he had fashioned from the unfortunate adventurer who had underestimated the strength of his clan of goblins.
Firing the second to last arrow he had left in his quiver blindly into the direction that his servant had ordered him to, the boy felt his body sweating purposely as he heard the battle cries of the remaining thirty goblins spinning toward his location. "They're coming… Are you sure this plan will work, Dame Knight…?" The boy asked quietly with an unnerved expression on his face, as he got up from the haystack he had been taking cover behind, before sneaking off into the deceased village chief's bloodied two-story home.
"Have faith in me, child. Has my strength and sense of battle direction not proven itself worthy to you?" The white-haired knight asked rhetorically within the boy's consciousness, as the many small footsteps of the incoming goblins drew closer, and closer. Waiting until they were on the other side of the dirt road that separated the village elder's ransacked home and the burned down cottage where the goblins were swarming through, the servant ordered the boy to draw his last arrow and take aim at the closest goblin within their vicinity.
'This has to work… Please let this work,' the boy thought with his heart racing, as he held his breath before firing the arrow at an unsuspecting goblin, who like every other one had been investigating the wrong property. Remaining still as his sweaty fingers held the grip of his scavenged bow, the boy swallowed back the lump in his throat as all of the goblins across the street turned their attention away from the deceased creature, and all directly on him. There was a moment of calmness that was shattered with a collective shrill cry from the goblins, as they immediately began sprinting toward what they figured to be easy prey.
Following the voice in his head, the boy was scrambling back into the two-story home of their village elder, who lay dead next to his mutilated family within their bloodied-defiled living room. Careful not to trip on any of their dismembered limbs or parts, the boy walked through the thick piles of dry compost that his servant had ordered him to pour through out the floors of the home; an act that was only made doable, due to the village elder having been stockpiling the previous fertilizing material for their crops.
Picking up a decorative boat-in-a-bottle from where the elder's living room table was at, the boy chucked it at first goblin who stormed into house; enraging it, so as to cause the vile creature to rally up the forces of its kin to chase up through the compost, and up the stairs leading to second story. Having a difficult time treading upstairs with the sounds of cackling several feet behind him, the boy narrowly avoided being grappled by the hordes of goblins as he tossed himself into the mostly clean bedroom that once housed the elder and his wives.
Skidding across the wooden floorboards, the boy immediately scrambled up on his feet toward the window; a sight that swayed the attention of the goblins away from the lit candle that had been resting loosely on the edge of the opened door that had been kicked upon the boy diving through the door frame. With how carelessly the goblins had been rampaging through the dried compost, none of them had even thought of anything suspicious due to having been tunnel-visioned on getting their hands on the boy; and planned oversight that cost all thirty creatures' their lives, as their nitrate-oxide covered bodies were all engulfed in an inferno.
Feeling the heat of the flames from within the burning home blowing against his back, the boy dived out of the opened window and felt his stomach turning as he descended down onto the haystack that his servant had earlier commanded him to strategically move near the front of the two-story cottage; letting out a grunt, as he safely landed onto the soft pile of dry pile of straws. Rolling over on his back, the boy got up onto his feet while basking in the orange light of the blazing fire within the village elder's home; watching with his heart racing and his fingers tightened around the handle of his dagger as goblins who were engulfed in flames scurried out of the inferno.
"The use of improvised explosives, such as this "dust bomb" I've shown you how to utilize, aren't normally used by those who've taken to the code of chivalry; such methods would be seen as too underhanded and destructive for most knights to use, especially those who are members of the legendary "Round Table"," the servant explained in a stoic voice, as the boy watched as each goblin who had managed to escape the initial blast of fire dropped dead onto the front yard; one-by-one, they felt. "… Fortunately for us, a child such as yourself in such a desperate situation isn't hindered by any code of honor. Now… Let's see what you can from their bodies to help us prepare for the final stretch; the fire is a beacon that will surely call upon the hobgoblin."
"Yes, Dame Knight…" The boy muttered with a shaken look on his cut-up and dirty face, as he cautiously yet swiftly approached each and every scorched goblin corpse that had managed to escape the destructive fire within the house before him. 'There's a chance that they could either just be in shock, or are pretending to be dead… I better ensure that they're really dead, before I got searching them,' the boy thought to himself, while doing his best to desensitize himself to the gruesome act of repeatedly scrambling the melted brains of each corpse; reminding himself of what dirty deed done by the dead goblins around him.
With the hobgoblin still within her two-hundred meter radius of detection, the white-haired knight instructed the boy what to take with him, and what to leave behind; centering his limited arsenal around the strategy of battling against an already durable-tanky monster who was dawning high-defense gear. Due to the lack of invisible strength that goblins had, none of them carried any two-handed weapons that would have been able to combat an armor-plated opponent; something that the servant figured to not be too much of a loss, as she herself doubted that the ten year-old boy would have been able to use such weaponry efficiently, even with his enhanced strength and abilities that her presence alone was providing him.
"The hobgoblin is the last enemy you must face… He's closing in, and is armed with a basic long-shield, suit of modified armor made out of a material I'm unfamiliar with, and is carrying a sturdy falchion. He will undoubtedly be your most formidable opponent… And it seems as though none of the gear laid out for us would do anything against him," the servant said with a mildly frustrated tone in her voice, after realizing that the goblins who had came after there were only equipped with iron daggers, wooden clubs and jury-rigged bows with brittle-obsidian arrowheads.
Disheartened while already being in an extremely stressful situation, the boy disappointingly dropped the blacksmith-hammer that he had looted from the goblin corpse by his feet, as he began scanning his clouded surroundings for any strategic vantage points. "Tch, ngnhh…! Damn it…! It's not like I can run away from that thing; not without risking the possibility of him running into the barn…! Is there even anything that I can do against something that hobgoblin, if he's got good gear?!" The boy asked with an exasperated tone, while tensing up as he heard the distant sound of heavy footsteps rapidly approaching him, over the creaking sounds that the burning house was making behind him.
"Anything is possible, child; don't be disheartened… But with that being said… The odds certainly are stacked against you in such a match up. However, we still have one option that we have up our sleeves," the servant said with an unphased voice, which seemed to somewhat ease the boy's mind. "Go grab that bow and quiver of arrows over there, I have an idea," the white-haired servant instructed; much to the confusion of the boy, who regardless of his own reservations still made his way over to where she wanted him to go.
"I… I thought I heard you mention that none of the weapons here would be able to penetrate his defenses," the boy mentioned nervously, as he immediately slung the quiver over his small chest; equipping the makeshift wooden bow in his right hand, as he sprinted around the burning house to take cover from behind the blazing structure's blinding light.
"You heard correctly, boy. But you're not going to use that bow to kill him; you're going to use it to lead the hobgoblin away from the refugees… Back to where their war wagon is parked, just outside the village's entrance," the white-haired servant instructed, before beginning to feed more commands to the young boy, who was completely trusting his life within her guiding hands.
Storming closer toward the stacking black smoke that his nocturnal vision had spotted since his sensitive ears had first heard the sound of sudden combustion taking place where he had ordered his goblin army to search. From behind his elongated visor that was built into his crimson-metal helmet, the hobgoblin inhaled the crispy-aroma of blistered and scorched goblin flesh; causing the enraged creature to drool hungrily, while growling in disdain. "Smells like dried cow shit and cooked meat… Must have been a trap devised by the archer," the war chief guessed to himself, before finding himself coming to a slow stop once he reached the ruined house that was across the dirt-road from the burning house that had led him there in the first place.
Raising his large shield in front of him, the hobgoblin cautiously approached the front yard of the crumbling structure in flames; unable to detect the smell of humans nearby, over the overwhelming stretches in the immediate vicinity. "Fools… All of you… I knew you were all pathetic excuses for soldiers; always prioritizing getting your little dicks wet, over what was truly important," the hobgoblin muttered bitterly, as he raised his armored foot over the head of one burned goblin, before stomping down at turning its skull into a pile of disintegrating ashes.
"Heh… No matter. I'll slay the rest of the humans here myself; including that archer… Man, woman, child; it makes no difference. I'll take the spoils for myself, and find more humans to breed with later," the battle-hungry goblin mused to himself, as he tightened his grip around the leather handle of his falchion; a smirk growing behind his helmet, as his ears detected the sound of footsteps from the ruined house he had passed by behind him. "… Found you," the hobgoblin muttered triumphantly under his foul breath, as he spun around on one heel just in time to block the arrow that he knew was coming for him; after hearing the pluck of the draw string when it was released.
Parrying the arrow by bashing it with his large shield, the hobgoblin let out a war cry as he looked through the eye-slits of his helmet; glaring vengefully at the ten-year old boy who was staring back at him with an anxious expression on his blood and dirt stained face. "RAGH! That's the last mistake you'll ever make, HUMAN!" The hobgoblin roared out, before using his powerful legs to carry him quickly toward the retreating child.
Having expected the chase to be extremely short-lived, the hobgoblin was genuinely surprised to see how fast the child he was chasing was able to run ahead of him; always just a few meters out of reach of his black-steel blade. 'Is this even a human child that I'm chasing?! I don't see pointy ears, or anything like that! Is this some sort of spell it's casting?!' The hobgoblin thought suspiciously to himself, as the two of them ran through the burned-down ruins of one cottage.
Chasing the child through what had once been a living room, the hobgoblin stumbled after the boy had suddenly spun around to throw fire a perfectly aimed arrow directly into the small slit of his helmet; the arrowhead blocking his few, which gave the boy an opportune time to run slightly more ahead of the enraged hobgoblin. "That little fucker…! I'm gonna kill it… I'M GONNA KILL THAT LITTLE SHIT!" The rampaging hobgoblin thought, as he snapped the arrow's wooden base off in his armored hand, failing to remove the piece of sharpened obsidian that his fingers were too big to properly pull out from where it had gotten lodged.
Lunging forward with his falchion in hand, the hobgoblin was moments away from cleaving his blade into the skull of the boy, but was foiled when the ten-year old suddenly slammed the front door shut behind him; causing the armored hobgoblin to be covered in splintered soot, as he stumbled out onto the burned grass of the abandoned front yard. The brief moment of losing his balance was all the boy needed to fire three arrows into the eye-slit of the hobgoblin's helmet; causing the furious creature to scream in annoyance, while obscuring more of his already limited vision.
'One hit… All I need to do is get one hit in, and it'll all be over for that little human…! No matter how skilled it is, it's still a weak-little child; so breakable,' the hobgoblin thought with determination in his head, as he tried to regain his composure while raising his shield up to protect him, as he began chasing the boy out through the large-stone archway that served as the village's only entrance and exit. Assuming that the child was going to try to run away from him, the hobgoblin dropped the shield and falchion in his hand.
'Your luck runs out, human… And look at that! It's heading straight for the wagon; where my light ballista is… Good luck trying to lift it, human,' the hobgoblin thought victoriously to himself; a crooked smile spreading across its vile lips, as he watched as the boy tried his best to pick up the aforementioned artillery.
With how heavy the two-handed projectile weapon weighed, which didn't even include how much strength it took to reload it with one of the many bolts that were stored within the leather straps attached to the base of its stock, the boy quickly gave up on trying to use the armor-piercing weapon as he heard the metal plating of the hobgoblin's armor clanging against one another. "Crap…!" The boy muttered under heavy breath, as he quickly began desperately searching for an alternative item he could use.
With seconds left to spare, the boy used his dagger to tear through the massive burlap sack that was closest to him, and grabbed a handful of random consumables before leaping off of the wagon; just in time to avoid being grabbed by the lunging hobgoblin.
Determined to skewer the child and leave him to die a painful death, the hobgoblin only gave chase once he had retrieved his ballista from where the boy had been digging around through his deceased army's assorted goods. "That's right, human… Run away from me! RUN, AND DIE LIKE A COWARD!" The hobgoblin roared out through his helmet, as he loaded a bolt before taking aim through the weapon's iron sights; locking onto the boy, who had stopped in the middle of the field to take aim at him, using the last arrow he had left from his quiver.
What was meant to be a quick process to align the shot ended up becoming nearly impossible with the four arrowheads obscuring his vision. Frustrated to the point that he was growing increasingly less concerned with his own sense of preservation, the hobgoblin swore in his native tongue as he swiftly pulled his crimson helmet off before throwing it on the ground near his boots. 'Enough of this… It ends here,' the war chief thought cynically to himself, before quickly taking aim and firing a bolt straight into the boy's center of mass; impaling him in the side of his abdomen, while flinching as he heard the drawstring of the boy's bow pluck one last time.
'… Eh? With how well that boy's been firing his shots, I thought he'd land his shot… And yet here I am, unharmed,' the hobgoblin thought to himself with a sense of relief, after having checked his ugly face for any wounds that he might have sustained. Grinning victoriously, the war chief chuckled sinisterly as he began loading another bolt while marching over to where he had last seen the boy's body, before it fell into the obscuring tall grass. "Hehehehe…! The same will not be said for you, human child… Far be it," the hobgoblin spoke sinisterly out loud, while thinking of spots where he could shoot the ten year-old, just to prolong his suffering.
Drawing closer, the hobgoblin savored the sickly smell of copper in the air as looked over the boy's bleeding body; cackling to himself, as he used his leg to part the tall blades of grass, so as to allow him a better visual of where he could shoot the boy. Thinking that he had already won, the hobgoblin's arrogance was what the boy had been counting on.
Quickly with stamina and agility that the lumbering creature wouldn't have thought possible from someone like him, the boy rolled backwards from the blood-soaked mud he had been laying on; throwing his dagger skillfully mid-roll toward the flinching hobgoblin. Clenching his jaw shut tightly, the boy felt his heart skipping a beat the moment he heard the firing mechanism of his opponent's rifle-ballista going off; sighing in relief, as the bolt never left from the hobgoblin's heavy weapon.
Confused as to why his bolt never shot, it was then that the hobgoblin realized that the boy hadn't been aiming for his body when he threw the knife at him. Instead, the ten-year old had managed to successfully cut the draw-string of the ballista before the firing mechanism could allow the tension to launch the bolt out. 'Sneaky little bastard! How the hell did that human even… I-Impossible…!' The hobgoblin's thought with a gasp escaping his parted lips, as his eyes drew away from the empty glass vial on the grass that laid next to an eaten apple core; gazing up in confusion and shock at the boy, who was standing up right with a menacing arm-sword attached to his forearm.
Taking a practice swing, the boy watched with a cold look on his dusty-rose eyes as the hobgoblin took a fearful step back away from him, as soon as the arm-sword's silver blade became enveloped in a bright cyan-light. "… I never knew that apples could replenish mana before, but then again, I never knew I had mana in me to begin with… I guess that makes sense why witches are obsessed with them, even though the effect they have is minor…" The boy spoke out loud for his servant to hear, before narrowing his eyelids as he raised his servant's powerful sword up toward the intimated hobgoblin. "Your kind wouldn't have use for mana-potions, so it would have been wishful thinking hoping that you'd have what I'd need to end you…"
"… Three-hundred and forty-six. That's the number of goblins that your army was made up of, and now they're all gone. So that only begs the question, huh jerk?" The boy asked rhetorically in a voice that sounded menacing for what a ten year-old was capable of producing. "… Who's left to save you from what I'm about to do to you?" The boy asked in a vengeful tone, before leaping forward into the air; thrusting the sword straight into the hobgoblin's head, before he had a chance to counter the boy's attack by grabbing him mid-air.
Screeching in agony as the left side of his brain was pierced with the energy-infused blade, the hobgoblin managed to shoulder bash the boy away. Howling ferally, the hobgoblin immediately went into "flight-or-fight" mode, and with his remaining brain cells his body chose to flee towards where he had dropped his helmet. 'Braaaainnn hurrrrrtttttt… Meeetal on muh heaaaddduhhh…' The hobgoblin's damaged brain thought to itself, as he limped as quickly as he could toward where he last remembered dropping the helmet; completely flabbergasted and panicked upon discovering that it had moved.
With a slowed reaction speed, it didn't dawn on the hobgoblin that the boy had shot his arrow at his helmet earlier; purposely making it roll underneath the nearby wagon, as it was all a part of the servant's grand scheme. Due to the apple only having provided enough mana for the boy to use his servant's weapon for a few brief moments, he took advantage of the hobgoblin's slowed movements and caused by his brain damage.
Too exhausted to give a long-winded speech, all the strength that the boy had left inside of his aching muscles and sore body was reserved for his finishing move for the night. Wielding the hobgoblin's dropped falchion with both of his hands, the boy let out a defiant battle cry as he sprinted toward the incoherent monster. Sliding underneath the hobgoblin's massive arm, as the monster attempted to use what reflexes he had left to defend himself, the boy dodged the attack before springing up from the ground.
Leaping up six feet into the air with his black-sturdy blade held over his shoulders and behind his upper back, the boy let out another battle cry as he swung the falchion down as hard as he could; using his downward momentum and enhanced abilities to bury the blade deep into the top of the hobgoblin's head. Having cleaved the hobgoblin's entire skull and jawbone into two, similar to the way someone with an axe would chop a wooden log, the boy released his grip from the handle in order to free his hands.
Diving downward to roll along the ground to break his fall, the boy stumbled up to his feet and spun around with his heart racing inside of his heavy-breathing chest; his dusty-rose eyes gazing as the still body of the armored hobgoblin seized up, before plopping down onto the ground like a rag-doll. "We… Ngh…! W-We did it…! We a-actually did it, ahhh…!" The boy gasped out with sweat pouring down every inch of his body, as he hunched over with his hands gripping his burning thighs; his mouth and throat were both dried, as the thought of drinking a cool cup of water sounded divine to the exhausted youth.
"I… I have to admit, child: you exceeded my expectations. But it takes a certain kind of talent to accomplish the orders I've been giving you; perhaps there's more to you than I thought," the white-haired knight mused with a intrigued tone in her voice, as she watched from a third-person ominent view as the boy tried taking a step forward, before suddenly collapsing underneath his fatigued legs. "Your sister and the rest of the survivors will undoubtedly search for you and the rest of the village once they feel safe enough to do so… In the meantime, I understand that you're tired, and you certainly have earned your right to rest…"
"… But not yet, child. There's a chance that they won't be able to find you out in the tall grass. Your last order is to crawl for me, boy; crawl towards the main archway, so that they may find you and administer care to you as swiftly as possible," the white-haired servant commanded with some empathy in her voice, as she watched with anticipation as the boy reached out with one hand.
Digging his fingertips into the dirt, the boy could only whimper in pain and discomfort as he pulled himself over twenty meters out of the tall grass; the muscles in his arms feeling as though they were on fire throughout the entire ten-minute endeavor. It was only once he had dragged himself through the dirt did the boy's body finally give out to absolute exhaustion; succumbing to it, as he laid face-down on the ground, as the last raging fire within the village began dying out.
Having given every ounce of strength in his body, the ten year-old boy skin was covered in a cold sweat, as his abdomen where he had gotten shot radiated with sore-pain; the minor healing potion had only done so much, and with his adrenaline running dry it wouldn't be long until the agony of his somewhat healed injuries forced him into unconsciousness.
Closing his heavy eyelids shut as his mind began to drift, the boy couldn't help but to wonder why he was suddenly hallucinating the sight of a young petite woman with long-auburn hair, sinking down into an endless ocean with oxygen and light fleeting from her limp body. Not being able to stay lucid long enough to come up with his own conclusion, the boy fell into a dream-like state as he became unconscious within several seconds.
"…Before me stands the "Holy Grail". I slowly extend my hand and place it on the core of the "Moon Cell"."
"… The instant I make contact with it, I am drawn inside the Holy Grail… To be more accurate, I am absorbed into it like water being absorbed into a sponge."
"… In the short time before I'm erased from existence, my consciousness is immersed into the Moon Cell… I can see everything that exists within it: every day piece of information, every observation, every conclusion."
"… The sheer volume of information and ideas stored in the Moon Cell forms an intricate collage that no human could decipher, though I sense a pattern… And throughout humanity's peaceful stagnation and wars that bring forth its eventual destruction, the Moon Cell will continuously and silently record what it sees; all without ever taking action."
"… But now is not the time to get emotional; I must tell the Holy Grail what my wish is."
"… "Input Complete"."
"… "Corrupt system data: Unable To Process Input"? "Error: System Failure. Execution Override. Restarting System"? That… That cannot be correct… Why didn't that work? Was this… Was this all for naught? A cruel ending to wipe the slate clean? Were all my struggles truly meaningless in the end?"
"… I can feel myself breaking apart into virtual particles; scattered into a bleak empty void around me, as the bright water-like environment I found myself in is deleted within an instant. Complete annihilation, and yet I remain slowly breaking apart, piece-by-piece…"
"… It's cold. I'm so cold… Is this what it's like to die? I thought I would have been more accepting of my sacrifice, but as I see my consciousness fragmenting into photonics particles, my memories begin to die with them."
"… I wanted to die remembering them during my final moments… Nero… Tamamo… Archer… Gilgamesh… BB… It's getting harder and harder with each passing moment to remember their faces. What… What relation did I even have with them? Who are they, and… Where am I? What is this…?"
"… "Searching Directory"…? "No Host Found: Searching Multiversal Database"…? "Host Located: Connecting to Host"…? "Peer-To-Peer Connection Established: Data Transfer Initiated"…?!"
"What…? What does any of that mean? W-Why is my head hurting?! It hurts so much…! Is there anyone there?! W-Why isn't anyone answering me…? Please, I'm… I'm scared; I don't know where I am! It's so hard to think with all this static in my head!"
"… Such despair."
"… If anyone can hear me… Please… Please help me if you can."