August accidentally got stuck in between a group of the vile monsters. Fortunately for him he wasn't their centre of attraction yet. Only two of the monsters had their red bloodshot eyes on him already. They stared at him with a vile gaze while colourless saliva dripped down from their grotesque maw.
August dodged as the sharp pincer-like elongation of a monster brushed past, missing him by a slight margin. Another one took a swing of long jointed legs on him, August jumped back struggling to keep himself from falling prey to these abominations.
He moved the blade to deliver a deadly strike on the leg of one of the monsters but the force behind his attack turned out to be shallow. Not enough to seriously hurt the monster. His blade struck the abomination's leg without leaving a scratch on it.
The other monster caught a portion of his arm suddenly in its grotesque maw. August struggled but in the end managed to free himself from the grasp of the vile creature. He took some steps back carefully. Cradling his wounded arm.
As the fresh blood fell down his arm, he appeared to have caught the attention of the other monsters as well with the stench of his blood. Abominations looked at him with utter frenzy in their eyes, drooling all over the place.
August found it hard to breathe under the pressure of their suffocating gazes. Their killing intent was overpowering his will to live. If not for his mental resilience that he developed while resisting against the echoes, he would've surrendered to this tide long ago. The fact that he didn't have a core element to anchor himself to was also the cause of him being affected by the vile gazes of these grotesque monsters.
His heart was beating loudly, sweat pouring down his body continuously. His breath seemed ragged and his throat became dry. However he knew he had to fight. He has a town to protect. People are playing their parts and he also had to play his own. From a corner of his eye he could see the spells like fire and ice trying to tear through the monster tide. He could hear the stifled cries of his parents desperately searching for him among these hungry growls.
That was the moment August knew he had to be responsible. Because waiting for death to come at him while lying there was easy, giving in to the pressure of countless killing intents from the surroundings was easy, to abandon his position was easy, living was difficult while dying was …easy.
'Exactly when did I become so useless?'
That's right, he was never useless. A bit unlucky perhaps, but useless? never. He was a fighter, a warrior. A child who constantly suffered from the unimaginable pain in the dark. The pain of echoes, the pain of unintentionally letting down his parents, the pain of being a …failure.
August stood up ignoring the constant seeping blood through his arm wound. Right at that moment an abomination attacked him with its sharp pincers, threatening to take his life in an instant. However the attack never reached him.
The dark blade of Fallen star touched the hard calcareous mandible of the monster with frightening force. August twisted the blade inside its vile maw and continuing the momentum the blade shot upwards slicing the head of the grotesque creature in two equal halves.
Fresh dark-crimson blood came pouring out on him, bathing August in its warm embrace. The red glow in the six eyes of the abomination faded and its lifeless corpse staggered and fell on the ground helplessly.
The sight looked disturbing but there was no time to falter.
Immediately he jumped on the other monster gauging its insides open. His blade struck right, cutting another monstrosity into bits and pieces. Then it struck towards the left, severing the limbs along with the head of another vile creature.
The boy's movements were precise and ruthless. Not showing even a hint of mercy to those vile abominations. He sliced through many of them in a short amount of time. The new sword worked like the elongation of his deadly limbs. Various monster corpses lay dead in a river of dark-crimson blood on his path.
His blood boiled and heart pounded loudly in the chest. Back, forward, left and right got sliced whatever came in his path. After years of training a specific swordstyle he finally managed to put that into battle successfully.
No matter how great of a fighting style a person had learned. It was a proven fact that his true style shines when faced with a life threatening danger in the battlefield. A wounded snake happens to be more deadlier than the one with more potent venom.
A person could only become a capable warrior when faced with hardships, when put the moves he learned in his training into battle not by just swinging his sword here and there. The rush of adrenaline which came after the fear was exhilarating.
August was feeling the blood rushing through his veins. He became so indulged in the murderous frenzy that he didn't realize coming this deep inside the monster tide now.
He looked around catching a breath after sacrificing numerous monsters to his blade on the way. Even after that he could still feel countless gazes on himself. The gazes that were more vicious than before.
August felt tired as he panted heavily, covered with warm blood. The dark liquid dripping down from himself as well as trails of it seeping down from the matte blade of The Fallen Star.
Puddles of blood and numerous cleanly severed heads of the abominations lay lifeless in his wake.
The atmosphere was filled with the stench of fresh blood.
Various monsters growled at him but he stayed calm and indifferent. He wiped the constantly running blood of the monsters from his face with one hand, continuing the movement to pull back his raven black hair as well. Causing the bloodshot look in his eyes to expose itself.
Normally there was just a hint of ruby red in his dark coloured eyes but due to the constant rush of adrenaline and his intent to murder those vile monsters, caused the blood in his eyes to reveal itself.
A gentle wind blew, causing his blood drenched hair to sway a little. Sunlight shone reflecting his fair skin bathed in red-crimson.
With a mild stretch, he assumed the fighting stance again and lunged at the monsters himself. The deadly blade of Fallen Star rose high and came crushing down on the various monstrosities severing and slicing every bone, tendon or ligament in its path. It passed through the hairy hide, even tore through the bristle bones and severed the abominations clean, under the sharpness of its dreadful blade.
Even the bestial growls of theirs turned into painful screeches when met with the sharp sword and the unstoppable murderous intent of the young boy.
Everyday in his life August had to suffer because of his ambivalence. He constantly has to remind himself of being inferior to the mages who could make impossible possible. Only if he had awakened a core element maybe he could kill these monsters more quickly. Maybe then, only then he could've been more powerful. Powerful enough to protect everyone all by himself.
Because August had a goal. He had watched his mother and father fight countless creatures, may it be beasts or monsters, greater or lesser and every time despite knowing they were mages of far greater caliber he couldn't help but worry for them.
In reality August didn't care much about the rest of the world. To him his parents meant the world. And thus, he had an ambition. To become powerful enough that someday he would be able to protect his world and the ones they felt responsible towards. He wanted to carry his father's burdens, he wanted to see his mother's pleasant smile always on her face.
He wanted to be responsible.
So that they wouldn't have to put their lives in danger to protect everyone. He wanted to become powerful enough to protect everyone on his own.
That was the dream he thought could be achieved only after having awakened a core element. An element that would suit him, give his life a meaning. So that he could be able to fulfil his purpose.
But he failed. For some reason despite having a great perception of mana, he became nothing but a useless, pathetic subject to echoes.
After witnessing a major setback in his life, he thought he could fulfil his ambition with a sword. Well he was right up to some extent but soon realised that a swordmaster cannot compete with even a lesser class mage.
Today, as he pushed his sword upon various monstrosities he could hear his inner voice whispering, 'It's not enough. It never will be'
As he sliced the heads of abominations clean open the only thing he could remember in the place of acknowledging himself was that a mage could do it even better.
— — —
While he continued to slaughter the monsters without a hint of mercy, his mother had successfully breached the formation of vile abominations to save her son. As she had no idea what was happening at the centre of the monster's tide. Her heart, a mother's heart was constantly filled with worries of her child.
She ruthlessly killed the incoming attacker creatures without any mercy. Some got sliced and pierced by the sharp shards of ice protruding from the ground beneath, some got inevitably killed by the deadly attacks of her long ice spear and the rest who managed to dodge both of her constant attacks were frozen to death under the cold spell of her core element.
Her husband was following closely behind her flames surrounding him consuming the monsters in all directions. His red blade struck precisely and mercilessly leaving giant hills of corpses in his wake.
Sophia and her team had deviated from their full proof plan because her son got stuck between the pack of monsters by some strange means. Praying to the gods of his safety, she marched into the monster tide without thinking much. The fact her husband followed her trail immediately, was the reason she was safe for this long having come this deep into the tide.
For some reason there was no sign of her baby boy till now. She could've sworn she saw him landing here. A sudden wave rose in her heart fearing the worst. Not to mention the numbers of these monstrosities tend to increase from here. Even if she managed to find her son, Sophia surely couldn't make it out alive.
She feared she would have to face more and more monsters from here and out.
Stealing the determination Sophia continued to march forward concentrating on the only task that was to save her son. Town would remain protected under Lord Victor leading the charge and no monster would sneak up on her from behind that she was confident of because her husband was a warrior mage of a great caliber. He had attained various impossible feats back in his days after all.
The high reaching flames as though trying to reach the sky were proof enough. Burned and severed corpses of the vile abominations witnessed the proof of his bravery themselves.
Cutting through masses of these abominable creatures, Sophia was about to reach the centre of the tide. She wasn't able to see anything from here that's for sure.
Cutting through the last line of monster tide when she prepared herself to face more numbers and that too of more vicious monsters, stunned as she saw the sight before her eyes.
The visuals were horrifying, the stench of blood permeated in the air. There was no sign of any magic spells to be casted.
Just her baby boy standing in the middle of a blood soaked battlefield with a matte black blade in his hands bathed in blood facing the distant horizon on which the Sun was about to set.
Her heart sank.
— — — — —