I stood outside the hut and stared at a country that should not exist anymore.
Smoke drifted through the air. The ground was blackened and torn apart, littered with bodies that had long since stopped being recognizable as people. Some were burned. Others were torn open. All of them were left where they fell.
The smell was worse than the sight.
Most people would break here.
I didn't.
That bothered me more than anything else.
Because whether I liked it or not, me and my team were part of the reason this place looked like this.
Not directly. Not all of it.
But enough.
Our government liked to stay at the top. Fear kept the world in line, and we were the ones sent to make sure that fear stayed alive. Spies. Magic users. Weapons trained to slip into enemy territory and tear it apart from the inside.
And we were good at it.
Too good.
What we didn't expect was the hatred.
The things I heard while we were undercover… what they wanted to do to our people… to our families…
It made it easier to justify this.
Almost.
I looked down at my hand and clenched it slowly.
I've done things in war that I don't even try to justify anymore.
But there are lines I won't cross.
Kids are one of them.
They don't deserve this.
None of them do.
I pulled off my glove and crouched, pressing my hand to the ground as I traced a magic circle. Mana flowed outward, spreading through the area like a pulse.
The base ahead lit up in my mind.
Fifty people.
Mostly soldiers.
I pulled my hood up and adjusted the mask I had taken from someone I killed earlier.
Then I moved.
Slow steps. Quiet breathing.
Almost inside.
A click.
Cold metal pressed against my back.
"What do we have here?"
I stayed silent.
"Look here, boy. I'm not afraid to shoot you. Start talking."
I turned fast.
My hand snapped up and twisted the gun out of his grip. The moment I touched it, I let my magic flow.
The weapon rotted instantly.
Metal cracked. Rust spread. The gun fell apart in my hand like it had aged a hundred years.
The man froze.
I shoved him to the ground and pinned him, pressing my knife to his throat.
"How many are inside?" I asked.
His hands shook as he tried to push me off.
"And think carefully before you lie."
He struggled harder.
I didn't move.
I drove the knife through his hand and covered his mouth before he could scream.
His body jerked under me.
I glanced behind me.
My team was still there.
Four of us.
That was all they sent.
Then again, we weren't normal soldiers.
The Magic Ministry didn't make normal soldiers. They took people with power and turned them into something else. Something useful.
We were supposed to fight the things that came out of dungeons. The monsters that appeared when magic entered the world.
Not this.
Not war.
I looked back down at the man.
"Where's the nuke?"
He laughed quietly.
"I'm not telling you anything."
That was enough.
I drove the knife into his chest.
His body went still.
I searched him and found a keycard and a map.
"Tunnel," I said, standing. "Leads to an elevator. That should take us to the silo."
No one argued.
We moved.
The path was filled with bodies.
One of my teammates stopped.
"Christ… look at that."
I followed his gaze.
A girl.
Burned alive.
Cut open.
Her magic crystal ripped out.
For a second, my hand twitched.
Not from fear.
From anger.
I grabbed the dead man's collar.
"You did this?" I asked.
"It wasn't me," he said quickly. "Another general."
"So there are more of you."
He laughed.
That was his mistake.
I kicked him down and stabbed him straight through the heart.
We kept moving.
The tunnel was quiet. Too quiet.
Footsteps echoed above us. Voices whispered through the ceiling.
"Wonder what they're saying," Kai muttered.
"Probably talking about how terrible we are," I said.
He laughed.
We walked deeper until we found a table and chairs.
"I can't wait to finish this," one of them said. "I just want to go back to clearing dungeons."
Before anyone could respond, an alarm blared.
We froze.
Then shouting.
"They activated it!"
"The nuke is going off underground!"
My chest tightened.
We ran.
The elevator was right there. I swiped the keycard and called it down.
As we waited, the shouting got louder.
"They set it off!"
The doors opened.
We rushed in.
I slammed the button for the bottom floor.
The descent was fast.
Too fast.
The doors opened.
There it was.
The nuke.
Active.
We rushed it. Controls. Overrides. Anything.
Nothing worked.
Locked.
Final.
I slowly sat down beside it.
We weren't here to win.
We were here to erase.
"There's nothing we can do," I said.
No one argued.
The light came fast.
Blinding.
Consuming.
Final.
I closed my eyes.
Not in fear.
In acceptance.
If this was the end…
At least I didn't run from it.
Then everything went black.
…
"Wake up!"