I… have always dreamt of the same thing. A story where I lived an ordinary life in a peaceful world with my family and the companions I knew.
In that dream, I worked in the profession I had always aspired to: a doctor who saved people's lives. My hobbies were painting and cooking. I had a cute little kitten and puppy by my side. It was the peaceful life I had wanted my entire existence.
But… every time I opened my eyes, I was met with disappointment. The life in reality was as different from my dream as heaven and hell.
It was filled with bloodshed, inhumane experiments, and the twisted nature of people. A struggle for power that I never understood the benefit of. The word "family" was no different from two people staring at each other through a glass pane, a space filled with the scent of medicine and an utter indifference to the world in their eyes.
I was sick of it… Even though I yearned for something called peace for all people, what meaning could it have when not even the ones I loved had ever given me that feeling?
I've had enough of it—this false hope called medicine. Whatever it is… please, just take it far away from me. Please… someone… Help me wake up from this nightmare!
'I shall grant that request.'
A mysterious voice echoed within the endless darkness, awakening his consciousness.
"Wh-who are you!" a shout escaped his lips. Even though he knew he wouldn't receive a pleasant answer, he still yelled out, hoping these desperate circumstances would just fade away.
'Me, you ask?'
The voice replied, its emotion unreadable. But in an instant, all the darkness around him began to transform into a white light that was both warm and intense.
'One day, you will know…'
..........
The young man awoke from that dream, only to be met with the sound of gunfire and explosions roaring from all directions. He noticed the area around him was riddled with bullet holes, and incomprehensible curses echoed intermittently. But before he could wonder any further, a deep, masculine voice, like that of a middle-aged man, shouted from behind him.
"Hey, kid! You okay?!"
"Yes?… Uh, I think so…" he answered instinctively, looking around in a daze as if he had just woken from an endless dream. 'What on earth is happening? A moment ago, I was on my bed reading a junior's thesis. How did I suddenly end up here?'
"Um… where is this—" He turned to ask the owner of the voice where he was, but his words caught in his throat when he saw that the speaker's body… was not human.
'A kapom! A kapom the size of a ten-year-old child is behind me!'
The young man's jaw dropped, stunned by the sight. The figure, seeing his reaction, started to grumble.
"What's wrong with you?! Why are you staring at me with your mouth wide open! Never seen a handsome dragon like me before?!" the kapom-like creature said, ducking his head to dodge a bullet that whizzed past his helmet, before turning to speak to him again. "I mean… you suddenly ran in and took a bullet for me. To be honest, I'm very impressed! For your good deed, I'll give you a reward after this is all over!" After speaking, the kapom-creature turned and yelled to someone behind him.
"Hey, Zazas!! When are you going to deal with them already! I'm getting tired of waiting, dammit!"
As the creature's voice faded, the young man saw a figure leap out from a bunker behind them.
The figure was a teenage girl in a hoodie, holding a sword. In the blink of an eye after she jumped out, the constant gunfire from all directions began to die down. Within a few minutes, all was silent. The curious young man slowly peeked his head out from behind a crate to see what had happened.
"Wh-what is this…"
He saw the girl hunting down those who were fleeing, cutting them down with cold-blooded efficiency. She did this with no one daring to turn and fight back. They ran as if she were a grim reaper harvesting their souls. When the girl finally stopped, the young man thought she must be tired and had given up the chase.
But he was wrong… because the girl who had stopped running summoned some kind of black shadow from her palm. The shadows merged, forming dozens of twisted spears. She grabbed them and threw them without needing to aim, for every spear flew straight towards the bodies of the fleeing people.
The young man couldn't bear to watch any longer. He was shocked and filled with fear at the sight of the girl's cold expression, which she wore throughout the slaughter. Even without hearing the screams of those impaled by the spears, just the sound of something piercing through flesh was enough to make him freeze in terror.
Finally, as the sounds faded, the young man dared to lift his head from behind the crate to look again. What he saw was the girl walking straight towards them, flicking blood off the sword in her hand.
It was only then that he clearly saw her form for the first time… including something hidden behind the black hood on her head.
"Is that… a dog's ear?" the young man muttered in astonishment, seeing something black and fluffy resembling a dog's ear on the girl's head. It was even twitching as she swung her sword. He had to admit it was a little cute, until he was snapped back to reality by an angry voice shouting from behind him.
"What did you say?! Dog ears!! Hey, kid! Don't you know that's rude to a Woof-erian! How dare you compare them to stupid house dogs!" the little kapom, who had been hiding behind him, yelled in displeasure.
"Uh… I'm sorry. But did you just say Woof-erian? What country is that from?"
"Country? Kid, what does that word even mean? Is 'country' the new slang young people use for a foreign land now?"
But instead of an answer, the kapom-creature just asked him a question back, leaving the young man speechless.
"Yoo-hoo, Boss! Are you still alive?!"
A shout rang out as a cute, red-haired girl vaulted over the bunker towards them. She held twin pistols in her hands. To be honest, the sight of a cute girl holding two pistols was a mismatch that scared him a little. But when he saw her friendly smile, he felt slightly more at ease.
"You useless angel! Who do you think you're talking to?! I am Bagod, the Great Dragon Emperor of Meili in Fongming! You think I can be taken down by some low-life mafia goons with mere bullets?" the little kapom puffed out a non-existent chest for them to see. The red-haired girl quickly clasped her hands and nodded obsequiously.
"The boss is right again! How could a great being like you be finished off by those bullets!!"
"Hmph, don't try to sweet-talk me! No matter how much you praise me, I'm not giving you a raise!" Even as he said it, the little kapom wagged his brown tail happily at her words, instantly erasing the grandiosity he had just built up.
"By the way… who's this cute young man next to you, Boss? A distant relative of yours?" The girl turned her gaze to the young man beside the boss and moved closer to get a better look at his face. The young man caught a faint scent of her perfume and couldn't help but blush.
'Too close…' But then, he smelled something familiar on her.
"Blueberries?"
"Oh! You can smell it?! That's right! I just had some. A blueberry pie stuffed to the brim with cheese. Mmm!! Just thinking about it makes me hungry again… If someone hadn't called me away, I would've finished the whole plate," the girl said, glaring at her boss.
"This is your fault, Boss. So don't forget to add some OT pay."
Those words made the little kapom furious. He picked up a nearby piece of wood and threw it at her. Unfortunately, his short arms meant the wood flew slower than a rock thrown by a baby.
"You gluttonous angel!! Your boss nearly had a .92 fly past his head! Is food still all you can think about?!"
"Come on… you're too serious, Boss. A being of your caliber can't be taken out by a bullet like that, right?"
"Yeah, yeah! I said it myself!! And this time, I'll let you see how it feels to have a .92 fly past your head!" The little kapom picked up a gun from the ground and started chasing the red-haired girl, firing wildly.
"Haha! The boss is angry! The boss is angry!! Don't forget to reimburse me for the bullets in that gun!" The girl, dodging the incoming shots, laughed nonstop, not seeming worried about the situation at all.
'What is this madness?' Strangely, the sight of a monster chasing and shooting at someone should have been terrifying, but from this angle, it looked more like a child chasing an adult.
"Are you two at it again…"
A voice from behind made the young man jump. When he turned, he saw it was the black-haired girl in the hoodie who had just slaughtered so many people moments ago. When their eyes met, a chill ran down the young man's spine, realizing this girl had killed over a dozen people in just a few minutes. She seemed to notice his fear, as she lost interest and looked away.
"Zazas! Is the business taken care of?!" the red-haired girl, still running, shouted. The black-haired girl nodded in response.
But as she was about to walk away, she stopped in her tracks, turned her head to look at the young man, and pointed a finger at him.
"You're bleeding," she said, pointing to the back of his neck. This startled the young man.
"What?" He quickly reached a hand to the back of his neck and felt something wet and sticky there. When he pulled his hand back to look, it was indeed covered in a lot of blood.
'That's strange. With this much blood loss, I should be feeling dizzy from the brain's lack of blood. I could even be having seizures from the poor blood flow to the brain—'
But before the young man could finish his thought, the world in front of him began to spin violently, and his body collapsed to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. The last things he heard before losing consciousness were the shouts of the red-haired girl and her kapom boss.
"Boss!! Your relative fainted!"
"What?! Hey, Zazas! Hurry and carry him to the car! I hate to admit it, but that kid just saved me from an M.12! Don't you dare let him die, you hear me?!"