"You... shouldn't exist!"
"You're not human..."
"Stay away! I don't want you near my children."
"What the hell are you?"
"You don't belong here."
"I always knew there was something wrong with you."
"No!! Stay away from me!"
"I'm sorry... but I can't love something like you."
"It's for the best."
"Don't bring it here!"
"...Please don't kill me."
"Monster."
...
eh? What happened?
That was Cassian's first thought when he finally regained focus. He felt like he had lost consciousness for a moment.
During that brief instant he felt a surge of many things, he did not remember exactly what, but it left a lingering bitterness in him.
But that was all, he could not allow himself to think about it too much; the present situation was more important.
"Hhhhaaah~"
A breath he had been holding came out as if he had forgotten to breathe for a moment. He realized that he was lying motionless on the cold stone floor.
Reflections of fire danced across his face: flames so intense that even the torrential rain couldn't extinguish them.
His senses immediately sharpened, and he felt once again how everything around him was moving slowly.
This feeling, which was becoming familiar to him, meant only one thing: he was running out of time.
~Get up...
He wanted to get up... but his body wouldn't obey him. It simply wouldn't move. Only his fingers scratched the hard floor, unable to do anything else. He was at his limit.
Why am I still fighting?
He didn't know.
Isn't this the opportunity? If I die here, then finally..."
No! I must fight.
Why?
It's my duty...
Is it? Why is it my duty?
Since when have I had that duty?
Why not just run away? Life comes first...
Ah! That's right. Life comes first, doesn't it?
Yes, you come first, nothing else matters.
Jee~ yes, life comes first. That's obvious, haha!
Many thoughts came to his mind at that moment... and curiously, that last thought was something he clearly did not identify with.
That thought made him regain his focus, which was perhaps lost due to the strong blow and the fact that his head was bleeding like never before.
Even so, he now felt that his thoughts were clearer than ever, and he realized something.
~Get up...
When did he start thinking that life was precious? Since yesterday...? Since he arrived here...? No, in fact, that thought had never crossed his mind.
That thought was not his own, neither before nor now.
But, of all his thoughts, that was the one that made him reconsider.
~Get up...
Not because he agreed with running away... no! At this moment, he had no right to give up on life as usual. At this moment, his life was not his alone.
Yes... life is something worth fighting for.
it is.
Yes, I must do it until the end.
I really can't get used to this, I'm sorry, I had a little lapse there. Thank you, I won't let you down.
It really is something so normal, so instinctive, so basic in all living beings, but it was something he had simply forgotten at some point. He couldn't remember exactly when.
I can't just give up like I always do.
Yes, the one who always gave up as if it were obvious, as if it were the most efficient, easiest, and most reasonable thing to do, swore not to be like that anymore.
But at the first opportunity, he fell back into the same trap. It really seems difficult to break a habit. Luckily, he wasn't alone.
~Get up...
Yes, he would not fall back into that vortex he had just escaped from.
Damn it!! I have to get up.
So he gritted his teeth and tried to get up.
But he couldn't feel his body. He felt like he had no strength left.
No, that's not the problem.
He clenched his teeth so hard that his gums bled. His fingers dug deeper into the ground.
~Get up
Yes, I am the problem.
It was impossible for his damn body to betray him just when he finally needed it. His body was never, and would never be, the problem.
Come on!! I don't have time to waste. I'm going to...
"Get up!!"
Crack!
Finally, he felt as if everything was connecting. His body was finally listening to him, and heat began to invade him to the point that his hand, with which he was supporting himself, cracked the ground. He finally regained control.
BOOOM!
Just in time, because the extra time was up, and a giant creature landed from above with the intention of devouring Cassian.
It hit him and caused a huge explosion that sent smoke billowing into the surrounding area, but it didn't take long for the heavy rain to extinguish it and reveal the result.
"Heh... Hehe... Hahaha... I'm not going to fall here! It would be foolish to fall now, when I've just realized so many things... thanks to you, bastard! This won't end the way you want it to!"
There was Cassian, holding the creature's open jaw with both hands.
SKLRTCH!
At that moment, his hands exerted unprecedented force and tore the creature's jaw apart, splitting it in half and killing it.
"One down, bastard."
When he finished off that creature, he took some of its flesh and ate it. He looked up and saw the giant tree in flames, surrounded by a huge creature, and the rest of what he had just killed... an aberration that, for Cassian, had always been the worst thing existence could spawn, but now multiplied by twelve.
"As long as my fucking body can get up, we'll do it! From now on, everything I start, I'll finish, and you'll be the first example... It doesn't matter if you're a god or whatever nonsense... You will fall before us! And that's the only option I can be reasonable about."
******
[Every aspiration that springs to mind is a thread of shadows. We think of wealth, power, or love, but we rarely stop to ask ourselves what threads bind us to our own essence.
Only when we pierce the surface of our whims do we discover that the deepest greed lies not in possessing more, but in filling a void that even the most tangible things cannot satisfy.]