22 Never Look Back

Metal shacks atop metal shacks, side by side they form the outline of what was once a village. This place, it can no longer be called a village. A village needs villagers, and all of the people in this dwelling place for hovel are dead.

Their desecrated corpses lay unceremoniously where they died, flesh ripped and gouged from their skeletal frames. Their faces, or at least the ones who still have faces, paint the portrait of unadulterated anguish and terror.

To have your meat clawed from your bone, to know in your last moments with a harrowing certainty that all your life had amounted to was the feast of an unfeeling monster…

Unimaginable…

Even for me.

Unimaginable.

I've witnessed this before…

In my village; in the days after those high-born bastards brought their war to my home. Unsatisfied as they were with the mountain of dead they had amassed, a Tower breach followed. Monsters of every variety swarmed what was left of my home just to ensure every man, woman and child was truly dead.

The survivors of their war were hunted down, mutilated, and devoured. To my knowledge, no one was spared. Alone, I escaped, but at a price.

Thomas…

My best friend, my only friend. A survivor of the initial bloodshed. He was the price.

They had found us; the monsters had found us. Hiding was futile, fighting meant death, so we ran.

We ran as fast as our tiny legs could take us. We ran, and we ran, and we ran, but it was hopeless. They never stopped chasing. Tom was always faster than me, he was faster than everyone. He was always proud of that fact.

Easily could he have outrun me. Easily could he have left me to the creatures behind. He could have escaped. There weren't that many of them. He could have escaped.

But, he didn't.

He stayed by my side. He urged me through my screaming legs and burning lungs. He would have rathered both of us die than to survive on his own. I didn't reach that same conclusion. Kicking his legs from beneath him, I slowed him down and never looked back.

I heard his screams and I never looked back. With his last breath he cursed me, but…

I never looked back.

Even before you got your hold on me, Father, I suppose I was already a killer.

Bursting from the doors of a nearby shanty, a young girl, no older than twelve, runs into the street. Drawing the eyes of the still feasting creatures, she yells out for help. From the shack she had escaped from, a goblin chases her down.

'We have to help her!' Whispering her words, Emma stands from her crouched position hidden behind one of the village's dilapidated buildings and jolts forward. Her progress denied, Abbigale catches her arm.

'We haven't surveyed the area, we don't know what's out there. Running in without a plan could get us all killed.'

'I don't care', Emma says while wrenching her arm free from our leader's grip.

'Stand down, Emily, that's an order.'

'You want me to do nothing? She's going to die and you want me to do nothing? I refuse.'

'Stand down', I say. Without protest, Emma returns to crouching. I don't look at her, but I can feel her glare. Against my commands she's helpless. She couldn't resist if she tried, and I have no doubt that at this moment she's trying. It's all for nought, however. That is the power of a spirit pledge.

Catching up with the girl, the goblin leaps. Tackled to the ground, the girl lets out a heart-wrenching scream.

'No,' Emma gasps.

Bearing its yellow, pointed teeth as it swings its head upward, like a pendulum in its return momentum, the creature launches its fangs into the bare flesh of the girl's neck. With a final scream and a crunch, the girl dies.

"The mighty crush the frail, the big devour the small, that is the way of this world."

Steeling my soul, I suppress the horror of the sight before me. What good is the dead? Their death means they were weak. The weak have no right to complain.

That's right...

The weak die and the strong survive.

I am strong.

Breaking the silence, Abbigale sighs. 'Thank Ember it was quick at least.' Tears threatening to fall, she lifts her sleeve to her eyes and erases any trace of sorrow. 'Okay, I'll go scout the area-'

'What are you doing?' Grabbing the lapel of Abbigale's Peace-Keeper long coat, Emma pulls her close.

'You just stood there and watched a girl die', Emma whispers sharply. 'Now it's just business as usual for you? For all of you?'

Gripping her wrist, Abbigale tears Emma's hand away from her collar. 'No one here is going to deny that what we saw just now is tragic, but scenes just like this are repeating themselves over and over throughout this region. If you want to make a difference, not just to one girl, but to hundreds of thousands of them you have to live long enough to do so. That means being smart. Charging in without a plan or an idea of their numbers, that isn't smart.'

'What good is all our powers if we can't save one girl?' Placing her hand on Emma's shoulder, Tabitha turns the bespectacled girl around to face her.

'What good is saving one girl if you both end up dead?'

'They're right', Solomon chimes in. 'We're not fighting one battle, we're fighting a war. The life of one girl, when compared to the lives of five military assets is inconsequential.'

'And what about you, Nero? I've looked into you. I know what happened in Area XIII. I know you know what it feels like to watch people die right in front of you. How could you have stopped me? How could you have just watched her die when you know her fear first hand?'

That's right, I do know her fear, but I'm not going to throw my life away for one girl. For one girl, am I going to risk everything? Ludicrous! I will scale the heights of power, rain hell down on all who oppose me, and claim Ember's Crown.

Let my will be done though the heavens should crumble and fall.

'Maybe we could have saved her, maybe we would have all died. Either way, what's happened has happened. There's nothing to be gained by dwelling on it.' Exerting the force of the Spirit Pledge, I make it clear that the matter is not open to further discussion. Defeated, Emma jerks her shoulder from Tabitha's hold and shrinks back into a crouching position.

'As I was saying, I'll go scout the area, get an idea of their tiers and numbers. From that, we can come up with a strategy or fall back and request backup if it's not viable to retake this village alone.' Tension fizzles around our leader and she vanishes.

No.

She's still there; I can still perceive her. In the corner of my consciousness, I can still tell that she's there.

A mind Art!

She's using a mind Art.

She hasn't disappeared; she's just rendered herself undetectable to conscious awareness. I wouldn't notice her at all if not for Father's training against these methods.

Does she only have a mind Art or is she a higher-form Tension Master as well? That could make things difficult…

Body, mind, life, and death Tension are known to be the most difficult to advance in. Their aberrant nature makes the results of their cultivation often unpredictable. The basis of mind Tension is the manipulation of consciousness itself. Done right, a mind Tension Master may gain dominion over their enemy's senses and control over all sentient beings. Done wrong, and their very perception of reality can invert. The absurdity of fantasy can become to them as common-sense as the notion that up is up and down is down.

Though risky, the rewards of progressing into those four principles of Tension are not few. What can be achieved through manipulation of the mind can be far more devastating than the hottest of flames or harshest of storms. A master of fire can bring death by the thousand, a master of mind can cheat death itself.

Abbigale Smok, you're not simple at all. It doesn't matter though.

You are in my way.

Half an hour passes, and Abbigale returns.

'There are around two-hundred, all low-tier Tension beasts. Trying to take them all as a group is feasible, but I think the better plan is to divide and conquer. If we split up into three units, each taking a different location around this village, we can attack them simultaneously and prevent their numbers from being a problem.'

Abbigale divides the party. She places Solomon and me in a pair, Tabitha and Emma as another, and takes the final position herself.

With hand motions, Abbigale points out the path for Tabitha and Emma to walk. Instructing Solomon and me to attack from our position, she moves in the opposite direction she had sent the girls, hiding behind buildings as she moves.

'Attack on my signal,' In my head, I hear Abbigale's thoughts.

A second mind Art… You're not simple at all…

Like a tug at my consciousness, the signal comes. No words are heard, just the impulse towards action. Allowing myself to comply, I move from the derelict cabin I was hiding behind, draw the sword from my hip, and advance on the mob of Tension Beasts idly wandering the blood-soaked village.

They see me.

They charge.

A goblin their vanguard, it claws the ground on all fours. Moving like a rabid animal, it pounces towards me. Stepping to the side, I raise my blade and slice through the creature from crown through spine until its bisection is complete. Tepid, green blood disperses in the air. Shifting my feet from the tips of my toes in a circular motion, I avoid most of the putrid liquid raining down on the black-grass terrain.

A pitch-black, clawed hand swipes at my chest. Defending myself with an upward slash of my sword, I sever the hand from the rest of its limb and kick the shade backwards with all the force of my Tension enhanced legs. Toppling several monsters in its flight, I take advantage of the chaos and leap forward. My heightened senses struggle to process the blur of my momentum. Diving into the sea of monsters, I wave my bladed arm and sever heads from necks, arms from shoulders, and chests from stomachs.

Showering in a mist of assorted colour, I continue my onslaught. Wherever enemies stand, I cut them down.

Melting into a pool of tar-like fluid, several shades merge into one conglomerating mass of towering malice. Four times my height, it stands tall on this battlefield. Prying its mouth apart to reveal rows of needle-like teeth from its otherwise featureless face, It lets out a deafening screech.

A shade champion.

The evolution of a shade through the joining together with others of its kind. A creature on the cusps of breaking into the highest tier of its evolutionary potential. Against that creature, my sword is useless.

Trampling down the other creatures in its path, the murky abomination tears through the ground, running on its four slender limbs. Reaching me in no time, I spring out of the way of its forward thrust. Hearing the beast carve through the earth as it repositions itself, I surge Tension through my legs, crouch, and jump backwards into to air, rotating myself until I'm upside-down, looking down on the Shade from above.

Soaring to the earth, I reach out my hand, condense Tension into a spear of energy and launch it from on-high, into the back of the tar-like creature.

Using the beast to break my fall, I land on its neck. Placing a hand on the monster's head, I force Tension to my palm and violently channel it through its skull.

The creature falls.

I lift myself from its corpse and face the remnant of the army of monsters.

Twenty-three Arts remaining, that's more than enough for what I have planned. I ready myself to charge once more into the horde. Before I'm able, Solomon dashes forward, battle axe in hand. Covered in a blend of his blood and that of the enemy's, it's apparent that in this time he has fought his own battles.

Okay then, let's see what you can do. A smile pulls at my lips as my servant hacks through the beasts as a man possessed. With each swing of his axe, multitudes are cleaved in half. A goblin pounces on his back and bites into his shoulder. Grunting in pain, Solomon reaches behind him, grabs the neck of the brute and crushes its windpipe to the melody of its croak.

Facing once more his foes, he continues his brutal attacks until the last monster falls. I walk up to him.

'Not bad.' Acknowledging my compliment with a reluctant grunt, Solomon places his battle-axe into the sheath strapped to his back.

In this field of carnage, I sit down and cross my legs. Drenched in blood and covered in wounds, Tabitha and Emma join me. Minutes pass, and Abbigale also returns.

'Mission completed. Let's head back to base-camp and rest up for-'

We hear it before we see it. A sound like a thousand whispers fills the sky. I look up. A dark cloud approaches.

Drawing closer with every breath, the cloud takes shape. A skeletal form, its lower half engulfed by a stream of condensed black fog writhing within itself. Protruding from every inch just below the surface of the mist, a face. The whispers, a screech. The faces adorning the swirling mass in the sky are screaming from beneath the vaporous cloak of their host.

A high-tier Tension Beast.

An Abyssal Wraith.