Imbeciles

Artillian was shocked with what he saw, and as the flames raged, a trace of fear could be seen in his eyes and this led to his speed to increase several folds.

He kept running until he reached an area that was slightly rocky and he noticed that the cave was just about 20 meters away from his current location. He slowed down because he could not see where he was stepping so he had to be extra careful with his footing, and because of that it took him at least five minutes to cover 20 meters. He entered the cave and sighed in relief as he plopped down to the ground and lay there like a dead dog for a full 10 minutes before he regained his wits.

"So ummm....very... powerful..... Lady..... Could you please explain to me my current situation and how you are just a voice?" said Artillian in the most polite tone he could muster.

"Listen carefully young man, I do not have much time. That last attack took most of my energy, so I need a full night to recuperate. My name is Hestia, and I am a soul currently residing inside your body, how this happened I am not too sure but I am sure everything will be explained in due time, but for now I will explain what I know so listen....

When you jumped off that building I decided to save you using my Divine Essence, but in the process your body started sucking in all the essence I had thus this explains why I am inside your body and this also explains why you are in this situation. You see because you sucked in so much of my Divine Essence I was powerless to stop you from hitting the ground, and even though you did die, because of my Essence your soul did not enter the reincarnation cycle properly thus it forced itself to be reincarnated without the proper procedure that is why you ended up here. So do you understand?"

After hearing the explanation, all Artillian could say was, "Uhhh..."

Artillian was in a state of shock after hearing these words. He kept opening and closing his mouth as if wanting to say something to no word comes out from his throat. He sat there silently for a couple of minutes digesting the words that had entered his ears, and at this moment he didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Then he finally spoke in a low but harsh voice.

"So you're telling me if it wasn't for you I would've died and been reincarnated without any knowledge of my previous life?"

"No, what happened wa-"

"Who the f*ck asked you to save me, you're nothing to me and I'm nothing to you, so why would you do something like that?"

"..."

Artillian was not willing to let Hestia continue, he couldn't care less why she had done what she did, all he cared about was him. As he realized that fact, it only served to further anger him. Hestia was forced to remain quiet due to the rebuttal she had received.

"All I wanted was to forget, and you're telling me thanks to your little trick I don't have the luxury of forgetting my horrible past? In the end I thought that death was the hell that I deserved, but I guess I will forever remember my sins and in my opinion that's worse than hell itself"

"Young man you can use this opportunity to look for redemption, there is no sin that is punishable by death. We all get second chances and meeting me was your second chance and that's what fate willed."

"Bullsh*t! You think it's easy to forget it all? To just throw it away and live on as if nothing ever happened. If you knew what I did before I jumped you would kill me where I stand"

"Young man-"

"Just stop, Ok? I just want to rest. This is all too much to take in at the moment. Is it possible for me to rest in here till dawn breaks or is there any place that is safer?"

"This is the safest place within a dozen kilometers; there is no one who can possibly find this cave for now."

"Sigh... I will be resting here then."

The entire exchange happened in Artillian's mind. If a stranger were present however, all they would see is a white haired fool screaming gibberish.

'Right now that cold stone floor is looking really attractive. Too much has happened today.' Sighed the boy as he reminisced about the day's events.

After their exchange Hestia quieted down, whilst he laid down to rest. Time seemed to be slow as Artillian was barely able to sleep due to the smell of blood and smoke from the battle that was taking place.

Artillian could tell that this 'new' body was quite different from his old one. This one was taller, slightly more vascular and incredibly fair skin. If one were to look at it one would think the boy used expensive skin care products that targeted women. The greatest change was not that however.

Sniff, sniff.

Artillian felt as if his five senses had reached an incredible unfathomable level. Especially his sense of smell and sight. Artillian had decent eyesight in his previous life but not to the point where his eyes were able to perfectly adjust to complete darkness.

Initially the boy was virtually blind, but he was able to overcome the issue thanks to his new found talents.

The memories of Artillian the orphan were still quite fresh, like a long and extremely vivid dream that had tattooed itself in his conscious and subconscious. Artillian went through the boy's memories to avoid being in. a jumbled state of mind. When he started going through his day he made a few realizations

'I should have killed myself in private with pills.'

'Why did I trust her voice on the battlefield so easy?'

'How did I kill that guy so easily? I thought the first kill was supposed to be the hardest and that you would lose feeling somewhere inside. Maybe I'm psychopath? Or is it Sociopath? What is the difference anyway?

.

As the night went by slowly he gradually fell asleep due to the slaughter quieting down.

As the first sign of light appeared down at the invasion area, soldiers were in formation whilst saluting a man clad in silver amour

"Sir, the enemy forces have been wiped out and we have confirmed that there are no survivors. We also got information that there was a larger army that was deployed yesterday in order to offer assistance to this small group of soldiers; they are set to arrive by noon. We await your orders Milord." said an armored soldier to the silver armored man.

The silver armored man was silent for a while as he assessed the situation, and it was only after a couple breaths of time that he spoke.

"Send spies over to wait by the mountain entrance and inform them to notify me when the opposition arrives. For now we will retreat back to camp and wait for back up to arrive, I'm positive once they see the scenes here they'll be hesitant to proceed over the mountain. With that said how many men did we lose?"

"Sire, we lost a total of twenty thousand soldiers during this ambu-"

"Wait!! How is that possible! We outnumbered the enemy by 10 to 1! How is it possible to lose so many men?" Said the armored man as he slammed the table in frustration.

After the man clad in amour asked this the atmosphere suddenly became tense. No one dared to utter a single word due to humiliation. There were a total of a hundred thousand soldiers that invaded a camp of only ten thousand, it wasn't that big of a loss but it was humiliating to have that many soldiers slaughtered by such a small group.

And after a long period of silence a middle-aged man stepped forward and offered an explanation.

"Milord, during last night's battle there was a man who ran toward a group of our men and unleashed an attack than burnt everything within a kilometer. That is how-"

".....And where is this great warrior's body? I would love to see just how he managed to unleash such an attack."

"Sire we never managed to catch up with him as he ran awa-"

When he heard these words the armored man immediately became enraged and started shouting at the soldiers.

"Did one of you not just say that there were no survivors? Do you know what a survivor is? Do you not know that a person who fled from battle is known as a survivor?"

"Sire-"

"Shut up! Half of you search the whole area and if you cannot find him in an hour retreat back to the camp! We can't afford any more casualties!"

"Understood!"

All the soldiers cried in unison as they spread out in every direction

The armored man pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration as he sighed, "Imbeciles, these guys are all imbeciles.