Halves of One

"Serve me well and I'll never dispose of you"

That's what Nicolas heard before everything turned dark and blank. He stood in panic and began walking backwards trying to grab on to something, then, a few more steps later, he bumped into something. His vision came back to normal when he turned around and checked what it was.

"Matthew?"

"Nicolas?"

"What are you doing here", Nicolas angrily exclaimed but Matthew was more concerned about their surroundings than the ongoing conversation.

"Yeah, I would like to ask that too. Where and why are we here?", he panicked as he looked down at the small street, a hundred stories below them.

Before they can even process what's going on, something went pass their shoulders. It was fast but the size suggested it was neither a fly nor any insect.

"Don't let them get away", a dozen men yelled as they come in pursuit.

Another high-speed pebble presented itself, inches away from their feet and it finally registered to them what it as.

"Guns? Bullets?", they both looked at each other in panic as they immediately took cover behind what looked like a ventilation unit.

"What should we do?", Matthew asked, sweat building up his forehead.

Nicolas who's intently looking at the other building had a crazy idea, "Jump across"

"Are you nuts? That's too far. If we mess that up that's a hundred-meter drop towards death"

"Well, if you want to stay, then stay here and wait for them to put holes all over you", Nicolas replied giving not a single care to what Matthew thinks.

"But—", a bullet chipped a small piece of the ventilation Matthew was hiding in.

"Your such a worry wart, we can do this, like we once did", Nicolas blurted out without thinking.

"Once did?", they both said in chorus.

"What do you mean once did, we don't even know each other in the first place", Matthew yelled.

"Forget it, either we die here, or we die trying", Nicolas convinced Matthew once more but he knows he's convincing himself more.

"But the ledge is still too far, the bullets will get to us first, we die either way"

Nicolas paused for a minute, peeked from his hiding place and examined their pursuers. "Use your soul", he suggested.

"Soul? Why?"

"Use your soul and turn it into a shield"

"My soul is a sword. How in the world will I supposed to do that", Matthew replied to what he thought was Nicolas's ridiculous idea.

"I don't know about you but I can. Just do what you can and run. Good luck"

"What?"

"NOW", Nicolas ran as he immediately called his soul and turned it into a shield preventing the bullets and changing his hiding place little by little to the ledge.

"What the hell?", Matthew thought. "He really could?"

A loud sound shook Matthew from where he hid. He never dared to take a peek but he knew what causes that kind of explosion. "Grenade!?"

Out of sheer distress, he immediately stood in panic and ran, calling his sword, though a bullet was already heading for his head. "The end", he thought as he shielded himself with his blade as a last resort for blocking the shot. To his surprise he too had produced a shield.

"What the—", he thought before continuing to run, enough to catch up to Nicolas who's now ready to jump.

"WHAT THE FUCK", Nicolas roared in horror.

"I told you it was too far", Matthew came yelling at him as both of them plummeted down the street.

When they hit the ground, they were somehow on a different place.

Nicolas tried to sit but he could not. He tried grabbing the wooden railing on his side but his hands does not seem to have the power to do so.

As he raised his hand he discovered something. "Why are my hands small?", he uttered but only a cry came out of his mouth.

He tilted his head to his side and saw a baby looking at him and also crying. The sharp look in its eyes made him realize it maybe was Matthew. They both cried while failing to hold a conversation.

They are inside a room, with patterned wallpaper of animals. The wooden railing surrounding them is a crib making sure that they will not fall off. Over their heads and a bit far from their reach are crib mobiles of bears as they are illuminated by the orange light coming outside the window.

It looked like a tranquil and normal night except for the voices making a ruckus outside, "WE CAN'T LET THEM LIVE".

A lady can also be heard outside the door arguing with a man.

"No, they are your sons, your flesh and blood", she cried as she tried to pull the man as they barged in.

"This can't be helped", the man tearfully cried as he pushed the lady against the wall, leaving her weak as she cried hopelessly.

The man looked at both of them and said, "Sorry Nicolas and Matthew"

Nicolas and Matthew on the other hand was surprised that the man knows their name and their cries stopped.

"Forgive Papa", the man carried both of them then gave them a kiss on the forehead before putting them back to the crib.

"PLEASE DON'T, STOP", the lady exclaimed as the man picked up something from the foot of the bed.

"Forgive me my sons", he uttered as his kind smile turned pained and guilty as he raised his hand into the air revealing a block of wood. He pressed it down together with gravity and Nicolas and Matthew could only wait as their tiny little soft heads were crushed. Though they felt nothing, it gave them shivers.

They again blacked out and once again thrown into an event one after another. It seemed like they are thrown from one nightmare to nightmare without a single second for a break. They kept getting stabbed or crushed, drowned in the river, or left on the forest to die. They kept bleeding, suffocating, all resulting to their death.

In one occasion eaten alive by wild animals and being forced to fight for a war just to be taken down mercilessly by a sniper, but mostly, they are killed as an infant or a toddler by their own family while looking at them like monsters as they sleep. Or grow into their teens to be later killed by strangers with swords and bow, and if they are too unlucky to what world they are in, even guns. Despite all that, they are reborn each time just to repeat the cycle all over again.

A drop of rain woke them up and as their reflections showed on the showy windows in an alley, they are exactly the same age for when they fought to death the other day at the waterfall.

"What's happening?", Matthew exclaimed as a mechanical entity tends to the laundry and clothes inside the building.

"I don't know… I think I just had a…"

"Nightmare?", Nicolas jinxed him by the end of his sentence.

The voices from the distance confirmed that they are still inside a nightmare, "Again?", they both looked at each other.

"Let's just run for now", Matthew proposed.

"As if we have a choice", Nicolas agreed when a single hot ray of light burned his leg. "What was that, Ow", he uttered reaching for his leg. It had no blood but there's a hole, "Did you see what that was?", he turned around and saw Matthew falling to the ground.

The left side of his stomach has a hole, cauterized. Nicolas felt concerned for the other boy, worried for him and at the same time angry about their pursuers.

Out of his frustration, his eyes glowed blue and called forth a bow. He fired a shot thinking just one thing, "Die". He pulled the strings of the seemingly luminous bow as their pursuers drew closer and closer.

"He's firing, SCATTER", one of the men on the front yelled while all of his comrades went to the sides in a hurry.

"Try evading this", Nicolas thought as the bow glowed even brighter, enough to illuminate the whole alley. Once he had let go of the arrow, it sent a blue stream of light to the narrow alley liquefying anyone and anything it came in contact with.

Though their comrades dead down below, the snipers kept shooting, almost getting a head shot out of Nicolas if he had not evaded. Only his right ear was the casualty.

"What are you doing?", Matthew uttered weakly as he watched Nicolas counter the shots with his bow and the light beams came raining from above, "Those laser beams are pesky aren't they?", his eyes also glowed blue as he produced a shield for protection and sat up. "You should save yourself while you still can" he whispered, changing places with Nicolas.

"I don't know what I am doing, and I don't even know what was going on", Nicolas tried to calm himself down.

"Me neither"

"Have you somehow seen a past memory of mine before all of this happened?", Nicolas asked trying to pinpoint the sniper from the darkness.

"Like that time when you thought that girl died? And other not so important events that happened in your life?", Matthew coughed blood as his soul began to flicker. "You've had a horrible life didn't you?".

"Yeah and so were you", Nicolas dragged him slowly as they backed away from the sight of the enemy.

"So am I?", Matthew stared at him in confusion.

"Don't tell me you can't remember?"

"Remember what?", five beams came hitting Matthew's shield causing it to break. Nicolas had no other choice but to give up shooting and handle the defense.

"Don't you have any recollection of your childhood?".

"What?"

"Anything that happened? deaths? killings? that you may have forgotten?"

"Deaths? Killings?"

"Forget it, let's just get away from here", Nicolas softly swiftly recalled his soul and helped Matthew walked. They looked like two drunken dudes who got out of a bar and can't walk straight.

With their pursuer dead and them out of the sniper's view, they managed to hide behind another alley beside a dumpster as the rain started to pour heavily.

"What's really happening here?", Nicolas murmured as he sat opposite Matthew.

"What do you mean earlier? Am I forgetting something? What did you saw in my memory?"

"Do you really want to know?", Nicolas asked tending to his lost ear and hole bearing leg.

"After all the words you used to describe it, do you think I'd just sit here and be oblivious?"

"Prepare yourself then, I don't know if this will work but call you soul. Any form will be fine, this might give away our location but if you insist, here goes everything", Nicolas laughed before manifesting his sword.

He stood up and went closer to Matthew who's bewildered by the color of his soul, "Is it only me, or did my soul changed its color. It was pitched black before"

"I never noticed, I thought it's already the same color as mine, before all of this started"

He kneeled, placed his hand on Matthew's head and closed his eyes. He showed him what he saw, all of it, no cuts, all the screams and the blood. By the time he opened his eyes Matthew was silently crying.

"I always thought that I've forgotten something. That Liam said he found me somewhere and that I owe him my life and soul", he uttered, as he rested his head beside the dumpster, "What a sad life. My family, dead, father possessed by something, and my soul is corrupted"

"Well, there's nothing we can do about it now", Nicolas sat back down.

Matthew stared at his own sword with curiosity, "I guess this is really what my soul looks like before that night"

"I think so"

"I wonder what the other side would look like", Matthew closed his eyes while his soul began to change colors. "Wow", he laughed. "I really am corrupted", he waved the pitch-black sword in the air.

"What would you do now?", Nicolas asked.

"I don't know, but none of that matters now, I'm dying", he looked up at the cloudy dark sky before bitterly looking back down and watched his reflection on a puddle. "Doesn't this sight look familiar to you? I felt like I've been here before"

"How could that be? We never had guns on Gregoria, nor lasers or concrete buildings this big in Yggdryas. I doubt not anywhere in the world would have these kind of things", Nicolas pointed at the skyscrapers from afar.

"I don't know, but don't you find it strange that you know what a gun or a laser is, despite seeing it for first time?"

Nicolas's mouth was left half open when he too have realized the fact. "Maybe you're just delirious. Wait a minute, it's not only you soul that's changed, your hair too, it turned black. It's quite unsettling, it's like I'm talking to my own reflection", he sarcastically replied while still trying to dismiss the conversation.

Matthew had also noticed the change since the start of their nightmares but disregarded it until now. "I have no idea. On the other hand, I can assure you, I'm dying, not delirious", Matthew fought too hard to laugh but ended up coughing blood instead.

"No, you're just badly injured, so you should shut up and rest"

"I'm stating a fact"

"No, you're not. Unless I get help", Nicolas struggled to get himself up, using the wall as he desperately wanted tried to stand, "Stay here and rest, I'll get some help"

"I'm already passed savable, you'd only be endangering yourself", Matthew tried to stop him but he's already too weak to even move a finger.

Nicolas felt a sudden pinch in his chest, "How could I just sit here and watch you die? What kind of a— What kind of a—", a heavy feeling washed over him as he fell back to the wet floor, rethinking what he's about to say.

"Why are you acting like a hero? You don't even know me"

He can't explain why, but he's growing irritated and angry at himself as he once again stood, "F— For some reason I can't accept that", Nicolas muttered as he turned his back towards Matthew and started walking.

The gentle yet restless fall of the rain, popping into crowns as they met the ground complimented each pitiful step of Nicolas. Matthew watched him stumble and slam his fist to the ground before standing back up once again to continue. He reached his hand towards him, stretching it as far as he could until Nicolas finally disappeared into the dark rainy night. And as his vision began to fade, a memory suddenly made things clear for him.

"That's why everything felt familiar", he weakly smiled, "You've always been like this, prioritizing my safety first more than yours"

He felt the surroundings getting cold as his vision finally went blank. All he could hear was the fading beats of his heart as everything that he saw finally made sense.

"Don't you remember Nicolas? This is where we parted ways, me sitting here beside the dumpster as the trash that I am and you leaving me here to die. I never really wanted anything else. I did not want you to save me. All I wish you could have done was to be here by my side… This was not the first time that I have felt death so I grew accustomed to it already… But dying here alone, it's another kind of horror", he closed his eyes as tears ran down his cheeks.

"You could have at least seen me off… Tell me to wait for you in the next life… I'm scared, don't leave, don't leave me here alone… brother"

Nicolas who's already far off in a clearing felt like he heard Matthew's words as he felt the boy's presence slowly fading. The sudden rise of his heartbeat made him decide to go back, urgently as if he's forgetting something of utmost importance. But he was too late, his body could no longer keep up with his injuries as he stumbled to the ground.

Tears began to skid down his cheeks as he desperately tried to crawl back, dragging his useless legs as all the memories that Matthew had seen came back to haunt him. With one last pull, he felt a cold metal spanning miles into both his right and left. He could only laughed as he felt the ground beginning to shake. As bright light shone on his right side, all he could do was curse his fate.

All of their passed lives flashed through his vision as the source of the light hit him, dragging him for a few meters, battering him to the ground as he fetl his body get torn to shreds.

"I'm sorry, Matthew", he cried before he was finally thrown to the very root of their existence.

He drifted and drifted into the endless spiral of the countless lives he lived, zooming through it with haste as he hurdled towards the epicenter. A small single speck of light surrounded by nothing but the void of darkness.

As he entered, he was greeted with a palace. A palace painted with silver and gold, extravagant and truly magnificent. It's walls we're decorated with paintings, weapons, trophies, and statues of a King that he could not recognize. He had a wide grin in every one of it, raising his sword with pride.

"Stop this, Liam, please", said a boy, he had no face, he had no distinguishing feature except for one thing. He was glowing, radiant from the strands of his hair to the tip of his toes. A personification of pure light himself

"Wow, even the god himself is here to stop me. I should be very special then", Nicolas watched as a young man kneeled in the middle of the room. His eyes are full of anger while his presence extrudes rage, punishing dark flames circled around him as he nestled a girl in his arms. Behind him, fatally wounded were two other young men and five decapitated knights.

"Step aside, Anwar, this is between me and that treacherous good for nothing King and his people"

"You can't do this, remember who you are"

The light engulfed boy kept shielding the people behind him from the unforgiving flames that Liam kept sending their way. Trying his best to withstand every attack as he kept convincing the boy to stand down.

"I know who I am, my name is Liam Baltazar, and I am fucking tired of all of this", he raised his hand, summoning countless swords and rained it down to his enemies, thrashing the room and claiming casualties where Anwar was too late to protect.

"They did you wrong, but this does not mean you should do the same"

"They did me wrong? We're 16 when we we're summoned in this world, after that, we were forced to fight in a war we have no business with. Just like that, as cliché as all the novels I've read. And now, after all the sacrifices we made, for six agonizing years, this is what they'll repay us? By taking our lives? Putang ina, kung ganito din lang, they might as well die!"

His eyes began to glow red. The fire began to intensify, burning anything and anyone to crisp, sword kept on manifesting with his beck and call as he held his friends tightly, shedding all the tears he could give. His agony echoes throughout the now broken palace while the heavy force of his soul shook everyone to their knees, shaking, hopelessly praying to Anwar for safety.

"Come to think of it, Anwar, you're the one who summoned us in the first place. You're equally guilty to their sin!", he let everything loose, directing everything to purge the King, his advisors, and greedy nobles.

Anwar, despite being a god, could no longer suppress Liam's attacks as he too started to fall. With one last attempt to protect the people he spread his arms. Specks of light scattered in the air as the world seemingly slowed down its pace.

Nicolas watched as the rampaging Liam panicked, his attacks gradually moved in slow motion as Anwar bypassed everything as he made his way towards him.

"Go away, Anwar, you may be a God but I will not hesitate to kill you"

"Forgive me, Liam, even I have no idea that they'll do this to you and your friends, but you know this is wrong"

"Wrong? Are you kidding me? this is beyond wrong; this is something they can't even pay by death. So, step aside and let me remove their soul from existence!", he called his soul pointed it at Anwar, slowly backing up as he carried the dead girl with him.

"Sasha wouldn't like this, Liam, you know this is wrong"

"Then, bring them back to life! You're a God, Give my friends back to me!"

Anwar sadly looked down, hesitating as he broke the news to him, "I can't do that"

"LIAR"

"They're souls, whatever they used damaged them beyond repair. Even if I we're to bring them back, they'll never be the same again, but trust me, revenge is wrong. Let me be the judge of their crimes, you should not taint your soul any more than this"

Liam fell to his knees, setting his blade down as he embraced Sasha as he cried. Slowly, he carried her towards the other three, laying her down beside them, "I couldn't protect them"

Anwar felt the guilt as he felt how much Liam cares for his friends. Why wouldn't he, he's the one who handpicked them all to be this world's heroes, watched them laughed, watched them smile, holding on to each other as they faced each new monster that they came face-to-face with. He knows it should have been his obligation to keep them safe, yet he failed to take notice of the greed of the humans he himself wished to protect.

"Liam, you need to let them go", he placed his hand on his shoulder.

The young man's cries slowly calmed down as he finally held Anwar's hand, "You're right, I should let them go", he tightened his grasp, "But not the people of this world"

With one flick of a finger, Anwar's spell was undone and the floating swords immediately stabbed him from every angle. "What did you—"

"They did not kill me first because I was the weakest of us four, after all, what a mere healer could do against a battalion of knights. But do you know where the Demon's power went, almighty Anwar?"

"It can't be"

Liam finally lost his mind, "If you give me your power, I can surely bring them back", he caught him in headlock as the King and the others could only watched. "Watch me, people of Anwaran, I will make sure not one of your souls could go back to the Tree of Life!"

Anwar tried his best to free himself, the young man started to absorb the God slowly, making him weaker and weaker, screaming in agony as he felt his divinity being ripped apart. In his final attempt to break free, he had no choice but to do the unthinkable. Shaking, he stretched his hands towards the King and his retainers, watching their cowardly faces, before regretfully closing them up.

As if squeezing a bottle of toothpaste, their souls was reaped from their bodies and became the source of Anwar's strength to break free, throwing Liam across the room.

Nicolas watched as Liam slowly sat back up and laughed, "Oh my, look what you've done, you consumed their soul there's no saving them from that", he continued celebrating, wiping his tears from excessive laughter, "Thanks, I guess?"

"LIAM"

"What? I didn't do anything, yet. I'll clean-up the rest of this world, don't worry"

Furiously, Anwar caught him by the neck. Slowly tightening his grip, but Liam's grim smile kept him on edge, "That was unnecessary! You made me kill them"

"And they killed my friends, A life for a life, there's nothing fairer than that. You might want to hold me tighter though, as I am now, I can even kill you if I want to"

"Then I have no choice"

Anwar began to glow as his body began to crack, forcefully trying to separate Liam's power from his mortal body.

"That won't work either", he laughed at him, "Don't you have other tricks? For a God, you are extremely lacking"

"Trust me, I have, but none of us would like it"

Nicolas felt the shift in the atmosphere, everything, the ruble, the dead bodies, the paintings, the statues began to levitate and Liam was wiped of his smile, "What are you doing!", he exclaimed in distress and tried to free himself, "Stop! If you do this you'll need to sacrifice yourself too!"

"I am more than prepared to do so. If your soul is split in three you'll not be able to have your full power, you'll become a wandering lamb as the entity that will be left of you. I will merge my own fragments to yours and suppressed you for all eternity. Indeed, I am falling short, as a God I've had my shortcomings and I hope you can forgive me with that, but I can't let you destroy this world"

"Are you out of your fucking mind? Let me go! Let me go!"

"Even if I will be reduced to an entity maintaining the fabrics of reality, I'm sure someone will be born to stop your attempt, and I hope, I hope you change your mind in time as you wander aimlessly in this plane of reality"

Liam felt his very soul splitting in three and each and every bit tormented him as if his own limbs are being pulled and there's nothing he could do to stop it.

"STOP"

Nicolas also exclaimed Liam's last words as he sprang out of the bed he was on. Tense and breathing heavily as he was greeted with the surprised face of Alisa who just entered the cabin. She all the vegetables she's carrying before wrestling him back to the bed with a hug.

"A— Alisa, I— can't breathe—", he cried, being too weak to push her off from all the sleeping.

"Sorry", she quickly freed him, "I was just happy. You've been unconscious for two days, I thought you'll never wake up again"

"Two days?", Nicolas immediately looked outside the window.

"Yes, but don't worry, we're in our cabin in the woods. We're safe here", Alisa assured, picking up the vegetables with a smile, "Do you want to eat?"

"I would be delighted, but could you call Anton and your Uncle first? I have both good and bad news to tell them"