Chapter 9

"Well you did it. To be honest I didn't expect to see you again."

I looked back at Jack, I smiled. I don't know why. I'm happy. Why am I happy? Can I be happy? Am I allowed?

"So kid now you're patched up, why don't I tell you a story."

We had returned to K.I.L and we were sitting in a dark room. I was covered in bandages, a red dot soaking into the white cloth.

"You mean yours?"

"Well a deal's a deal."

"Sure."

"Far in the distance there is a nation. But before it was that it was two empires. It had a war that lasted thousands of years. Each was matched equally in power. The citizens would fight and fight with no other purpose. Then one day a general proposed an idea. The idea to take children and make them weapons, from birth train them in murder and death. To send them onto the battlefield to slaughter. That was the year me and my sister were born. Twins. We were selected for this particular force. Along with a thousand others. We were told how to kill. How to murder. Where to cut. Where to slice. We were shown on each other. We killed mercilessly, told that this was moral. Good. pure. From birth we were drenched in blood and death. I don't remember what it feels like to not hold a knife. That shadow, the grip around my palm. That ghostly touch. I still feel it even with my hands empty. anyway when I was six my sister rebelled. She hated killing and one day she was forced to kill her best friend. We were inseparable at that point. We had to stay together and I tried to look after her. But that one fateful day she denied the general and screamed at him. I still remember the look on his face, the glint in his eye as he pulled out his gun. I remember the echo of the shot as I thrashed and kicked. I was held back by a guard. I screamed and cried. I beat my hands as hard as I could, biting down on the guard's arm until he let me go. When I finally got free I rushed to my sister's side and watched her life drain, her blood pool beneath her. I'll never forget that rage. That anger.

I was deployed two years later. Thrust into the middle of a battlefield. There were ten of us. Nine hundred and ninety children were slaughtered in that camp. My life cost ninety nine others there, including my sister. I remember the hail of bullets and the haze of explorations, the mud, the fire, the spells racing across the sky and whistling into the ground. I was in that hellscape for ten years. I killed three hundred people. The other nine were killed. All that sacrifices, death, destruction placed on my shoulders. I remember every one of their names and I carry them with me. I remember the name of every person I've killed or been responsible for killing. I remember all eight million. I carry them all with me, all in this blade and all in this cloak. In every movement of my body there is the weight of eight million behind it. When the war finally ended it was a joyous occasion, the two warring nations were married with their children. A sweet story right? The military was dissabled and I was cast out, my entire life in service of one country and in the end I was put out on the street with nothing more than a knife and thirteen hundred souls on my shoulder. I decided then that I would kill for a living, and my first official assassination. General Hughes the bastard who killed my sister. I cut him up and stole all his money. Of course I was imprisoned but that princess decided that I was just desperate and turned over my sentence. I killed her too and the prince murdered them both. And again I stole their money hiding it away before being captured. Those three were my only selfish kills. First the man who killed my sister and all my friends. And second the couple who devalued all those deaths and decided that the war was pointless. Those who made my sisters life useless making all my killing and murder amount to nothing. I then left the nation and came here. That's where I met Arachnid and all my other comrades. Where we formed Grim Reaper and I was given the name Jack the ripper."

I couldn't think of any words. I just sat there in stunned silence.

Even if I added in all the monsters I have killed, I don't think it would even scratch eight million.

"It's a sad story I guess. You asked how I can kill so mercilessly. It's because I don't have a soul. I am but an instrument of death. I am merely a weapon. I always have and always will be."

"What's your real name if it's not Jack?"

"I don't know."

"How do you know everyone else's name then?"

"We all gave each other names but I never wanted one. I was fine with my number. 0737"

He lifted up his shirt and turned his back to reveal the numbers cut into the flesh, a pale white line across his flesh.

"Now Sam, if I may ask you a question? Why do you want to save people so much? The average human is happy to kill given a reward."

"It has to do with my brother. He was always so weak when we were growing up. He got bullied a lot for being an orphan so one day me and Kane went to his school. We walked with him every day for a month, we cut class and we got out of chores to walk him to and from school every day. We told everyone that if anyone hurt my brother again they'd deal with us. The feeling of protecting another always resonated with me. It's what made me want to become a guild master. And when I stopped I still vowed if anyone in my old guild or my brother was ever in trouble I'd help them. No matter what they'd done. I figured if I couldn't help the world with my brain I'd help them with my power. I thought I could walk away from that. I guess not. I'm pretty pathetic. Even for the sake of my only brother I still can't be heartless and kill as you do. Even though I've killed two of my family."

We sat in the room in silence. Staring at the floor. Neither knew what to say to the other.

"Oh I almost forgot, Sam I got something for you!"

He ran over to the wall, opening a panel and pulling a hoodie from it. It was black and would've reached down to my shins. It was open at the front. It had a sheath for my knife worked into the side.

I slotted the coat on, fitting the hood over my head and tightening my mask. I stood in the mirror, my bandages covering my chest. The cloak was light and strong.

"Thanks? Why did you get me this? I'm not ungrateful, just a little confused."

"Look at the side, there is a zip. That acts in a similar way to my cloak and it will let you store bodies, up to five to be precise. So if you ever get the desire to be a hero again you won't make Arachnid carry two men. It also means you won't have to lug around the people you kill." I fit my knife into my new coat and walked out being wrapped up by his cloak as I left and suddenly I was outside, on the top of the building. The sun rose in front of me. This was the start of a new me.

For the sake of my Brother

And for the sake of Grim Reaper

For Jack and Arachnid

I WILL KILL

£45,000,000