1 Prologue: I Shouldn't Be Here

The air was stifling hot as he took in the carnage of the battle that was happening around him. The corpses of those that had died were piled haphazardly to one side to make way for the bloody battle that had been raging on for days now and that may be raging on for many days to come.

He wasn't supposed to be here; He wasn't made for this!

But his haven of books had stopped being his reality a long time ago, and now every day was spent trying to survive the new, horrible reality that he'd been tossed into without warning.

"Oh, for Imp's sake, DODGE YOU MORON!"

He dodged away as a blade missed his neck by mere inches, the voice in his ears berating him for daydreaming before calling out all sorts of combos that he could use to decimate his opponents, and yet it meant nothing because he simply didn't understand how to execute the attacks, nevermind how to pile them together successfully to activate the bonuses that apparently resulted from well-timed attacks or combos, or how to use them in the bulky body that he was still getting used to!

"Dodge left! Use your shield to block, and then bring your sword up! Be carefu-" he didn't hear the rest as one of his opponents landed a successful attack from behind that left him seeing stars while a second attack from the front knocked him out completely.

His would-be killers barely blinked as his body crumbled onto the bloodstained ground; instead, they turned toward their next target, and the battle simply carried on.

No one noticed a blue light enveloping the body among the sparks of arcane magic that lit up the battlefield or that there was no corpse left once the light disappeared, but the voice saw everything, and her shock and horror were almost tangible as their link was severed.

For a moment, everything seemed to fade away, but then relief came crashing down hard as the link was swiftly re-established, and she was momentarily blindsided when he didn't reappear in the form of her Avatar, but instead, he now had his own.

He raised his arms to see that he now held two short curved swords and that his gear was completely different from the warrior gear that he had used up until now. It resembled assassin gear more than anything else, and for some reason, it really suited him.

Kurai moved into a basic attack pattern, and he couldn't help but smile as he realized how light he now was in comparison to earlier. A glance to the side revealed that the ones that struck him down weren't too far away, and the thought barely registered before his daggers were buried in their necks.