Incident 002-12-04-1124

The boy's silver hair glistened through the sun's beating rays upon the small town holding a populous of two hundred. He walked through the streets, his silver eyes only having but a hint of life behind them.

A sliver of will to live.

Sweat dripped off the boy's forehead and onto the gravel road on which he walked. Those who saw him walked around so as to not touch the young boy and his tattered clothes. He wished for sustenance desperately but knew nothing would come.

'Beggars don't deserve shit!'

His pace soon went still as he fell to the ground due to his own imbalance. The sharp gravel pieces pierced his open skin causing it to bleed in some places. His hands pushed off such spikes to bring back balance.

'Keep dreaming kid.'

The kid continued to wobble down the gravel road. The road that had only been made twelve years ago was all he knew. This same path. Every day. Every night. There was never a time in memory in which this was not his life.

Tiresome.

His body convulsed from the smell of food coming from one of the nearby houses. The smell of wheat being baked into a beautiful loaf of bread. The texture of the grain. The squishiness of the bread when pressed on.

A dream.

Approaching the end of the road, a land beyond the village. New opportunities. Food. Water. Shelter. Pleasure. All just by continuing on the road toward a new future.

Wishful thinking.

His body groaned for him to rest and eat. There was nowhere to rest. There was nothing to eat. The air was the only thing to which he could use without reservation.

'To have to share the same air as that thing-!'

The pain in his legs became unbearable—the dirty alleyways seeming like an alluring luxury suite. The boy waddled his way over to and sat down; his stomach grumbled and rolled as he finally had nothing left as a distraction.

'Get away from me you gray-eyed beast!'

His eyelids twitched open and closed as his consciousness seemed to fade.

'Devil child!'

A man in clothes more unique than those of the villagers seemed to appear through his closing eyes.

'You shouldn't exist at all.'

The man slowly reached into his bag, as if in no rush for anything.

'Disgusting bastard."

The man seemed to pull something out of the bag. The boy was unable to see anymore. His eyes had already closed even through the glaring sun's rays.

'Why don't you die already.'

Tired…

Without warning, a hot piece of bread touched the boy's dried lips. His eyes immediately opened in surprise at the food that seemed like a luxury. The boy grasped the bread and, without hesitation, bit down on it in great desperation.

Life filled his being. The feeling of the hard crust. The softness of the insides. The grainy feeling on the tongue.

A true luxury.

Only after the bread was all gone that the boy remember the man who had given him the beautiful and luxurious feast. The man stood before the boy as if a giant to an ant. His body was extremely muscular. Not even the armor which he wore could hide it. His eyes were a greenish color, accompanied by the dark brown hair that seemed to come with all generic men.

The giant man crouched down to properly meet the boy's eyes; the smile on his face was now visible to the young boy who only knew distaste.

"Was it that good?"

The man seemed to laugh at his own comment before turning to the long road through the village. The boy's eyes seemed to shimmer while looking at the smiling man. The man's mana was in perfect harmony; perfectly circulating around and throughout his body.

"Uh-!"

Before the boy could speak, the man picked the boy up to stand him up on his feet. The man, whose smile had yet to fade, looked at the boy with great joy.

"Ok! Time to head to my inn. Have a good day kid. Don't think you can get up from a fall off a cliff."

The giant man walked away, his mana still in ecstasy.

…

The boy with silver eyes and hair sat there off the road in the alleyway from the day previous. His stomach growled once again. His body craved what it had gotten a taste of once before.

The boy sat there, hungry and wishing for something to happen. The sun's bright rays were much harsher than that of the day before. His stomach growled out once more. The boy finally decided to head back to the road on which his life stayed.

"Oh, kid!"

A giant came running at the young boy from across the street. His signature smile was still there from the day before.

"Do you happen to know a decent restaurant that doesn't just sell bread? Oh, I'll treat you!"

The boy looked at the man in disbelief. The boy turned away from the man and began walking toward the restaurant with the nicest smell coming from it. When they had arrived the boy pointed at the restaurant that was double the size of the biggest village house.

"There."

The boy spoke as he looked up at the man with empty eyes. The man's smile grew wider as he approached the restaurant. Suddenly the boy could feel a hand pushing him along.

"Go on. I said I'd treat ya didn't I?"

The man walked into the restaurant, and the boy looked down while following the man as fast as he could.

The two were seated at a small table for two. As the giant man looked through the menu, he noticed the boy staring at him from the other side of the table.

"Order whatever you want. I hate seeing innocent kids hungry in a village as prosperous as this."

The boy looked confused.

"Listen, just tell me what you want and I'll get it ordered for ya. I'm not lacking money. I'm actually pretty well off. I'm probably one of the richest mercenaries in the kingdom. Aha-!"

The man laughed out loud at his own gloating before calling over a waiter.

"Give me your best mutton. I wanna treat myself!"

He smacked the table with great joy as the waiter wrote down the order.

"What do you want, kid."

The boy began to panic at all the choices but settled on what the older man had chosen.

"Oh-! Their mutton must be really good then! Two orders of mutton good sir."

The waiter in his formal attire looked over at the boy in tattered clothes. His eyes were full of scorn and disgust.

"...Sure"

The waiter confirmed the order before walking away. The man began to chatter away as the two waited for the meal to appear before their eyes.

It was a truly delightful meal.

…

"Phew! I'm damn stuffed."

The giant man patted his enlarged stomach. The kid who barely reached the man's waist observed the man's face. His face had a great deal of life behind it unlike his own.

"Okay then. It seems I need to get back to my Inn. I've only got another day after this so I better make my break count."

The man walked away. He continued to walk forward. The kid, standing there with his silver eyes, could feel his heart starting to truly beat again. It was painful.

Before he knew it, he had gripped onto the man's clothes. The man's momentum was stopped completely. His mana seemed to be disrupted for a moment, but it began to reach out. The boy could feel the mana grabbing hold of him, pulling him forward.

This curse, it was the first time it had brought such warmth to him. He could hear the man speaking ahead of him.

"If you wanted to come with me you should have just said so."

…

The sun seemed to rise, and, for the first time, it seemed to be on the boy's side. The boy looked over at the wall on which the man slept leaning on. He had decided to sleep on the floor and didn't take no for an answer

'I can't promise you a comfortable or safe life, but I can promise the essentials.'

The boy seemed to smile for the first time as he looked out the window.

Without warning, the sounds of screams could be heard outside the inn walls. On the road, which was normally bustling, was still. The kid ran out of the inn to see the commotion.

A monster.

Standing in the middle of town was a monster pure black. Its eyes were barely visible and its teeth and claws were extremely sharp.

Standing in the way of the monster and the villagers was a man who stood a head taller than most. The man held a giant broadsword in his burly hands.

Taking a step, the man swung the blade at the monster, only for it to dodge out of the way and onto a nearby roof. He disappeared in an instant and only appeared right next to the man. The man had a large gash on his side, and the beast had a portion of its tail cut. Nobody there was able to see the two's movements.

Red marks would appear on the bodies of each without anyone seeing how they happened. The manna around the two fighters couldn't be in a more different state. The man's mana was calm and collected, but much sharper than usual. The beast's mana seemed to fluctuate unnaturally. It seemed as if it was on the verge of death.

Wounds continued to appear on each of them. Neither seemed to be able to gain the other hand on the other. The burly man gripped his broadsword harshly before slamming it down onto the ground. The village shook by the blow; the grotesque monster flinched.

The man jumped forward and sliced down as fiercely as he could. The right half of the man was ripped off in one moment. Blood seemed to gash out of the wound. The claws of the beast seemed to grow in retaliation, as they pushed forward into the man's chest. It then bit down on the man's side before falling due to blood loss.

The man's breathing was heavy. He finally looked away from his dead opponent. The boy's gaze filled his own. A usual smile seemed to form on his face. Quite a distance away, the kid could hear the man yelling to him.

"Go back to the Inn and get my back! I have stuff to heal my wounds! This shit hurts like a motherf-!"

Before he could finish, the boy ran in the direction of the inn. Sweat dripped off his forehead. Desperation he had never felt before. Incomparable to the feeling of hunger from which he had felt for years.

…

He gripped the bag as he ran back toward the battlefield. He continued to run. Through the road. Through the crowd. He continued to run

"He's already gone."

A faint voice could be heard from the center of the crowd. The boy's heart seemed to stop as his legs continued to push even faster than before. When he finally met the eye of the store, the man lay on the ground. His body still. His eyelids closed.

Silence.

He looked at the man's body. It lay there. Nothing seemed to hint at life. The kid could feel a streak of warmth flowing on his cheek. His heart ached. It was painful. More than any pain he had felt before.

'Annoying bastard!'

'You're even useless as a slave!'

'Disgusting, cursed bastard'

The kid's vision blurred and turned gray. He could feel his own mana. Pushing forward. Grabbing out for some warmth.

There is no warmth.

The pain continued to grow. His mana had become erratic. His vision was almost gone.

'Cursed child!'

'Why won't you die!'

'Who would pity something like you.'

Silence!

Silence. Everything around had turned gray. All the sounds were gone. Everything was gone.

The color seemed to return, but it was only green. The trees remained, but the houses, the people, they were all gone. All that was left were the patches of grass in which the village once stood.

The boy could see it. The man in full view. He ran at full speed; absolute desperation. Nothing else mattered. The boy slid down onto his knees to look at the man in full view. He tried to lift up the man's head but couldn't.

Through the tears, he could see a smile on the man's smile.

It was a bitter smile.