Playing with Fire, Part One
I gritted my teeth and glared in frustration. However, it wasn't directed at Barik but toward myself and my inability to act.
Thanks to the pain in my chest from his attack, my mind was gifted a moment of clarity. I remembered the crucial rule instilled in me over my four years of fighting.
'You idiot,' I cursed myself, 'how could you let fear overtake you?!' I, a man who's waded through valleys of death, blood-red rivers, and the smoldering remnants of towns, was crippled by something as small as a phobia.
Though I say small, the terror surging through me was nothing minor. My heart hammered away at my chest, and my palms became slick with sweat. But how I felt didn't matter; what mattered was survival.
"Nothing else matters," I wheezily mumbled to myself.