Once a person loses everything, their life becomes a bleak narrow hallway of never ending suffering. It was as though Maru couldn’t help but feel a sense of guilt for killing someone, yet he wanted revenge. Even if revenge won’t solve anything, he wanted it. But now he just felt an overwhelming heaviness, but he would be the only person to carry this weight. No one else remained to listen to his ramblings, No one remained to tell him that he did his best and it was only inevitable.

He couldn’t save his own sister, own mother, not Joen, and not anyone else in the village. They were like family to him, yet now they were only dead bodies on the floor. Ema, who he would play with everyday, was dead with her legs cut off. 

Unable to look at it, he started vomiting. He only screamed, doing nothing but crying. Yet no one existed to hear these crys. Why was it that he was tormented so? 

Deciding that the least he could do is to bury them. Slowly he got up. Limping, one step at a time. He walked and walked, yet the same distances felt like they were much much longer. 

He’d reached his shed soon. Taking his shovel, he tried walking using the shovel as support. Yet he was so slow. Trying to walk faster, he used the shovel. He had reached a faster speed! Yet he fell over. Collapsing and falling unconscious.

Waking up he thought ‘what the hell...’, yet he was now mysteriously able to get up without much problems. Not questioning his powers, he continued on, he slowly but surely came back to the village. 

Digging a grave for all of them, he carried their bodies with care. Without ever once crying again, he simply carried the responsibility of bringing this upon himself. For if he hadn’t beat Varkhaz back then, would this still have happened? He continued to blame himself for his own powerlessness.

Carrying Ava and Joen, he simply shed but a simple tear whale burying the both of them in a wider grave. Perhaps they’d be happy in the afterlife, he thought.

“Mom… I’m sorry...”

| Target found; Status (Unknown). |

‘Who could this be?’ He thought. He had heard the same voice while fighting Varkhaz. Why would anyone help me? What was the point of it all? The questions kept building up. And what did it mean by target found but status unavailable? Was it maybe talking about mom? He asked himself again and again. Deciding it will be of no use, he simply asked a question.

“Who are you..?”

| I am sorry for not introducing myself. I am sarah. |

“Is that so?”

| Will you not question me? |

“I have no real point in doing so. My family is dead, my village was massacred, and I couldn’t do anything but simply watch.”

| I... am sorry. |

“It’s fine either way, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know what to do anymore...”

| You need to go to the south! |

| If you don’t, then you’ll be considered a traitor to the dukedom! |

“Why does it seem that you care about me more than I do?”

| That’s because I do! |

“...”

“Okay.” that was all he said, he didn’t ask more or say anything more. Sarah only instructed him in what they would need.

Maru tried to take the sword out the ‘empty space’ by emulating how he did it last time. Yet nothing happened. Realising that the sword was now gone, he simply walked back to his shed. Seeing that his clothes were stained with blood, he simply changed into the cleaner clothes that were present there, however they didn’t quite exactly fit him. But he wore them regardless. 

Taking the iron sword he had initially used against Varkhaz, he sheathed it and kept it near him.

Deciding that it was perhaps time to sleep, he simply slept in his cold shed. With no one to comfort him.

Yet there was one person.

| Maru... Just know that, I will always be with you... |

“Mhm.” though he wasn’t sure whether Sarah could see him, he simply nodded and slowly he closed his eyes.

He then fell asleep. Perhaps there was someone who could heal him.