It wasn’t the first time the girl saw a monster. It’s razor-sharp teeth wet with hunger. Eyes mad with whatever it was that drove those creatures to wreak mindless havoc.

It wasn’t the first time she got to see one this close. The smell of it made the girl choke up the nearer it got.

It was the first time there was no steel bars dividing them.

The attack itself started only some twenty minutes before. The first victim’s scream sounded as a gong, announcing the last hour of the village. After that, more and more gongs sounded as the people ran just as mindlessly as the monsters did. 

The red was the color of the hour. The pain the sound of it.

The girl shook violently, not even the coldest nights had her shiver so. Her lungs hurt from running. She ran up, up up. All the way to the watch tower to the sound alarm. Her weak hands had managed to make the bell move. Her palms burned as the rope slipped from her grip. But she did it. She sounded the alarm. She would have been quite pleased with herself if it wasn’t for the imminent death.

Her legs gave out, there was no strength left. No energy for self preservation. She exchanged all of it for a flimsy chance that someone will come to save them all. As the first painful gong screamed, her only thought was to get up here and pull that heavy rope. At that time, she didn’t stop to think what would happen once she was done.

And done she was. 

Another creature leaped inside the tower, bringing the stench of death with it. The monsters were swarming the place slowly but surely, called on by the very same bell, that ought to have brought help.

The girl pushed her small frame into a corner, readying her galloping her heart. It final sprint was upon it. She would end her sad life in pain and agony, tore apart by this horde.

The sunlight reaching her was swallowed up by the monster’s frame. She shut her eyes firmly, in a childish belief that it would make it stop from happening. The time slowed down for her, the sound quieted. Only the cold and the wind was permanent.

And then the warm rays hit her eyelids again. Glittering spitefully at her misery. Something warm touched her face, not as formless as the rays had been. Something more physical. It made its way down her cheek, dripping.

A force showed her up, commanding in a cold voice, “Wake up.”

It took her a full minute to realize it was a human hand that had her stand up on her weary legs. As she opened her eyes, a tall back shielded her from the rest of the horrors. 

There was a strange change in the atmosphere, she noted. A crispiness to the air. Everything was suddenly unmoving, a drastic change from before she had closed her eyes, as  death made its way for her. 

The stillness was cut in half and another body joined the pile on the floor. There were two more surges of air before the horde would move no more. The girl gaped, her fatigued brain couldn’t comprehend what had she just seen. She only knew that the monsters that had came for her blood, laid in a pool of their own.

“Are you hurt anywhere?” the voice from before asked. The same hand reached for her. But it was all just too much. Her legs gave out the second time as she still gaped at the sight in front of her. At the man in front of her. His light eyes as crisp as the first snow.

The man brows grew tight as she sat there unmoving. His jaw clenched and unclenched a few times as he chewed on his words. The words never came. In their stead a scream echoed in the tower. His head shot up as he listened, seemingly having made the decision, he gave the girl a sharp nod, threw his cape over her head and ran off to save some more.