My eyes snapped open to a dark, cloudy night sky. The stars were faintly visible, peeking through a thick veil of mist hanging low in the swamp.
Crickets chirped sporadically, their calls mixing with the distant croaks of frogs and the occasional splash of something unseen moving in the murky depths.
Shadows flickered above me, cast by the faint moonlight struggling to break through the gnarled canopy of moss-laden trees.
The damp chill of the marsh seeped into my back, and the ground beneath me reeked of stagnant water, decaying vegetation, and something sharp and metallic. Bitter.
Blood. That's blood. How do I know? Because blood and I have had a very close relationship… back on that island.
Wait. Island? What island?
My chest rose and fell in shallow, erratic breaths. Pain tore through me, sharp, searing and relentless.
A groan escaped my lips as my hand instinctively clutched at my chest, desperate to find the source of the agony.
My fingers brushed against something cold and unyielding. I froze. My eyes darted downward, and that's when I saw it.
A very familiar looking knife was protruding from my stomach. My breath hitched as I recognized the hilt, its intricate design of twisting dragon motifs unmistakable.
No. It couldn't be. It wasn't possible.
But there it was, the Silver Dragon Knife... no, blade? It looked warped and monstrous, its edge glinting faintly in the dim light.
But why was it here? The last time I saw it, it was…
"ARGH!" I shouted as memories came flooding back, crashing into me like an unforgiving tsunami.
Her piercing eyes. The way she locked them on me just before she drove the blade into my chest. Citra.
Her words were a blur now, drowned out by the chaos that followed. My head spun as nausea churned in my stomach, bile rising to my throat.
Shaking, I wrapped my hands around the blade's hilt and pulled. Pain exploded through me as the blade scraped against flesh and bone, the sound sickeningly loud in the swamp's eerie quiet.
I braced for blood to pour out, to soak my hands and stain the ground. But none came.
Instead, the knife… no, the blade… hovered in front of me, defying gravity. Its single crimson eye stared at me, unblinking and predatory.
Wait... Since when did blades have eyes?
Then it moved. The cloth-like appendages snaked out, lashing tightly around my arm, winding over my tatau. A cold, creeping sensation flooded my body, and I felt my strength drain away as if the blade was feeding on me. My knees buckled, and I hit the ground hard, trembling, breathless.
"What… what the hell?" I rasped. My voice sounded foreign to me, hoarse and weak. My limbs felt like lead, and my vision blurred as the world around me dimmed.
Faces flooded my mind, ones I had fought so hard to forget. Grant. My older brother. His face burned in my memory, as vivid as the day he died. He had been leading the way, so confident, so sure we'd escape.
"I promised Dad I'd take care of you two," he'd said, glancing between me and Riley. "We're gonna find him, we're gonna free the others, and then we're going home."
BANG!
The gunshot. The spray of blood. The way his body crumpled to the ground, lifeless. I screamed for him to get up, but he never did.
I wasn't strong enough to save him.
Then there was Liza. I saw her tear-streaked face as she begged me to stop. "No. Jas! Please! Please… Jason! No! No, please!"
But I didn't stop. I slit her throat. Citra's whispers guided my hand, steady and sure.
I could still feel the knife in my grip, cutting through Liza's skin, her blood wet, warm and sticky against my fingers. Her choking, my betrayal… it haunted me.
And the others. Oliver, Keith, Daisy, even my brother Riley. Their faces blurred together, all ending in blood and my steady hand.
I convinced myself it was necessary, that it was what Citra wanted. What I wanted. But now, staring at the floating, thicker, and longer Silver Dragon Blade, I couldn't lie to myself anymore.
I killed them. I didn't save them. I ended them. The hum emanating from the blade grew louder in my ears, a low, mournful sound that mirrored my despair.
Tears burned down my face as I clutched the blade's hilt again. My heartbeat slowed, faint and uneven.
My free hand trembled as I trailed it to my chest. I closed my eyes, letting their faces fill my mind one last time. "I can't do this," I whispered. "I don't deserve to live."
With shaking hands, I turned the blade toward my chest. Its tip pressed against my sternum, its edge cold and biting. My voice cracked as I spoke. "Let's finish it."
I forced the blade downward. But before it could pierce my skin, the blade resisted. Its cloth tightened around my arm, yanking the blade upward. I gasped, struggling against it.
"Why won't you let me die?!" I shouted, the words raw and broken. The blade's crimson eye glowed brighter, its gaze glaring and unwavering.
It wasn't compassion. It wasn't pity. It was defiance, cold and unrelenting.
A piercing screech cut through the air, sharp and jarring. My head snapped up, and I saw something moving among the trees in the swamp.
A dark, birdlike creature the size of a hawk dived straight toward me, its glowing white wings fully extended.
Its impact sent me sprawling, and the blade's grip on my arm forced it to swing wildly. Pain flared as a glowing wing grazed my ribs.
I looked down and felt that my side was already starting to bruise. "Yep… that's gonna leave a mark," I muttered, glaring at the offending flying chicken.
Instinct took over. I scrambled to my feet, clutching the blade like the weapon it was.
The creature circled above me, its wings glinting unnaturally in the moonlight. Then it growled, a low, guttural sound that made my skin crawl.
Wait... do birds even growl? Since when did birds growl? And why was my body suddenly growing weaker? The longer this day dragged on, the more questions I had.
My limbs felt heavier with each passing second, but then my tatau burned, a searing pain that shot up my arm.
A sudden burst of strength surged through me, replacing the weakness. It was raw, primal, similar to the rush I'd felt when I'd doped myself with syringes back on the island.
"What the hell is happening?" I growled, my voice low and feral. My attention snapped back to the glowing-winged creature as it circled for another attack.
I focused on its movements, muttering to myself. "If the wings glow, and it uses them to attack… then maybe the non-glowing parts are the weak spots?" I readied myself and gripped the blade tighter.
The creature dove again. I swung wildly, my movements brutal and efficient. The blade connected, slicing through its wing and shoulder joint.
The bird screeched, spiraling to the ground. It staggered back to its feet, wobbling as it prepared for another charge.
"Damn, that's like a full-charge lunge from a cassowary," I muttered as it barreled toward me again.
I braced myself, raising the blade to block. The impact drove me back, the blade's draining pull intensifying. My vision blurred, my strength nearly gone.
But survival instincts don't care about despair. They roared to life, primal and raw. With a guttural yell, "DIE, CHICKEN FUCK!"
I drove the blade upward, piercing the bird's chest. It convulsed once before collapsing, lifeless.
My chest heaved as I stared at the blood-streaked blade in my hand. The adrenaline faded, leaving only exhaustion and the hollow ache in my chest. I let my head fall back against the damp earth, closing my eyes.
"I'm not even good at dying," I muttered bitterly.
I shoved the bird's body aside, gasping for air, every part of me aching. Its dark feathers, matted with blood, shimmered faintly in the moonlight.
Its strange, hook-like tufts drooped lifelessly now that it was dead. Bigger than any hawk I'd ever seen.
The swamp's eerie silence returned, broken only by my ragged breathing and the faint hum from the hovering blade. The creature's lifeless eyes reflected the faint moonlight, and for a moment, I wondered if it, too, had just been another survivor, fighting to live in this twisted place.
The blade's cloth twitched, a subtle reminder of its relentless presence. The Silver Dragon Blade hovered above me, still tethered to my tatau.
Its single crimson eye was fixed on my face, glaring, unrelenting, judgmental.
"What the hell are you?" I muttered, my voice barely audible. It didn't answer, but the connection between us was undeniable. I wasn't free. And it wouldn't let me die.
In the oppressive silence, the blade's eye glowed brighter, and I felt a wave of dread wash over me.
Then I heard rustling. My head snapped up, scanning the darkness. Something else was out there. My grip tightened on the blade, my heart thundering in my chest.
I forced myself to my feet, my muscles screaming in protest. The faint glow of the blade's eye barely lit the oppressive darkness, but I could sense them above, hidden in the canopy. Wings rustled softly, branches creaked faintly, and I could feel their movements, circling in the shadows.
They were searching, their presence like a weight pressing down on me, unrelenting but imprecise.
My breath hitched, my body tensed as I tried to pinpoint their location, my mind racing. I wasn't alone, and they knew I was here.
Yet, as much as they searched for me, I found myself doing the same.
I was hunting...
Hunting for shapes in the darkness, unsure if I really wanted to confront them or avoid them entirely.
I tightened my grip on the blade, my heartbeat thundering in my ears. My survival instincts roared back to life, even though every part of me rejected them.
I no longer wanted to fight… or survive. But since the blade wouldn't let me die peacefully, and now, neither would the creatures emerging from the shadows.
"Fine," I muttered bitterly. My body protested every movement, but I didn't care. "If this is how it's gonna be, let's see how far this goes."
The rustling grew louder. Shadows moved. My teeth clenched, and I bolted into the swamp, the blade glowing faintly in the dark.
I didn't notice that the corpse of the flying chicken I had just killed was already a husk, slowly crumbling to dust.